wireless: report from final project presentations

Report from Final Project Presentations

Wednesday, June 29

Alberic Chimon - AVU

Projects of extending the network connectivity with wireless technology in few different AVU country centres

Burundi
Mali (and extension to faculty of medicine)
Senegal (2 sites, one of them has a student villages to connect)

Benefits:

Linking teachers, students and staff

Financial aspects:

Total cost 600.000 euro (97% already financed)
Each project cost average 2500 euro/country

Training:

July 2005 in Bamako (Mali), participants from the region (using also a WiKi)
Advanced training in mid-January 2006 in Dakar (Senegal)
Project implementation in August 2006
Create ICTP-Clubs within the AVU network

For the Bamako Training:

translation of material
need more items (pigtails, etc.)

Questions and answers:

radicella: project is 600.000, but then you said 2500 for country...

answer: that 2500 euro part is the one still to be financed, just for equipment for the wireless links

radicella: you indicated 3 sub-projects, is the need of 2500 for each of them?

answer: yes

chaudhari: how much bandwidth ?

answer: before it was 128/256, now I changed to 256/256

sebastian: how much do you know about remote teching and distance interaction via Internet?

answer: we have a long experience on distance education at AVU, we deliver courses via satellites, with live servers and mirror sites. Students at beginning weren't able to study in this way, we made some studies, last year we discovered that the best students in some african sites were students following the courses virtually via the satellite system, and they were leading on students from MIT, which were attending courses in the class directly.

marco: you said that in Senegal you want to connect the student villages at 200-300 meters with wireless, why not with cables?

answer: we made a small analisys there, after they installed fiber optic in the university because they had problems with UTP cables. And wireless is cheaper than fiber optics

summary (by struzak): presentation that fit time limites and topic, there were questions and satisfactory answers.

Chomora Mikeka - University of Malawi

Support rural community development in Malawi using wireless

Country profile:

agricultural production
role of university in R&D
we pay 1.600 USD/month for the VSAT link (256/128k) at chancellor college

Problem:

high cost of VSAT
limited access (42%)
lack of extensions support
inadeguate tech information
poor market info

Proposal and design solution

Smartbridges and cantennas

Cost of investment

6750 USD for 60 PCs (3 institutions)

Financial aspects: formulae for initial investment and project expansion

benefits and project justification

vertical market segment
WiFi is cheap and fast (ref.: Wi-Fi 101)

Revenue model

monthly subscritpion service
pay per use
premium surcharge
free to users

results/impact of pilot phase

how is life different for staff and students now?
expected output among academia:
- interesting applications

next phase

real-time IT support on agribusiness
agro-extensions services

conclusions project initiated by the training at ICTP ARPL, motivated by the demand for access on chancellor college campus and triggered by compassion to steer a way to save or at least support 12 million people living on agriculture in malawi.

references and bibliography

Questions and answers:

radicella: is the extimated cost only for the campus or also for rural connectivity?

answer: is for everything

is the VSAT already financed?

answer: it's already there, but we pay the montly fee

is the cost including only the hardware?

answer: it is reported in the detailed budget (page number 2)

radicella: we are going to talk tomorrow with the people of Regione FVG, let see if they can support such amount of money

radicella: regardless of cost implied here (material cost), do you expect some type of support for installation, monitoring, etc. ? Or can you deal with it?

answer: students can handle this, without being paid

struzak: what do you mean by "supervision" ?

answer: I meant that it would be easy for me to monitor and supervise the project, being my region and where I lecture

struzak: could be possibile to buy equipment trought ICTP, obteining lower prizes?
radicella: you are talking about investement budget requirments for 60 client machines...

answer: we considered that the served institution have this max number of client machines for each point-of-presence to be served by the wireless link

sebastian: I liked very much that you started with a small feasibility study as pilot, with realistic marked prices, I think this should be supported. You may probably need more client infrastructure. I would also tipically extimated that environmental situation will make equipment to fail after a while, so you better consider some more items in the list (spare parts, more laptop machines as clients). Small is ok, but this may be a little too small.

radicella: you better add more (maybe 3?) client computers and spare parts (10% of costs for maintenance, over 1 year), before tomorrow, for presenting this project to the region authorities.

precious: you mentioned to use students for the projects, what if they leave after the graduation, what if you go away?

radicella: you are right, but this is clearly a demo projects, only after the demonstration that it works, you can build a more stable project

sebastian: you should state (the fact that is a feasibility project, a demo pilot project) this clearly in your presentation, it's a strong point for this project

arikpo: you should maybe add some more detail about: where are the impacts on conservation of culture, on the economy? will the people be able to use it well?

comments by struzak: I'm delighted to see that the projects have been improved a lot during this few weeks.

