Wireless Mesh Network for Campus Radio, eLearning & Communication in a Tertiary

Institution

By Nasir Faruk BSc, MSc, Ph.D (In view)

Department of Telecommunication ScienceFaculty of Communication and Information Sciences

University of Ilorin, NigeriaEmail: faruk.n@unilorin.edu.ng

Mobile: +2348032428141Presented at Youth Engagement Summit on ICT 5th December, 2013

Outline Introduction Overview of the technology Why WMNs? Application of WMN Project Target Sponsors, AFRINIC The team Main Mission of AFRINIC What is FIRE FIRE Grants Why deploying in University area? Project Implementation Workshop Gallery Impact and sustainability Conclusion

Introduction A wireless mesh network (WMN) is a multi-hop wireless

network that consists of mesh clients and mesh routers. Mesh routers form the backbone of WMNs. Some of mesh routers are called gateway nodes and connected

with a wired network. Each node can communicate directly with one or more peer

nodes The host nodes (typically stationary) can also serve as routers

to forward the clients’ traffic in a multi-hop fashion to thedestination

Wireless routers

Gateways

Printers, servers

Mobile clients

Stationary clients

Intra-mesh wireless links

Stationary client access

Mobile client access

Internet access links

Node Types Link Types

Overview

4

Why WMNs? easy deployment greater reliability self-configuration self-healing, and scalability. the nodes in the network are able to establish

and maintain mesh connectivity automatically

Applications of WMNs WLAN hotspot multi-hopping citywide surveillance systems wireless sensor networks (WSNs) broadband home and office Indoor

networking intelligent transport system networks community and neighbour networking micro base station backhaul and many

others

Project Target Innovation on access provision E-Development Workshop and training for students, local

technicians and staff members in some aspects of the setup, installation and maintenance of the SECN

Sponsors AFRINIC/FIRE (Major sponsor) University of Ilorin, Nigeria Cape Peninsula University of Technology,

South Africa Asmic Computers VT community members (Hackers, South

Africa)

The team Nasir Faruk (Dept of TCS,University of Ilorin) Olayiwola Bello (Dept ICS,University of Ilorin) Dr. Michael Adeyeye (Cape Peninsula University of

Technology, South Africa, Asmic Computers) Thomas Gone, Steve Song, Antoine Van Gelder

and the VT community members (Hackers, South Africa)

Undergraduate students (TCS dept University of Ilorin)

Main Mission of AFRINIC To serve the African community by providing

professional and efficient management ofInternet number resources

Supporting Internet technology usage anddevelopment,

Promoting a participative and multi-stakeholder approach to Internet self-governance.

What is FIRE? The Fund for Internet Research and Education

(FIRE) is an initiative of AFRINIC, the regionalInternet registry for Africa

In existence since 2007 Aims to encourage innovation and find creative,

accessible and acceptable solutions to Africa’sICT challenges.

Support activities promoting Internetdevelopment in the African Region, withparticular emphasis on the role of the Internet insocial and economic development in the

i

FIRE GRANTS A Grants programme aimed at stimulating creative solutions to ICT

development needs in the Africa Region

Small grants allocated to new initiatives:- looking for seed funding for research or implementation- looking to scale up, expand coverage or develop new components

Implementation period: 6 to 12 months

Grant: USD 10,000

Application period for 2014 Grants closed on November, 30 - 2013

2013 FIRE programme Grantee1. Dr Viv PADAYATCHY (Cybernaptics Ltd ,Mauritius)2. Jayson JOHANNES ( South Africa)3. Dr Gary BROOKING (University of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe)4. Lillian NALWOGA (Collaboration on International ICT Policy in East

and Southern Africa (CIPESA) , Uganda)5. Jane Ngima MURIUKI (Network of Non Formal Education

Institutions, Kenya)6. Peter KAAYA (Arusha Technical College ,Tanzania)7. Richard MUGATA (Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI)

Kenya)8. Nasir FARUK (University of Ilorin, Nigeria) (Me & My team)9. Dr Jean CHAMBERLAIN (Uganda Christian University )10. Jean-Robert HOUNTOMEY (ISERVICES SARL)11. Dr Julius OKELL (SYNERGY INFORMATICS, Kenya)

Why ? There are over 35,000 students and 5000s of staff

(academic and non- academic). Unilorin provide for studies, training research and

development of techniques. Reliability and availability of the existing networks. The use of cellular phones for voice communication

amongst Staff and students. No infrastructure for the legacy Plain Old Telephone

System Recurrent cost.

Project Implementation The network is made up of Mesh Potatoes (MP). Each MP features a wireless transceiver, telephone and RJ45

interfaces as well as industry standard PBX controllers in a robustsimple weatherproof package.

