Friday, February 10, 2012
Wireless/Mobile
Error 404--Not Found |
From RFC 2068 Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1:10.4.5 404 Not FoundThe server has not found anything matching the Request-URI. No indication is given of whether the condition is temporary or permanent. If the server does not wish to make this information available to the client, the status code 403 (Forbidden) can be used instead. The 410 (Gone) status code SHOULD be used if the server knows, through some internally configurable mechanism, that an old resource is permanently unavailable and has no forwarding address. |
Wireless Notes archives
Man accused of shoving phone down women's throat; lost cell phone leads to drug arrests
July 26, 2006A trial began this week in Independence, Mo., in which prosecutors say a man forced a cell phone down a woman's throat but the defense say says the woman swallowed the device on purpose to hide data on whom she...
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WLAN resource: RF power values
July 21, 2006Cisco has a helpful online document on radio frequency power values for wireless LAN radios and antennas....
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Taking apart Motorola's Q smartphone...literally
July 21, 2006The market researchers at iSuppli dismantled Moto's hot Q phone to assess what's inside....
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A framework for mobile Web services
July 18, 2006A recent paper at IEEE Distributed Systems outlines a way to adapt Web services to mobile environments by using mobile agents....
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Wireless telemetry tracks cane toad onslaught in Australia
July 18, 2006Wireless packs strapped to 50 of the 4-pound cane toads show the amphibian pests are spreading faster through Australia by traveling along roads and highways....
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Dell releases draft-11n wireless card for laptops
July 17, 2006Dell today unveiled an internal wireless LAN adapter, based on Broadcom's draft 802.11n radio chipset....
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Motorola upgrades management for Canopy wireless
July 17, 2006Motorola recently unveiled the latest version of its Prizm net management application for the Canopy line of fixed, broadband wireless products....
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New buyers guide includes wireless security products
July 12, 2006Our revamped and expanded Buyers Guides now include a brand new Guide devoted to security products, with a section for wireless LANs. Just click on the link and scroll down to "wireless LAN security."...
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Demand rises for wireless IT skills
July 12, 2006We have a story on the steadily rising demand for wireless skills in enterprise IT....
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Mobile threat: USB drives
July 06, 2006In a recent security test, 20 thumb-sized USB drives were scattered around a company's offices. Each drive had a disguised program written to collect software written to collect user names, passwords, and systems data. Guess how many were picked up...
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Intel invests $600 M in WiMAX venture
July 06, 2006Intel has invested $600 million in Craig McCaw's Clearwire wireless broadband venture, which will use WiMAX radios to create a nationwide net of wireless broadband connections....
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Cell phone condoms
July 06, 2006A Dutch company, Innovalife, offers high-performance latex sheaths that slip over your mobile phone to make them "water dirt mud paint sweat blood snow proof."...
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A badge, a gun, and a Wi-Fi signal detector
June 30, 2006The sheriff's department in Douglas County, Colorado has a new mandate: warning wireless users that their access points or routers are unprotected....
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Earthlink launches its first muni Wi-Fi net
June 30, 2006Earthlink and the City of Anaheim, Calif., formally launched what will be a city-wide W-Fi network last week....
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Muni Wi-Fi: teething pains or terminal symptoms?
June 22, 2006Chaska, Minn., has been the poster child for municipal Wi-Fi deployments. Now comes word that until recently, the wireless mesh net was a mess net....
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NIST release draft on WLAN security
June 22, 2006For your summer reading list, the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) has just released a draft guide on 802.11i-based wireless LAN security....
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Buggy WLAN device drivers threaten laptops
June 22, 2006Two security researchers have discovered a way to exploit buggy code in a range of WLAN device drivers and seize control of a laptop PC....
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What it takes to converge wireless nets
June 13, 2006Can you bring together different kinds of wireless nets in an enterprise infrastructure? Network World's John Gallant explores the subject in one of our Hot Seat video interviews with Cathy Zatloukal of MobileAccess Networks (broadband link recommended)....
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Chinese walk out on wireless encryption talks
June 12, 2006International talks over China's homegrown wireless LAN encryption standard, called WAPI, turned bitter when the Chinese delegation withdrew from the talks, charging the IEEE with unfairness....
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French telco's embrace Wi-Fi VoIP
June 12, 2006French cellular carriers are embracing VoIP over Wi-Fi wireless connections, giving those subscribers with cell phones that also have Wi-Fi a less expensive alternative to cellular minutes....
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Users battle wireless security threats
June 12, 2006A key issue at last week's recent Globalcomm show was how the increase in wireless access means increased wireless threats, and what network professionals are doing about them. NW's Jim Duffy has the story....
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New chief exec takes Nokia's helm
May 31, 2006On June 1, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo takes over the top spot at Nokia, as the company enters a time of increasing competition, fast-changing technology, and pressure on revenues and profits....
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Wi-Fi buses in Cincinnati
May 26, 2006The city's mass transit agency is teaming with a non-profit agency to test Wi-Fi access points on two buses....
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EarthLink picked for New Orleans Wi-Fi mesh
May 26, 2006Reaping another municipal network deal, EarthLink this week got a green light from the New Orleans city council to build a Wi-Fi mesh network for the hurricane-battered city....
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Atheros co-founder cashes in, reaps $17 million
May 23, 2006Teresa Meng, a co-founder of Wi-Fi chipmaker Atheros Communications, has sold $17 million worth of the company's stock during the first four months of 2006. Even after taxes, that's a tidy nest egg....
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Climbing Everest with wireless notebooks
May 23, 2006But not just any wireless notebooks: they're Panasonic's ruggedized Toughbooks with a satellite link....
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Students exploit handhelds for high-tech cheating
May 23, 2006Today's college students are using MP3 players, cell phones and instant messaging to cheat on exams....
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Boingo puts Wi-Fi toolkit in open source
May 22, 2006Boingo Wireless, the Wi-Fi net aggregator, has released a developers toolkit for connecting client devices to a Wi-Fi network....
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Mobile VPN runs on Windows Mobile 5.0
May 22, 2006German company NCP Engineering has added support for Windows Mobile 5.0 devices to its IPSec mobile VPN product....
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$400 M national wireless net in the works
May 22, 2006A startup is raising funds and seeking FCC approvals for a wireless broadband net that will sell high-speed capacity to service providers and offer free, but slower, access to the general public....
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Wireless to boost remote patient monitoring?
May 12, 2006A new study from Spyglass Consulting finds that a growing number of healthcare providers are investing in remote patient monitoring technologies, including wireless....
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Kimberly-Clark extending RFID
May 10, 2006Kimberly-Clark has now slapped Gen2 RFID tags for the first time on individual cases of its well-known consumer products, which include brands such as Kleenex, Scott tissues and Huggies....
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RIM still strong in enterprise market
May 10, 2006Research in Motion is still the mobile messaging leader for the enterprise market, according to a new analysis from Standard & Poor's....
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Tracking troops via vision systems and wireless
May 08, 2006An innovative vision system coupled with portable computers and a tactical wireless mesh net could help soldiers find their way through battlefield chaos more accurately and safely....
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Weather forecasting with cell towers?
May 08, 2006Israeli researchers report that signal strength data, which is automatically collected at cellular towers, can be more accurate than weather radar for calculating rainfall....
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Microsoft, Qualcomm to partner on wireless
May 08, 2006Microsoft and Qualcomm have agreed to share with wireless handset and equipment makers more data on how Windows software and Qualcomm's cellular radio chips work with each other....
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RIM faces new patent battle.
May 05, 2006This time with Visto. And this time, RIM is launching a full-blown counterattack....
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Notebook PCs replacing notebooks on campuses
May 02, 2006More colleges and universities are now requiring incoming students to bring a notebook PC with them, usually with a wireless LAN card....
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Interop: wireless innovations
May 01, 2006There are some real innovations for enterprise wireless LANs at this week's annual Interop show....
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Qualcomm launches WiMAX patent offensive
April 28, 2006Qualcomm has signed its first patent deal on technology essential to WiMAX, the wireless broadband radio standard now gaining traction around the world....
