wiki:WIMXCOLUM/QSR-2011-Q1

Version 3 (modified by SungHoon Seo, 13 years ago) (diff)

draft

WIMXCOLUM Project Status Report

Period: 1Q2011

I. Major accomplishments

A. Milestones achieved

  • Completed installation of NEC WiMAX base station.
  • Running the latest version of OMF-Aggregate Manager (omf-aggmgr-5.2 package) with wimaxrf enabled.
  • Tested indoor environment: WiMAX clients with Intel 6250 chipset are able to successfully detect the base station by scanning and establish a connection through the base station.
  • Pending the onsite deployment.

B. Deliverables made

II. Description of work performed during last quarter

In the 1st quarter of 2011, we have been completed that both base station and clients are operational.

(1) Server side configuration: The installation of the NEC WiMAX base station with the latest version of OMF-aggregate manager (i.e., omf-aggmgr-5.2 package) has been completed and the base station is currently operational at an indoor testing environment at the Internet Realtime Laboratory, 7LW2, CEPSR building at Columbia University. In order to decrease the transmission power of the antenna, we used an attenuator and reduced a parameter of the base station, bs_tx_power, into the level of 20.

(2) Client side configuration: One WiMAX client is ready to be operational with Intel's 6250 network interface card on Linux operating system. Through the indoor testing environment, we checked the WiMAX client is fully functional to perform scan the NEC WiMAX base station as well as to establish Internet connection via the base station. We also have 10 AWB US210 usb dongles to connect the NEC base station in Windows operating system.

(3) Onsite deployment: We currently have the base station deployed in the lab only. Although we have all the hardware, including cables and weatherproof boxes ready, all outdoor work needs to be done by certified professionals and we are still negotiating that with Facilities. Unfortunately the initial price quote was prohibitive and we need to negotiate the price down to be able to install all the equipment at the outdoor site. There are no known technical difficulties at the moment, but we need to get all the paperwork and contracting done before we can proceed.

A. Activities and findings

The project team has worked to create educational modules for VoIP measurement in WiMAX systems. The main objective of this work is to show how parameters on both WiMAX base station and client affect the overall network system performance. We've tried to measure throughput which can be achievable at clients using real-time applications, e.g., VoIP services. By using existing network monitoring tools, such as wireshark and iperf, we can easily measure IP level (layer 3) throughput and obtain upper level network protocol header information. However, to the best of our knowledge, Intel's current version of device driver for 6250 network interface card does not provide any functionalities to monitor the layer 2 level header (WiMAX MAC level) information by using existing network monitoring tools. It is because layer 2 WiMAX frame is emulated into 802.3 Ethernet frame. The first step we are currently trying to find is whether the WiMAX MAC level (layer 2) frame information acquisition is possible, which may helpful for analyzing network performance.

B. Project participants

  • Prof. Henning Schulzrinne (PI)
  • SungHoon Seo
  • Jan Janak

C. Publications (individual and organizational)

D. Outreach activities

E. Collaborations

F. Other Contributions