Abstract: The ability to communicate with anyone on the planet from anywhere on the planet has been mankind's

dream for a long time. Wireless is the only medium that can enable such untethered communication. By using VLSI technological advances, coupled with the flexibility and mobility of wireless systems, are the driving forces behind the Anyone, Anywhere, Anytime paradigm of networking. With the recent advances in VLSI and wireless technologies, it is now possible to build high-speed wireless systems that are cheap as well as easy to install and operate. However, the wireless medium is a broadcast medium, and therefore multiple devices can access the medium at the same time. This paper throws light on the basic infrastructure of wireless network and design by using current technological evolution. It also includes the others wireless network solution likesWi-Fi network, bluetooth, shared wireless access protocols.

Introduction: The term wireless networking refers to technology that enables two or more computers to communicate using standard network protocols, but without network cabling. Strictly speaking, any technology that does this could be called wireless networking. This technology, fuelled by the emergence of cross-vendor industry standards such as IEEE 802.11, has produced a number of affordable wireless solutions that are growing in popularity with business and schools as well as sophisticated applications where network wiring is impossible, such as in warehousing or point-of-sale handheld equipment. Wireless networking technologies range from global voice and data networks, which allow users to establish wireless connections across long distances, to infrared light and radio frequency technologies that are optimized for short-range wireless connections. Devices commonly used for wireless networking include portable computers, desktop computers, hand-held computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), cellular phones, pen-based computers, and pagers. Wireless technologies serve many practical purposes. For example, mobile users can use their cellular phone to access email. Travelers with portable computers can connect to the Internet through base stations installed in airports, railway stations, and other public locations. At home, users can connect devices on their desktop to synchronize data and transfer files. In many situations, where lying of physical wire is too costly or impossible. Wireless network technology becomes a viable solution. Today's wireless network technology has improved significantly in term of bandwidth and range. The cost of using wireless network is much less than renting a lease line from Telephone Company. There are mainly two kind of wireless network technologies that are quite popular: Radio LAN and Infrared light beam. They both have their pros and cons. Radio LAN is more popular than Infrared. It typically offers 2Mbps in bandwidth, some recent model offers 11Mbps. For long-range transmission, it can reach up to 50 km in distance.

Need of Wireless Network: Increased use of laptop computers within the enterprise, and increase in worker mobility has fuelled the demand for wireless networks. Up until recently, wireless technology was a patchwork of incompatible systems from a variety of vendors. The technology was slow, expensive and reserved for mobile situations or hostile environments where cabling was impractical or impossible. With the maturing of industry standards and the deployment of lightweight wireless networking hardware across a broad market section, wireless technology has come of age.

Need arises to use VLSI technology for wireless network: It is necessary to modify the MAC-layer protocol of 802.11, such that we can extend the range of behaviors available to the MAC layer. The interest of the research team is seeing whether it is possible for individual MAC nodes to learn from their environment--consisting of conditions of the medium, information shared by surrounding nodes, and information it is able to deduce from its own internal state. By using VLSI technology the design of 802.11 MAC layer, the protocol and its architecture is modified so that the MAC can take on a new set of characteristics.

Wireless Network Architecture:

In many situations, where lying of physical wire is too costly or impossible. Wireless network technology becomes a viable solution. Today's wireless network technology has improved significantly in term of bandwidth and range. The cost of using wireless network is much less than renting a lease line from Telephone Company. There are mainly two kind of wireless network technologies that are quite popular: Radio LAN and Infrared light beam. They both have their pros and cons. Radio LAN is more popular than Infrared. It typically offers 2Mbps in bandwidth, some recent model offers 11Mbps. For long-range transmission, it can reach up to 50 km in distance. In most countries, Radio LAN uses the ISM (stands for Industrial, Science & Medicine) public frequency of 2.4G Hz and 5.8G Hz. For this frequency, no license is required from government. Infrared light beam wireless network is more secure because it uses light beam the size of about 2 feet in diameter to transmit data. It cannot be intercepted without alerting the receiving side. Many banks like to use Infrared wireless network between their buildings for security reason. Typical bandwidth is 10Mbps, but as high as 155Mbps (ATM speed) can be achieved. We carry both Radio LAN and Infrared wireless products. Mostly our work is to connect LAN to LAN between buildings and factory compounds. The cost of having a wireless network can be low and it provide many times the bandwidth of T1 at no monthly cost. Most products are very reliable now, having on average 5 to 8 years of working life. Actually, MCI of United States used wireless network to provide hundreds of millions of long distance calls every year.