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Rhode Island plans state-wide wireless net
April 28, 2006Rhode Island is launching a pilot project that could eventually be a $20 million wireless net spanning the entire state....
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Cell phones that automatically disassemble
April 26, 2006Ever wonder what happens to all those zillions of old cell phones that people don't use because they bought a cool new one, which will in turn be replaced by a cooler one?...
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Muni Wi-Fi growing pains in Florida
April 24, 2006The free municipal Wi-Fi net in St. Cloud, Fla., is running into some problems, according to a news report....
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Dr. PDA
April 24, 2006More medical schools are requiring students to use handheld PDAs to store data and access a range of clinical applications. Users say the devices, often with wireless access, save time and reduce errors....
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N.Y. county mandates wireless security
April 21, 2006Weschester County N.Y. has gone ahead with a plan to require wireless business nets, such as public hotspots, to install basic security measures. The measure was first proposed last fall....
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Wireless hiding: masking location
April 21, 2006In a 2003 paper from an Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) conference, the two authors detail a way for a WLAN to client avoid being triangulated and its location tracked....
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Palm handheld part of 7th grade "technology curriculum"
April 19, 2006The Wichita public school system is buying 730 Palm TX handhelds as the client device for its 7th grade technology curriculum....
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Boosting realtime data throughput for sensor nets
April 19, 2006A Lehigh University researcher has won a grant to create algorithms to compress data transmitted over wireless sensor nets....
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Google/Earthlink selected for San Fran net
April 06, 2006A San Francisco panel has selected the Google/Earthlink proposal for a free city-wide Wi-Fi net. The city and the two vendors will start final negotiations on a contract....
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New IEEE standard to upgrade WLAN security
April 06, 2006The pending 802.11w standard is designed to fill an emerging gap in WLAN security. Check out our Technology Update....
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Pay-as-you go wireless VoIP
April 05, 2006A VoIP carrier called Viper Networks says its vPhone product now works with broadband wireless cards for the Verizon and Sprint cellular nets....
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Negroponte defends $100 laptop project
April 05, 2006At LinuxWorld this week, MIT professor Nicholas Negroponte dismissed criticisms of the project, which intends to distribute cheap wireless computers to third-world students, and said first shipments could begin in early 2007....
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Fashion statement: the cloth computer
March 31, 2006A U.K. startup is creating a cloth interface to portable computing devices: it's actually a touch sensor woven in fabric, which can be incorporated into some article of clothing....
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Passengers love flying Wi-Fi
March 30, 2006Connexion by Boeing, which offers wireless Internet connectivity on board airliners, says passengers really like being able to surf and check e-mail instead of watching inflight movies on crummy screens, and trying to ignore crying babies and the person who...
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Washington, D.C. rated best for teleworking
March 30, 2006Intel this week announced the results of a study that found the nation's capital to be the best city for teleworking, a phenomenon the chipmaker says is being fueled by mobile computers and more pervasive wireless networks....
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Synchronizing data on mobile clients with SyncML
March 28, 2006SyncML is a standard for automatically updating data between mobile devices and backend servers. We have a Technology Update this week on SyncML....
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How dangerous are cellphones, laptops on airplanes?
March 28, 2006A new study claims that portable electronics has greater impact than previously believed on cockpit instruments....
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Palm pushes Treo as BlackBerry alternative
March 24, 2006With Research in Motion mired in its high-profile patent battle, Palm beefed up sales and marketing efforts push its Treo handheld as a more fully-featured alternative to RIM's popular BlackBerry device. It seems to be paying off, for now, according...
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Check out wireless briefings from our IT Roadmap
March 22, 2006Our just-concluded IT Roadmap event in Boston featured a thorough overview of wireless broadband trends by consultant Craig Mathias....
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Time to update those wireless "Solar Storm Disaster Recovery" plans
March 22, 2006A new cycle of more powerful solar storms is due to start this year or next. Their shockwaves could disrupt electronic nets of all kinds, including wireless voice and data nets....
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Bill the Grinch slams $100 laptop project
March 16, 2006Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates this week riduculed the plan for a handcranked, wireless $100 laptop being designed for the world's poorest kids. His comments have ignited a firestorm of criticism on the Web, even though he made essentially the same...
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The wireless enterprise, with Craig Mathias
March 16, 2006We interview consultant Craig Mathias on the impact of wireless in the enterprise, and how to deal with it. It's part of our March 20 IT Roadmap: Boston....
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Vendor disputes claims of RFID virus threat
March 16, 2006A British threat management software company says that warnings that RFID chips are vulnerable to malware are theoretical and there is no cause for panic....
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Certicom white paper on VoIP security
March 16, 2006Certicom recently posted a 13-page PDF (registration required) on "Securing VoIP Networks: the importance of device security....
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Wirelessly take 2 asprin and call me in the morning
March 16, 2006Researchers are experimenting with wirelessly administering drugs through implanted devices that contain a postage-stamp sized microchip and scores of tiny addressable reservoirs of medicine....
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126,00 square miles of Wi-Fi?
March 15, 2006ABI Research is predicting that the area covered by municipal Wi-Fi nets will jump from a mere 1,500 square miles to nearly 100 times that by 2010. That's an area the size of New Mexico, or if you prefer, Poland....
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Study: RFID tags vulnerable to viruses
March 15, 2006A group of researchers say they've shown that computer viruses can infect the microchips in radio frequency identification tags....
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WPA2 security now mandatory for WLAN gear
March 14, 2006Wi-Fi Protected Access 2, a wireless LAN security specification from the Wi-Fi Alliance, is now mandatory on all WLAN equipment certified by the Alliance's tests....
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New CEO for Network Chemistry
March 14, 2006Paul Thomas has been named CEO for Network Chemistry, which sells wireless security products for enterprise WLANs and mobile users....
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Will Microsoft's Origami handheld fit into enterprise?
March 09, 2006Samsung unveils an "ultramobile" handheld based on Microsoft's Origami operating system, and targeted at business users. And Microsoft and Intel shed some more light on future plans for Origami....
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Intel lays out wireless plans
March 08, 2006Intel's Sean Maloney this week laid out some details of the company's drive to make computing more mobile. He talked about the next generation of Centrino, which will include 802.11n, and mobile WiMax....
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Will Microsoft Visto simplify Tablet PC deployments?
March 07, 2006Yes, according to the true believers at Thetabletpc.net....
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T-Mobile offers "free Wi-Fi Weekends"
March 07, 2006Is this a good sign or a bad sign?...
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Netgear plans "pre-11n" WLAN gear
March 07, 2006NetGear says it will introduce wireless LAN products based on the existing IEEE 802.11n draft specification for 600Mbps by June....
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RIM pays off its adversary
March 06, 2006RIM has signed a deal with patent adversary NTP, paying $612.5 million to settle all outstanding patent claims. The long-running federal court case against the Blackberry maker was dismissed Friday after the deal was signed....
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Municipal Wi-Fi nets surging
March 06, 2006This year could see deployment of scores of municipal wireless nets, using a combination of 802.11-based mesh nets combined with WiMax backhaul links....
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So this guy builds a 60-foot tower to get Internet access...
March 03, 2006"I was stuck with a 56k modem for nine years because no other option is available in my town." An epic tale of desperation, determination, digging, 14,000 pounds of concrete, and wireless broadband obsession....
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Should Palm sell itself?
March 02, 2006This seems like a strange idea to me. In this BusinessWeek analysis, Rachel Rosmarin picks up suggestions by two key stockholders in Palm,...
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Contracts signed for Philly wireless net
March 02, 2006Philadelphia Mayor John Street this week signed four agreements between Earthlink and the city-chartered non-profit group Wireless Philadelphia....
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Wi-Fi mesh completed in Tempe
March 02, 2006The last access points have been placed to completely cover the 40-square-mile area of Tempe, Ariz. The WAZTempe (for Wireless Access Zone) net has about 550 Access/One outdoor mesh access points from Strix Systems. Each device, mounted on...
