HAM RADIO Mesh Networking 202 SeaPac Northwest

HAM RADIO Mesh Networking 202
SeaPac –Northwest Division
Convention
Seaside Oregon, June 2, 2013
Brian D Heaton
Steve Aberle
Curt Black
ky9k@ky9k.org
wa7ptm@aberle.net
wr5j@arrl.net
While We’re Waiting to Start
• Get One of These IRC Applications
–Android: SimpleIRC
–IOS: IRChon
–Windows: Pidgin
• Then Connect to IRC Server Address
• Wifi to: NW-MESH-AP1-2462
• IRC Server: 44.24.195.1
Today’s TrajecTory
1.Refresher of 101 – HSMM-Mesh Project
2.Beyond the WRT Hardware – Scale up!
3.Adding Access Points and Services for
others
4.App Demos IRC/Webserver/VIDEO/VOIP
5.Questions…
4 Questions
1.How Many 101 Grads
2.Who has a WrT54…?
3.Who has Meshed?
4.Who has other
Hardware running
Traditional Wireless Network
Infrastructure Mode
(Access Points and Stations)
• Access Points (Master)
• Stations (Slave)
• Why not?
• Stations only communicate
via access points
• Network will not function
without access point
• Single point of failure.
• Service provider model –
client stations are simply
“consumers”
Mesh Networks
Ad-Hoc Mode (IBSS)
(Peer to Peer)
• All stations are peers
• No access points (APs)
Required
• No single point of failure.
• Routing protocols handle
multi-hop paths
Mesh Networks
Ad-Hoc Mode (IBSS)
Sounds great – Problem?
• Multi-hop on-channel paths
load the RF networks twice
reducing channel throughput.
• New firmware is required for
consumer routers
• Requires a fundamental
understanding of IP
networking
This is the second “R” in the
ARRL “radio relay” in simplex
operations.
•Seen for $3.50 on EBay
•Maybe $8.00 at Goodwill
•Maybe $20 at RePC
•And $50 in the corner of this swap
meet …
•For that much – Get a Ubiquity Bullet
Is This Ham Radio? – YES!
• The Part15/ISM Bands and Part97 bands
overlap significantly.
– 2.4GHz – Channels 1-6
– 5.8GHz – Channels 132-165
– 900MHz – Full Band
HSMM-MESH Firmware
• HSMM-MESH (http://www.hsmm-mesh.org/)
– Very Simple web interface
– Provides basic functionality
– Supports ONLY the WRT54G/GS/GL family
– Current version (0.4.3) has a bug in the routing
software (OLSRd) that prevents interoperability
– New version (unreleased) claims to support other
vendors hardware by deactivating the only
security used to prevent non-ham network use
NW-MESH Firmware
• Based on HSMM-MESH 0.4.3 with a bug-fixed
version of OLSRd (not on-air compatible with
HSMM-MESH 0.4.3)
• Same hardware support – WRT54G series
• Web interface is identical
• All HSMM-MESH How-To documents are still
usable
• Uses the SSID “NW-MESH-2412” for the main
mesh channel on 2.4GHz Channel 1
(2412MHz)
Beyond the WRT54G Series
• OpenWRT is the basis for HSMM-MESH/NWMESH firmware
• Any device running OpenWRT can participate
in NW-MESH when properly configured (bug
fixed OLSRd)
• LUCI web interface is more flexible (and more
complicated), but well documented.
So What Extra Stuff Can We Do?
• Nodes can operate on multiple bands and route
traffic between bands
– Reduces traffic on the main 2.4GHz channel
• Point-to-point links on other bands
– Longer range, repeater linking, etc
• More flexible firewalling
• Easily supports multiple VLANs
• Supports packages not available on the HSMMMESH/NW-MESH firmware
– Base OpenWRT version is no longer supported
Mesh Software Etymology
OpenWrt
DD-WRT
HSMM-MESH™
NWMESH
Broadband-Hamnet™
The VCR is Flashing 12:00
Downloaded the firmware
Install in on your mesh unit
Enter your callsign
The mesh status page shows
neighbors
Now what?
Advertising is Everything!
Applications on your computer
Visible to others via the mesh
Need to advertise the applications as
"services"
IRC = Internet Relay Chat
• Supports multiple “rooms” linked across
servers.
• Connect to the closest server and see all
linked rooms.
• Rooms can be created and deleted on the fly
– Some rooms are configured staticly
• Everyone sees all room traffic no matter what
server they connect to.
IRC Room - #MESH
/join #MESH
• Get One of These IRC Applications
–Android: SimpleIRC
–IOS: IRChon
–Windows: Pidgin
• Then Connect to IRC Server Address
• Wifi to: NW-MESH-AP1-2462
• IRC Server: 44.24.195.1
IRC Server – NGIRCd
(Next Generation IRC Daemon)
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Available for NW-MESH/HSMM-MESH
Available for OpenWRT (all current versions)
Runs on any Linux system
Relatively simple configuration
Supports Linking and SSL (Secure Socket Layer)
How-To available at HSMM-MESH site
Main Site: http://ngircd.barton.de/
IRC Applications
• Iphone app here
Basic IRC Operations
• Set your nickname to your callsign
– /nick callsign
• List available channels
– /list
• Join a channel
– /join #channelname (eg: /join #mesh)
• Creating a new channel is simple – just “/join”
a channel that doesn’t exist.
– /join #somechannelname
IRC Demo
• Set your nickname to your callsign
– /nick callsign
• Join The #MESH Channel
– /join #mesh
• Say something creative
IRC Further Thoughts
• Be careful with room names on broadly linked
servers.
– #EOC – which EOC?
– #us.wa.co.pierce.eoc – longer to type, but identifies a
single EOC. (us.wa.ci.seattle.eoc is another example)
• While a single IRC server can be used in an area, it
makes less efficient use of the network
– Separate TCP connection for each connected user
– Users lose connectivity if the single main server goes
down
• All channel members see all traffic on channel
• Possible to create “secret” and “private” channels to
control who is allowed to find and join channels
Demo of Foscam F18918W
Download 17 page install
instructions from here:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DAWG-HSMM/files/
Coming Attractions
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•
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•
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QoS
VoIP
Newsgroups
Repeater Linking
Winlink Gateways
APRS igate and Digipeater (APRX – working now)
D-Rats (Chat, File Sharing, Maps, Locations)
How will you use it?
Additional Information
• NW-MESH via Yahoo Groups
– nw-mesh@yahoogroups.com
• OpenWRT
– Software, documentation, forums, etc
– https://openwrt.org
• HSMM-MESH
– How-To documents usable with NW-MESH
firmware
– http://www.hsmm-mesh.org
• Video Configuration File:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DAWG-HSMM/files/