Architecture Example:
Here we take example of LAN-to-LAN connection between office buildings in Hong Kong or to set up multiple connections in your factory compound in the Mainland China. There are three types of network architecture for the above problem: 1. By using Internet line (Figure-1) 2. By using 128 leased circuit (Figure-2) 3.By using IPLC Circuit (Figure-3)

Figure 1:By using Internet: -

Figure 2: By Using 128 Leased Circuit: -

Figure 3: By Using IPLC: IPLC (INTERNATIONAL PRIVATE LEASED CIRCUIT) is a dedicated communication service. It is a Point-to-Point link. Various services are supported: Voice and Data. It is believed to be the most stable (dedicated) communication service between HK and China. During the past few years, IPLC line cost has fallen steadily. Right now, the typical cost for 64kbps IPLC line (from HK to China) is about HK$12,000 per month (varies from company to company and China location). We are expecting its cost will fall further in the near future.

The VoIP (Voice over IP) is used to implement voice over IPLC line. Voice data will be compressed to send through the line and decompressed over the other end. This method enables a voice channel with good speech quality occupying only 8kps of bandwidth.

How do they work: There are two kinds of wireless networks: a. An ad-hoc or peer-to-peer wireless network consists of a number of computers each equipped with a wireless networking interface card. Each computer can communicate directly with all of the other wireless enabled computers. They can share files and printers this way, but may not be able to access wired LAN resources, unless one of the computers acts as a bridge to the wired LAN using special software. (This is called "bridging")

Figure 4: Ad-Hoc or Peer-to Peer Networking. Each computer with a wireless interface can communicate directly with all of the others.

b. A wireless network can also use an access point, or base station. In this type of network the access point acts like a hub, providing connectivity for the wireless computers. It can connect (or "bridge") the wireless LAN to a wired LAN, allowing wireless computer access to LAN resources, such as file servers or existing Internet Connectivity. There are two types of access points: 1) Dedicated hardware access points (HAP) such as Lucent's Wave LAN, Apple's Airport Base Station or Web Gears Aviator. (Figure: -5). Hardware access points offer comprehensive support of most wireless features, but check your requirements carefully. 2) Software Access Points, which run on, a computer equipped with a wireless network interface card as used in an ad-hoc or peer-to-peer wireless network. (Figure: -6) The Vicomsoft Integrate suites are software routers that can be used as a basic Software Access Point, and include features not commonly found in hardware solutions, such as Direct PPPoE support and extensive configuration flexibility, but may not offer the full range of wireless features defined in the 802.11 standard.

With appropriate networking software support, users on the wireless LAN can share files and printers located on the wired LAN and vice versa. Vicomsoft's solutions support file sharing using TCP/IP. Figure5: Hardware Access Point. Wireless connected computers using a Hardware Access Point.

Figure 6: Software Access Point Wireless connected computers using a Software Access Point.

Other solutions: Wi-Fi Network: Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity) is the most commonly known type of wireless network. Communications are done across radio waves, which allows for complicated networks to exist, due to the lack of line-of-sight communications required. Wi-Fi essentially means that the product complies with the IEEE 802.11b standard. The 802.11b standard focuses on direct-sequence spread spectrum (DSSS), due to the fact that DSSS can achieve a

higher throughput. There are many clear advantages to using Wi-Fi for wireless networking. It has a throughput of around 11Mbps, and is reliable. In the right conditions, it has a long rang of around 1000ft (in open areas) and over 250ft in closed areas. It is also backward compatible with older 802.11 DSSS devices. The disadvantages of Wi-Fi are that it is expensive (though prices are constantly declining), and the speed can fluctuate if too much interference is presented. Bluetooth: There are a number of available wireless solutions other than Wi-Fi, however. First of all, there is Bluetooth. Bluetooth is not expected to ever be used for high-speed transfers between computers. Infrared Data Association (IrDA) is a standard for infrared light communications. Since infrared light is used, there needs to be a direct line of sight between the two devices. Although the throughput is around 4 Mbps (which is relatively fast, though still slower than Wi-Fi), there is no real use for it in home settings, because you would need an access point in each room to provide constant connectivity.

Shared Wireless Access Protocol: Another lesser-known wireless option is Shared Wireless Access Protocol (SWAP). SWAP also uses the 802.11 specifications and communicates through radio waves. SWAP devices, however, do not broadcast on one frequency. They hop between frequencies 50 times a second, and transmit at 1 Mbps (up to 2 Mbps, depending on the manufacturer). While SWAP is cheap, easy to install, requires no access point, and allows up to 127 devices per network, it is still slower than Wi-Fi. Also, it isn't compatible with FHSS (Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum) devices, has a very limited range (a maximum of 125 feet under optimal conditions), and it is very perceptible to obstructions (walls, doors, etc) which are commonly found in a building designed without wireless networking in mind.