The telephone interface provides voice (telephony) services with theuse of traditional analog telephone boxes, while the RJ45 interfaceprovides connection to the corporate local area network (LAN) fordata and computer based services.

The wireless interface provides support for WiFi enabled devicessuch as laptop computers, tablets and mid-to-high end mobilephones. Multiple MPs are setup to form a resilient mesh network

Architecture

Accomplished

On process

Hardware Architecture

Fig 3. Interior View of the faculty

Fig 4. Showing complete set of MP and battery backup

Fig. 5. Showing MP for Department of ICS

Fig.6. MP for department of Computer Science

Phone Number DistributionOffices Number

Dean’s Office 01Department of Telecommunication Science 02

Department of Information and Communication Science

03

Department of Computer Science 04Department of Mass Communication 05

Department of Library and Information Science

06

WORKSHOP PHASE2-DAY WORKSHOP ON WIRELESS MESH NETWORK PROJECT

FOR CAMPUS RADIO, eLEARNING, COMMUNICATION AND KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER ACROSS AFRICA

Design of wireless mesh networks Over view of wireless communication Overview of WMN structure, client infrastructure Overview of Mesh routing protocols Scalability Recovery Addressing, routing and domain name resolution Interference with external networks (single homed and multi home

WMNs) WMNs for internet access

Design Authentication, Authorization and accounting WMN visualization and monitoring WMN security

Demonstration Introduction to OpenWRT/embedded linux Configuration and flashing of devices WMN Troubleshooting

WMN installation Installation of APs in the faculty Testing Monitoring Evaluation

Lectures delivered during Workshop Dr A. O. Issa LIS

Information and knowledge transfer Dr A. Tella (Mass Communcation) eLearning

African Academy of Languages Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA), Computer Aid International Computers for African Schools (CFAS) Commonwealth of Learning (COL) eGranary Digital Library eLearning Africa, Free and Open Source Software Foundation for Africa

(FOSSFA) United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) of e-learning in

Africa Open source e-learning tools; Wiki, Online Forum – yahoo/google, etc,

Dropbox, Blog, Social Networking Sites – Facebook, Twitter, ToGo, etc.

Thomas Gone from Nairobi WMN installation Installation of APs in the faculty Testing Monitoring Evaluation

Some Workshop Pictures

Dean of Faculty and Chief host of the workshop. Prof L.O Aina

HOD Telecommunication. Prof. A.Ayeni and HOD ICS, Dr. (Mrs) Mejabi during the workshop.

Mr. Thomas Gone: Explaining the procedure for monitoring the WMN

Cross section of participants during the workshop

Workshop Registration desk

Photo of students of the faculty at the closing

External participants from various institutions

Results

Fig 7. Distribution of Participants by Gender

0102030405060

Awarenessof WMNBefore

PracticalKnowledge

of WMNbefore

Awarenessof WMN

After

PracticalKnowledge

of WMNAfter

Freq

uenc

y C

ount

Exit Knowledge

YES

NO

About 2,300 calls was made in a month6,000 calls was recorded for 3 monthsCoast Saving about N 180,000 for 3 monthsN 700,000 per year

Fig 8. Exit Knowledge

Impact Provision of alternative, reliable and easy means of

communication for staff -Intranet Sharing files admin ? Course materials-Lecturers? - At the end of the workshop, this project deliver the

following: I. AwarenessII. Knowledge transfer and acquisitionIII. TrainingIV. Platform for researchV. Donation of some WMN equipments (VT, Serval and FAbfi) for

communication and research

Dissemination of project activities

Project Website: http:\\kwaraproject.ngportal.com.

University of Ilorin Bulletin of July 22nd, 2013.

Unilorin FM radio station Village Telco website, http://villagetelco.org/

Sustainability Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) National University Commission (NUC) Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TetFund) and Non-governmental organisations (NGOs). As awareness and uptake into the programme

increases, it is hoped that participants will be levied to sustain the continuous spread of the knowledge and latest developments in related areas.

Further work Connecting MPs to the internet grid Planning a fully mesh communication network based on extensive use of

Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) clients (e.g. Elastix or Trixbox) and closely following any new developments of the Firefox OS / Firefox phone as we presume this will be dominant technologies in the future.

Implementation of PSTN/GSM gateway & the billing system (software purchase, application development and Integration) designed by Ernesto Gomez Tagle G (Violetta Platar) and Abdel Wahid Sabre Ousman (Ben Sabre Fils) in South Africa. so that calls can be made from the facility to mobile stations (GSM) and other public switched telephone networks outside the University.

