Indiana University goes wireless

University network exec shares experiences and challenges of rolling out wireless across two campuses.

Rolling out wireless Internet access is tricky, especially when it comes to finding the best locations for wireless gear. Even more important is making sure that wireless communications are secure. Network World spoke with Mark Bruhn, Indiana University acting associate vice president for telecommunications, about these and other challenges that it faced in deploying nearly 1,600 wireless-access points across its two main campuses. Here are excerpts from the conversation:

Can you describe Indiana University's network infrastructure?

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Rolling out wireless Internet access is tricky, especially when it comes to finding the best locations for wireless gear. Even more important is making sure that wireless communications are secure. Network World spoke with Mark Bruhn, Indiana University acting associate vice president for telecommunications, about these and other challenges that it faced in deploying nearly 1,600 wireless-access points across its two main campuses. Here are excerpts from the conversation:

Can you describe Indiana University's network infrastructure?

We have responsibility for the core campuses at Bloomington and Indianapolis. We have about 3,000 acres of campus at Bloomington and 600 acres in Indianapolis. There are hundreds of buildings. We run the core network to all those buildings. We also run the statewide network that connects eight regional campuses to Indianapolis and to the outside world.

The ballpark number of users is 126,000. That would include 98,000 to 99,000 students, 5,000 faculty and another 10,000 staff. We also have a category of "other users," such as contract programmers.

The number of users is getting higher because we're attempting to better serve our admitted students and even prospective students. We have students who are no longer enrolled but still have some continuing tie with the university, whether they owe a bursar bill or have incompletes. That number of 126,000 is going to grow as we take into consideration these peripheral relationships. Identity management is a huge area for us. When we install wireless , we want to make sure that the people who are using our wireless network are the people who are affiliated with Indiana University and should be allowed to use that resource.

Where does the wireless-access piece fit in?

All over the place. We have all of our administrative and academic buildings 100% covered by wireless, although we do identify dead spots periodically. On the Bloomington and Indianapolis campuses, about 85% to 90% of the outside areas that matter are covered by wireless. We've been looking at areas where students and faculty congregate and where wired access isn't possible.

At some point, we may think we've got all the outside areas that matter covered, but then certainly there will be areas brought to our attention by faculty and students, and we'll have to go out and take a look. Wireless in residence halls hasn't been a high priority because every room has at least one data jack and all the common areas have data jacks. We're doing the residence halls last because the students already have connections.

When did Indiana University begin its wireless rollout?

Early 2003. We had a few hundred - maybe 300 or 400 - wireless-access points on the Bloomington campus. My predecessor told the telecom staff that we were going to double that number over the space of a year or 18 months. And we did. The last number I saw was 978 wireless-access points at Bloomington and 600 at Indianapolis.

How did you select the equipment?

We standardized on Vivato outside, and the equipment inside was Lucent/Orinoco [now Proxim]. We engaged a consulting company to advise us and do some preliminary site surveying. After that engagement was complete, and we had a good idea of how many access points we would initially need and where they would be placed, we released a request for proposals for hardware.

Did you do this wireless rollout with your own staff or did you contract it out?

All of it was done internally. One of the things we dealt with was that you can place a little piece of equipment in a ceiling panel just about anywhere, but then you've got to get wiring to it. The network cabling wasn't overly difficult, but you have to get power to those things. The areas where they don't have ready access to power, they've been using Power over Ethernet, which has been outstanding, because then you run the one cable and you don't have to worry about looking around for a conduit to tap or a box.

How much have you spent on wireless-access initiatives during the last 18 months?

The total amount was just short of $1 million. We estimate that the cost of maintenance and life-cycle replacement amounts to about $250,000 per year. We're on a three- to four-year replacement cycle.

Describe some of the rollout's challenges.

Getting the wires from a switch to the wireless access point. We've got older buildings, especially in Bloomington. The architects don't want you to run an ugly conduit on the outside of a hallway, so you have to be a bit more creative. The network connection and the power continue to be a challenge. When you look at a site survey, that's obviously one of the things you look at first.