WebJunction - Wireless Success Stories

In January 2005 Emporia Public made available to our patrons wireless access to the Internet. We purchased the equipment with money that had been given to us as a gift. I consulted with an IT person at our City offices and he gave me some valuable pointers on what items to purchase. The equipment was surprisingly inexpensive ($350 for 2 routers, 2 additional antennas and 2 POE [Power Over Ethernet] kits), and setting up the routers was surprisingly easy also. Our guy at the City recommended purchasing an omni-directional high gain antenna to replace the ones delivered with the routers. We purchased 802.11g Linksys routers (which are backward-compatible in terms of speed). We also purchased POE (Power Over Ethernet) devices that allowed us to send both electricity and the network signal over one Ethernet cord. This was great because it reduced the number of cords and allowed us to put the router on a wall where there was no power outlet.

As for security, the router plugs into our Cat5 connection on the wall which goes through our patch panel to our server room. From there it connects directly into our DSL router--outside our firewall and therefore outside our staff network. The wireless router has its own public IP address (separate from our network's IP) and uses DHCP to send the signal to the patron's computer. Through our DSL account we received a range of IPs to use.

I created a brochure about the wireless access with basic instructions about how to connect. We use a WEP key, which requires the user to input a 10 digit number to connect. Also in the brochure we include a copy of our Internet Use Policy and ask that the patrons follow this policy concerning the websites they view. (I don't know that we monitor this, but it at least covers us.) We ask patrons to sign up when they get a brochure so that we can get a rough count of how many people use our connection.

A couple of patrons have had trouble with the connection, but the problems were solved and I was able to learn from them and use the same remedies later for other patrons. The problems have been with DHCP settings.

Another problem was where to put the router. Our maintenance man built a shelf high on the wall, which has worked great. The router is near the reference desk, so the staff would notice if someone tried to steal or damage it.

One benefit for staff is that we can use the wireless access to do our inventory. I have a notebook computer set up to access the signal, and we do inventory using it and a barcode scanner. Not having to bring the items to a central location has worked out well!

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