Precious Muyideen and Bassey Ekpangedoho - Teledom

Implementation of broadband wireless in frastructure for the public service network in 36 states of Nigeria

Introduction:

Public service network is an initiative of NITDA (agency of the nigerian government for nation development of ICT)
many criteria have been considered for connection of governmental offices all around the country

general description

wireless was considered appropriate

aims and objectives

e-government
support to SME
etc.

technical description

core component is BreezeAccess 11 by Alvarion
VSAT in the state capitals
VPN over a wireless broadband network
link budget calculation
procedure for planning, installation, activation
(IP subnetting has been improved)
(BW maximization by monitoring of the network)

schematic diagram

experience gained during the ictp activities

further expectations

to start a new project: e-Students

budget extimation for the project

more than USD 1.277.600
funding already provided by the federal government

conclusions

Questions and answers:

carlo: what about the costs? it's almost 12.000 USD per link, did you considered other cheaper althernatives?

answer: this project is already in implementation phase, and the costs are reasonable for a governmental project

sebastian: in certain cases this "pro" technology is appropriate, but you should be ready to defend the choices you made. The cost of a base station can be 18.000 instead than 100 USD, but you should give a strong motivation. the presentation in some point looks like a vendor advertisement, this may have a negative impact on people that is in charge of judging the project.

Iwara Arikpo - Univ. of Calabar

Univ of Calabar Wireless Project

introduction

network in UniCAL started in 1999 (when there was only dialup access)
50.000 students, 4 Km of campus, so the most appropriate technology was wireless ('99)

objective

bring the net to all segment of university
online registration and administrative procedure for students, library info system

current state of project

completed at 70%
11 faculties already connected, 8 still to be connected

RE-design of the project

major question posed during the training

network security
monitoring network access and content filtering
bandwidth management

achievements of the training

network security has been tought deeply
content filtering has been demonstrated and tought
BW management has been considered
linux

requests

I need a radio (apart from Alvarion, that we have already) for teaching and demonstration

conclusions

very successful training, I will send feedback

Questions and answers:

struzak: this presentation was slightly different from the previous ones, presenting not only the project but also the added value of this training

sebastian: I wasn't presented in the first 2 weeks, was BW management and content filtering really extensively covered?

answer: the general discussion we had was very fruitful, and we also had demo of some applications (content filtering at the proxy, etc.). We touched also the problem of password protection and network protection. MRTG, Squidgard, chillispot were demonstrated

Thomas Ongeri Ombasa - Alldean Satellite Networks (Kenya)

Wireless as last mile connection for rural Kenya - extending ICT to rural schools

pre-amble

postal corporation and ministry of ICT of Kenya have developed already a VSAT communication network providing services to rural areas
all post office are networked by VSAT now
600 outlet already connected, 400 more to be connected soon

achievements/challenges so far

600 outlet connected: very good!
major challenges:
- economics, ROI in rural area is low, do not justify investments
- infrastructure (low PC density, electricity, etc...)
- security
- human resources and human skill development structures <<< THIS IS THE MAIN PROBLEM for extend ICT to rural farmers

proposed project

to extend the existent network to the rural schools
last mile link from the concentration point (post office) to the rural schools
institution interconnection for e-learning and local interactions

scheme of the network

immediate beneficiaries

middle level colleges, polytechnics and institutes of technology
post secondary management and business training institutions
primary and secondary schools <<< Access to ICT here is VITAL

formulation and funding

institutions that may be the possible main stakeholders are:
- ministry of education
- Kenya institute of education
- teachers service commission
- ministry of ICT
- postal corporation of kenya
- jambonet kenya Ltd
- local authorities - LATF, CDF
- communications commission of kenya

schematic diagram

Backhaul Subscriber Unit

budgetary estimates

pilot project for 2 sites (demonstration of feasibility)
120 deg sector antenna on main site, directive antennas on both remote sites
estimated total: 7000 euro

acknowledgements

Questions and answers:

struzak: you did not take in estimation the cost of computers:

answer: I considered 8 client PC, with a cost of 250 euro each

struzak: what about the training for the teachers?

