Before we talk about Juniper (and Mist, specifically), let me take you way back in time to another acquisition. I wrote that article back in 2012 after several great years of enjoying Meraki as a pioneering cloud-managed network at the same time I was dealing with endless bugs in Cisco’s wireless controllers and APs. The cultures of the two companies seemed so different- Cisco tends to be cavalier (in my opinion) about bugs especially in their WLAN related code sets, and customers are very much an extension of the QA process whether they want to be or not. Code roulette is a fact of life, and ..read more

Are you ready to get like 46 Gbps over Wi-Fi? ARE YOU? Because if you’re not, well, you’re just a big fat loser. You gotta know that Wi-Fi 7 is buckets of wireless awesome that will friggin rewrite the ENTIRE STORY of Wi-Fi as we know it, Jack! Or not. Big News from the Wi-Fi Alliance All that silliness aside, today the Wi-Fi Alliance announced it’s Wi-Fi CERTIFIED 7 program. I also spoke with Kevin Robinson, the Alliance’s CEO, late last week about the news. Kevin is rightfully excited about the promise of Wi-Fi 7, but as a geezer who has been at this kind of juncture a few times before I ca ..read more

With 2024 fast approaching, my thoughts are on the February WirelessLAN Professionals Conference (WLPC, for you hipsters in the crowd). We’re looking at the tenth incarnation of this awesome event, which I can only describe as the singular best tech conference I have ever attended. What do I like about WLPC? For starters, it’s wireless-focused. Under the heading of “wireless”, it’s mostly about Wi-Fi but with enough variety on other wireless topics to keep it interesting. It’s also a conference BY wireless people and FOR wireless people- with very little vendor influence in the mix. The major ..read more

Ventev is a company who makes WLAN environments better, regardless of which Wi-Fi solution is in use. Their antennas provide flexibility and reliability when built-in dipoles just won’t cut it, along with an impressive range of power-related components and specialty mounting enclosures that let WLAN designers get effectively creative when required. Then there is the new VenGo as presented at Mobility Field Day 10. At least several times a year, I’m asked to provide reliable Wi-Fi for a few hours in some oddball space where there is no easy way to get clients to the Internet. VenGo looks quite ..read more

Back in 1597, Kevin Bacon said “knowledge is power” before he rebelliously danced his way all over 16th century London, or at least I think that’s how it went. Consider this: if Scott McDermott had knowledge that the hotel’s fish and chips were going to be sub-par, I wouldn’t have had to watch him drool while he eyeballed my chicken and waffles (which by contrast to the fish were very good). Knowledge is indeed power. Wyebot is in the knowledge business. They are in the INTELLIGENCE business. And good intel makes all the difference, I tellya. (I’ll thank you not to pass judgement on my Wi-Fi ..read more

Now that I’ve wrapped up my trip out west and the dust is settling in my mind, it’s time to reflect on what I heard and took away from Mobility Field Day 10. Here’s at least some of my perspective on Cisco”s session, as written up as a LinkedIn article. Hint: Cisco and Meraki are now same-same. More to come ..read more

Off I went to San Jose for the Mobility Field Day 10 event, starting with the trip to the airport. I had an excellent Uber driver, and it was around 35 degrees and sunny. Security was easy and the TSA did not cavity-check me. Good start, good start… I boarded my Southwest flight- the first time I used them and fast learned their unique boarding method. I landed in my preferred aisle seat. I cranked up my library of tunes, donned my headset, and dozed in and out of sleep a bit. My musical tastes are far-ranging, and I found myself thinking about the wireless industry, past Field Day events, and ..read more

This is being written BEFORE I strap my fine posterior into a sleek American aircraft and wing out to San Jose for Mobility Field 10 (I run in those circles, you realize). A few days from now I’ll be sitting in front of the networking vendor Nile at some point and hopefully hearing something of substance about their actual products. I say hoping because their web pages and articles about the company don’t actually tell me a lot about their products, only that they are evangelists for subscription-based Networking as a Service . From what I can tell, next-gen BaaS (Buzzwords as a Service) is al ..read more

You gotta love it when things just work- especially things like cameras that you rely on to help safeguard your property in this unfortunate age of what’s yours I want and so I will take. I really wasn’t expecting a lot when I took a chance a few years ago on a brand called Zumimall I somewhat randomly picked off of Amazon, but fast forward to today and I got praises to sing. Zumimall solar-powered wireless camera standing guard at Wirednot HQ Here’s what I bought- and I bought two: The price does vary on this… like in $50-$75 range Yeah, yeah… “But Lee, it only does 2.4 GHz!” It’s also just a ..read more

I’ve never met a fellow Synology customer that wasn’t impressed with the company’s Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices. Regardless of the specific model in use, these boxes go far beyond storage and to me equate to being mini-data centers. Among their far-ranging applications is Surveillance Station, which I have ran for several years now using a couple of no-brand cameras. The application itself is pretty slick, though my cheesy cameras have been less than impressive at times. That’s one of the reasons I was tickled to hear that Synology was introducing their own camera models- the BC500 a ..read more