Software Development and installation of Automatic call logs which would provide information on the frequency of use of the telephones

Deploying TV white space solution for last mile connectivity

Other case studies Nyandeni, South Africa

The Nyandeni telco was initiated with the support of the University of the Western Cape which has provided the initial funding to acquire the hardware and the training for its installation. It is now operated and maintained by the local community.

Ibadan, NigeriaMichael Adeyeye has been a member of the Village Telco community since its earliest days. Working through his own company, Asmicom, Michael partnered with colleagues in Ibadan to set up the Ibadan Wireless User Group.

Fusagasugá, ColombiaJorge Gomez is building a Village Telco in the hills around Fusagasugá where phone and Internet coverage is not available.

Orocovis, Puerto RicoJose Soto is the President of CoquiTel, a small WISP whose goal to provide equal access to Internet and phone service to underserved areas of Puerto Rico.

Case studies cont… Kranshoek, South Africa

Wayne Abroue has lived in Kranshoek, 15km outside of Plettenberg bay in South Africa for the last 20 yrs. Kranshoek is a Griqua community. Through the wireless mesh project, Wayne’s goal is to transfer my many technical years of experience to the young generation.

Bo-kaap, Cape Town, South AfricaOne of the first pilot sites for Village Telco was the community of Bo-kaap in Cape Town. We chose Bo-kaap partly because of proximity but more importantly because the Bo-kaap community is well known for the strength of the community ties that bind it together. Village Telcos are most likely to thrive where people have already have strong reasons to communicate with each other locally.

Piracanga, Bahia, BrazilWhen Mike Jensen moved to an EcoVillage on the north-eastern coast of Brazil, he brought Village Telco with him. He has since expanded access into the local town through a WiFi hotspot and cybercafe.

Way forward for a better Africa

Collaboration amongst Universities in Africa Knowledge transfer Student exchange programme Staff exchange Postdoctoral opportunities Scholarships for post graduate studies

Industrial-Academic links Research Africa: http://www.researchresearch.com

Funding Government NGOs

Acknowledgements AFRINIC/FIRE for funding and travel grants

Attend AIS in Lusaka Attend YES Summit in Mauritius

University of Ilorin and FCIS University of Cape Peninsula, SA (Dr. Michael

Adeyeye, Asmic Computers) Government of Mauritius and Extensia ltd WaveTek Nig LTD for TV white space project Ernesto Gomez Tagle G (Violetta Platar) and Abdel

Wahid Sabre Ousman (Ben Sabre Fils) in South Africa and so of my undergraduate students who are currently working on the further work of the project

Useful references1. Adeyeye. M and Gardner-Stephan P (2011),”The Village Telco Project: A reliable and Practical

Wireless Mesh Telephone Infrastructure. EURASIP Journal of Wireless Communication and Networking, available on http://jwcn.eurasipjournals.com/content/2011/1/78

2. E. Hossain, K. Leung “Wireless mesh networking Architecture and Protocols” 2008 Springer Science Business Media, LLC 233 Spring Street, New York, NY 10013, USA

3. I. Akyildiz, X. Wang, and W. Wang, (2005)“Wireless mesh networks: A survey,” in Computer Networks’ vol. 47, no. 47, pp. 445-487. Retrieved on 31 Feb, 2010 from http://www.sciencedirect.com

4. Mihail L. Sichitiu” Wireless Mesh Networks Challenges and Opportunities” Electrical and Computer Eng. Dept. NC State University,Raleigh, NC, USA

5. J. Jun and M. Sichitiu (2003) , “The nominal capacity of wireless mesh networks,” Wireless Communications, IEEE Vol:10 Issue: 5 pp): 8 – 14 Retrieved on 29 Feb, 2010 http://wwwieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/7742/27826/01241089.pdf

6. M.I Gumel, N. Faruk and A.A.Ayeni,( 2011)” Investigation and Addressing Unfairness in Wireless Mesh Networks”, Journal of Emerging Trends in Computing and Information Sciences, Vol. 2 No. 10, October 2011, Page 514-524

7. Mohammed .I Gumel, Nasir Faruk and A.A Ayeni “Routing With Load Balancing in Wireless Mesh Networks” International Journal of Current Research, ISSN 0975-833X Vol. 3, Issue, 7, pp.087-092, July, 2011

8. P. Ball “Broadband Wireless Networks (2010)” Unpublished Lecture notes Oxford Brookes, University, UK

9. S. Hethley. “Essentials of Wireless Mesh Networking” Cambridge Wireless Essentials Series, 2009 Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York

10. Y. Zhang and J. Luo, H. Hu “Wireless mesh networking Architecture, Protocols and Standards,” Wireless Networks and Mobile Communications Series Auerbach Publications, New York