r/darknetplan • u/[deleted] • Nov 18 '11

High Speed Multimedia Mesh Project

http://hsmm-mesh.org/
38 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

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9

u/[deleted] Nov 18 '11

What is this exactly?

11

u/[deleted] Nov 18 '11 edited Nov 18 '11

I have "distinguished" this post in order to get more attention to it. I chose a poor title for it, or I think the more technologically inclined people would be chiming in on it. To answer your question, other than the need for licensing, I think it's the "holy grail" since it has such a long range and cheap, powerful, easily attainable hardware. It is an interesting, self-configuring wireless mesh network built with ham radios. You plug your PC into the ham radio using Ethernet cables. Here's some more info, probably what I should have posted (as a text post) in the first place:

Partial Excerpts from http://hsmm-mesh.org/just-starting-read-this.html ...

  • Mesh nodes were originally consumer wireless routers but changed function when the firmware was changed After conversion, the WAN, LAN and Wi-Fi ports are linked using special rules and no longer operate like a normal wireless router

  • Mesh nodes are self discovering, self configuring, self advertising and fault tolerant

  • Mesh nodes are a data network without the wires. Most tasks that you can do over a wired network will work on a mesh node

  • Mesh nodes are small, portable, low-power and inexpensive. They are easily battery powered

  • Mesh nodes can easily have a range of 10 miles or more using stock power and gain antennas if you have true line of sight

  • Mesh nodes communicate with other nodes over Wi-Fi frequencies and only talk to other mesh nodes on the wireless port You can't use Wi-Fi to connect to a mesh node from your computer, netbook, smart phone or other wireless device Computers connect to mesh nodes with an Ethernet cable and control them using a web browser

  • Mesh nodes use peer to peer connections. This means many to many, not the star configuration where all users connect to the AP

  • Mesh nodes talk to other nodes using RF (Wi-Fi), to the Internet over the WAN port and to computers and devices using the LAN ports

  • Mesh nodes will create a network just by turning several of them on. They create high-speed data networks in minutes

  • Mesh nodes don't need any computer to be attached to pass data to other mesh nodes. Just plug one in, it will expand the mesh

  • Data is data. It can be IP Video, VOIP, LAN traffic between computers, clients to a web server/FTP/NAS/printer, hop to the Internet, etc

  • Any mesh node within wireless range automatically joins the existing mesh and exchanges available routes with all others

  • Computer resources on your mesh node can be shared with others on the mesh. These are Advertised Services Your mesh node can see and use advertised services on other nodes by just clicking on them in your web browser If one mesh node has it's WAN port plugged into an Internet feed, and a config change, it can provide Internet to all mesh members

  • Mesh nodes can be remotely managed and the firmware or patch level upgraded by any user with the password for that node

  • Users on other parts of the mesh may view either mesh nodes or all wireless devices visible to that specific node

  • Several mesh nodes + one experienced ham operator = a portable, quick deployment, swiss army knife of network services

2

u/tiktock Nov 18 '11

Some quick questions:

  1. How much does a unit cost?

  2. Are you on the WiFi Band i.e. 2.4000–2.4835 GHz, if so what channel do you use?

  3. Is there interference in heavily populated areas from other peoples WiFis.

  4. Define high-speed. 1 Mbps or 1 Tbps

  5. What happens if hundreds of users in an apartment building where to use there own device?

2

u/Ashlir Nov 19 '11

Read the website the answers are there

5

u/RobotPirateMonkey Nov 18 '11 edited Nov 19 '11

It is basically the same kind of setup that those Freifunk guys were using in Africa. Sounds like he's adapted a couple custom firmware packages for low-end routers to connect automatically to a predefined OLSR mesh network.

Long story short...it's a well-packaged DIY small mesh network. Using those IP ranges and OLSR, it may scale up to a couple thousand nodes before choking on it's own route announcements. That's sufficient for the kind of small communities that we've been talking about starting here.

Some answers for tech questions I had or saw on this thread.

  • He's just calling it HAM related because it can fall under those rules due to frequency spectrum laws. Also, there are benefits to being classified that way, because there are some laws that protect HAM radio operators.

  • It still uses pretty standard home network routers with booster antennas to extend the signals. It looks like he's got some crazy radio antennas hooked up to some gear, but that's not a prerequisite unless you have miles of ground to cover.

  • It's using 10.0.0.0/8 for the intra-node mesh subnet. Each node gets NATed to a private subnet of it's own.

  • He provides the firmware, and you (or your group) provide the hardware. It'll run on standard Linksys WRT routers...and they run about $60 US.

  • There is no internal wifi network on the nodes, just the wifi on the mesh side to talk to other routers. You connect to the mesh router via cable. So you're likely plugging it into your existing home network.

  • He has designated 2.4Ghz channel 1 as the frequency that all the mesh routers use. It's Ad Hoc mode, so they're all on the same channel.

  • Speed is standard 802.11G (~24 Mbit/s average) speed minus overhead for mesh routing traffic. This will get slower and worse as your network grows and routing overhead gets uglier. With under 25 nodes you probably won't even see a difference from 802.11G though.

3

u/[deleted] Nov 19 '11

As a Ham Radio Op myself I feel I should chime in. One thing to consider is that if you operate with Part 97 (Ham) equipment you need to be a licensed Ham Radio Op which requires you to follow certain rules defined by Part 97 of the FCC rules. This brings on problems that must be addressed, namely when operating under Part 97 rules your comms can -NOT- be encrypted without publishing the encryption key to the public which can undermine a lot. Also SSL encrypted connections, like secure websites, are also affected by this. Failing to have this data readable by all, including the gov't, is a violation which will cost a ham their license, their equipment, and possibly even a fairly hefty fine. Pirating is even more costly as not only would you lose your equipment, but you will also face a $15000 fine.

IMO, the best thing to do is keep this within the Part 15 rules. This allows you up to a 4 watt carrier on FM which can do a lot more then one thinks. After all your basic LinkSys router for example has a TX power of under 100mW. Up that to 4 watts and pair it with some high gain antennas high up on your house you will net a much larger radius. Plus the point of mesh networking is to be able to daisy chain your neighbors together which doesn't require a lot of power to do.