Building a Hot Spot inside school

Hi group,

We have WAN connections in our classrooms and we have several mobile carts
with a laptop, digital projector and an electronic microscope hooked to the
laptop. Right now we have to snake a 25 or 50 foot LAN cable from the
laptop over to the wall jack, unplug the teacher's computer and plug in the
laptop. If we were to plug a wireless router into one of the wall jacks we
could cover one whole end of the building (I tested it today with the router
off-line and walking around with my laptop. The students really thought it
was cool, me talking into a laptop saying "can you hear me now?" -- but I
digress.

How difficult will it be to set the router up on one of the unused WAN
jacks? I tried to set it up today, and the DCHP worked and got an IP number
assigned to the router. I used the rest of the network information that is
set on my computer. Everything worked except that there was access to the
WAN from the laptop via the router.

The router is a Linksys wireless router. The local computer "guru" and
system administrator said "we have to have special equipment to do that and
it will take several months to get it and your department will need to pay
for it, about $3,000.

Ideas? Advice? Comments?

TIA

Dave


--


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"Through the Crystal Lens of History Doth Man Clearly View His Follies..."

CWO4 Dave Mann wrote:

> How difficult will it be to set the router up on one of the unused WAN
> jacks? I tried to set it up today, and the DCHP worked and got an IP
> number
> assigned to the router. I used the rest of the network information that
> is
> set on my computer. Everything worked except that there was access to the
> WAN from the laptop via the router.

If all you're doing is connecting the computer to the lan, a router or
access point is all you need.
>
> The router is a Linksys wireless router. The local computer "guru" and
> system administrator said "we have to have special equipment to do that
> and it will take several months to get it and your department will need to
> pay for it, about $3,000.
>

If the previous answer is correct, he's full of it.

--

Fundamentalism is fundamentally wrong.

To reply to this message, replace everything to the left of "@" with
james.knott.

WO4 Dave Mann" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:


>How difficult will it be to set the router up on one of the unused WAN
>jacks? I tried to set it up today, and the DCHP worked and got an IP number
>assigned to the router. I used the rest of the network information that is
>set on my computer. Everything worked except that there was access to the
>WAN from the laptop via the router.
I'm not sure what your asking in the above??? What didn't work?? You
couldn't get to the net or something else??? Maybe what happened is
the "router" got it's ip address from the lan jack (school network).
Because you have a router, it's giving out a different set of ip
addresses, 192.168.1.? or something along those lines. You still
should be able to SEE the out side world but others that are on the
"school net" might not be able to see you. So if you let us know what
the problem is then someone can help you out. And I don't think you
need to spend another $3.000 but I could be wrong as I don't know how
your school is set up.

HTH

>
>The router is a Linksys wireless router. The local computer "guru" and
>system administrator said "we have to have special equipment to do that and
>it will take several months to get it and your department will need to pay
>for it, about $3,000.
>
>Ideas? Advice? Comments?
>
>TIA
>
>Dave
>
>
>--
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>---------------------------------------
>"Through the Crystal Lens of History Doth Man Clearly View His Follies..."
>
>

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
CWO4 Dave Mann <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
:How difficult will it be to set the router up on one of the unused WAN
:jacks?

Fairly easy in some ways.

: I tried to set it up today, and the DCHP worked and got an IP number
:assigned to the router. I used the rest of the network information that is
:set on my computer. Everything worked except that there was access to the
:WAN from the laptop via the router.

Normally having access is not a problem. Did you perhaps mean that there
was -no- access ?


:The router is a Linksys wireless router. The local computer "guru" and
:system administrator said "we have to have special equipment to do that and
:it will take several months to get it and your department will need to pay
:for it, about $3,000.

I'm not at all sure what your systems administrator was referring to.
I suspect they were thinking of installing some kind of firewall, but
I'm not sure what they intended to protect from what.

If you intend to protect each wireless user from the other users, then
it's not as simple as dropping in any random Linksys wireless router.
If you don't care whether one wireless user can theoretically see what
another is sending or receiving, then it can be fairly simple.

Another problem is in locking down the access so that you could use it
but the students would not be able to (e.g., if they had a Palm Tungsten
with built-in 802.11b, or if they had a laptop with a wireless card.)

Sometimes, there are Regulations From Above that impose firewall
and security restrictions on wireless equipment. I don't know if any
your admin was thinking of that or of something else entirely.
--
Rome was built one paycheck at a time. -- Walter Roberson

"Walter Roberson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:c0e8fn$9ch$(E-Mail Removed)...
> In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
> CWO4 Dave Mann <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> :How difficult will it be to set the router up on one of the unused WAN
> :jacks?
>
> Fairly easy in some ways.
>
> : I tried to set it up today, and the DCHP worked and got an IP number
> :assigned to the router. I used the rest of the network information that
is
> :set on my computer. Everything worked except that there was access to
the
> :WAN from the laptop via the router.
>
> Normally having access is not a problem. Did you perhaps mean that there
> was -no- access ?
>
>
> :The router is a Linksys wireless router. The local computer "guru" and
> :system administrator said "we have to have special equipment to do that
and
> :it will take several months to get it and your department will need to
pay
> :for it, about $3,000.
>
> I'm not at all sure what your systems administrator was referring to.
> I suspect they were thinking of installing some kind of firewall, but
> I'm not sure what they intended to protect from what.
>
> If you intend to protect each wireless user from the other users, then
> it's not as simple as dropping in any random Linksys wireless router.
> If you don't care whether one wireless user can theoretically see what
> another is sending or receiving, then it can be fairly simple.
>
> Another problem is in locking down the access so that you could use it
> but the students would not be able to (e.g., if they had a Palm Tungsten
> with built-in 802.11b, or if they had a laptop with a wireless card.)
>
> Sometimes, there are Regulations From Above that impose firewall
> and security restrictions on wireless equipment. I don't know if any
> your admin was thinking of that or of something else entirely.
> --
> Rome was built one paycheck at a time. -- Walter Roberson

Thanks for the informative replies. As far as firewalls and access is
concerned, all of that is already set up between the building and the
outside world. As far as accessibility to students, that is not a problem
since students already have access to the network and their personal work
spaces which are set up by student number and password. The signal will not
penetrate the walls, we tested that to make sure we were not going to have
"junior student parking hotspot". The signal is confined to the target
area.

This is a comment from the IP "guru" that runs the school system:

"Mr Mann, We cannot use a linksys wireless router on our network. It is not
supported and could potentially cause problems even if turned on inside this
network since they are capable of handing out DHCP. We only use Dell
TrueMobile 1170 Access Points. This access point is very different from the
linksys router."

Of course, he is full of beans, but he is also the guy who came to the
building one day and shut off the network right in the middle of the
teaching day, throwing about 500 students off of the network, both local and
internet. When I asked him why he did that and informed him that in
industry (where I came from after retiring 3 years ago) shutting a network
down in the middle of production would mean that the person responsible had
better have a very good reason or he would be using his technical skills
operating the French fry system at the local Burger King. His response to
me and several other teachers who were listening eagerly, was "Hey, they
don't pay me enough money to come around this place after hours!".

I think that says it all, doesn't it?

Anyway, I did discover that they are using the Dell 1170 AP at another
location, so I think we will buy one of those and ask our local boy to get
out from behind his Dungeons and Dragons HAK0RZ terminal, his grape sodas,
twinkies and his fatpipe connection to the
news://alt.binaries.writhing.whipped...s,creepy.gurlz
and do some work. He can even do it during school hours.

Cheers from the wonder world of public schools!

Dave