MERAKI - All New Dashboard Radio Settings Page

Meraki’s AutoRF technology performs automatic cloud-based, system-wide network optimization to ensure peak network performance in any environment.  Each AP on a Meraki network continually monitors its environment for interference from other APs and feeds this information back to the Cloud Controller.  Last month we added Spectrum Analysis, mitigating interference from non-WiFi devices like microwave ovens and Bluetooth headsets.

AutoRF has always run quietly in the background.  But now, our new Radio Settings page gives you more visibility into what’s happening behind the scenes, and exposes new controls for advanced configuration.

The new Radio Power selector either allows the Cloud Controller to automatically dial back transmit power if it detects adjacent access points stepping on each others’ toes, or allows you to maintain full power for all APs.

The Channel Planning Report sheds light on how AutoRF is tuning your network, providing  visibility into the current channel and transmit power settings for each AP,  as well as the interference sources that were avoided.  If you click on the “Details” link next to each row in the table, you will find a detailed report for all of the APs in your network on a particular channel.

Regular users of the Cloud Controller will notice that some settings previously found under Network Wide Settings have moved to this page, where they fit naturally.

We hope that you find this Radio Settings page helps you better understand how the Cloud Controller is optimizing your network, and helps you to make more informed decisions about how to use the Cloud Controller’s RF controls.  Please let us know what you like, what you don’t, and what you’d like to see next!

http://meraki.com/blog/2010/10/all-new-dashboard-radio-settings-page/


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

MERAKI - Leave the bug spray to us

Cisco recently issued a security advisory about several serious vulnerabilities for its wireless LAN controllers, including DoS, privilege escalation, and ACL bypass vulnerabilities. These liabilities could allow attackers to modify your controller’s configuration or bypass your ACLs—so if it were my network, I’d certainly want a fix.
Cisco issued software updates, but they’re no quick-snap remedy. Here’s what I’d need to do before I could download the new release:

1. Follow Cisco’s instructions on the command-line to determine which software version is running on my controller.
2. Verify if my software version is an affected release. If it is, confirm which versions are “fixed” and note the “recommended release.”
3. Download and install the patch.

A few of the steps for determining patch compatibility from cisco.com

The real kicker is what I’m signing up for when I actually install the patches.  From Cisco’s advisory:

In all cases, customers should exercise caution to be certain the devices to be upgraded contain sufficient memory and that current hardware and software configurations will continue to be supported properly by the new release…  Prior to deploying software, customers should consult their maintenance provider or check the software for feature set compatibility and known issues specific to their environment.

We don’t mean to pick on Cisco here, and we certainly aren’t implying that one vendor’s products are more secure than another’s.  With any complex system, bugs and security patches will happen.  But the customer experience of dealing with these patches for traditional, behind-the-firewall appliances like wireless controllers is a royal pain. At best, they result in headaches, downtime, and frustration.  At worst, administrators miss patches altogether, and their systems are vulnerable.  Fortunately, The Cloud points to a better way.

The Cloud Controller, like other cloud applications such as Gmail and Salesforce.com, is always up to date.  We push out new features, bug fixes, performance improvements, etc. several times a day.  This is completely invisible to the customer, save for new features appearing from time to time.  (How we do this, and maintain quality, is pretty interesting, but we’ll save that for another post.)

But what about the firmware running on our APs?  They aren’t in the cloud…  Are they resigned to the fate of traditional patch management?

Fortunately, an AP that can be managed from the cloud can also be upgraded from the cloud, seamlessly and automatically.  Our Cloud Controller knows with certainty that all of the Meraki access points deployed around the world are up to date, with the latest features, fixes, and yes, security patches.

Since we can install firmware seamlessly, over the web, we’ve been able to release new firmware every three months or so, continually delivering new features to our customers. We just did one, in fact – with firmware support for application-aware traffic shaping.

Here’s what our customers saw in their dashboard before the update:

Firmware Upgrade Notification in the Meraki Dashboard

Customers can let the upgrade happen on its own, schedule it when they want it, or click “Upgrade Now” to get it right away. It’s worth noting that the upgrade process was engineered to be completely fault tolerant.  Say, for example, you lose power in the middle of a firmware update.  No problem, the AP will boot up with its previous firmware once power is restored.  This technology has let us do quarterly upgrades for four years straight and keep customers happy.

We’re excited about how this system has not only eliminated headaches for our customers, but has also enabled us to innovate much faster.  We hope to see this architecture spread to other types of infrastructure, so patch management nightmares some day become a thing of the past.


http://meraki.com/blog/2010/10/leave-the-bug-spray-to-us/


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Aims for Enterprise – eWeek | Headset Walkie Talkie

The latest update to Meraki Cloud Controllers and 802.11n access points adds application visibility and throttling capability, along with some limited spectrum visibility for non-WiFi interference.

The latest update to the Meraki Cloud Controller and Meraki’s 802.11n access points delivers a hit-and-miss collection of enterprise-class features designed to provide customers with improved visibility into and control over WiFi usage, along with automated reactions to non-WiFi sources of interference.

