LuckyLab : 30th October 2001BR Scribe: Lonnie WormleyBR Any comments like no information due to disk error are translated into my brain did not capture the information fast enough. Even though ChristianSeppa will be taking on this task in the future I'd like to advise that there are never too many note takers in the meeting. Please add your comments to this page and fill in any missing details or link your detailed comments from this page.BR Completed 11/1/01

Presentation

802.11 Based Smart Jitnet / Community SystemsBR presented by Robert W. BehnkeBR This presentation was recorded by Omega using audio equipment.

Focus Group

• PlayDay report

  • DanRichardson gave a report about the recent pladay. There were 8 participants that showed up. The focus of the playday was to test relays. A relay is where you have three clients in ad-hoc mode and two are communicating with each other and passing packets through a shared wireless client in the middle. The results were that layer 3 routing sucks. Using access points is realy the way that you want to do this.BR

• Gotta get shit done! Maps, FAQ and Nodes!
  • The new map looks great. It covers more of Portland and SW Washington. Update your node.
  • There is the issue about what to do with the PDX Wireless map. It is out of date and causes confusion.

Report from the Special Interest Groups

• Propaganda - LonnieWormley

  • I had TeeShirt at the meeting and I sold 8.

• MAN - LucasSheehan

  • no information due to disk error

• Access Point - JerrittCollord

  • no information due to disk error

• User - LonnieWormley (Pass off?)

  • Well maybe somone else should do this. I'll stick to promotional and donations.

Action Topics

• Need Linux bootable CD/Floppy w/ Host AP and NoCatAuth pre-installed

  • There was a guy with long black hair and black Tee Shirt that said building a bootable image was no problem(please put your name here).

  • There was a discussion of how the bootable image would work. Ideally it should be a GUI interface that prompts the user for the options that will make it function.
  • There was an alternative idea that a standard CD image would be created and all options would be placed on a floppy. There would be different folppies for various options. A user would not have to know how to select options because it would be pre-configured for the installed system.

• Sylistic image with HostApMode drivers and NoCatAuth

General Meeting

• Monthly Updates

  • Introductions ...

  • Status of PayPal account.

    • Currently we have $781.52 in the account. Adam Shand still needs to be reimbersed for the cost of the shirts. The shirts cost $634.30 plus $35.00 for shipping.
    • After Adam withdraws his money we will have a balance of $115.22

    • I'll update the TshirtBooking page with the donations that I recieved on 10/30/01

  • Propaganda Update.
    • Passed out larg and small stickers
    • We are going to work on clear window decals next.

• New Topics

  • Lonnie do you still want to be secretary?

    • Well I'm not very good at this and will gladly pass the responsibility over to ChristianSeppa.

      • ChristianSeppa volunteered to take meeting notes for the next few meetings. SamChurchill will be his back-up.

  • Anyone actually using IPv6? Anyone willing to research?

    • Go to the [http://www.freenet6.net freenet6.net] web site and get familiar with IPv6.

  • Copywrite of logo.

    • It was agreed that the logo should be part of open source licensing. It was not made clear in the meeting what was the best method for doing this. The logo is officially the property of PTP and LonnieWormley makes no personal claims to it as it was designed by the PersonalTelco group.

  • Copywrite for web site.

    • The issue of how to protect the content of the web site from commercial abuse was discussed. AdamShand has been approached by several ISPs in the past about using our site.

    • This discussion lead into a debate about our status as a legal entity. Questions were raised about pursuing non profit status.

    • ChristianSeppa volunteered to contact a friend to come to the next meeting to give a brief talk on IP litigation.

  • NigelBallard volunteers to be official press contact.

    • Doing a radio interview sound bite about wireless community networking
    • Official Press Policy in response to comparisons to Napster

      • The Internet is a many to many medium and PersonalTelco wants to keep it that way.

• Action Topics

  • How to organize PdxWireless and PersonalTelco

    • Do we really want to be a non profit? This topic was discussed at length. The general consensus was that the group wants to pursue this. The only thing that is preventing this is funding. We decided to search for a lawyer that would do this for free.