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Bluesocket CEO resigns
March 01, 2006Wireless security vendor Bluesocket has announced that CEO Ralph Calisti, who joined the company in August of 2004, has "decided to leave…to pursue other interests." Vice President of Engineering James Funucane has been named by the board of directors as...
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EVDO vs Wi-Fi Mesh?
February 27, 2006EVDO cell nets promise anywhere-access at up to 2Mbps. But Wi-Fi proponents argue a wireless LAN mesh is cheaper and can do more. The debate heats up in California....
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Microsoft's ActiveSync for non-Windows handhelds
February 27, 2006Microsoft is busy extending its mobile messaging solution beyond handheld clients running Windows Mobile 5.0....
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Judge: no RIM injunction...yet
February 24, 2006Reuters reports that U.S. District Judge James Spencer stopped short of ordering an immediate shutdown of the BlackBerry e-mail service. But Spencer found RIM to be infringing on the NTP patents and said he would issue a decision on an...
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Should carriers lock your cell phone to their net?
February 24, 2006The Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Univ. is looking at how the practice of carriers locking your cell phone so it can only use one network is affecting consumers and the public interest....
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Hearing today on RIM injunction
February 24, 2006A federal judge today could set a date for closing down RIM's BlackBerry service in the U.S., and decide how much the company has to fork over to patent holder NTP. Or not....
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Canadian school bans Wi-Fi over health fears
February 23, 2006The president of Lakehead University says the "jury's out" on whether Wi-Fi radio signals are a health threat, especially "in younger people (who have) fast-growing tissues."...
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Another use for cellphones: cracking RFID tags
February 23, 2006At the recent RSA Conference on security, legendary cryptographer Adi Shamir revealed details on how a cellphone could be used to attack and compromise RFID tags within its range....
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Two U.S. Senate bills aim to free up spectrum
February 21, 2006Republican Senator George Allen has introduced the Wireless Innovation Act (WINN Act), while Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Senator Ted Stevens, also Republican, introduced the American Broadband for Communities Act (ABC Act)....
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Bath, England plans multi-wireless net
February 21, 2006The City of Bath in England has announced a multi-million dollar city-wide wireless net project. Normally, that wouldn't be news....
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E-band radio for high-capacity links
February 17, 2006Millimeter wave, or E-band, radio fires a very high-frequency, pencil-like narrow beam between two points. It can carry up to 2.7Gbps, according to the vendors. College campuses are deploying it successfully. http://www.campus-technology.com/article.asp?id=17889 And the FCC Web page on the technology...
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Cisco CIO says mobile industry failing the enterprise
February 16, 2006The consumer focus of much of the mobile industry means wireless products and services fail to meet enterprise requirements, according to Cisco's CIO, who spoke this week at the 3GSM World Congress....
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FCC adds spectrum, channels for 5.4 GHz band
February 16, 2006The FCC has taken the final step in adding more spectrum, and therefore more channels, in the 5.4-GHz band, as reported by our "Wireless in the Enterprise" Newsletter Editor, Joannie Wexler. New devices in this band will now have to...
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Wi-Fi market forecast
February 15, 2006The semiconductor industry analysts at Merrill Lynch have come up with some interesting thoughts in their latest report on the Wi-Fi chip market (12-page .PDF file)....
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Users weigh in on Microsoft mobile messaging news
February 14, 2006We reported earlier on the Microsoft news from 3GSM World Congress. Slashdot.org already has a lively thread, laden with comments....
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If you're involved in "community wireless"...
February 14, 2006The Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network is co-hosting the second annual National Summit for Community Wireless Networks. The Summit will bring together technology geeks, policy wonks, network builders and operators, and enthusiasts March 31-April 2 at Lindenwood University in St. Charles,...
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Reading tea leaves at 3GSM World Congress
February 14, 2006BusinessWeek Online has a rather routine analysis of issues and trends at the 3GSM World Congress this week in Barcelona....
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RIM gives details, sort of, on "workaround" software
February 09, 2006Early this morning, Research in Motion unveiled the first public details of what the BlackBerry maker is calling its "WorkAround Strategy." And some in the Blogosphere are not happy....
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Check out our ongoing DEMO 2006 Coverage
February 09, 2006The annual DEMO conference, unfolding this week in Arizona, always covers a wide range of emerging products, including wireless and mobile. You can find a bunch of DEMO bloggers for commentary, and our day by day online coverage....
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Lucent adds Cellular/Wi-Fi roaming
February 09, 2006Lucent is incorporating into its IP Multimedia Subsystem for carriers a PCTEL application that lets a handheld device roam seamlessly between cellular and Wi-Fi nets....
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Vendors partner for Wi-Fi/GSM phone design
February 07, 2006Three companies have banded together to create a ready-to-use reference design for a low-cost smartphone that has built-in Wi-Fi and GSM support....
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Mobile wireless broadband launches in Texas
February 07, 2006A wireless service provider called Xanadoo has launched a wireless broadband Internet service to blanket Lubbock, Texas. Xanadoo's net is based on the same gear, from Navini Networks, that BellSouth is using in its trial network in Atlanta....
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Top Palm investor: sell this company
February 03, 2006One of Palm's biggest investors is urging the company's board of directors to consider "strategic alternatives," including selling it off. Yay or Nay?...
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"I stalked my girlfriend through her cell phone"
February 03, 2006Who needs the National Security Agency when you can use a Web site to track and record someone's movements based on their cell phone?...
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Patent cops reject NTP patent in RIM case
February 02, 2006The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has rejected a key patent in the ongoing battle between NTP, which holds the patents, and BlackBerry maker Research in Motion....
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MIT, City of Cambridge plan Wi-Fi net
February 02, 2006The City of Cambridge, Mass. and one of its big name property owners, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will partner to deploy a "free" Wi-Fi wireless mesh to the city's 100,000 residents by summer 2007....
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Finally, a REAL use for those camera phones
February 02, 2006The real value of those built-in cellphone and PDA cameras comes not in taking pictures but in scanning information, according a report from ABI Research....
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Securing mobile data
January 31, 2006Utimaco is offering some mobile security tips for laptops, PDAs and removable media....
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Venture funds shying away from WiMAX?
January 31, 2006Our review this week of the IT venture fund investments for 2005 shows wireless start-ups were the big winners. But a couple of other reports suggest investors are leery of WiMAX, one of several standards for wireless broadband nets....
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Intel reaps ROI with mobility
January 30, 2006Chris Thomas, chief strategist and director of strategic initiatives at Intel, says the chipmaker is seeing double-digit returns on its investment internally on mobile computing. He's in "Network World's Hot Seat with John Gallant," our five-minute video interviews....
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The 3G Enterprise, ready or not
January 30, 2006Our "Tech Insider" package this week focuses on the rise of 3G cellular data services. Among other topics, Mark Lowenstein looks at 3G trends for notebooks and other client devices....
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Boosting power in power-over-Ethernet
January 24, 2006A key technology in simplifying wireless LAN deployments, and holding down their costs, is power-over-Ethernet, which lets a wireless access point draw power from the switch to which it's attached over an Ethernet cable....
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Southwest offers wireless checkin on flights
January 24, 2006Southwest Airlines now lets you use a handheld to check in wirelessly for your flight....
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Supreme Court refuses to hear RIM's case
January 23, 2006The U.S. Supreme Court said it will not review the patent infringement dispute between Research in Motion and its adversary NTP....
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More on that Windows Wi-Fi "anomaly"
January 20, 2006Cirond CEO Nicholas Miller weighs in on the vulnerability, which he says he was talking about nearly 18 months ago....
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Palm does Windows: the new Treo 700w
January 20, 2006Cool Tools Editor Keith Shaw takes the first Windows-powered Palm device for a spin on Verizon's EV-DO cellnet. Check out his video review....
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IEEE adopts specification for 802.11n
January 19, 2006As expected, the IEEE 802.11n Task Group has voted unanimously to accept a proposed compromise specification as the basis for a new high-throughput wireless LAN standard. Incredibly,......
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RIM: Apocalypse is nigh
January 19, 2006In court arguments against a possible shut down of its Blackberry service, Research in Motion warned that halting service could threaten U.S. public safety and cripple the economy. Meanwhile......
