On Wed, Sep 11, 2002 at 11:26:01AM -0500, Andy Isaacson wrote:
> Is there anyone on moos at nerp.net that isn't on tcwug-list, and wants to
> continue to be included in these discussions?  If not, I suppose the
> alias can go away.
> 

Yeah, I wanted the extra attention to this post.

> This is all very interesting, but a radio friend of mine made a good
> point when I was discussing the Moos Event with him.
> 
> In general, the AP is going to have a better transmit side than the NIC;
> it has more power to work with, a better antenna system, etc.
> Conversely, the NIC probably has lower transmit power and a lesser
> antenna.
> 
> Furthermore, an AP on Moos is going to be barraged with noise, since it
> has LOS to just about every radio source in Hennepin and Ramsey
> counties, while the NIC can hear the AP and any other radiators in its
> immediate vicinity, but not much else.
> 

Actually moos-6 was a 12db antenna on what I believe was a 100mw output 
cisco AP, I was using a 15db antenna (yes, on my truck) with a 100mw cisco
PC card, i'd say they were about equal =)

Of course, this is an unusual setup, but I'm really not concerned with
tower->ground connectivity at this point. (This is what sector antennas are
good for)

> These points suggest that we should do more than just running Kismet to
> test connectivity between Moos and a mobile station.  Kismet is a
> fabulous tool, but it explicitly does NOT test the host-to-AP side of
> the connection (please correct me if I'm wrong in this claim).  We
> should also find out how well mobile nodes can associate with the AP,
> and do some round-trip tests, to ensure that the radio round-trip is
> usable.

I associated in multiple locations to make sure the signal readings weren't
false, in most locations the signal was _very_ good, it was simply a matter
of getting out from behind houses/trees/etc.

> 
> I don't know of any pointy-clicky tools that make this easy, but I'm
> sure we can whip something up if need be.
> 
> Does anybody out there have any experience doing this kind of
> connectivity testing?  If so, are you willing to share your experience
> with the group?
> 

swap to another VT, 
kismet_unmonitor (leave kismet running, but take the card out of monitor mode)
iwconfig eth0 essid moos6
dhcpcd eth0
ping <gateway> (mmkay, we have signal houston)
kismet_monitor

drive off. 

> [Aside: The NIC has one potential significant advantage over the AP --
>  the NIC can use a directional antenna, while (in our current
>  configuration) the AP must use an omni.]
> 
> -andy

-- 
Matthew S. Hallacy                            FUBAR, LART, BOFH Certified
http://www.poptix.net                           GPG public key 0x01938203