Let's make campjs 2014 local network connectivity awesome. #3
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My suggestions:
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I don't have advanced wifi knowledge, but happy to help in general with making networking and such more awesome |
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Found some useful links: |
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The device we currently have at the internet source, as recommended by a network dude is a RB2011UAS-2HnD-IN: At the campsite also had 3 of these UniFi AP units:
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@geoffreyd @mipearson you may want to chime in on this with what you observed/learned. I noticed things were a lot smoother after @mipearson had a proxy set up. |
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So, @geoffreyd did the initial improvement by moving one of the UniFi APs into the main hall, thus sharing the ~100 device load over two aps. These APs are rated to above 30 devices per AP, not 50 or 100. My work was simpler: I set up a transparent proxy. This had three benefits:
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Yup, the load balancing was the biggest improvement to reducing local packet loss, and the proxy for reducing internet packet loss. Personally, I'm not sure I'd go for the UniFi AP's again, unless we had a whole bunch. I've seen much better performance from Airport Extremes, and easier setup to boot. If we where to have Internet again, I think we might be better of blocking all access unless through a non transparent proxy, this means it would need to be intentionally setup, so only those who really wanted it would get it. The router we got was great, while configuring it wasn't as easy as something like IPCop, it was very powerful, and changes went into effect immediately (most devices need to reboot for changes). Banning local hotspots will help, but also providing separate 2.5 & 5Ghz networks will also help spread the load. I think if we have a solid wireless setup, we shouldn't have any need to provide a separate presenter one. |
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It's important to note that some Macs with broadcom wifi will have issues with network equipment. Unifi stuff is usually pretty solid but it may be worth investigating a mac-only network or really just a separate g and n network. |
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My 2c: create raspberry pi image to use PIs (without any additional configuration) as access point (i think we had over 10 PI in total, maybe 20). Have ethernet hub with enough cables for all PIs. Install some advanced dhcp/dns/http proxies. I'm happy to try to implement dns/dhcp part in node. |
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The PI solution sounds interesting, especially since the devices are so cheap. |
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Having so many access points in the same area seems like it would cause Can the Pi's to 5gz? if they can, then we could spread things out more. With getting the Pi's to be AP's are they able todo 'extended networks', as DNS/DHCP is not an issue, the router that we already have is more than Geoffrey D. On Thu, Aug 15, 2013 at 11:16 AM, Tim Oxley notifications@github.comwrote:
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This sounds clever, but risky: has this been attempted before with over 100 clients? Remember that each AP needs to sit on its own channel, and those channels have crossover. |
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Oh. What @geoffreyd said :) Paging @wolfeidau to the thread |
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@geoffreyd - I only tried 2.4Ghz usb wifi with PI (you can get them for 5 to 12$) 5Ghz seems to be more expensive - http://www.ebay.com/bhp/usb-wireless-adapter-5ghz - 20 to 50$ |
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Worth noting that the dual-band Airport Express is much cheaper at $120/unit than the dual band UniFi PRO at $270/unit. I agree with @geoffreyd, and I think we should just buy a few airport express units and leave it at that. |
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I agree. The airport express option is sounding pretty good. I guess we put them into bridge mode and hard wire the expresses to the main router? That way the main router can handle the NAT / DHCP management without melting down. Were the APs at campjs this year wired together with ethernet? |
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Correct. Also, I suspect the bigpond modem (not the routeros unit) handled NAT&DHCP, which may have been part of the problem. Not 100% sure on this though. |
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Yeah, we had Cat5e connecting all the AP's and the router was doing the I'm not sure about the newest Airport express's, but the old (non apple tv Geoffrey D. On Thu, Aug 15, 2013 at 12:25 PM, Eugene Ware notifications@github.comwrote:
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@mipearson The net connection was double NAT'd, so the bigpond router saw our router as the only device. The biggest issue was just the pure number of connections ... I think having a manual proxy would eliminate a number of these issues. |
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According to apple, both the most recent Express & Extreme handle "up to 50 simultaneous users". No idea what that means in real world terms. |
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I agree with the manual proxy idea, btw. |
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Yes, but in real life, they do closer to ~150 pretty well. This post linked to by @eugeneware above seems to agree. It might be that the expresses have upped their game recently. |
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I'm not convinced that we really need to manual proxy - kind of defeats the purpose of providing a network at all if we need people asking us "please sir, may I have some Internet?". If we really enforce the Internet free campjs idea then that's probably appropriate, but as interesting the idea is, I think campjs needs Internet. The transparent prox and other systems in place did really well, the only thing I feel we need to hit on the head is the number of LAN connections. Once you had a connection the Internet speed was more than good enough. Also FYI, as much as I love raspberry pi, they aren't great networkers. The 10/100 on board is actually on the USB bus, and uses CPU. |
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Eugene's points 4,5,6 are really good to put in place. Wifi scanning tools periodically can ping hotspots and name and shame and block :-) |
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I am also pro-internet... even bad internet is better than no internet. Regarding airport express's - it seemed there were a lot of apple users at campjs 2, i'll bet more than a few have airport express's - i know i keep one in my gadget pack as an essential. What about BYO airport? |