    • In the meantime PersonalTelco will have to come up with some policies to govern the behaviour of the members activities.

  • Getting the LuckyLab and RoseAndRaindrop wired!

    • NigelBallard has already contacted the owner.

    • The group discussion centered around getting the LuckyLab to pay for the DSL connection and NigelBallard would supply the AccessPoint.

    • One of the tactics that was suggested is to ask the LuckyLab to pay for 3 months of DSL. during the three months have employees monitor the number of patrons that come to the pub and use the Internet connection. They can monitor how much they spend if desired. At the end of 3 months if the cost of the DSL is more than the revenue generated by the patrons that used the Internet access then PersonalTelco will refund the costs of the DSL.

    • If this proposal is agreed to by LuckyLab then it was suggested that PersonalTelco members clearly identify themselves when using the Internet and making purchases.

Addendum

Hi everyone. Sam Churchill, here, the backup note-taker for Christian. I thought Robert had some interesting things to say about the Intelligent Transportation System and his Sandy Oregon proposal to provide "Smart Jitney" services. The idea is that wireless access points could be used to match riders with drivers. Drivers get a discount on gas. Sandy dropped out of the Tri-Met party, apparently, and has looking into alternative mass transit ideas. Smart Jitney is one.

Here are some (unofficial) notes, links and comments on Bob's presentation:

Tuesday (Oct 30) at the Personal Telco meeting, Robert W. Behnke gave a presentation on the Intelligent Transportation System (ITS). He has proposed a [http://www.cascadepolicy.org/bgc/athena.htm Smart Jitney] project in Sandy Oregon. It would let people match a rider and driver and use 802.11b.

Bob has had much experience as an ITS developer and worked with many organizations [http://faculty.washington.edu/~jbs/itrans/webber.htm around the country].

He suggested that here may be synergies with community wireless lans. No specific role for PersonalTelco was mentioned but the possibilities of using 802.11b for this project was described in a general manner. For more information you might write Bob at rbehnke@hevanet.com

As an aside, the FCC allocated a new ITS band at 5.8 GHz. It is ajoining, and just above, the (unlicensed) 802.11a band at 5.8 Ghz.

Manufacturers of commercial wireless lan cards like [http://www.atheros.com/news/releases.html Atheros] were selected for licensed "telematics" applications] in the specially designated 5.850-5.925 GHz band. Atheros AR5000 chipsets were used to test the IEEE 802.11a technology. Those 5 GHz PC Cards are for sale today by Intel and others.

---

Here are the FCC designated frequencies for 802.11a:

(1) U-NII lower band (100Mhz) (5.15 to 5.25 GHz) - 40mW

(2) U-NII middle band (100Mhz) (5.25 to 5.35 GHz) - 200mW

(3) U-NII upper band (100Mhz) (5.725 to 5.825 GHz) -800mW

(4) Here are the designated FCC frequencies for ITS: (5.850 to 5.925 GHz )

---

You can see the designated ITS (licensed) frequency ajoins the 802.11a 5.8 band (which stops at 5.825 GHz). The [http://www.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Engineering_Technology/Orders/1999/fcc99305.txt FCC allocated 75 megahertz of spectrum] at 5.850-5.925 GHz for the mobile service for use by Dedicated Short Range Communications ("DSRC") systems operating ITS.

It's my understanding that regular IEEE 802.11a wireless lan cards can also be used to carry ITS information. So, perhaps wireless lans and ITS COULD work together in the 5.8 GHz band.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) funded three Research Centers of Excellence (RCEs) to engage in research in ITS technology:

• [http://rce.tamu.edu/TAMU_RCE.htm Texas A&M University ITS Research Center]

• [http://its.engin.umich.edu/itsrce University of Michigan ITS Research Center]

• [http://www.ctr.vt.edu Virginia Tech ITS Research ]

• Also:

• [http://www.cts.umn.edu University of Minnesota ITS Institute]

• [http://www.ivhs.washington.edu/ University of Washington ITS]

The State of Oregon does not appear to have any effective ITS leadership despite the traffic problems and the high-tech companies located here. BTW, [http://www.qsent.com Qsent], located in the Pearl District, has contracts with over 1,000 taxis and limos. They provide pickup services for individuals using WAP phones.

