Mesh networks and OS/2

[Mike Luther]

I have a friend who is perfectly happy with her WiFi operation and OS/2 through
a Linksys WRT-53 wireless bridge and WRT-54 router which services a pair of IBM
Thinkpads via standard hard wired Peer connections in MCP2 latest everything.
Now comes the group who runs the system and wants to move to a Mesh WiFI
operation.

Never having studied this, we both are wondering. Yes, as far as I can tell it
is 802.11 and she is currently using 802.11G if I recall it right. Anyone here
have any thoughts about what will come of this fork in the road?

Thanks!

[William L. Hartzell]

Post by Mike Luther
I have a friend who is perfectly happy with her WiFi operation and OS/2
through a Linksys WRT-53 wireless bridge and WRT-54 router which
services a pair of IBM Thinkpads via standard hard wired Peer
connections in MCP2 latest everything. Now comes the group who runs the
system and wants to move to a Mesh WiFI operation.
Never having studied this, we both are wondering. Yes, as far as I can
tell it is 802.11 and she is currently using 802.11G if I recall it
right. Anyone here have any thoughts about what will come of this fork
in the road?
Thanks!

It is a fork in the road, IEEE 802.11s. She will need to update her
hardware, which means the usual problems of finding drivers. Since the
protocol is still under discussion in IEEE, it is really too early to be
purchasing equipment, unless you have a grant for experimental work.
You should know that like all wire-less protocols, it is subject to the
man-in-the-middle attack, which even the latest 802.11 crypto does not
fix. If the data being handled by these networks involve DARPA
classified work or privacy restricted data (credit card numbers, social
security numbers, etc.), then it is a must that some higher level crypto
be used like IPsec, or TSL be used.

My advise is if the protocol passes ballot this next coming January,
then purchase of equipment in March-June time frame of next year should
be okay. (Double check with IEEE for status updates.) I assume the the
GenMac drivers will be updated to handle the Windows drivers for these
adapters. Double check that they are using some higher level protocol
of cryptography for their data transfer and connections. VPN over SSH
is doable on OS/2 as well as Stunnel.

[Mike Luther]

Blessings to you Will ..

Post by William L. Hartzell
It is a fork in the road, IEEE 802.11s. She will need to update her
hardware, which means the usual problems of finding drivers. Since the
protocol is still under discussion in IEEE, it is really too early to be
purchasing equipment, unless you have a grant for experimental work.
You should know that like all wire-less protocols, it is subject to the
man-in-the-middle attack, which even the latest 802.11 crypto does not
fix. If the data being handled by these networks involve DARPA
classified work or privacy restricted data (credit card numbers, social
security numbers, etc.), then it is a must that some higher level crypto
be used like IPsec, or TSL be used.
My advise is if the protocol passes ballot this next coming January,
then purchase of equipment in March-June time frame of next year should
be okay. (Double check with IEEE for status updates.) I assume the the
GenMac drivers will be updated to handle the Windows drivers for these
adapters. Double check that they are using some higher level protocol
of cryptography for their data transfer and connections. VPN over SSH
is doable on OS/2 as well as Stunnel.

My initial research sort of went this direction. But I thought maybe I was
wrong because this RV park was actually thinking of going the whole route right
now! I'm dead on in sync with you over delay until IEEE and so on gets things
even started toward official standardization. In my friends case, I think from
what I've read and gotten from you that as long as the whole hardware scenario
at this location is shuffled to work with the 801.11s whatever, since her use
of OS/2 is simply tied to the actual LAN hardwired operation in the Linksys
router, that will likely remove the driver development issue for OS/2 proper as
to this part of the puzzle.

At any rate, I clipped your remarks from here with the citation to your credit
and posted the answer to her via FidoNet... (Woof?) ;)