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First mobile WiMAX chipset released
January 19, 2006WiMAX silicon start-up Beceem Communications, San Jose, Calif., says it has released the first client-side chipset that supports the recently ratified IEEE 802.16e mobile WiMAX standard....
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Windows Wi-Fi security hole
January 19, 2006An "anomaly" in Windows XP and Windows 2003 can leave a wireless laptop vulnerable to attack....
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Solar Wi-Fi
January 18, 2006Scotland is testing lampposts with solar panels that not only power the light but also a wireless access point, which could use either Wi-Fi or WiMAX radios....
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Aussie cops use SMS message to track drug dealing
January 17, 2006When someone tries to buy quantities of pseudoephedrine, which is used in making illegal amphetamines........
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Is IEEE ultra wideband dead?
January 17, 2006Apparently, there's some dispute over how long the effort to create a 480Mbps short-range wireless standard has to live....
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Wireless laptop troubleshooting
January 17, 2006NW's Ron Nutter has some suggestions for diagnosing wireless troubles on your laptop. What's been the most frequent, or the biggest, trouble for you?...
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Homemade RFID tag zapper
January 13, 2006As if there wasn't enough for network professionals to worry about. Ex-Forrester Research analyst John Robb describes a project that modifies a single-use film camera, to create a short range microwave pulse that can fry nearby RFID tags. Robb says...
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New military radios jamming garage doors
January 12, 2006Manufacturers of radio-operated garage doors are getting swamped with complaints about malfunctions, which are due to spread of a new two-way portable radio system at military posts across the U.S....
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Nokia's Internet tablet a hit?
January 11, 2006Nokia introduced its 802.11-based 770 Internet Tablet last May, and products began shipping last Fall. It looks like a hit.......
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Busy signal on the Netgear "Skype phone"
January 11, 2006The Netgear Skype phone, unveiled last week at the Consumer Electronics Show, is generating a lot of enthusiasm among users of Skype's VoIP service. And some frustration: Netgear isn't saying much about the phone....
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Pfizer battles Viagra counterfeits with RFID
January 09, 2006Drugmaker Pfizer is pasting onto all bottles of Viagra a product label with an RFID tag, in a bid to foil drug counterfeiters....
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Vivato's demise stalls Pittsburgh Wi-Fi zone
January 09, 2006When WLAN vendor Vivato shut down operations last month, it threw a monkey wrench into Pittsburgh's plan for a municipal wireless LAN covering parts of the downtown area....
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Craig Mathias on CES: check out Amimon
January 09, 2006Wireless guru Craig Mathias spotlights an "almost unbelievable" wireless technology: real-time transmission of uncompressed HDTV signals, up to 1.5Gbps over a wireless LAN connection. How? Read on.......
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A view from the CES floor
January 06, 2006We asked wireless guru Craig Mathias, principle of the Farpoint Group, to share some impressions and thoughts on this year's CES. Here's his first post…...
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Feds prepare to vacate radio spectrum
January 03, 2006The federal government is preparing to shift a bunch of its fixed wireless usage to an obscure section of the spectrum, paving the way for cellular carriers to bid for the radio waves being vacated. The UPI story reports the...
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Build your own 3G/Wi-Fi router
January 03, 2006The Stompbox project cobbles together some of this and some of that to forge a link between an EV-DO 3G cell net and, via 802.11 wireless LANs, local client computers. In effect, it's a portable access point tethered to a...
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Wi-Fi Wars, San Francisco style
December 27, 2005The city's recently released request for proposal for a citywide Wi-Fi net has only intensified the controversy over the way Mayor Gavin Newsom has turned a technical issue into a political one....
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Via cell phone: "You've been indicted"
December 27, 2005South Korean prosecutors will start using mobile phone text messages to notify suspects that they've been indicted, according to this Reuters story. Over 75% of the population carry mobile phones, so officials have decided to move from paper notifications to...
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Visto co-founder blogs on Visto's patent suit against Microsoft
December 23, 2005David Cowan, a co-founder of wireless e-mail provider Visto, clears up some confusion over Visto's recent licensing deal for NTP patents and its patent infringement suit against Microsoft...
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(Wireless) Nightmare at 30,000 feet
December 23, 2005With the advent of wireless access on passenger jets, guess what? You face the possibility of being hacked by the passenger in the seat behind you. Or in front of you. Or next to you....
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RIM strikes back, gains Patent Office backing
December 21, 2005Research in Motion is turning brinkmanship into an art form. The company is publicly blastingl egal adversary NTP, emphasizing a recent but preliminary Patent Office ruling that found the remainder of NTP's wireless e-mail patents invalid....
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Federal emergency wireless net inches forward
December 21, 2005Hurricanes Katrina and Rita may have spurred progress on creating the federal Integrated Wireless Network, a proposed multi-billion dollar net that would be used by thousands of federal agents and employees in the Homeland Security, Treasury and Justice departments....
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Palm's profits improve
December 21, 2005Surging Treo smartphone sales have boosted Palm's profits above analysts' expectations....
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RIM close to showing 'patent-busting' technology?
December 20, 2005RIM's co-chief executive Jim Balsillie says the company will soon reveal details of the software that will let the Blackberry service keep running, without violating patents owned by NTP, according to a Reuters interview....
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Retrofitting your Website for wireless?
December 20, 2005IBM's Developerworks Website as an article on retrofitting Web content to make it accessible to mobile clients connecting wirelessly....
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Revisiting wireless LAN myths
December 20, 2005This seems like a good time of the year to revisit "Top Ten 802.11 Myths of 2005", by Matthew Gast, author of "802.11 Wireless Networks: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition" from O'Reilly Media....
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"We regret to inform you that BlackBerry service is ending."
December 16, 2005Okay: it hasn't happened...yet. But what is YOUR company going to do if the worst happens -- if RIM and NTP refuse to settle and a federal judge grants an injunction to shut down BlackBerry service in the U.S.?...
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The next wireless buzzword
December 16, 2005"Near field communications," as mentioned in this paen by a Philips Semiconductor executive. What does it mean?...
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Faking out wireless hackers
December 14, 2005A security Web site called Black Alchemy has a Linux-based program that generates thousands of fake wireless Access Points....
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RIM, NTP near the brink
December 14, 2005NTP says it has rejected the latest offer from Research in Motion to settle NTP's patent infringement suit against the maker of the BlackBerry e-mail handhelds, according to this Reuters story....
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You tax dollars at work: K-12 handhelds
December 12, 2005Handheld computers and wireless nets are making possible "media-rich" classrooms for students K-12, according to this AP story....
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RIM in talks with NTP
December 09, 2005A RIM executive has confirmed that the BlackBerry maker has been meeting with a court-appointed mediator and NTP for several days, in an effort to resolve NTP's 4-year-old patent infringement suit, according to this ComputerWorld story....
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WPA2: resources for wireless security
December 08, 2005Are you forging ahead with Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2, also known as IEEE 802.11i) in your enterprise wireless LAN? What's the experience been like? What issues are you running into? If you're not deploying WPA2, then rethink, says our...
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Just in time for Christmas: the final, formal 802.16e standard
December 08, 2005The IEEE on Wednesday took the final step http://ieee802.org/16/arc/802-16list2/msg03069.html in approving a standard for mobile wireless broadband metropolitan-area networks. Mercifully, we have two shorthand alternatives: 802.16e-2005, or "mobile WiMax." Mobile WiMax means you're moving around with a computer or phone...
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Cell phones going to the dogs
December 07, 2005The first cell phone for dogs will be available in early 2006, according to this story: "Hung off Fido's collar, the PetCell is a bone-shaped cell phone that will let dog owners talk to their best friend over a two-way...
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Investors back Java smartphone
December 07, 2005SavaJe OS, Java, smartphones, cellular, wireless
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Wireless bathrooms
December 06, 2005We know the Wireless Revolution has truly arrived. More and more Americans are logging wirelessly into the Internet - from their bathrooms....