Defining standards & Protocols: Wireless networking hardware requires the use of underlying technology that deals with radio frequencies as well as data transmission. The most widely used standard is 802.11 produced by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). This is a standard defining all aspects of Radio Frequency Wireless networking.

Media Access Control(MAC) Classification of MAC Protocols

Figure 7 shows a classification of wireless MAC protocols.

Wireless MAC protocols can be broadly classified into two categories, distributed and centralized, according to the type of network architecture for which they are designed. Protocols can be further classified based on the mode of operation into random access protocols, guaranteed access protocols, and hybrid access protocols. In a random access protocol, nodes contend for access to the medium. When only one node makes a transmission attempt, the packet is delivered successfully. When multiple nodes make a transmission attempt, a collision results. Nodes resolve the

collisions in an orderly manner according to rules defined by the contention resolution algorithm (CRA). In a guaranteed access protocol, nodes access the medium in an orderly manner, usually in a round-robin fashion. There are two ways to implement these protocols. One is to use a master-slave configuration, where the master polls each node and the node sends data in response to the poll. These protocols are called polling protocols. The second is to operate in a distributed manner by exchanging tokens. Only the station with the token can transmit data. Each station, after transmitting data, passes the token to the next station. These protocols are called token-passing protocols. Hybrid access protocols blend the best qualities of the above two protocols to derive more efficient MAC protocols. Most hybrid access protocols are based on requestgrant mechanisms. Each node sends a request to the base station indicating how much time or bandwidth is required to send the data currently resident in its buffer. The request is sent using a random access protocol. The base station then allocates an upstream time slot for the actual data transmission and sends a grant to the node indicating that time slot. Depending on the intelligence at the BS, the hybrid access protocols can be further classified into Random Reservation Access (RRA) protocols and Demand Assignment (DA) protocols. In an RRA protocol, the BS has implicit rules for reserving upstream bandwidth.. On the other hand, in a DA protocol the BS controls upstream data transmissions according to their QoS requirements.

Hardware Requirements: Because most wireless networking hardware vendors support the 802.11 standard they can inter operate. However, we recommend verification as the standard is a fairly recent one, and does specify two different methods for wireless communications; Frequency Hopping (FH) and Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS or DS), which are not interoperable. Within a short time we expect all new wireless cards, like Ethernet cards, to become inexpensive, ubiquitous and totally interoperable. Also of note is that the latest version of the standard defines 11mbps and 5.5mbps networking, with support for the older standard 1mbps and 2mbps speeds. This provides some compatibility with different

or older equipment. Note that this new standard covers DS-type Networks, not FH types. Software access points such as InterGate which uses the wireless interface of the host computer should have no compatibility issues with third party wireless hardware, as long as standards are followed. Typically wireless hardware is identified to the software as a network interface, and therefore can be used in the same way as any other network card.

Software Requirement:1) MS Windows Server 2000 2) MS Exchange Server 2000 3) Fox mail Mail Server for NT 4) MS SQL Server 2000

Network Security: Any decision to invest in a security system is based on two questions: How valuable is the object being protected, and what is the level of the threat? In determining the security needs of networks on the "information superhighway," both questions are easy to answer. The services provided--information and entertainment, wireless communications, and electronic commerce, for example-- will have great value. Consumers and businesses alike are showing considerable willingness to pay for services as familiar as cable television and as new as cellular telephones and interactive video gaming. Electronic commerce systems, such as automatic debiting for retail purchases, are handling an increasing volume of transactions. The threats to those services already have been well demonstrated by video hackers, cellular telephone eavesdroppers and, for business applications, corporate spies (including foreign intelligence agencies). These threats can be expected to increase commensurate with the increasing value of the services provided.

AT&T Bell Laboratories and VLSI Technology, Inc., (VLSI) have agreed to develop a new generation of security chips that will make built-in privacy readily available in a wide variety of "information superhighway" applications. The companies will produce silicon chips with built-in data- and privacy-protection features for products in the areas of communications, access control and connectivity. These chips can be embedded in commercial products such as cellular phones, set- top boxes, wireless networks and controllers, smartcards, and other delivery systems for entertainment and information. By embedding protection features into systems during initial design, the incremental cost associated with their addition is small. The need for the benefits offered by security-protected equipment is growing dramatically with the increasing number of people on the Internet and other common data and voice networks, the spread of cellular technology, and the expansion of electronic commerce into the consumer market for tasks such as home banking and bill payment. Bell Labs system and security expertise will be matched with VLSI's experience in the design and manufacture of high-performance, high-complexity integrated circuits with secure features to enable an effective and practical solution to the growing problem.