 

Released to customers at the end of September, the update delivers a suite of new features designed to help optimize and streamline network performance to Meraki’s APs and Cloud Controller. New application and content insight into wireless traffic grants Meraki the ability to fine-tune network performance by shaping traffic usage on specific networks, while Auto RF gives the network some self-healing capabilities with the ability to compensate against both WiFi and non-WiFi interferers.  

I tested the Meraki Cloud Controller in conjunction with a pair of Meraki MR14 access points, replacing our corporate WiFi deployment with the Meraki products for just under a month, servicing dozens of users and devices on two different WiFi networks over that time. Each MR-14 costs $799 and offers a pair of dual-band 802.11n radios (2 stream, 2 by 2 MIMO) and a single 802.3af Power-over-Ethernet-compliant gigabit Ethernet port. Licensing for the Cloud Controller costs an additional $150 for one year and includes product support, maintenance, and upgrades, or purchasers may opt for the three-year license for $300 each.

New application visibility provides detailed information about network usage, identifying not only network ports and protocols used but specific application information as well, in order to help break out how Web traffic is being consumed. Meraki utilizes its global network to help fingerprint Web applications, helping them suss out identifying application characteristics and behaviors and organizing applications into categories. Meraki claims application fingerprints are updated to Cloud Controllers all the time, so the network should be able to respond quickly if an application changes its behavior.

Administrators can view application usage information on global or a personal scale. I found I could look at traffic from the last two hours, or the last day, week or month and access pie charts displaying the traffic mix over that time, highlighting sites or applications used most. For example, in my network, I found that over a month, 63.2 percent of the aggregate WiFI traffic consisted of encrypted SSL traffic to Microsoft.com. Skype, generic Web traffic to non-fingerprinted sites, Exchange traffic to our hosted e-mail provider and Windows File sharing traffic rounded out the top five applications over that time.

Usage totals for the individual WiFi clients are broken out below the pie charts. Meraki leverages the user name (if using user-based network authentication) or the device host name to identify the device, rather than the MAC address, making it easier to attribute a device to a user. Drilling down into an individual client displays more application information, breaking out network port usage, application usage and HTTP content mixes into separate pie charts. I also found I could create my own customized pie charts for the applications, sites or network services I specifically want to track.

Beyond the fun Orwellian aspect of knowing pretty much everything that my wireless users have been up to for the last month, Meraki utilizes this information for something constructive as well, delivering traffic-shaping capability beyond simple port-based QoS. Specifically, with Traffic Shaper, administrators can create rules to limit a user’s bandwidth usage for a specific type of traffic or, if not yet fingerprinted, for a specific Website. These throughput limits can be aggregated, or set separately for both uplink and downlink traffic. Meraki offers several different categories of traffic that can be shaped: music/video, e-mail, VOIP/Video conferencing or peer-to-peer networking, among others.

As an example, I was able to limit video services to each client attached to one of my wireless networks (I set up Meraki to service two networks) to just 100 kilobits per second. This caused the Netflix application running on an iPhone associated to that network to provide a much choppier experience with lots of pauses for buffering, while a network speed test performed using the same device was not subject to the same throughput limitations.

Following the path well blazed over the last six months by Cisco, Aruba and Meru, with this update Meraki added spectrum analysis functionality to their APs and Cloud Controller with the new Auto RF feature. Auto RF allows the Meraki network to hear non-WiFi sources of interference cluttering up the RF around the network and adjust network settings to compensate automatically. However, I was underwhelmed with the feature compared to similar capabilities of those other products, finding Meraki’s implementation less helpful and less configurable.

To force a manual interference scan, I had to switch the AP's mode, causing the AP to reject client connections to both radios (on the other hand, both Cisco and Aruba allow client connections during RF scanning). This requirement is especially unfortunate because the Cloud Controller only shows RF data for the 2.4 GHz band, meaning one radio is taken offline for no apparent reason.

The RF data presented from a manual scan to the administrator is fairly underwhelming. The Cloud Controller shows an instantaneous sample of the detected interference signal strength and affected part of the spectrum, as well as a cumulative distribution that shows those detections over time. But the scans only display noise levels, so while the feature may quantify interference generated by a microwave oven or wireless camera, Meraki won’t explicitly identify the possible source of the interference. The administrator has to figure out what is causing the noise, then go try to find it. Not that Meraki presents any information to help correlate those findings across APs.

Auto RF, on the other hand, listens for non-WiFi noise as part of the AP's normal course of operation, listening by default on channels being serviced by the AP, and to the other channels as part of either scheduled or opportunistic sweeps of the spectrum. APs package up both WiFi and non-WiFi interferer data and send it all to the Cloud Controller, where current and historical data is analyzed against algorithms derived from thousands of other Meraki networks around the world.

Using that data, Auto RF can change an AP's channel assignment via the Cloud Controller when needed to work around interference, or it can adjust the radio transmit power levels. The network also now bumps capable clients from 5 GHz over the 2.4 GHz band to avoid the more congested airspace altogether. With a stark lack of a front end for Auto RF, however, it doesn’t appear there is a way at this time for an administrator to customize threshold levels for radio change events.