answer: 2 teachers will help me during the initial installation and they will be taught to teach other teachers after this

struzak: may be useful to add a short line in the budget about preliminary training for teachers, even at zero cost

struzak: these 600 VSAT are delivered by one or more company?

answer: just one eqpt manufacturer - GILAT, project implentation - ASNK

question: what about power and power problems in schools?

answer: for the pilot project we will choose commercial available power places, however for the VSAT we don't have grid power at every site, so we use solar power.

sebastian: it would be useful to do an estimation of the running costs: power consumption, network traffic costs, replacing equipment/spare parts.

marco: a question about computer literacy: do you have some figures on the usage of computers and internet on the post offices?

answer: I don't have precise numbers, may be on the order of 10% or less, but the average level of computer literacy on rural areas is surely very low (even in urban environment admittedly the computer literacy can be rather low)

marco: it would be very interesting to see how things change after introduction of this connection into the schools

arikpo: kenya is quite mountainous, it may be useful to design the pilot project considering this fact. Another comment is about e-learning and training of people, that may require more focus than the technological part.

carlo: may be useful to do a survey on computer literacy before and after the project. Also it is useful to have some entries in the budget for providing books and didactical material to schools.

sebastian: use of kiswahili and local language issues can be considered into the project

sebastian: sometimes mountain areas are easier than flat ones, for wireless communications, because you can use high altitude sites for repeaters (like nepal, venezuela, etc...)

comments by struzak: thanks very much to everybody!

Thursday, June 30

Elie Martial Mabo - University of Douala, Cameroon

Wireless Networking Project

Douala Univ in brief

created in 1993
7 main directions, 4 faculties, 3 higher schools, 16000 students, 425 teachers and researchers

actual situation

3 campuses connected by wireless, 1.3Km for Ndogbong, 4.6Km for Akwa, and <1 Km for directions into the main site

main objectives

this project aims to connect all admin offices (directions) located at the main site
reinforcement and improvement of existing wireless equipment
allow data, video and files sharing among students, teachers and staff
allow authorized users to get access to the academic and financial applications
allow teachers with laptop to get access to the network

who is in charge

IT tech committee: E. MABo and Armand YOMBI and other 5 members

phases

phase: acquisition of equipment (1 month)
phase: installation (2 weeks)
phase: training of 2 net managers (5 days)

total period: 7 weeks

net topology

P-t-P between main campus and Akwa campus
P-t-MP between main campus and Ndogbong campus
P-t-MP to directions at the main campus

selected equipment list and costs

previously I thought to use Alvarion equipment, now the choice is different
1 Metrix Mark 2
2 sectorial antennas
11 flat panel antennas
cables
11 WLAN pc-card + PCMCIA-PCI adapter card for remote client stations
1 orinoco PC card
total cost: 4.965 USD

discussed issues and satisfaction percentage

quality of equipment: are the chosen equipment appropriate? 95%
security: 90%
confidentiality: 90%
interference problems: 95%
QoS management: 70%
how to optimize the project budget? 90%
how to deny access to some users? 100%

budget of project

equipment: 4.965 USD
acquisition: 1.800 USD
installation: 2.500 USD
configuration: 0 USD
training 700 USD
total cost: 9.965 USD

source of financing

ICTP, World Bank, others

conclusions

references

training: ARPl school 2005
advices: Clement, Enrique
books: Building wireless community networks, 802.11 security
web links: metrix, moonblinkwifi.com, Power Budget calculators

gratitude

thanks to everybody!

