Chapter 1

Overview of Wireless Standards, Organizations, and Fundamentals

Exam Essentials
Know the three industry organizations
Understand the roles and responsibilities of the regulatory domain authorities, the IEE, and the Wi-Fi Alliance.

Understand Core, Distribution and Access

Know where 802.11 technology is deployed in fundamental network design

Understand wavelength, frequency, amplitude, and phase

Know the definitions of each RF characteristics

Understand the concepts of modulation

ASK, FSK, PSK are three carrier signal modulation techniques

History of WLAN
Trace back to 19th century scientists
Radio Frequency

WWII
Tramsitting encrypted plans over RF

Spread Spectrum Technology created 1970s-Aloha Net 1990s-Early commercial development

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Standards Organizations
FCC IEEE Wi-Fi Alliance ISO

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FCC
Regulates Communication in the US Regulate Licensed and Unlicensed
Wireless LAN mostly in unlicensed

Regulates:
Frequency Bandwidth Maximum Power of the intentional Radiator Maximum equivalent isotropically radiated power (EIRP) Use (indoor and/or outdoor)
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FCC
Regulates Communication in the US Regulate Licensed and Unlicensed
Wireless LAN mostly in unlicensed

Regulates:
Frequency Bandwidth Maximum Power of the intentional Radiator Maximum equivalent isotropically radiated power (EIRP) Use (indoor and/or outdoor)
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 Manage RF for USA 802.11 wireless can use both licensed and unlicensed frequencies Unlicensed means no cost to users
2.4 Ghz industrial, scientific and Medical (ISM) 5 Ghz Unlicensed National Inforamtion Infrastructure (UNII) band
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Federal Communications Commission

ITU-R
Manages global spectrum of RF

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IEEE
Defines the 802 series standards
802.3 Ethernet 802.11 Wireless

Document the technical and equipment basics

Can be different interpretations

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Wi-Fi Alliance
Starting with 802.11b manufacturers formed WECA
Promote technology Support interoperability

In 2000, WECA became WiFi Alliance

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Interoperability Certifications
Addressed the issue of standards Help growth and progression Allow interoperability

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 Created due to weak security in initial standards Interim solution before 802.11i
Temporal Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP) Passphrase 802.1X/EAP

Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) Certification Overview

Two Modes
Personal
Home Office

Enterprise
Larger Deployment (Servers)
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Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA 2.0) Certification Overview

Post 802.11i
WPA 2.0

Personal and Enterprise More advanced security

Personal mode security uses a passphrase
Generates a 256 bit preshared key

Enterprise mode uses 802.1X/EAP

Port based authentication designed for enterprises Strong security and external authentication
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Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA 2.0) Certification Overview

WiFi Alliance Security Mechanism Authentication Mechanism Cipher Suite/Encryption Mechanism

WPA-Personal
WPA_Enterprise WPA2.0 Personal

Passphrase
802.1x/EAP Passphrase 802.1x/EAP

TKIP/RC4
TKIP/RC4 CCM/AES or TKIP/RC4 CCM/AES or TKIP/RC4

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 Proactive certification for 802.1e

Wi-Fi Multimedia (WMM) Certification Overview

Address QOS for wireless networks

WMM Validates the features of 802.11e

Vendor neutral QOS approach Ciritical for interoperability

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Wi-Fi Multimedia Power Save (WMM-PS) Certification Overview

Designed for Mobile devices with battery issues
VoIP Phones Notebooks PDAs Headsets Mice Keyboards

Allow dozing to save battery May affect performance

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 Designed for simple set up of wireless for SOHO networks Requires support for two types of authentication
Push Button Config (PBC) PIN based config

Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) Certification Overview

Enables automatic configuration of network names and WPA2 security Both methods need to be supported Near Field Communications also supported
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ISO
Identifies standards for business, government and society Created the OSI model for computers networking
Not implemented, but often referenced

Should understand the layers

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OSI Model
Layer 7- Application Layer 6-Presentation Layer 5- Session Layer 4- Transport Layer 3-Network Layer 2-Data Link
LLC MAC

Layer 1-Physical

Please Do Not Throw Sausage Pizza Away All People Seem To Need Data Processing
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Core, Distribution, Access

Core
No routing-High Speed Switching Redundant Solutions

Distribution
Router Traffic between LANS/VLANS Wireless Bridges can operate here

Access
Slower delivery to end user devices To the desktop 802.11 Mostly implemented at access layer
Access points
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Communications Fundamentals
Most people have a basic idea about transfer of data This section gives more background on fundamental communications for wireless

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Carrier Signals
Need to be able to transmit two states:
1 or 0

AC or DC alone wont do it, need to alternate or modulate The base signal that is modified is called the Carrier Signal The method of adjusting it is the modulation technique
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Amplitude and Wavelength

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Key wave terms

Amplitude is a measure of the height of a wave. The higher the amplitude, the higher the power. Wavelength is the measure of the length between peaks. Frequency is how often the peaks come in a period of time, usually measured in Hertz (times per second). Phase is usually used to refer to the relationship between two waveforms of the same frequency. Phase is measured in degrees.
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Amplitude and Wavelength

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Phase

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Keying Methods
Signal transmitted from the transceiver has to be manipulated to let receiver distinguish between 1 and 0
This is the keying method Also known as modulation techniques

Amplitude Shift Keying Frequency Shift Keying Phase Shift Keying

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Current State Keying

Uses the current (in time) value to show a 1 or 0 Whatever the current state is is the binary 0
Other state is 1

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State Transition Keying

The change, or lack of change will signify a 0 or 1 0 is a change in state 1 is no change in state of signal

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Amplitude-Shift Keying
Uses the height, or amplitude of the wave to signal change. Current state technique
A shift indicates a change from current signal

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Frequency-Shift Keying
Uses the frequency, or number of cycles per second to indicate change. Current state technique
A shift indicates a change from current signal

Used in legacy (older) 802.11 technologies

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Phase-Shift Keying
Varies the phase of a signal to represent data State Transition technique

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Phase-Shift Keying-Advanced
Can encode multiple bits per symbol as well
Use four different phases
Multiple Phase shift Keying

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Exam Essentials
Know the three industry organizations
Understand the roles and responsibilities of the regulatory domain authorities, the IEE, and the Wi-Fi Alliance.

Understand Core, Distribution and Access

Know where 802.11 technology is deployed in fundamental network design

Understand wavelength, frequency, amplitude, and phase

Know the definitions of each RF characteristics

Understand the concepts of modulation

ASK, FSK, PSK are three carrier signal modulation techniques
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