Also, manual interference scans tended to fail after limited use during my tests. One of my APs could conduct an interference scan for 5 to 10 minutes, while the other would fail in under a minute. The AP logs failed to identify a cause of this problem, but I’d hazard a guess it has to do with a lack of available memory on the AP.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://headsetwalkietalkie.com/5937/meraki-aims-for-enterprise-eweek/&ct=ga&cad=:s7:f1:v0:d2:i2:lt:e0:p0:t1287030321:&cd=vkKjg3fLKP0&usg=AFQjCNHS3QITiY6Eklu1Jwq3RWz-VEQQzQ

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Red Alert!! Enhanced Dashboard Alerts Now Available

We are excited to announce that network administrators now have enhanced alerting capabilities in Dashboard to help them stay up to date with their wireless network.  Under Configure->Network-wide settings in the Network Alerts section you’ll see these expanded options:

Now you can select to receive prompt email alerts when an AP goes offline or switches from gateway to repeater mode, a new rogue AP is detected or configuration changes are made to your network settings in Dashboard.  You can also customize the time delay before you are notified as well as qualify the type of rogue APs for which you are alerted to so you’re not bombarded with low priority updates.  These alerts can be sent to multiple administrators via email.  

The email alerts contain detailed information to help you determine the urgency of the situation, such as the AP that went offline or what configuration setting was changed.

In addition to the unprecedented visibility that is provided about your network through the Cloud via Dashboard’s reporting capabilities, these new alerts will now allow you to stay on top of your network even when not logged into Dashboard.  These alerts are one more tool in the administrator’s toolkit to make managing Meraki networks remotely even simpler and to enable you to be more responsive to your end users’ needs.  New alerts are now available to all Meraki customers.

http://meraki.com/blog/2010/09/enhanced-alerts-in-dashboard/


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Webinar Invite - 5 Success Factors for Upgrading to 802.11n

Since wireless devices have become the norm, the need for organisations to provide a fast, reliable and secure wireless network has become a requirement. This webcast discusses how advancements in radio technologies, wireless management, and network automation have enabled small, leveraged IT staffs to deploy wireless, and meet employee's needs for bandwidth and mobility.

What's more, we are providing a FREE Meraki wireless access point*, along with a license for its award-winning Cloud Controller, to IT professionals who attend. This AP can be used in your office, or can be taken home, to provide an awesome, reliable professional-level WiFi experience at your house. This is a £250 value, provided free for all who attend.

Meraki has taken a unique approach to wireless. They move the complexity of the network from your infrastructure to the cloud, providing many benefits:.

* Centrally manage access points from an intuitive browser interface

* No controller hardware to buy, no software to install

* Secure access for employees, guests and devices

* Self-configuring adaptive mesh routing

* Scalability for networks of all sizes

We look forward to showing you how Meraki’s cloud-hosted controller architecture can help you implement a simpler, faster, and more cost-effective model for wireless networks.

* Please follow this link for details of how you qualify to receive your FREE Meraki wireless access point.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Alvin schools select Meraki's cloud controlled WLAN Telecompaper

Alvin Independent School District has selected cloud-based wireless networking company Meraki's cloud controlled WLAN to serve its 16,000 students and over 2,000 staff members. Alvin ISD has selected 771 Meraki MR14 access points.

Alvin ISD is based in Alvin, Texas, with 21 campuses, including two high schools, five junior high schools and thirteen elementary schools. Using Meraki's Enterprise Cloud Controller and self-configuring MR14 APs, Alvin ISD has deployed 530 APs across all of its campuses. Alvin ISD will deploy an additional 240 AP's as new campuses are added later this year.

The network will support Alvin ISD's technology initiatives, including 4,400 new netbooks being rolled out across its classrooms. Meraki's 802.11n network offers RF management and replaces HP system.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://www.telecompaper.com/news/article.aspx%3Fcid%3D757834&ct=ga&cad=:s7:f1:v0:d2:i1:lt:e0:p0:t1285073436:&cd=4n_QZD_0Jxg&usg=AFQjCNEajXr_vVmwCFXqTIGJvEn-vs0PVw


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Webinar: 5 Success Factors for Upgrading Your Wireless ...

Meraki Webinar:
5 Success Factors for Upgrading to 802.11n

Thursday, September 2 11:00 am PDT 

Deploying and maintaining a wireless network need not be a challenge. During this webinar, we will explore how advancements in radio technologies, wireless management, and network automation have enabled small, leveraged IT staffs to deploy wireless, and meet employee's needs for bandwidth and mobility.

Join us as we examine the components of successful wireless deployments:

• Radio technologies, including 802.11n
• Safe, isolated Internet access for guests
• Secure LAN access for employees with WPA2
• Centralized management and remote administration
• Simple, cost-effective scalability

Sign Up for the Webinar here - https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/745260216

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Remington College Deploys WiFi with Cloud-Based Control -- Campus ...

Remington College, a confederation of private career colleges, has deployed campus wireless networks that are managed centrally through a cloud-based service. The 19 schools in 10 states have chosen Meraki to supply 802.11n WiFi gear to extend wireless access to previously uncovered areas. The campuses have a total of about 9,000 students and 1,400 staff.

The previous setup included a multitude of vendors' access points. As the students' consumption of digital content increased, the strain on the network--and the college's IT staff--grew. Remington wanted to standardize on a wireless platform that could be managed centrally from its headquarters and that would deliver a better user experience.