Questions and answers:

struzak: a question on the 3 phases of the project... the first is acquisition, but it should be a preliminar phase 0, before acquisition, that is choice of the equipment
marco: going back to the map of the campus, how far are the buildings to be connected in the main campus?

answer: it's written in the map

sebastian: what kind of equipment for the remote stations?

answer: still to be decided

Rita MBAYIHA - Kigali Institute of Education, Rwanda

Wireless Networking of Hospitals in Rwanda

Central Hospital of Kigali

introduction

Rwanda's general plan of the national information communication infrastructure (NICI)
national telemedicine project for rwanda. the curren ttarget is to have 5 telemedicine centers by the end of 2005

objectives

reducing costs and improve productivity
modernizing operations
taking telemedicine system in urban and rural hospitals
support medical research

pilot project

pilot hospital is the central hospital of kigali (CHK)
22 blocks spread over and area of about 3 sqKm
only admin block has internet via ISDN
pilot project is to extend the net to 3 more blocks

estimated budget

for 3 links
sect antennas and metrix boxes
total for equipment: 10.135 USD

expectations

to be able to advice the tech team on how to implement the wlan successfully

conclusions

thanks to all of you!

Questions and answers:

she has to run to visit the university of trieste

Dorothy Odhiambo and Albert Adams Yugi - KCCT, Nairobi, Kenya

demo project in wireless networking

existing network

3 campuses: HQ, city centre and Loresho
HQ has 300PCs with leased line of 128Kbps
city center has 200PCs, leased line of 128kbps
Loresho

building not yet networked

6 buildings at the HQ still need to be connected

project objectives

to reach 40% of the staff community
serve the student community to a cybercafe
offer internet facilities to conferencing participants
become a regional training centre for wireless networking in east african region

technical summary

2 phases:

wireless LAN at main campus
interconnection of the 3 campuses

current physical layout at HQ

Ip addressing scheme

16 subnets: 6 for HQ, 4 subnets for Loresho and 4 for city center

WLAN requirements and costs

Netgear Wireless Access Point, 54 Mbps: 9 items
directional antennas: 7
netgear USB wireless adapters: 20 items
etc.

2 phase: interconnecting campuses

via a tower in a repeater site (Ngong Hills)
3 links: 20, 25 and 16 Km

requirements for the campus interconnection

total cost around 30.000 euro

discussion issues

how to deal with obstacles and L-o-S
security
optimization of bandwidth, how many PCs can be supported at a certain BW ? how to do BW management
impact of new load (wireless traffic) over the existent one (constrained net infrastructure)

training expectations

design WLAN and WWAN
configure and install AP
specify and identify network equipment
model and simulate proposed networks
analyze the designed network

way forward we want to do immediately the following things:

regulatory issues on use of ISM band
complete cell planning for HQ and WWAN
survey on available equipment in kenya
evaluate cost effectiveness of project
explore use of powerline technologies
purchase 2 APs, antennas and wireless cards for test runs

project timeline

installation of HQ WLAN by: dec 2005
training announcement to the region: jan 2006
launch of training at KCCT: aug 2006
advanced training: jun 2007 and continuos

Questions and answers:

chaudhari: what about the cabling inside the building you are going to interconnect at HQ?

answer: the wiring inside the building is very difficult because of how they are constructed, we should probably use wireless even inside, or ethernet over powerlines

struzak: you should maybe consider the use of different technologies for different places

ombasa: in relation to the cost-effectiveness of the project, I'm looking at it in 2 prespectives: first the project in itself to provide internal facilities, but a SECOND perspective is to look at it as a functional for training, where you don't expect an immediate return. I think that from this perspective this project is a MUST in a training institution like KCCT.

radicella: in this case it should be build having in mind the purpose of being used as support for training.

struzak: maybe isn't so good to mix the two things, it may be useful to have a separate project for teaching purposes on wireless technologies, the issues can be different

arikpo: equipment used by students should be very robust and protected, and also NOT too expensive. Sate-of-the-art equipment is not suitable for training purposes

sebastian: general comment: it's unclear to me what is the current network between all the client machines

answer: it's wired in the building, and optical fibers between buildings

sebastian: considering the prices of the leased lines and so, may be useful to investigate more on the bandwidth management. Also i have some doubts about the choice of technologies (netgear, 802.11g ...). may be useful to implement many different technologies, do some test and use them for training, and after these try-outs you can decide about the technologies to implement for the real network. And more comments (in general, related to the other presentation as well).