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New wireless-threat Web site
December 05, 2005Wireless Vulnerabilities and Exploits , wireless security
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New Orleans says crabby BellSouth rescinds donation
December 05, 2005Some New Orleans officals are saying, according to this Washington Post report that BellSouth was so angered by the city's announcement of a wireless net for free Internet access that the telco cancelled its offer of a building to house...
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Free legal advice for RIM
December 01, 2005RIM seems to be having some legal issues involving its BlackBerry devices. Let's help them out with the poll below:...
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Wireless New Orleans
November 30, 2005Hurricane-ravaged New Orleans announced yesterday it's phasing in a free, wireless mesh Internet access service. It may be the nation's first municipally owned and operated wireless mesh offering free service. At least temporarily....
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Netgear settles wireless class-action suit
November 29, 2005Netgear has settled a class-action suit that claimed the wireless LAN vendor exaggerated the true data speeds of its equipment....
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Building Linux-based wireless LANs
November 29, 2005AbsoluteValueSystems of Florida offers several products to create Linux-based wireless LANs....
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Before Wi-Fi there was Marconi and ham
November 28, 2005The Antique Wireless Association, founded in 1952, runs a Museum of Electronic Communications in upstate New York....
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Wireless Macedonia
November 28, 2005Strix Systems last week announced a deal to blanket the Republic of Macedonia, all 1,000-plus square miles, with a multi-radio wireless mesh, using Strix's Access/One Outdoor Wireless System....
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Better browsing via cell phones is coming. Honest.
November 28, 2005The Mercury News' Jessie Seyfer has a story about how your Web experience will get better someday, partly through 3G cellular connections, with much higher throughput, and partly through Web browsers and applications that are better designed for midget cell...
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Embrace Utopia
November 28, 2005The "LA Times" weighed in last week on the question of whether, and how, municipalities should create wireless LAN-based metro nets for Internet access....
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The answer to life, the universe and Wi-Fi
November 23, 2005We're a bit tardy picking this item up. You may not have wondered what "Wi-Fi" means because you already knew, right? It means "wireless fidelity," of course. Or not....
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The Dark Side of Wi-Fi, part 73 and counting
November 22, 2005A story at Slate looks at how 802.11 wireless access in classrooms is distracting students and wonders whether its really worse than the traditional low-tech distractions....
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Network World's wireless all-stars
November 22, 2005This week we're honoring groundbreaking network projects at 50 companies and organizations. Click to see the 50 grouped by technology, scroll down to find the nine wireless winners. The projects include wireless asset tracking at Beth Israel Deaconess medical center,...
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The first shot in the next wireless wars?
November 21, 2005The multi-billion dollar plan by Australian cell carrier Telstra, to go national with a unified IP and 3G GSM net is being attacked by Unwired, a network operator that is the chief Australian champion of WiMAX wireless broadband....
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Today in Network World
November 21, 2005Check out what's news in Network World this week: Cisco's new Aironet 1500 outdoor wireless mesh access point raises some interesting issues for network folks. Tom Henderson tests two radio airwave scanners, from AirMagnet and Network Chemistry. Cisco takes the...
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Mobile WiMAX trial starts in Korea
November 16, 2005Korea Telecom this week started the trial run of its WiBro personal wireless broadband service, the first to be based on the soon to be finalized IEEE 802.16e standard, also known as WiMAX....
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Fiddling on the roof with mesh
November 15, 2005MIT has an experimental, homegrown 802.11b/g wireless mesh network, called Roofnet, currently with about 20 nodes active in and around the Cambridge, Massachusetts campus (see their map). It's a project of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, which is...
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New mobility model: Linux to go
November 14, 2005Ubuntu H2 is a Linux desktop distribution. But Tom's Hardware has a mobile take on this: store the Ubuntu OS and your applications on a USB storage device, take it with you, and plug it into almost any device with...
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Latest WiMAX Plugfest
November 11, 2005A dozen WiMAX vendors, and two equipment test companies, were part of the latest WiMAX Plugfest, this time in China on the eve of the WiMAX Forum Plenary Meeting, held in Beijing....
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Wireless mesh potholes
November 09, 2005The Michigan Department of Transportation has begun testing a Motorola wireless mesh to reduce accidents and congestion....
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Funds pour into wireless companies
November 08, 2005Venture capitalists are pouring money into wireless-related private companies, as Network World's Cara Garretson reports this week. The flow of funds indicates some of the products enterprise network professionals will be seeing in the future, with most of the action...
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Proposed law to require wireless hotspot security
November 07, 2005Andy Spano, county executive of Westchester County in New York, has found something else for government to do: securing your wireless connections at Wi-Fi hotspots....
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What do you care about, wirelessly speaking?
November 04, 2005You can you can make your voice heard, enter into a conversation, share a thought or a question or a conviction just by clicking on a link, like my e-mail address here - john_cox@nww.com. That's one of the most striking...
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Cisco readies wireless mesh gear
November 03, 2005As we reported in March, Airespace (now part of Cisco) had been developing a 802.11-based outdoor wireless mesh access point. The installation manual for the new and as yet unannounced Aironet 1500 product has been posted on Ciscos's Web site....
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Shortcut to longitude
November 02, 2005Socket Communications has released a new version of its GPS Nav Kit, a toolkit for adding GPS navigation features to a mobile device, including those running Windows Mobile 5.0....
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Can you program me, now?
November 01, 2005This was a new thought to me, anyway, in today's column by David Hayes, senior technology writer for The Kansas City Star - cellular wireless is no longer about the handset, and even less about the radio net; it's about...
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Unwired Linux
October 31, 2005The latest Linux kernel, 2.6.14, now includes the open source Linux Wireless Extensions API, which will simplify writing applications that can run on wireless Linux devices....
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USA Today slaps Boston airport over Wi-Fi grab
October 28, 2005The October 25 editorial accuses the Massachusetts Port Authority, which runs Boston's Logan International Airport,, of an "audacious assertion of power" in moving to shut down wireless LANs run by its airport tenants, such as airlines....
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Your WiMAX router ... almost
October 28, 2005You can get a glimpse of what your own WiMAX wireless broadband router might look here by checking out Aperto Networks' newly announced PacketWave subscriber stations (photo) and Soma Networks' Somaport 300....
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WiMAX World in Boston
October 27, 2005About 3000 people, and most of them seem to be squads of marketers from a vast array of vendors, are meeting today and tomorrow in Boston to whip up excitement about WiMAX, a standard for broadband wireless, in both licensed...
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The not-very-inquisitive Philadelphia Inquirer
October 26, 2005The editorial writers at the city's newspaper of record are now on the record as concluding that the Wireless Philadelphia project is an unqualified Good Thing. But the editorial wasn't very inquiring....
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Doctors without wires
October 25, 2005A pilot project at the UCLA Medical Center lets doctors with smartphones and PocketPCs wirelessly access patient medical data, according to a report. The system, dubbed Global Care Quest system (GCQ), works not only over the hospitals internal wireless LAN...
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Education and IT
October 20, 2005This week is the annual EDUCAUSE conference, a major gathering for IT professionals in higher education....
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Gadfly Andy Seybold on municipal wireless
October 13, 2005The starting point for Andy Seybold's latest commentary is San Francisco's decision to create an 802.11-based municipal wireless net, and Google's offer to build it, and offer free service at a minimum 300K bit/sec rate all over the city....
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This is the future of municipal wireless?
October 10, 2005A non-profit group, acting on behalf of elected Philadelphia officials, is negotiating the final contract with Earthlink to create a 1M bit/sec wireless mesh over the city's 135 square miles....
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Coming wirelessly to a screen near you. Really near.
October 05, 2005A company called AdtekMedia has the bright idea of using wireless LAN connections to beam TV commercials, movie trailers and other drek to flat plasma screens, 17-30 inches wide....
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Wireless to the rescue?
September 12, 2005Wireless LANs and WiMAX radio links are starting to go up as part of the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts....
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Wireless growth
September 12, 2005Wireless LAN and WiMAX markets face years of healthy growth according to a new study from Tempe, Ariz.-based Forward Concepts....