After an evaluation of systems from various vendors, Meraki was chosen. The expansion with Meraki didn't require deployment of a wireless controller at each location, according to the college. Meraki's access points can be managed over the Web by the vendor's Cloud Controller, a Web-based network management console.
"I would definitely recommend Meraki and have already referred it to other school groups who would benefit from this offering," said CIO Chuck Farraj. "We are big fans of the Cloud Controller, and Meraki has created the most user-friendly dashboard we've seen. It's a great product and a very ingenious way to approach enterprise wireless."

http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://campustechnology.com/Articles/2010/08/09/Remington-College-Deploys-WiFi-with-Cloud-Based-Control.aspx&ct=ga&cad=:s7:f1:v0:d2:i1:lt:e0:p0:t1281486641:&cd=gpZ13GojqbE&usg=AFQjCNE1CFyM7x2TdiDxcQKez7cvMLR-wA


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

802.11n Technology sponsored by Meraki

The 802.11n draft 2.0 standard offers several technical benefits over previous technology generations, which result in improved throughput to 802.11n-based clients, as well as greater reliability for legacy 802.11a/b/g clients.

802.11n is much more than just a new radio for 802.11. In addition to providing higher bit rates (as was done in 802.11a, b, and g), 802.11n makes dramatic changes to the basic frame format that is used by 802.11 devices to communicate with each other. This section will describe the changes incorporated in 802.11n, including MIMO, radio enhancements, and MAC enhancements.

Environmental characteristics and network density plays a significant role in the ultimate performance of a network. In well designed networks, each access point can serve over 130Mbps of TCP throughput to clients using 802.11n technology, and multiple radios can operate simultaneously to provide several gigabits of throughput.

http://searchstorage.bitpipe.com/detail/RES/1281124703_555.html?asrc=RSS_BP_KABPMANAGEIT


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Adds High-Resolution Spectrum Analysis to Cloud-Based Wireless Optimization Suite

Meraki Auto RF, now with spectrum analysis, automatically delivers consistent, reliable performance under challenging interference conditions

SAN FRANCISCO — August 11, 2010 – Meraki, the cloud-based wireless networking company, today announced the addition of high-resolution spectrum analyses to Meraki Auto RF, their cloud-based wireless optimization system. Auto RF with spectrum analysis is included with Meraki’s Enterprise Cloud Controller, and will be available free-of-charge to all Meraki enterprise customers beginning September 30.

While wireless networks are becoming more and more business-critical for organizations, new and greater numbers of interference sources – new Bluetooth headsets, microwave ovens, cordless phones, and neighboring wireless networks – are appearing every day. As a result, many organizations have turned to costly and complex wireless optimization solutions to ensure high performance. Meraki Auto RF offers an alternative: an incredibly powerful, yet completely automated RF optimization system, completely integral to the wireless network, that delivers optimal performance under dynamic interference conditions. The addition of high-resolution spectrum analysis now enables Auto RF to detect and mitigate non-802.11 interference sources.

Benefits of Auto RF with Spectrum Analysis
• Increased reliability under challenging RF conditions
• Better coverage with fewer access points
• Higher client throughput
• Requires no additional hardware, software licenses, cost or complexity

Spectrum Analyzer Key Features
• Granular reporting from dedicated spectrum analysis hardware on APs
• Quantifies interference from Bluetooth devices, microwave ovens, etc.
• Real-time spectrum visualization over the web
• Available on all Meraki 802.11n access points

Cloud-Based Optimization Architecture
With Auto RF, every access point on the network continuously and automatically monitors its surroundings for any source of interference that could affect Wi-Fi performance. Interference metrics, including newly added spectrum analysis data, are continually uploaded to the Cloud Controller from the access points. Armed with real-time and historical data, the Cloud Controller continually assesses the health of the entire network, dynamically tuning wireless channel selection, transmit power, and client connection settings to automatically adapt to changing interference conditions. Auto RF, leveraging the power of multi-tenant cloud computing, tunes optimization algorithms with inputs from 15,000+ networks.

“What our customers love about Auto RF is that they don’t have to worry about complex radio settings – they just set it and forget it,” says Kiren Sekar, Product Marketing Manager at Meraki. “Adding high-resolution spectrum analysis now makes Auto RF even more capable of quickly and accurately responding to interference from non-Wi-Fi sources, ensuring that our customers get optimal network performance in even the toughest interference conditions.”
Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Debuts First Cloud-Based Application Traffic Shaper

SAN FRANCISCO — August 11, 2010 – Meraki, the cloud-based wireless networking company, today announced the launch of Meraki Traffic Shaper, an application aware bandwidth control system integrated with Meraki’s wireless networking solutions. Traffic Shaper is the first cloud-managed traffic shaper, as well as the first intelligent bandwidth control to be integrated into a wireless LAN. It enables administrators to see precisely how their network is being used, and to reserve bandwidth for critical applications while restricting recreational network usage.

Traffic Shaper enables administrators to:
• Analyze network traffic by application or application class
• Enforce traffic shaping policies (e.g., limit each user’s peer to peer traffic)
• Stay up to date with hundreds of constantly updated application signatures
• Prioritize critical applications using QoS policies

Traffic Shaper is Business Critical
Wireless LANs have become a critical part of a network infrastructure. Yet mission-critical applications increasingly compete with bandwidth-intensive recreational applications like video streaming and peer-to-peer file. The result? The ability to intelligently control wireless traffic translates directly to business application performance.

