[Sussex] Project Advice....

[Richie Jarvis]

Dave Phelan wrote:
> Richie,
>
> On 9/28/06, Richie Jarvis <richie at helkit.com> wrote:
>> It all works pretty well most of the time, but has a few niggles which
>> really annoy me (and several of the others in the group, and elsewhere
>> in the world that are using this system.)  So what I want to do, and
>> have done for ages, is to write our own version of this system, which is
>> compatible with the AODV Mesh (for easy switchover), can be loaded to
>> the nodes without having to remove them (the MeshAP can download and
>> install new versions in-situ, by overwriting the cramfs files), and can
>> interface with the WIANA system (pretty easy, WIANA downloads a
>> text-based key:variable file, and then a script runs through it all to
>> setup the node itself.)  Oh, and the other thing that would be great is
>> if we can also produce a similar setup on the OpenWRT system, that can
>> inter-mesh with the old compaqs we have, as this would reduce our node
>> costs considerably.
>
> piertopier.net have abandoned MeshAP. We're using a mixture of pebble
> Linux on intel, and openWRT on linksys APs, and are using OSPF and WDS
> for the routing. We don't have all the bells and whistles of MeshAP,
> but then we don't need them.
>
> AODV is an interesting networking protocol for ad-hoc, on-demand
> networks, but with a fixed node network, we found MeshAP was happier
> autoblocking it's own route to the internet when the signal strength
> momentarily dropped. A fixed link routing protocol is sufficient.
>
> We've also moved from NoCatSplash as the captive portal to Chilispot,
> which with a bit more back-end smarts (radius and an SQL database)
> allows us to give registered users longer dwell-times than guests, and
> do bandwidth capping.
>
> http://wiki.piertopier.net/index.php/Technical has some more detail,
> but it's all still a work in progress.
>
> Moving to a set of software on a debian-ish Linux base, rather than a
> monolithic OS drop, allows us to look at additional platforms, such as
> the gumstix tiny tiny device:
> http://www.piertopier.net/forum.htm
> As long as the software set (hostapd, chilispot, iptables) is
> available or portable to the platform, you're not stuck with
> intel-based devices...
>
>> What I need is some advice here.  I am worried about doing all of this
>> myself - I've been very tempted to try and do it all myself many times,
>> and have not got past the thinking and requirements stage as yet.  I am
>> also scared that if I do try and do it myself, I will make a hash of it,
>> and leave some crucial flaw in the system.
>
> Testing will help this. Do you have paying customers? Since
> piertopier.net is free, we can break it and just get a few complaints.
> We try not to, but volunteers and beer and ssh sessions sometimes get
> a bit messy...
>
> Can you either have a small partition of the network you can test
> under, with friendly users? Or build a small test environment?
>
>> The upshot of all of this is
>> that I need to better understand how to sell this to the open-source
>> community, and where it really fits in the grand scheme of things, as
>> this would be something which (a) I am interested in, and (b) I need
>> some help to implement.
>>
>> I think that there are enough mesh networks around now who are using the
>> MeshAP, but would jump at the chance of something which is truely open.
>
> There is indeed a lot of disatisfaction with MeshAP, and one of the
> piertopier.net volunteers responsible for much of the work removing
> MeshAP has had a number of enquiries from people.
>
> My best advice would be this: work out what you *need*, work out what
> is *nice to have*, and then find the best implementations of that out
> there already. Create as little custom stuff as possible.
>
> Any assistance piertopier.net can be, I'm sure we'd be delighted to
> share our experiences.
>
> Dave Ph
Hi Dave,

I didn't realise you folks had come on quite as far as you have!  Well 
done!  I think the only difference between what you have, and what we 
need is the remote management and install pieces.  That seems to be the 
driver here, as going into 100+ lofts, and reinstalling a package 
without a screen attached is not my idea of fun!

Is it still Tom who is doing the work for piertopier.net for the node 
creation work?

Thanks,

Richie