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3Com revs wireless LAN unit
August 29, 2005Marlborough-based 3Com is throwing more resources behind its wireless LAN marketing and product management efforts....
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WhenMAX?
August 29, 2005You might think with all the announcements about WiMAX (or 802.16) licensed and unlicensed wireless broadband products that there would actually be WiMAX products available....
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Broadcom and bubbly
August 29, 2005Chipmaker Broadcom recently patted itself on the back by sending out champagne bottles made of dark chocolate, in honor of shipping its 50 millionth 54g wireless LAN chipset....
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Mobile phones are REALLY important…or are they?
July 25, 2005Enpocket, which sells "mobile community applications," claims its latest quarterly survey shows that people think mobile phones are really important. Kind of....
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Maybe the survey was really asking about Wi-Fi phones…
July 25, 2005Market watcher Infonetics predicts strong growth in 802.11 (Wi-Fi) voice handsets....
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The Wi-Fi police strike back
July 07, 2005A "St. Petersburg Times" story on stealing Wi-Fi opens and closes by focusing on a rare incident: the arrest of a man caught in the act of allegedly [we have to use that word] stealing someone else's Wi-Fi connection to...
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Metro wireless Webinar replay
July 06, 2005Come up to speed on metro wireless nets via a recorded online Webinar featuring Esme Vos, founder of MuniWireless.com....
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Group issues guide for mobile PC fuel cells
June 27, 2005A group promoting fuel cell technology for mobile PCs has issued a document for battery makers to use in designing fuel cells....
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Orlando says buh-bye to Wi-Fi
June 22, 2005The city of Orlando has pulled the plug on a 17-month wireless project that let downtown users access the Internet at no charge....
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100-plus M bit/sec isn't even here and it's, like, so over, already
June 09, 2005While members of the IEEE 802.11n task group continue their squabbles over a high-throughput wireless LAN standard, with a minimum of 100M bit/sec, a Germany-based research consortium, with the acronym WIGWAM, is looking ahead to 1G bit /sec wireless nets....
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New antenna design in test for large-scale wireless LANs
June 09, 20055G Wireless is testing a wireless LAN antenna array that borrows from cellular base station antenna designs....
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Open source software for mobile deployments
May 30, 2005Silicon Valley has coughed up another start-up, Funambol (pronounced "foo-nahm-ball"), which offers an open source-based software package for synchronizing and provisioning mobile applications and managing the devices on which they run....
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Smart phones are dumb
May 30, 2005That's the implication of a new In-Stat study, which to be fair focused on the latest experiment in wringing cellular minutes from subscribers -- the Multimedia Phone....
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Reports of UWB's death may be under-exaggerated
May 30, 2005Sister site Techworld.com has a dispiriting interview with Bob Heile, chair of the IEEE 802.15.3a group, which is trying to craft a standard for ultra-wideband radio nets....
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Cellphone viruses: Not so scary
May 06, 2005The scare over a potential epidemic of cellphone viruses is overblown, says In-Stat's Alan Nogee in a lucid and succinct analysis....
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Philly's wireless net gets a lot more complicated
April 21, 2005A study commissioned by the City of Philadelphia has concluded that residential and business users will need more than a WLAN card plugged into their PC to access the proposed citywide wireless net, originally estimated to cost $10 million....
Wireless LANdmines headed for Iraq
April 14, 2005The Army's Stryker Brigade will shortly be deploying land mines that can be selectively detonated over a wireless connection, from a soldier armed with a laptop computer, according to an Associated Press story....
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If Lego® made cell phones
March 21, 2005If the Danish maker of the well-known interchangeable plastic blocks made cell phones, we'd probably be able to switch around both hardware and software to make just the kind of handset we wanted. And then change it into something else....
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AMD ships new mobile CPU
March 14, 2005Chipmaker AMD has released a new processor designed for the newest, thinnest notebook PCs. The chip is the latest move to wrest marketshare in this fast-growing segment from arch rival Intel, with its Pentium CPU. Chipmaker AMD has released a...
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Wireless VoIP beta to start in NYC
March 03, 2005Wireless ISP TowerStream has completed trials of VoIP calls over a WLAN infrastructure....
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PalmOne: the sound of one hand clapping?
March 03, 2005Troy Wolverton, of TheStreet.com, has an interesting analysis on PalmOne's future. Namely, that it doesn't have one....
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I sing the body electric
February 22, 2005I4U, "future technology news," has a reference on NTT's human area network research, a project called RedTacton. The transmission medium is the body's weak electrical field....
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Free Wi-Fi?
February 22, 2005A start-up has announced plans to offer "free" Wi-Fi connectivity via hotspots supported by advertising....
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City of Brotherly Wireless
February 18, 2005The New York Times has a preview story on Philadelphia's upcoming municipal wireless announcement. Unfortunately, it doesn't break any new details on the ambitious plan to blanket the entire city with a 802.11-based wireless mesh. Philly Mayor John Street still...
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I left my heart in San Francisco and my laptop in Chicago
February 17, 2005A recent survey of cab companies by Pointsec Mobile Technologies found that tens of thousands of cell phones, PDAs, and laptops are being lost each year. And every one of those gadgets is crammed with personal and corporate data....
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More talk on "Evil Twin" hotspots
January 21, 2005Network security guy Martin McKeay picks up this story and offers some practical suggestions of his own and points off to two entries on this topic at the SAS Internet Storm Center, last Sunday (scroll down to "Thoughts on hotel...
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Calendar: Digital Cities Convention, May 2005
January 20, 2005The Wireless Internet Institute (W2i) launches May 2-4 the first Digital Cities Convention....
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BBC: Fake hotspots can lure users
January 20, 2005The BBC has a warning about the threat posed by fake hotspots, or public access WLANs, such as those offered by retailers, airports, libraries and other venues....
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IPv6 and mobile computing
January 10, 2005It's safe to say that most of the people at the giant Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, including users and manufacturers and installers, didn't have the next generation Internet, or IPv6, "top of mind" as the marketers like to...
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3G TV
January 10, 2005Verizon announced it will introduce VCAST, an EV-DO data service that will send television and other multi-media content from MTV, NBC News, Newscorp, 20th Century Fox and others....
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Wireless a "silver bullet for poverty?"
December 21, 2004That's the contention of Civitium LLC, a consultancy founded to "assist public and private organizations in the construction of Digital Cities," according to the firm's Web site....
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Calling Dr. RFID
December 20, 2004A new RFID chip, called Surgichip, is designed to ensure surgeons are cutting up the right part of the right patient, according to "Electronic Design" magazine....
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Prison for wireless LAN hacker
December 16, 2004A Michigan man who hacked into the Lowes hardware chain's corporate net from a WLAN at one of its stores, has been given the longest prison sentence ever for a federal computer crime case, according to this Associated Press story....
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A CPU for .Net
December 14, 2004A start-up has unveiled a tiny chiplike microprocessor that runs a version of Microsoft .Net designed for embedded applications in small devices like watches and sensors....
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WLANs become integral to corporate nets
December 13, 2004In-Stat/MDR has just published a user survey that has some interesting conclusions....
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Your tax dollars at work
December 13, 2004"Mother Jones" magazine had a recent story that documents how deputy undersecretary of Defense, John Shaw, orchestrated a swarm of government officials, Republican legislators, corporate flunkies, and lobbyists to win a favored place for Qualcomm and its patented CDMA celluar...
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VC funds hop on NextHop
December 08, 2004NextHop Technologies, which develops Layer 3 IP routing software for router and other network hardware vendors, has added over $6 million more to its Series A round of financing, bringing the round's total to $24.5 million....
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City Wi-Fi Nets
December 06, 2004City-wide WLANS designed to give residents and businesses wireless Internet access are gaining ground across the U.S., and sparking opposition from carriers and service providers. We have a story in this week's edition here....
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Auto-updates to your cell phone
December 06, 2004Extended Systems has announced a software development kit for phone makers and carriers....
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The "e" in e-mail stands for "elderly"
December 01, 2004A study in Korea shows that e-mail is rapidly being supplanted by other online technologies such as instant messaging, SMS on cell phones, and something called mini-homepages, which may be what we call blogs. Students and the young in general...