Controlling Traffic with a Wireless Network
While dedicated traffic shaping appliances are available, they come at a considerable cost – often tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars – and require yet another solution to be deployed, maintained, and managed. Integrating Traffic Shaper directly into the wireless LAN provides intelligent bandwidth control with no additional cost and complexity.

Cloud Based Application Signatures are Always Up to Date
Traffic Shaper’s cloud-based signature database is constantly updated, enabling Traffic Shaper to identify new and changing applications without requiring the administrator to download and install software updates. Meraki’s cloud-based architecture also enables Traffic Shaper to continually learn from Meraki’s 15,000+ networks and millions of users, increasing the accuracy and precision of application fingerprints.

Line-Rate Layer 7 Fingerprinting on Every Access Point
Traffic Shaper operates through a custom-built layer 7 packet inspection engine running on each Meraki 802.11n access point. Meraki Traffic Shaper recognizes hundreds of applications, including recreational applications such as YouTube and BitTorrent, and business applications like Salesforce.com and Google Apps. Traffic Shaper provides extensive visibility and control into network usage. Administrators may view and control bandwidth consumption by application, by content type (e.g. video, audio, text), and by user. Meraki Traffic Shaper runs at line rate, with no loss of performance.

Beta-Tested by Top Universities and Enterprises
Traffic Shaper has been beta-tested by a number of Meraki Enterprise customers, including Stanford University’s Computer Science department, Foster Pepper PLLC, and Sweet Briar College.

“For wireless-heavy campuses like ours, this is an essential tool for managing bandwidth,” said Aaron Mahler, Director of Network Services at Sweet Briar College. “As we move critical applications for staff and faculty to the cloud, we have to ensure uninterrupted access to these tools while maintaining a quality experience for recreational users. Traffic Shaper empowers us with detailed knowledge of how people are actually using the network so we can make educated decisions when it comes time to add bandwidth.”

“With the proliferation of business-critical web applications, and bandwidth-intensive recreational applications spilling over to business and campus networks, application-aware bandwidth control is a key to a high-performance wireless network,” says Meraki CEO Sanjit Biswas. “Traffic Shaper is a huge step forward in enabling administrators to understand and control what is flowing over their networks Our cloud-based architecture lets us deliver features like Traffic Shaper without adding cost or complexity to our customers’ networks.”

Traffic Shaper will be available for use by all Meraki Enterprise customers, with no additional hardware or software, and at no additional cost. Traffic Shaper is currently in beta, and will be generally available September 30.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Extends "Free The Net" Project In San Francisco To ...

Meraki, the company that is pioneering new technologies to bring the next billion people online, announced today it will "unwire" affordable housing in San Francisco, another milestone in the company's effort to bring free broadband wi-fi access to the city's residents.

"The Meraki mission is to change the economics of Internet access for everyone, including those who live in some of our most underserved communities," said Sanjit Biswas, CEO and founder of Meraki. "For a fraction of the cost of hardwiring these communities, we will bring high-speed Internet access to families who have never had access in their home before. And we're bringing new communities online everyday across the globe."

Already Meraki has established free wireless access in Altamont Hotel and Dunleavy Plaza, two of the city's affordable housing communities that provide single occupancy and family housing to over 100 tenants. Over the coming months, Meraki will extend Free the Net to dozens of similar communities in San Francisco.

Mayor Gavin Newsom and Sanjit Biswas appeared together today at the Altamont Hotel and Valencia Gardens where they spoke about unwiring the city.

"San Francisco is one of the most connected cities in the country and we are excited to support the work of companies such as Meraki in their endeavor to bring wifi access to every neighborhood in the city," said Mayor Gavin Newsom. "It is due to local based companies like Meraki who blend the best technology with the best intentions and an ability to execute which make our city great."

Meraki also said it has added new neighborhoods to its "Free the Net" network in the city. Residents in Noe Valley and Bernal Heights are now connecting to the network. Residents in those neighborhoods as well as those in the Mission, Alamo Square Hayes Valley, Nob Hill, Russian Hill and the Castro can now sign up at http://sf.meraki.com ; to find out how they can help spread access throughout their community. Meraki is providing this free access as it tests its ability to bring wireless access to an entire city.

San Francisco residents have transferred more than 25 terabytes of data on the Meraki network and activity on the network has increased 120% since January of this year. In the meantime, Meraki wireless networks continue to proliferate around the country. Thousands of Meraki networks have been established in more than 100 countries across the globe.

Meraki's technology is unlike any other wireless access technology currently available. Every point in the network communicates with each access point and reports information back to a central server which can optimize speed and performance throughout the network.

Meraki is funding the entire cost for establishing the network across the city, including affordable housing communities. The company is funding "Free the Net" in order to demonstrate to other communities around the world that Meraki technology can be used to create city-wide wireless networks at a fraction of current costs. No public funds will be used to build the Meraki wireless network in San Francisco.

Meraki said it will initially use Wi-Fi technology to build its network, but plans on updating and improving the technology infrastructure with technology innovations developed by the company or others.