El Hag Huda Mohamed Ahmed - Khartoum University, Sudan

Phase one of the proposed university of khartoum wireless network

introduction

we have optical fibers in the many campuses, connected via leased line to internet, but no interconnection among them, and this is very expensive

background

oldest university of sudan

campuses

6 campuses: central campus, medical sciences campus (7 Km), natural science (15 Km, over the nile), education (17 Km), soba teching hospital (25 Km), nursing hospital (5 Km)

statistics

17022 undergraduate students
18 faculties and schools
18 institutes
6 campuses

objectives of wireless networking

provide conveninet network access for students and faculty
reduce IT administration time (i.e. providing connectivity for conference rooms, etc...)
connectivity for off-campus buildings
cost management (i.e. reduce telephone costs)

challenges

provide students with constant access to resources to improve their education
provide staff with resources needed to perform their jobs
extending connectivity to off-campus faculties and admin building
reduce the large cost for extending the existing optical fiber backbone
solve the problem that the access to internet is now limited to computer lab and few staff offices
solve the problems due to diversity of devices, OSs, network connections

argument for adopting wireless technologies

improve the existent ???
develop innovative applications ???
expand existent resources ???
answer : Yes Yes Yes

strategy

start with a pilot project

plan - phase 1

use the tower at faculty of engineering as central AP
connect two buildings to this (inst. of environmental studies at 500 mt and univ. service admin at 1500 mt)

plan - phase 2

intercampus links using wireless

benefits of wireless links

intangible
- access to accurate info
- staying connected
- easy maintenance
- simple installation
tangible:
- decreased telephone bills
- increased productivity, not tied to a fixed location
- decreased cost of office materials

capital investment cost

total 3.925 USD including renewal and maintenance (2 links)

device specs

schematic diagram of one link

acknowledgement

thanks to everybody!

Questions and answers:

sebastian: because you listed even detailed items in the equipment list, it looks like some things are missing (you included cables, but not connectors. etc...). maybe some more things are missing (i.e. firewalls, etc..., they are in the scheme but not in the shopping list)

answer: we have already an infrastructure, many things are already available. what we miss are some interconnection links

radicella: maybe what you could add is a one-line clarification that these things are already available

Johnson I. Ejimanya - Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Nigeria

A proposal for an integrated wireless computer network for on-campus and off-campus communications and web access

background

university established in 1980, one of the 5 federal univ. of technology
25 Km from owerri city centre
map of the campus location (45.8 Km sq)
the active area of the campus is much smaller, due to financial crisis after the economic boom

academic stats

33 departments

justifications

no campus-wide network
less than 50% of students is staying in the campus
staff and students have to travel a lot
the on-going activity to deploy a wired network is very slow, will not be able to solve the problem
university innovation project (informatized admin) need a network

university strategy

decision to set up an ICT dept
univ. teamed up with a private company to develop a wireless infrastructure

priorities

choice of wireless solution

link budget

for VSAT

link budget

for local radiolinks at 2.4 GHz

proposed network topology

project cost

total 29950 euro
including VSAT, APs for 4 sectors, etc...

funding

conclusions

acknowledgements

thanks to everybody!

Questions and answers:

struzak: it may be useful in future to organize a training activity on how to organize a trining lab, etc...

precious: why 50 ethernet switches?

answer: they are already in place, etc...

sebastian: so, better to state that it's part of your self-contribution to the project

Final considerations

radicella: each one of you can please prepare a 5-pages doc that describes in summary your project (including human resources), etc...
radicella: it would useful if in the next 45-50 days you prepare and improve these documents and send them to the people that have been advising you, get the reaction and suggestions, and in 60 days collect back a final verison, it could be possibile that we are able to promote these projects with potential donors and funders.
radicella: thanks to all of you!

struzak: it may be useful in future to organize a training activity on how to organize a trining lab, etc...

precious: why 50 ethernet switches?

answer: they are already in place, etc...

sebastian: so, better to state that it's part of your self-contribution to the project

Final considerations

radicella: each one of you can please prepare a 5-pages doc that describes in summary your project (including human resources), etc...
radicella: it would useful if in the next 45-50 days you prepare and improve these documents and send them to the people that have been advising you, get the reaction and suggestions, and in 60 days collect back a final verison, it could be possibile that we are able to promote these projects with potential donors and funders.
radicella: thanks to all of you!
struzak: thank you for the effort of providing reports on the wiki.

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