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Is there some easy way we can load test a solution prior to the camp? |
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Yes, have everyone connect at once from phones and laptops at a BrisJS. That should give us 40+ devices. |
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tl;dr. |
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@rvagg what file system is on the USB stick? Does it need linux? Guess we Definitely bring it along though! On Thu, May 15, 2014 at 10:03 PM, Rod Vagg notifications@github.com wrote:
Eugene Ware Phone: +61 3 9955 7041 Noble Samurai Pty Ltd noblesamurai.com http://www.noblesamurai.com/ | eugeneware.com | |
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@mipearson @rvagg if @eugeneware brings his mac mini then we should be set for server I guess, though is it a good idea to drive infrastructure from the same machine that we're allowing users to upload their apps to? |
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I can probably bring my old laptop along and we can use it as a server if needed. It's pretty beefy, just without a hdd atm. |
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I think I have it as ext4 atm but I can be flexible if need be. Perhaps I should also set up npm as a Docker container to alleviate some of the CouchDB pain involved in making it actually run. |
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@mipearson I'm happy with whatever you're suggesting, your call! |
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What's pros/cons of the Gigabyte Brix vs NUC @rvagg suggested? |
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@rvagg would love an npm Dockerfile! :-) On Thu, May 15, 2014 at 10:08 PM, Rod Vagg notifications@github.com wrote:
Eugene Ware Phone: +61 3 9955 7041 Noble Samurai Pty Ltd noblesamurai.com http://www.noblesamurai.com/ | eugeneware.com | |
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@timoxley seems to work fine for railscamp :) Your call on whether you want to run stuff off of Eugene's machine to save a few bucks this round or set up something a bit more permanent. Question is still open re gear for other spaces. If Eugene brings his airport expresses, we're okay. Thinking of people trying to run demos in rooms, that sort of thing @rvagg You're right - that wipes about $100 off the price of the miniserver. |
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Okay. Bedtime. I'll be heading to scorptec tomorrow to get these items. If we do go with a campjs-specific miniserver I'll configure it over the weekend. |
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@mipearson yeah just get the server. @eugeneware also plan to deploy this dokku business up to a server somewhere afterwards. I'd like to be able to do an |
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may be worthwhile getting this up and running on the server https://github.com/cdnjs/cdnjs |
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@timoxley Doing more research: even with the pro, we will probably still have issues as you can only put a certain number of devices on each radio. Also doing a bit of googling I've found anecdotes of issues with Apple devices (which is consistent with my experience at out office - I just thought it was my laptop). One thing I didn't also know is that airport express will allow roaming. So, what I'd like to do is forgo the purchase of the unifi pro for now. We have one that we use in our office environment that I'll bring instead as a tester - then we can see how well it performs and grab some for next camp. (it won't impact office connectivity - it's used nearly exclusively by the IT team, of which all will be at camp!) @eugeneware Can you confirm that you'll be bringing airport expresses to campjs? And what generation? Will you be coming in on the Friday afternoon/evening? If not, I'll purchase a few tomorrow. |
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ref, unifi pro apple issues: https://community.ubnt.com/t5/UniFi/Apple-macbook-connection-issues/td-p/468937 |
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I'm also bringing my Airport Extreme (flat style, non-dual band, N 2.4 or 5gzh) and Airport Express, so we should be able to share the load. |
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Hi @mjpearson, I'll be bringing 2xlast gen airport expresses (2.4ghz), and 1xcurrent gen And yes, I have them set up at home for roaming. My set up at home is that I'll also bring a last gen (but dual band) airport extreme (the flat one, Cheers, Eugene On Fri, May 16, 2014 at 7:07 AM, mipearson notifications@github.com wrote:
Eugene Ware Phone: +61 3 9955 7041 Noble Samurai Pty Ltd noblesamurai.com http://www.noblesamurai.com/ | eugeneware.com | |
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Excellent news. If that works well CampJS can buy some of their own for next camp. My big worry is purchasing hardware and then having it not actually work in real world conditions :/ |
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Hi. Who took home the cabling from the last campjs? Reasonably sure it wasn't TEG (we got NaN & the Routerboard). @SomeoneWeird ? @eugeneware ? @deoxxa ? @cgiffard ? |
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Not me, maybe @rvagg ? |
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No, I had limited capacity for taking stuff home because I flew, I'm guessing @eugeneware who may also have the wine glasses? Unless someone's driving up from Melbourne I'll probably be having to buy new glasses for QLD. |
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Not me, sorry! I had a bagful of my own stuff to bring back on the plane.
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Hi. I have the cables, joiners, some coffee machine and @rvagg's wine glasses too. I can't make it this weekend due to a family wedding. But happy to drop the off to a plane mule in Melbourne if someone has luggage allowance to spare. I live in Glen Waverley |
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@dcousens Are you coming up from Melbourne? |
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Indeed I am
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I won't be able to fit much... But I'll take anything I can.
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It's all good. I've posted the cables up using Express Post. Should get there by the camp start. Tracking link: http://auspost.com.au/track/track.html?id=99601129587201004572503 It was addressed to @timoxley. |
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Boss! |
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Close? 💃 |
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Close! |
Wifi and local network connectivity was a big challenge for the last campjs. Let's all put on our propeller hats and think of creative ways to make the next campjs better.
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