The company expects to have "Free the Net" access points up and running in every neighborhood of the city by the end of this year. Meraki makes their new home in San Francisco this week.

http://lifestyletom.com/path/rao10925685146ros/roin59012456772


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

WiFi at your event should just work

 

It doesn't matter ho larger or small the conference is, it seems like they always have WiFi problems. The networks are consistently slow, frequently fail, and usually require some arcane security measure that involve weirdly-small scraps of paper and bizarre usernames.

There's no reason for WiFi to be this frustrating!

At Meraki, we've had some experience setting up WiFi at large events so we know it can be done, it's just a matter of having the right equipment and a little know-how. We'll give you both, for free.

We've started a new project to loan our enterprise-grade WiFi gear to smaller tech conferences, meetups, BarCamps, WordCamps, Tweetups, whathaveyou … for free. You provide the Internet connection, and we'll provide a rock-solid WiFi connection. All we ask in return is that if you like our products, tell your friends, and if not, let us know how we can make them better.

We've just gotten started with this project, but so far, meetups like SF Beta, WordCamp Boulder, and Hacks/Hackers NYC have had great experiences.

"One of the best decisions we made for our conference. Not only was the delivery and setup effortless, our network remained stable throughout the entire day. No matter your wireless needs, this experience alone tells me Meraki's solutions are some of the best." —WordCamp Boulder

As part of this project, we're excited to be partnering with Social Media Club and WordCamp.org. We'll offer a streamlined signup process for the many BarCamp-style events that these organizations sponsor throughout the year.

If you run an event and would like to participate in our new Free Event WiFi project, we'd love it if you signed up! We're looking for small to medium-sized events that have enough bandwidth to support that group.

More information

If you're interested, head on over to the signup page to learn more or take a look at our plug-and-play setup guide, or ask any questions below!

http://meraki.com/blog/2010/07/wifi-at-your-event-should-just-work/

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Wireless LAN Reviewed – SmallNetBuilder « Chicago Mac/PC ...

Meraki Wireless LAN Reviewed – SmallNetBuilder. This is a great way for small business of under 5000 to get wireless access without having to pay for expensive consulting or design. Enhanced by Zemanta ...

Chicago Mac/PC Support - http://chimac.net/

http://chimac.net/2010/07/28/meraki-wireless-lan-reviewed-smallnetbuilder/

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Remington College Deploys Meraki at 20 Campuses Nationwide

Meraki, the cloud-based wireless networking company, today announced that Remington College, a career school and technical college, has selected Meraki to provide wireless networking to its 20 campuses. 

The deployment will upgrade all of Remington’s campuses to 802.11n and extend connectivity to previously uncovered areas, campuses, enhancing the Wi-Fi experience for the college’s 9,000 students and 1,400 staff.
Headquartered in Heathrow, Florida, Remington College is an accredited college offering career training and associates and bachelors degrees in areas such as business, information technology and graphic design. Remington College’s 20 campuses span the country, from Tampa to Honolulu.

Prior to Meraki, Remington College had deployed unmanaged wireless access points from a number of vendors. As the students’ consumption of digital content increased, the strain on the network – and Remington College’s IT staff – grew. Remington College sought to standardize on a wireless platform that could be managed centrally from its headquarters, and that would deliver a better experience to its students across all 20 campuses.

Remington College evaluated systems from Aruba, HP, and Meraki. Aruba and HP’s traditional controller-based solutions required deploying wireless controllers in each of Remington College’s 20 locations, while Meraki’s access points were centrally managed over the web by Meraki’s Cloud Controller, with no on-site controller hardware. In addition to lowering the cost of the deployment, this architecture proved far simpler to deploy and maintain, allowing Remington College’s small IT staff to “set it and forget it,” and focus their time on strategic activities.

“I would definitely recommend Meraki and have already referred it to other school groups who would benefit from this offering,” said Chuck Farraj, Chief Information Officer, Remington College. “We are big fans of the Cloud Controller, and Meraki has created the most user-friendly dashboard we’ve seen. It’s a great product and a very ingeneous way to approach enterprise wireless.”

About Meraki
Meraki offers enterprise-class wireless networks at a fraction of the cost and complexity of traditional networking vendors. Using Meraki’s unique cloud-based architecture, an administrator can configure thousands of Meraki access points over the web through a single interface. The company’s customers range from enterprises to world-class educational institutions. Meraki wireless networks serve millions of users on over 15,000 networks in more than 140 countries. Meraki is located in San Francisco, California, and is funded in part by Sequoia Capital and Google. Follow Meraki on Facebook and Twitter. For more information, go to www.meraki.com.

About Remington College
Remington College is a common name used by all 20 campuses of a group of affiliated companies of privately-owned, post-secondary educational institutions based in Heathrow, Florida. Through its campuses, Remington College offers diplomas, bachelor’s and associate’s degrees in a variety of fields, including: cosmetology; nursing; healthcare; criminal justice; business; electronics; information technology; and more. Course offerings vary by campus. Remington College and its predecessor companies have been part of the higher education community since 1985. For more information, please visit http://www.remingtoncollege.edu/.


Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Remington College deploys Meraki's wireless networking - Telecompaper

US career school and technical college Remington College has selected cloud- based wireless networking company Meraki to provide wireless networking to its ...

www.telecompaper.com/news/article.aspx?cid=745657

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Who is on your Network RIGHT NOW? Introducing Live Client Tools

One of the most challenging aspects of managing large distributed networks is troubleshooting issues when the client is across town (or maybe even across the country!).  Having on-site IT personnel 24/7 at even small satellite branch offices can require a very large IT staff and is too expensive for most organizations. 

Meraki networks offer a variety of "remote hands" troubleshooting tools, helping network admins diagnose and resolve many wireless connectivity issues without dispatching IT staff to the site.  The ability to run diagnostic checks such as pinging an access point, running a throughput test from Dashboard, or reviewing detailed event logs have been integral to Meraki's value for distributed networks and organizations with small IT staffs and large footprints.

We are now announcing a set of Live Client Tools that expose even more up-to-the-second information about who is on a wireless network, and further help troubleshoot connectivity issues.  Administrators who log into their Enterprise network in Dashboard will notice several new and improved areas.  On the Monitor > Overview page, there is now a new addition under the network name showing the number of clients that are associated at that moment:

If you click on the "More" link, you will see an expanded list with more information, including which SSIDs and channels the clients are using.  This data is automatically refreshed as long as the "More" link is expanded.

Even cooler, Enterprise customers can change the access points map to show where clients are associated: click the "Options" menu on the map and select "Current clients."



But the really interesting stuff is on the Access Point and Client detail pages.  The Access Point detail page used to look like this:

Now, all of the live tools have been consolidated into a new, cleaner layout.  Both Pro and Enterprise networks will benefit from the new layout.  Enterprise networks now have two additional features in this area: Current Clients and Ping Client MAC.  Clicking on the play icon next to Current Clients will pop up a list of all clients associated to that AP at that instant, including useful information about each client such as MAC, SSID, channel, signal strength, and how long they have been associated.  Click on the name of a client to go to its client details page.  You'll even see clients that have associated, but not authenticated (they're listed in grey).  If you click the Ping link next to the client, you can actually ping that client in real time using ARP, as well as get additional information, such as RSSI changes over time and 802.1X identity (if appropriate).

The other new addition, Ping Client MAC, allows you to enter a MAC address and try to ping it.  This can be very useful if you are trying to determine if a particular device is on your network at that moment.

There is also a new Live Tools section on the client detail page.  From this page you can also ping that individual client, but there are a few additional new tools:

The Locate Client tool allows you to find out whether that client is associated on your network at that moment, and if so, where they're associated and for how long:

Finally, the Packet Counter tool shows a real-time count of received and sent packets to that client.  You can actually see the packet counters roll as you ping the client!

We think these new tools further improve Meraki's uniquely clear approach to distributed, multi-site network management, a normally challenging task.  Network administrators can more quickly resolve their wireless users' connectivity issues and access accurate real-time data about the exact state of their network.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

A

Meraki - Get a Bird's Eye View of All Your Wireless Networks

Meraki’s cloud-based architecture makes it an ideal choice for distributed, multi-site systems of networks, with administrators able to manage up to 1,000 networks from a single web browser using Dashboard. We’ve recently added a feature that makes it even easier to visualize and manage geographically distributed networks. Users who have logged into Dashboard in the last day may have noticed a new link above the network name on the Monitor > Overview page:

The link is the name of the organization that contains the network. (The network selector at the top of the page groups your networks by organization. Many of our network administrators have just one organization, but it’s not uncommon to have more — one for Enterprise networks and one for Pro networks, for example.) Clicking on this link will take you to a new page, the All-Network Overview page:

This displays all of an organization’s networks on single map. These networks are listed at the top of the screen, along with color coded markers so that each network can be easily located on the map below. The usage graph displays cumulative usage across all listed networks. If you mouse over a particular network name, that network’s usage is highlighted on the usage graph, and its network markers are highlighted on the map below.

Jump to a network’s overview page by clicking its name, or jump to a particular access point in any of your networks by double-clicking its marker. If you’d like to see all your networks’ access points color-coded by status, that’s easy too: just uncheck “Color by network” on the map’s Options menu.

You can also get to the All-Network Overview page by choosing “All-network overview” from the network selector:

The All-Network Overview page is available today to all Meraki network administrators with two or more networks. This is a great tool to assist with managing large, multi-site deployments and we are very excited about this new addition to Dashboard.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Introduces First Solar Powered Outdoor WiFi Access - Congo ...

New Meraki Solar and Meraki Outdoor Work Together to Cover Entire Neighborhoods with Outdoor Wireless Access

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA – June 4, 2007 — Meraki Networks, pioneer of the first consumer wireless mesh Internet network designed to “unwire the world,” today announced the new Meraki Outdoor repeater and the Meraki Solar accessory, that together can cover entire neighborhoods with Wi-Fi access.

Priced at just $99, Meraki Outdoor can send a signal up to 700 feet. Paired with Meraki’s existing indoor $49 Mini, the Meraki Outdoor repeater can power access for dozens of households sharing one high speed connection. Meraki Outdoor can be easily installed on a wall or even a pole outside the house. It marks another step forward in Meraki’s efforts to change the economics of Wi-Fi access, driving the cost per household of high speed connections to $1 to $2 a month.

