[OLPC Networking] Wireless Recommendations (Ricardo Carrano)

[Walter Bender]

As I recall, someone wrote a store-and-forward activity for the laptop
in the very early days of the program. What I don't know is the
current status of the work. There are many real-world examples of
people building and deploying such hybrid networks and undoubtedly
they have an important role to play in olpc deployments.

-walter

On Sat, Aug 9, 2008 at 6:46 PM, Ricardo Carrano <carrano at laptop.org> wrote:
> Hi Tom.
>
> On Sat, Aug 9, 2008 at 6:50 PM, Tom Mitchell <mitch at niftyegg.com> wrote:
>> Ricardo Carrano wrote:
>>>
>>> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 3:21 PM, Tom Mitchell <mitch at niftyegg.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Greg Smith wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Hi Ricardo,
>>>>>
>>>>> Interesting page with some great ideas. A few comments and questions
>>>>> after a quick read through.
>>>>
>>>> Not for the high priority project list:
>>>> One connectivity model that could be considered is a
>>>> disconnected model.  I think of it as a dial up
>>>> on demand uucico model,  uucico for short
>>
>> .....
>>
>>>
>>> Tom,
>>>
>>> The subject of DTN (Delay or Disruption Tolerant Networks) are now
>>> perceived as increasingly important and I am sure that, in many
>>> deployments, technologies emerging from this research and efforts will
>>> be very useful.
>>>
>>> It seems that we have another category of recommendations, or another
>>> page, which deals with the school connectivity. So, that would split
>>> the deployment recommendations into two categories:
>>>
>>> - The backhaul (or external) connectivity - the school connecting to
>>> the Internet
>>> - The wireless (or internal) connectivity - the school wireless
>>> infrastructure
>>>
>>> Comments?
>>>
>>> Cheers!
>>> Ricardo
>>
>> I suspect that DTN issues will work themselves out. They are core to mobile
>> networking futures.
>>
>> What I was reflecting on is a supplemental backhaul connectivity strategy
>> built on existing code and designs.  In the "old days" before wide area
>> TCP/IP we moved email, net news, files, sources and more via uucico (unix to
>> unix copy in copy out) over telephone line modems when daytime long distance
>> calls were expensive and the internet non existent.
>>
>> Delivery addresses were bang "!" separated routing lists. The telephone
>> calls were made on demand, or on a schedule, in the middle of the night, on
>> weekends within a time slot window so as to not overload modem banks.   A
>> subtle twist to this would be a cross between sneaker net and meshed
>> networking where a portable machine could visit collect and deliver files,
>> mail, etc. up and down a delivery route on an irregular snail mail like
>> schedule.
>>
>> Like I said not the first thing to work on but something to keep in mind as
>> a possible solution for areas with expensive or non existent connectivity.
>> It turns out that late versions of uucico work over TCP/IP making
>> connectivity transitions almost transparent.
>>
>
> And I second your suggestion. [Side note: Let's say I'm not young
> enough not to remember uucp. ;-)]
>
> I didn't bring the DTN term to the discussion gratuitously. Actually
> the example of the guy that takes a bicycle with a linksys router and
> every day rides it through disconnected villages and collect people's
> url requests (via email) turns to be one classic scenario of DTN. As
> usual, it's just a fancy name for an old problem.
>
> The email seems to be the last remainder of an store-and-forward
> application and that's why it probably fits well in this scenario.
>
> I also agree that this may not be a top priority, but I have the same
> feeling that there exists the situation where this class of idea (name
> is less important) would come in hand.
>
> So, the question is, how can we formalize a deployment recommendation
> based on that idea? Would you volunteer? :)
>
> Cheers!
> Ricardo
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