60-Mile Wi-Fi

This article describes the work of internet professor and developer Eric Brewer, who is working on a wireless networking scheme called "Wildnet", meaning "Wi-Fi over long distance". [Wi-Fi is the trade name for a wireless technology used in home networks and mobile phones, for example.] According to the article, "Wildnet is cheap to deploy, using the publicly available radio spectrum and the free Linux operating system on an inexpensive Intel computer board with off-the-shelf Wi-Fi radio chips. One router costs less than [US]$400 and sips only 8 watts of power. A solar panel can run it." The aim is to make the Wi-Fi internet connection available 100 times farther than available router technology provides.


Small Wildnets have been built in the Philippines and Ghana to promote rural internet penetration and in Guinea-Bissau for community radio stations to share content. Wildnet has been used in southern India, where the high-speed links are bringing improvements in eye care to economically poor villagers. The village of Andipatti is a site which has opened its own eye clinic connected to the city of Theni's Aravind Eye Hospital using a Wildnet link. The clinic can conduct real-time eye exams with doctors in Theni, over a direct connection 150 times as fast as its old dial-up modem. The installation expense was US$1,800 and operates with almost no added expenses. As stated here, the local clinic can see patients for about a third of the cost of a visit to the city hospital.


Developed in the Intel Research Berkeley Lab, the Wildnet technology was conceived as an appropriate technology for developing countries, especially in low-density rural areas. According to the Brewer, the lab's director: "Unlike a Wi-Fi antenna, which is omnidirectional and sends out one packet of data only after receiving an acknowledgement from a recipient, the Wildnet antenna is narrowly aimed at its mate miles away and can transmit and receive many packets at once without waiting for acknowledgements." Hence, it is appropriate where it can be coupled with conventional Wi-Fi spots, but where there are no telephone poles for a connection.


The Wildnet system was developed through a University of California project called Technology & Infrastructure for Emerging Regions (TIER), now sponsored by the Intel Berkeley Research Lab. Under Brewer, its next project is to provide data processing help for microlenders in economically poor countries, possibly keeping records using cell phones or low-cost personal computers (PCs).