Security Solutions The basic security required for the services described
above are data privacy or confidentiality, data integrity, access control and authentication. All can be provided through encryption-based systems. Privacy is the most obvious advantage of encryption. Anyone without the encryption key can't access the information being communicated without spending huge amounts of time and money. Encryption systems can also detect tampering with data in transit. For any message, a mathematical "hashing" process results in a particular number. If even a single character of the message is altered in communication, a different value will result from the hashing process upon receipt. Like encryption, this process can be implemented automatically. Encryption provides a straightforward access control method for information services. If only authorized users receive encryption keys, the information cannot be accessed by unauthorized users. Encryption-based systems can provide digital signatures, a mathematical process that can prove the source of the transmission. More advanced services, such as non-repudiation (proof that a transmission was sent and received) and

electronic notarization, also can be provided.

The AT&T Bell Laboratories-VLSI

Connection AT&T Bell Laboratories and VLSI are bringing together their expertise in secure systems to provide embeddable chips that can provide these security services.

Pros and Cons from a business aspect: Wireless connectivity for corporate information access offers a variety of potential business benefits driven by user convenience, timeliness of information, and increased ability to transact business. There are organizations out there that have adopted wireless computer technology and seen the following types of benefits:

Increased sales Decreased costs Improved customer service Competitive advantage Rapid ROI (return on investment) But keep in mind that supporting wireless connectivity also has the potential to

increase certain challenges. These challenges are central to mobile computer solutions in general regardless of the connectivity option chose. However, the relative immaturity of public wireless networks does not tend to exacerbate them. These challenges include:

Coverage Reliability Standards Speed Costs

Pros and Cons from a Networking aspect

The corporate benefits listed above are available thanks to the advantages of wireless networks. Compared to wired networks, wireless networks are:

Easier to deploy and configure

Ultimately more cost effective, because of scalability More portable Easier to maintain

Just as from a business aspect, wireless networks also have several disadvantages from a networking aspect. These disadvantages include:

Slower - Ethernet speeds from 10 mbps to 100 mbps; corporate networks require high bandwidths

Can be less secure (depending upon the skills of the network administration and security team)

Signal interference often causes disruptions in connection Systems from different vendors may not be interoperable Costly installation Someday in the future, these challenges will be overcome. When that happens,

wireless networks will be the best choice for businesses. Although wireless networking offers obvious benefits to users of laptops who move from location to location throughout the day, there are benefits for users of fixed position computers as well: Many schools and businesses have unsuitable building layouts or walls that cannot be wired for various reasons making it difficult or impossible to build a wired network. Wireless networking in these environments is a very cost effective alternative also providing future flexibility. In cases where a small number of computers are separated from a main network a wireless link may be more cost effective than network cabling although the latter is perfectly feasible. Temporary wireless LANs can easily be created for exhibitions, school or business projects, all without any trailing cabling.

Area of Application: . 1. Doctors & nurses in hospitals are more productive because hand-held or notebook 2. Consulting or accounting audit teams or small workgroups increase productivity with quick Network setup. 3. Student holding classes on a campus greensward access the Internet to consult the catalog of the library of congress. 4. Network managers in dynamic environments minimized the overhead caused by the moves, extensions to networks and other changes with wireless network. 5. Training sites at corporations and students at universities use wireless connectivity to ease access to information, information exchanges and learning. 6. Network managers installing networked computers in older buildings finds that wireless networks are cost-effective network infrastructure solution. 7. Trades show and branch office workers minimized setup requirements by installing pre-configured wireless network needing no local MIS support. computers with wireless network capability deliver patient information instantly.

Conclusion: Flexibility and mobility make wireless network both effective extension and attractive alternative to wired network. Wireless network provide all the functionality of wired network, without the physical constraints of the wired itself. By using VLSI technology improvement in the wireless network is becoming possible. We get the secure network. Besides offering end user mobility within network environment wireless network enables portable network, allow network to move with the knowledge workers that use them. . The design of high-speed wireless network is another area that needs significant research. It is an additional challenge to provide Quality of Service in these networks.

References: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. www.google.com www.wirelesseternet.org Wireless LAN ------- Raymond P.Weing www.formulasys.com www.msn.com www.com2000.com www.wireless.com www.proxim.com