Building a Cisco Wireless LAN
Over the last 10 years, the impact of wireless communications on the way we live
and do business has been surpassed only by the impact of the Internet. Cellular
phones, pagers, and wireless personal digital assistants (PDAs) have become so commonplace
in our lives that it is easy to forget that 10 years ago, they were a rarity. But
wireless communications technology is still in its infancy, and the next stage of its
development will be in supplementing or replacing the network infrastructure that
was traditionally “wired” as well as enabling network infrastructures that previously
could only be imagined. From local coffee shops to commercial inventory control
systems, within restaurants and throughout public airports, wireless commerce is
beginning to challenge the exchange system that our modern world currently
embraces, by accessing central pools of information and communicating directly
between users and between the devices themselves.
No longer are our choices restricted by the shortfalls of processing and battery
power, operating system efficiencies, or heat dissipation within the small footprint of
the mobile device. Rather, we are limited only by the practical application of these
technologies. How will we access information? How will we integrate multiple hardware
and software technologies into intelligent and useable form factors? Not all
business models necessarily imply the use of a single terminal to supply the user with
voice, video, and data services. Ergonomic factors may dictate that voice services are
maintained privately while data exchange and video information is easily viewable
from a specified distance, perhaps on complementary devices.
As network engineers, the challenges before us include the seamless distribution
of information between seemingly incompatible software and hardware standards. In
addition, we will be challenged by narrower bandwidths to develop highly efficient
means of transport in order to fully leverage wireless technologies. |
