The many faces of spectrum management

Hardware or software? Dedicated or time sliced? Baked in or third party?

Industry analysis by expert Joanie Wexler, plus links to the day's wireless news headlines

Managing the airspace in any wireless network is critical for avoiding interference and optimizing performance. There are many different approaches to controlling the air in Wi-Fi networks, and most enterprise-class Wi-Fi vendors now have a whole suite of radio frequency management tools, many of them conveniently automated.

In addition, there are companies that apply sophisticated antenna technology to help alleviate the problem of interference. Still others advocate putting all Wi-Fi devices on a single channel, far away from each other with the power cranked up high, to avoid interference from other members of said network.

How are large-scale, dense Wi-Fi networks affecting radio management issues?

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Managing the airspace in any wireless network is critical for avoiding interference and optimizing performance. There are many different approaches to controlling the air in Wi-Fi networks, and most enterprise-class Wi-Fi vendors now have a whole suite of radio frequency management tools, many of them conveniently automated.

In addition, there are companies that apply sophisticated antenna technology to help alleviate the problem of interference. Still others advocate putting all Wi-Fi devices on a single channel, far away from each other with the power cranked up high, to avoid interference from other members of said network.

How are large-scale, dense Wi-Fi networks affecting radio management issues?

And, of course, some Wi-Fi vendors bake the spectrum management tools into their wireless LAN systems in dedicated or time-sliced modes, while specialty companies scan all the airwaves -- even unused channels -- with dedicated sensors full time. Spectrum analysis, offered by some vendors, identifies the sources of interference so that you can (hopefully) do something about it.

Determining the "best" approaches and tools makes for a highly subjective discussion. And that's exactly what's going on right now in an interactive text format at Webtorials, an online educational and informational resource for professionals in the IT and networking industries. The discussion, sponsored by Cisco and AirMagnet, is open to anyone who wants to learn about spectrum management by reading the back-and-forth discussion, asking questions or providing comments.

Some of the questions being debated: Does spectrum analysis need to be in hardware in order to have the horsepower needed to adequately classify interference sources, or is a software implementation just as effective? Do the airwaves really need to be scanned 24x7? If dynamic channel selection is used, what happens to a VoIP call in progress? And how do you know if the channel your traffic is “hopping” to is any better?

Feel free to drop in at www.webtorials.com/main/summits/wifi-spectrum/ and learn and share. Full disclosure: I'm the moderator of this lively thought leadership discussion and I receive a fee from Webtorials for my role.

Read more about wireless & mobile in Network World's Wireless & Mobile section.

Joanie Wexler is an independent networking technology writer/editor in Silicon Valley.