[http://www.business2.com/articles/mag/0%2C1640%2C16664%7C3%2CFF.html Seattle's BusView system], graphically displays on a website the minute-by-minute locations of buses. It was developed not by, or even on behalf of, the local transit agency, but by a group of students at the University of Washington after they discovered that location information broadcast by buses could be easily intercepted over the Internet. Another University of Washington website, [http://www.MyBus.org MyBus.org], predicts when the next bus is going to arrive at a given stop. My Bus currently pulls in about 1 million pageviews a month, and gets e-mail from "bus junkies," who sit by the window with a computer to compare predicted and actual arrival times and report discrepancies. The instructor and his students are currently working with the Portland's Tri-Met to come up with an arrival-prediction system that's accurate even in the face of traffic accidents, ice storms, and drawbridge openings.

More Links: [http://www.itsa.org/ ITS America] [http://www.its.dot.gov/ ITS DOT] [http://www.itsa.org/itsview.html ITS View Magazine] [http://www.itsworld.com/tme/ ITS World Magazine] [http://www.navglobe.com/whatsnew.cfm Navglobe.com] [http://www.navtech.com/index.jsp Navtech] [http://www.nawgits.com/icdn.html Nawgits] [http://www.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Engineering_Technology/News_Releases/1999/nret9006.html FCC on ITS] [http://www.sae.org/technicalcommittees/websites.htm Standards Committee on 511 Road Info] [http://www.nawgits.com/ite/JB01HA32.pdf ITS Deployment] [http://smarttrek.org/ Seattle's Smart Trek] [http://www.BusView.org BusView.org] [http://www.MyBus.org Seattle's MyBus.org] [http://www.mybus.org/trimet/locations.jsp Tri-Met's MyBus][http://www.its.washington.edu/its_sites.html ITS Washington State] [http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/PugetSoundTraffic/ Puget Sound Traffic]

Business Articles: [http://www.business2.com/articles/mag/0,,14745,FF.html Traffic Control] [http://www.business2.com/articles/mag/0,1640,11235,FF.html How It Works: Location, Location, Location] [http://www.business2.com/articles/mag/0,1640,14649,FF.html Borderline Savings] [http://www.business2.com/articles/web/0,1653,8409,00.html Subways of the World] [http://www.accutraffic.com/ AccuTraffic][http://www.currenttraffic.com/home.asp CurrentTraffic.com][http://www.etaktraffic.com/ Etak Traffic][http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,63565|102|0|0|1|a,FF.html Transit Systems][http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,64631|102|0|0|1|a,00.html Metro systems] [http://rideguide.wmata.com/ The Ride Guide] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,63565|102|0|0|1|a,FF.html National Transit Database] [http://mobility.tamu.edu/ Urban Mobility Study] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,63489|102|0|0|1|a,FF.html Innovations in Bus Travel] [http://www.talkingbus.com/products/demo/index.html Talking Bus] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,63558|102|0|0|1|a,00.html Bus Rapid Transit] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,64521|102|0|0|1|a,00.html Light Rail] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,16537|125|0|0|1|a,00.html GPS] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,20131|125|0|0|1|a,00.html On Star] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,20132|125|0|0|1|a,00.html Tele Aid] [http://www.business2.com/webguide/0,1660,16505|102|0|0|1|a,00.html Vehicle Navigation Systems] [http://www.metrocommute.com/ Metrocommute.com] [http://www.smartraveler.com/ SmarTraveler] [http://www.traffic.com/home/html/traffic.html Traffic.com] [http://www.its.dot.gov/itsweb/tcomm/tcomm.htm ITS Telecommunications Links] [http://www.its.dot.gov/tcomm/specqa.htm Dedicated Short Range Communications (DRCS) FAQ] [http://www.itsdocs.fhwa.dot.gov/edldocs/13464/featured.htm DOT's Featured ITS Sites]

- Sam Churchill (Nov 4, 01) [CategoryMeetingNotes]