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WLAN test and measurement standard
November 29, 2004The IEEE recently launched a new project for evaluating WLAN performance. The idea is to come up with a common set of measurements that can be used to determine how WLAN gear actually performs....
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Take two RFIDs, and call me in the morning
November 29, 2004Drug makers plan to adopt wireless radio frequency identification (RFID) tags to block counterfeiters, according to this Associated Press story. The technology is intended to let manufacturers and federal agencies track the drugs from factory to pharmacist. The maker of...
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Wireless apps growing in popularity
November 29, 2004By 2007, 65% of companies will have at least one wireless application, according to research by Meta Group, a market research firm in Stamford, Conn....
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RFID and privacy
October 11, 2004Jim Harper, one of the libertarian-minded writers at the Technology Liberation Front blog points to an assessment by the left-of-center Progessive Policy Institute has on radio frequency identification (RFID) wireless technology and privacy....
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Growing opposition to city WLANs?
October 11, 2004Nancy Gohring at the Wi-Fi Networking News site takes note of an editorial in the "Twin Cities Pioneer Press" arguing against tax-payer funded public WLANs. The link to the editorial is here (but fill-in-the-blank, free registration is needed to view...
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Wireless capacity, not range
October 11, 2004Think about designing your WLAN for optimal capacity instead of optimal coverage -- packing your wireless zone with lots of access points instead of trying to get by with as few as possible....
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New Website for Windows mobile developers
September 20, 2004You can check out www.mobidogs.com. The site is focused on programmers working on mobile, embedded, or location-based applications running on Windows operating systems....
J2ME usage
September 20, 2004The Fall Wireless Developers Survey by Evans Data Corp. finds that the number of developers working with the Java2 Micro Edition (J2ME) mobile platform has reached a new high point: 40% of respondents say they're working with it, and another...
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Mobile application use in the enterprise
September 20, 2004enture Development Corp. has launched a study on the enterprise software stack for mobile applications. The firm has a brief note on some of the issues and requirements for scaling business critical mobile applications, and an outline of the proposed...
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Wired pedicab bring the 'Net to rural India
August 18, 2004Project uses Wi-Fi and amplifiers to create a wireless zone for Internet access by villagers. An Associated Press story on the project via siliconvalley.com....
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Guilty plea in Wi-Fi wardriving case
August 17, 2004Michigan man pleads guilty to federal misdemeanor of unauthorized access to a protected computer. He used an unprotected WLAN access point in a Lowe's home improvement store in suburban Detroit. Security Focus has details here....
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Wal-Mart: Always low prices....for broadband?
August 11, 2004Techdirt.com has some thoughts on the Intstitute for the Future's thoughts on whether Wal-Mart might deploy fixed wireless broadband base stations and become, in addition to everything else, a telecommunications company....
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Brador and you
August 09, 2004Several users and readers sent us comments on Brador, apparently the first full blown malware aimed at PDAs, but too late for our print deadline this past Friday. Here's some of what they had to say:...
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Is 11a in your future?
August 02, 2004Check out our story this week on the resurgence that 11a is making in the enterprise, and why....
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Another week, another WLAN "controversy"
August 02, 2004Aruba Networks says it has documented an attack that exploits over wireless several well-known and long-standing RADIUS vulnerabilities. The WLAN vendor says it plans to submit the documentation in the form of a draft proposal to the IETF, meeting this...
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Voice over WLAN planning
August 02, 2004Proxim has a white paper on capacity planning for VoIP over WLANs (you can find it here)....
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Finding MIMO
July 26, 2004This week, we have a Tech Update on a promising wireless technology called MIMO -- multiple inputs multiple outputs. Essentially, these new radios use multiple antennas to send and receive signals, and algorithms that turn the interference created by multipath...
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Debating the limits of wireless mesh nets
July 22, 2004A highly technical argument is unfolding online about the bandwidth limits of wireless mesh networks. Or of some wireless mesh networks....
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Wireless calendar
July 19, 2004Some upcoming wireless conferences and shows worth noting:...
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802.11i: It's official
June 28, 2004The IEEE has formally approved the 802.11i WLAN security enhancements. The changes correct a number of shortcomings in Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP), the encryption protocol in the original 1999 standard....
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Wi-Fi wallpaper
June 23, 2004A British company has come up with a wall covering, based on the material used to make stealth aircraft stealthy, that apparently blocks radio transmissions....
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Wi-Fi ice
June 23, 2004A scientific team from Univ. of South Hampton, U.K., is using wireless in specially designed sensors, which look like 6-inch-long allergy capsules, to monitor and track conditions and movement at the base of glaciers....
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Product review: AirMagnet Distributed, Version 4.0
June 23, 2004Tom Henderson, of the NW Lab Alliance, likes what he tests in this new version of the WLAN RF analyzer....
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Wireless User Group: Toronto
June 23, 2004The Toronto Wireless User Group is focused on business users and applications, and it keeps an archive of presentations made to its members. Many of these are from WLAN hardware vendors and mobile software or middleware vendors. But there are...
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Wireless changes sensor nets
June 07, 2004This week, we look at how wireless is changing sensor networks, and opening the door to networking "everything except the kitchen sink." You can expect a lot of these devices, all directly addressable, to show up on your enterprise net,...
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Ex-Symbol execs charged
June 07, 2004Symbol Technologies sent out a press release last week with the headline "No criminal complaint filed against Symbol Technologies" which is probably the best that anyone could do, given the fact that you don't want to call attention to the...
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If you're in the Baltimore
June 07, 2004If you're in the Baltimore area this week, check out the Wi-Fi Planet conference and exhibition, which bills itself as the only all-Wi-Fi show. find more information here on sessions, exhibitors, and directions. We've got additional coverage of the show...
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The Pig and Cow Webcam Research Project
May 24, 2004Wi-Fi Networking News (wifinetnews.com) runs a report about a Portland Oregon coffee house has become part of a study by Intel Research on building "communities-in-place" via 802.11 WLANs....
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Cometa closes: any future for hotspots?
May 24, 2004NW reporter Denise Pappalardo reports this week on Cometa's closing, despite being backed by IBM, AT&T, and Intel. You can find the story here....
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Hotspot locator
May 24, 2004You can find one at Wi-Fi Zones.com and another at jiwire.com....
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Bluetooth security
May 17, 2004This week we've got a story on Bluetooth security issues. More enterprise net managers are noticing that more Bluetooth radios are showing up, some of them as almost standard features in the next laptop or PDA upgrade for their company....
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Keep on truckin'
May 10, 2004WLAN access points, with broadband access to the Internet, spring up at truck stops across the U.S., and long-haul truckers are willing to drive extra miles to get it, according to this Associated Press story....
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A new meaning to "WLAN pilot"
May 10, 2004Memo: Equipment needed for new WLAN pilot...
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Happy WLAN cracking
April 26, 2004"Pentesting" is a conflation of penetration testing -- finding out where the weak points are in your network, especially your wireless network....
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Commodity WLANs?
April 26, 2004Marvell Technology Group and Cavium Networks have announced a jointly created reference design for highly secure enterprise WLAN switches....
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Most Unwired
April 19, 2004College and university campuses are hotbeds of wireless activity and innovation. And Intel, which is itself no slouch in those areas, wants you to know about it....
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Wi-Fly tests show cost-effective alternative to ADSL
April 12, 2004Among other things, there was a new record set for the PDTR (pigeon data transfer rate)....
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Cisco's WLAN woes
April 12, 2004The dominant enterprise WLAN vendor embarrassed twice in as many days with WLAN security problems....
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Beyond wireless
April 05, 2004The recent March CTIA conference, billed as THE cellular wireless show, had an extensive non-cellular wireless infrastructure, both official and unofficial, according to a survey by AirDefense, a vendor of WLAN monitoring software....
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Check these out
March 29, 20041. Don't forget to check out our first Virtual Showdown, this one on WLAN switches, which begins today. Six vendors will stand up to be hit with questions and comments, first from wireless consultant Craig Mathias and me, then by...
