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POSTED ON Mar 16, 2005 - 10:40 AM by Nyx
By Thomas J. Hardman
Wireless Hacking: Projects for Wi-Fi Enthusiasts
by the SoCalFreeNet Wireless Users Group
Lee Barken, et al. Syngress, 2004, distributed by O'Reilly Media Inc.
"Wireless Hacking" covers a lot of ground. It's intended for someone who
has some computer and networking experience. It does give fairly in-depth
coverage of networking fundamentals, but it's primarily concerned with
wireless networking.
It gives fairly deep, if not overly technical, background on all of the
wireless networking standards and protocols, such as 802.11a/b/g, as well
as covering general Radio Frequency concepts such as antenna radiation
patterns, antenna types, and methods to calculate the power required to
cover a given area or distance.
The chapter on "securing your wireless network" is comprehensive in
detail, including tutorials on captive portals, encryption and
authentication systems, NAT, DHCP, and PPTP VPN.
Several chapters give deep detail on making your own access points out of
off-the-shelf systems, including modification of the popular Linksys
WRT54G to run a variety of aftermarket access-point operating systems,
including coverage of techniques to "re-flash" the EPROM with firmware
versions of Linux. A variety of aftermarket OS are contrasted and
compared, and the basics of installing each of this is covered, some with
more detail than others. M0n0wall and Pebble are together given an entire
chapter, covering conversion of PCs of any intel-architecture type to
dedicated access-popint controllers.
Particular detail is given to the Soekris Single Board Computers ("SBC")
as access-point controllers for higher-power higher-usage WiFi access
points. This section of the book is profusely illustrated, with
step-by-step "how to", accompanied by "how it works" sections. In
particular, the "how-to" section is exceptional in discussing adapting a
Soekris SBC to use with two wireless cards to create an 802.11b
access-point connected to the rest of the network with an 802.11a wireless
backhaul.
Client devices are well-covered, from PCI adapters to PCMCIA laptop
cards, Secure Digital and Compact Flash format adapters and client
devices. There is also a chapter covering low-cost commercial options for
those who would prefer to deploy "off the shelf" rather than customizing
their own systems.
The monitoring tools chapter touches "just enough" on everything from SNMP
to installing Apache, PHP, RRDTool, and SNMP to build the MRTG
multi-router traffic grapher for both Microsoft and other operating
systems. The "Cacti" network monitoring system is also covered.
A rather brief entry covers WiMax and Mesh Networks, which at the time of
publication weren't yet subject to final IEEE or industry standards. This
is given mostly as background to cover the basic concepts and to point the
readers to online documentation of various competing standards and
experimental deployments.
Considerable detail is given, again with profuse illustration and
per-procedure "how-to" and "how it works" sidebars, to the construction
and placement of outdoor enclosures and antenna masts. This chapter gives
more detailed coverage of RF concepts and calculations of radiated power
and radiation patterns, detailed discussions of antenna types, cabling,
and connectors. Construction of "cantennas" is covered in detail.
The capstone of the book covers the construction and placement of
solar-powered access points and repeaters, giving in-depth overviews of
solar power generation and storage, collector panel mounting and
orientation, etc.
There's a rather brief chapter on organizing neighborhood wireless
networks in the FreeNet WiFi model. The book is a little bit "preachy"
when espousing FreeNet WiFi, and it's more than a bit politicized
throughout the work.
This is an excellent little resource book for anyone interested in
deploying a neighborhood wireless network, and for anyone who wants to
take things apart and put them back together to get new functions and
increased value, this book is invaluable. The breadth of coverage of many
diverse topics in depth, with a focus on hands-on and practical toolkits,
the profuse illustration and the tightly-focussed on-task sidebars makes
this book a "must-have". I personally look forward to any updated
reprinting which gives more detailed coverage to the topic of
mesh-networks and WiMax, once the standards are published and adopted by
industry.
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