Adding the Meraki Solar accessory kit (priced separately) will allow the repeater to broadcast a signal without being connected to any electrical source, making it an ideal solution for any community, even emerging markets where electricity is scant or unreliable. Once connected, Meraki Solar’s power usage can be distributed throughout the day and managed by the Meraki Dashboard service ensuring the repeater is powered during peak usage times. The Meraki Dashboard is a web-hosted management tool designed to make monitoring, configuring, and monetizing a Meraki Network easy and is included with all Meraki products for no additional charge. The solar kit includes a solar panel, battery pack and an outdoor Ethernet cable.

“To change the economics of Wi-Fi access across the globe, there’s got to be a simple, efficient and inexpensive method for sending the signal long distances outdoors,” said Sanjit Biswas, CEO and a co-founder of Meraki. “The Meraki Solar and Meraki Outdoor will play an important role in our efforts to bring the next billion people online in the coming years.”

Formally launched just months ago, Meraki is already enabling Internet access around the globe. Today, more than 1,000 Meraki networks are up and running in more than 35 countries, providing access to about 40,000 users. Networks exist in a variety of economic and geographical landscapes – from urban networks in San Francisco, Portland and Caracas to rural networks in Alaska, Ecuador, and Brazil.

Some of the technical specifics of the Meraki Outdoor and Meraki Solar kit:

The Meraki Outdoor is an indoor/outdoor repeater that supports high gain and directional antennas and works with other Meraki repeaters to create robust networks. Features include:

- Unique industrial design (weatherproof plastics, easy to mount)
- Dual SSID supports public and private networks on the same connection
- Long-range support (400-700 ft; 6-18 miles with point-to-point antenna)
- 2 x 100Mbit Ethernet ports
- Low-cost: $99
The Meraki Solar accessory kit enables consumers to power their outdoor Wi-Fi with solar energy and is ideal for rural or urban settings.

- First solar repeater for the consumer market
- Regulates its own energy usage, providing up to 3x energy efficiency
- Pricing will be set this summer but the Meraki Solar will clearly be the most affordable option on the market
Both Meraki Solar and the Meraki Outdoor are expected to ship late this year.

Meraki’s mesh networking enables anyone to easily and affordably install wireless networks in their home, apartment building, or across a city. The mesh topology enables multiple people to share one Internet connection, significantly changing the cost of Internet access. The Meraki system includes inexpensive hardware, network management tools, and online billing services.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud

Meraki Enhances Network Insight Technology With Apple iPad Fingerprinting

Meraki, the cloud-based wireless networking company, today announced that its Network Insight technology now fingerprints Apple iPads, aiding wireless network administrators in analyzing and supporting their networks.

Network Insight is a technology unique to Meraki's Enterprise Wireless LAN, wherein Meraki's access points perform application-level inspection on wireless traffic, capturing forensics information used by network administrators to analyze network activity and troubleshoot client issues. The technology identifies network events (DNS, ARP, HTTP, etc), and client information such as the NetBios name, MAC address, operating system, and device make and model. This deep packet inspection operates at line-rate, with no drop in performance.

Once captured, this data is uploaded to the Enterprise Cloud Controller, Meraki's hosted network intelligence platform, allowing a network administrator to access the entire network's data from Meraki's browser-based Dashboard management tool.

With the enhancements announced today, Network Insight distinguishes Apple iPads from other devices running the iPhone OS, namely iPhones and iPod Touches.

"There is incredible excitement around the iPad, yet network administrators are eyeing it with caution," said Kiren Sekar, Product Marketing Manager at Meraki. "After the iPad's well-publicized DHCP renewal bug, as well as the potential for significant bandwidth consumption, administrators need visibility into their networks to see the iPad's impact and to support their users. Meraki's enhancements to Network Insight make this simple."

In use at MIT CSAIL network (covering MIT's largest interdepartmental laboratory), Network Insight identified iPads as a significant driver of wireless traffic. For the week ending May 21st, iPads made up 9 percent of all iPhone OS devices on the network yet consumed more than half of the bandwidth. The average iPad user transferred more than 300MB over the week, compared to an average of 31MB for iPhone users and 12MB for iPod Touch users. Over all, 40 iPads transferred 13.3GB, out of a total of 4192 devices that had transferred nearly 1TB of wireless data.

"The visibility that Meraki provides into their wireless solution is invaluable in understanding our network and supporting our users", says Jack Costanza, Assistant Director at MIT CSAIL. "Meraki removes the guesswork and uncertainty as we encounter new devices like the iPad that require us to adapt to new usage patterns."

iPad fingerprinting is available immediately for all Meraki Enterprise Cloud Controller customers.

About Meraki:
Meraki offers enterprise-class wireless networks at a fraction of the cost and complexity of traditional networking vendors. Using Meraki's unique cloud-based architecture, an administrator can configure thousands of Meraki access points over the web through a single interface. The company's customers include small-to-medium sized businesses, global hotel chains, and world-class educational institutions. Meraki wireless networks serve millions of users on over 15,000 networks in more than 140 countries. Meraki is located in San Francisco, California, and is funded in part by Sequoia Capital and Google. Follow Meraki on Facebook and Twitter. For more information, go to www.meraki.com.

Join Us: http://bit.ly/joincloud