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WLAN worries
March 22, 2004From the gigantic CeBIT high-tech show in Germany last week came word that interoperability problems with WLAN gear are growing....
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WLAN vs. cellular
March 22, 2004This week is the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association's CTIA Wireless 2004 conference, in Atlanta. You can find the conference schedule here. One issue that's emerging is how cellular carriers, which offer "long-distance wireless," are dealing with WLAN services, or...
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NW's Virtual Showdown
March 15, 2004On Monday March 29, we'll launch our first "Virtual Showdown," featuring an online debate with, and among, six WLAN vendors. The event is an online version of the vendor debates "Network World" has hosted at shows such as Networld+Interop. You...
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High-throughput WLANs
March 15, 2004This week, the IEEE 802.11n task group will be meeting at the regular 802.11 plenary, which will at Walt Disney World Resort, in Florida....
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Something new to worry about
March 10, 2004At least a little. Wi-Fi cameras are being used for everything from building security to nanny surveillance to, um, adult entertainment. The bad news: the cameras can be wirelessly monitored. The good news: there's not, apparently, very much to see....
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MIMO and WLANs
March 08, 2004As my story in Network World this week suggests, MIMO is emerging as a key technology for dramatically boosting WLAN throughput and performance, without using more spectrum, and with a modest increase in price and battery demand....
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Cisco tackles wireless security
February 12, 2004Cisco has submitted to the IETF a draft document for a new Extensible Authentication Protocol type that's designed to fix security weaknesses in its proprietary Lightweight EAP, or LEAP. The draft, dubbed an "information draft" in IETF lingo, can be...
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New 11g chip
February 02, 2004Atheros Communications has begun sampling a single-chip 802.11g 54M bits/sec radio. The company claims its latest silicon product could make 11M bits/sec 802.11b radios obsolete, especially because its no more costly than the multi-chip products offered by rivals....
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Just what the Dr. ordered
January 12, 2004One of the hot areas for mobile computing and WLANs is healthcare, but even here, deployments remain pretty basic. That's one result from a 2003 study by Spyglass Consulting, Menlo Park, Calif. Author, Managing Director,and Founder Gregg Malkary says he...
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Enterprise WLANs not so big
December 15, 2003In this week's issue of "Network World," you can find some interesting points that suggest wireless LANs in the enterprise are going to be less of a phenomenon than we though as recently as, oh, say, last week. Vendors like...
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A Bluetooth Christmas?
December 08, 2003The annual Bluetooth Americas Conference runs this week in San Jose, Calif., where the drums will beat, again, for this low-bandwidth, short-range radio technology. We've written recently about Bluetooth's gains, with the Bluetooth Special Interest Group celebrating the fact that...
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Locking down your WLAN
December 01, 2003Our spanking-new "How To" issue includes one article on "How to lock down your WLAN." I asked three of the Network World Test Alliance experts -- Dave Newman, Tom Henderson and Joel Snyder -- to offer their thoughts on this...
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Getting nervous about notebook/handheld security
November 24, 2003After sitting through some Comdex sessions on network-based security threats to corporate productivity and data, I don't think I'll look at my Windows 95 Compaq notebook the same way again....
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IEEE finalizing 802.11e
November 17, 2003The IEEE took the latest step last week to finalize the WLAN quality of service standard, known as 802.11e....
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Next generation WLANs
November 10, 2003Three panels at the Next Generation Networks show last week in Boston revealed the ferment in wireless LANs....
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Bluetooth matures
November 03, 2003Six years old and you're "mature." That's high-tech networking. Bluetooth is an industry specification for a wireless connection based on a low-power radio with a range of about 30 feet. It was unveiled in 1998 as, simply, a way to...
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Wireless grows, but security still a concern
October 06, 2003A new user study by Infonetics Research is forecasting that wireless voice-over-IP is already growing in the enterprise. Findings include: - end-user WLAN spending will be $1.49 billion this year, $2.94 in 2006 - IP network performance and quality of...
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Is more bandwidth better?
September 29, 2003The IEEE 802.11 working group has blessed creating a new 100M bit/sec WLAN standard, called 802.11n. That's good news. Isn't it? The idea is that more bandwidth for, and to, the end user is always good....
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Intel and the wireless enterprise
September 15, 2003Intel's view of wireless is its view of Ethernet: one more form of networking that puts more demand on Intel's bread-and-butter -- the microprocessor at the heart of your computing device. Intel doesn't care what the device is: Windows notebook,...
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Tales from the WLAN tour
September 08, 2003There are some interesting user experiences emerging from Network World's latest Wireless LAN Technology Tour, which continues later this month in Houston and San Jose. [For more information, click here] The tours are hosted by Network World Events Editor Sandra...
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Give Palm a hand for this Java plan
September 01, 2003A wireless connection, whether WAN or LAN, doesn't do you much good if you can't do anything with it. And a database of phone numbers and addresses on your handheld has a limited utility, too. Palm, finally, is taking some...
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In the middle of things
August 25, 2003If you have a PalmOS or PocketPC handheld, you already use something called "mobile middleware" - the software that synchronizes the data on your handheld with data on your PC, usually via the handheld's cradle and a cable. A recent...
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Kiss the revolution goodbye
August 18, 2003You can notice two things in the latest batch of reports from analysts covering the wireless LAN market. 1. Vendors are selling more wireless LAN access points and adapter cards. 2. There is no "number 2." And this means, class,...
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Wireless apps: Getting beyond basic
August 11, 2003Mobile and wireless applications are still pretty basic, according to users chatting on a recent online user roundtable hosted by Sage Research. Wireless e-mail and calendaring are the most common mobile applications, according to the group of about 10 enterprise...
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IETF pushes ahead with new wireless LAN standard
July 21, 2003Vienna, Austria -- The day before what promises to be a grueling weekend touring and toasting this historic city, members of the Internet Engineering Task Force, meeting here, took on a new wireless LAN standard....
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Forget RFID: Worry about wireless security
July 14, 2003Consumer privacy concerns about wireless radio frequency identification (RFID) were stoked last week by Wal-Mart's decision to cancel an in-store trial of the inventory tracking technology (See our news story and my analysis) But what you should really be worried...
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Battling over RFID ... or is it over spy tags?
July 09, 2003Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is well on the way to becoming a lightening rod for a lot of post-Enron consumer fear and loathing. RFID combines a very small chip and a wireless radio into a tag that can be attached...
A dismal security picture
June 30, 2003A new wireless LAN study just out from Jupiter Research makes for depressing reading....
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Can Palm get Java right this time?
June 09, 2003About three years after Palm executives said they were going to embrace and cuddle up with with millions of Java programmers, they're saying it again. But this time, they say, it's serious....
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802.11g issues
May 26, 2003The IEEE 802.11g Task Group has crossed the last 't' and dotted the last 'i' in the draft standard that is expected to quickly replace the 11b standard for wireless LANs. The final remaining step is for the IEEE in...
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Do WLANs pay off? And how can you tell?
May 19, 2003There seem to be two basic opinions about "return-on-investment" in wireless LANs. It's important It's not important Obviously, how you define ROI largely determines where you stand....
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Strike up the Bandspeed
May 05, 2003There are two interesting things about Bandspeed, a privately-held Australian company that's established itself in Austin.
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Lightweight, standardized WLAN access
April 28, 2003A draft proposal submitted to the Internet Engineering Task Force outlines a standard protocol to be used by switches or routers to control a group of IEEE 802.11 wireless LAN access points and make their deployment much simpler than is...
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WLAN switches: Simple to the point of confusion?
April 21, 2003Next week, net executives attending Networld+Interop in Las Vegas will have a chance to see and touch this emerging class of so-called "wireless LAN switches." A pack of these vendors, including established wireless LAN vendors, a bewildering array of start-ups,...
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Mt. Washington wireless
March 31, 2003Wireless LAN communications results in some astonishing inventiveness. A solar-powered camera installed over 4,000 feet high at the Wildcat Mountain Sky Area in New Hampshire uses a Wi-Fi 802.11b wireless radio to transmit images five miles to the summit of...
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