<nettime> INDIA ... RURAL WIRELESS MESH: Warren Noronha's AirJaldi posting

["Frederick Noronha" <fred@bytesforall.org>]

[http://www.bytesforall.net/node/196]

The AirJaldi [1] mesh network is located in and around Dharamshala.
The network can be considered as one of the largest mesh networks in
the world. It covers over a hundred kilometers of rough terrain with a
number of mountains and hills.

Most of the network is situated in the foothills of the western
Himalayan ranges. The network has already provided Internet access to
over 2000 computers. The backbone is comprised of 30 nodes. More
information on mesh networks and infrastructures in Dharamshala will
be furnished in a follow-up article.

According to me the network can be considered as the ICT
infrastructure of the Tibetan government. This is because mainly the
Tibetan Children Village, Tibetan Medical and Astrological Institute,
Norbulingka etc use the network. The network is maintained by the
Tibetan Technology Center also know as TibTech [2]. It was developed
in cooperation with other institutes such as the Dharamsala
Information Technology Group and the Tibetan Computer Resource Center.

The network is built using cheap and off the shelf hardware. The
firmwares on the routers are modified to improve efficiency, using
OpenWRT as the base. The networks run software known as OLSR
(Optimized Link State Routing) to create a P2P mesh between computers.
The systems will move to a much more stable and robust platform called
B.A.T.M.A.N. (Better Approach to Mobile Ad-Hoc Networking) that is
championed by the Freifunk ("Free radio" in English).

Prominent personalities...

There were keynotes by:
Roger Downer who is a professor in the University of Limerick
Eric Brewer from the University of Berkley
Vic Hayes who is regarded as the father of WiFi [3]

There were also a number of presentations from other noted speakers such as

Richard Stallman founder of the Free Software Foundation
Dave Hughes who created the worlds highest CyberCafe in the Himalayas [4]
Malcom Matson who works for the OPLAN Foundation
Mahabir Pun who can be considered as the father of the Nepal Wifi Networks
Elektra an intellect in wifi and radio technologies
Jim Forster, one of Cisco's pioneering engineers

The conference had a good presence of Americans, Europeans, Asians but
lacked representation from the African subcontinent. The next WSFII
Annual meeting will be held in Ghana, in hope to increase the African
presence.

Related Links:
AirJaldi: http://www.airjaldi.com [5]
Freifunk: http://www.freifunk.net
OLSR: http://www.olsr.org [6]
wnoronha's [7] blog | login or register to post comments

[1] http://www.bytesforall.net/freelinking/AirJaldi
[2] http://www.bytesforall.net/freelinking/TibTech
[3] http://www.bytesforall.net/freelinking/WiFi
[4] http://www.bytesforall.net/freelinking/CyberCafe
[5] http://www.bytesforall.net/freelinking/AirJaldi
[6] http://www.olsr.org/
[7] warren.noronha at gmail.com
--
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Frederick Noronha http://fn.goa-india.org  9822122436 +91-832-240-9490
http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com http://www.flickr.com/photos/fn-goa/
Free Software gives you the freedom to run, study, copy and improve software!


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