Author: j2sw

Categories
Wireless WISP

LigoWave APC Button First view

Ligowave has recently launched a small form factor 802.11N radio. This is one of the growing number of devices designed for the SOHO and small and medium enterprise installs. You can read the full data sheet here. https://www.ligowave.com/public/downloads/APC%20button.pdf

IMG_2890

IMG_2891

One of the first things I do with a unit like this is login and look at the existing firmware.  My unit came with Version 5.95 and the latest available was 7.02.  Since this is a new platform for me, I can’t speak to the in the firmware, other than what I saw on the surface.

I noticed some cool things about this unit, which some other vendors are lacking at the moment

Spectrum Analyzer
The spectrum analyzer under tools loaded very quickly.  No complicated Java or slow load times.  The following is a screenshot from it sitting on my desk.

.Screen Shot 2016-05-06 at 12.15.49 AM (2)

Site Survery
Just like the spectrum scan the site survey was quick and trouble-free. It picked up everything I expected it to see. It is very handy to just pop into a unit and see what it sees.

Screen Shot 2016-05-06 at 12.15.32 AM (2)

SNMP and SMTP traps
Something that is very handy for the small office or small deployment was under services…System alerts. You can have the device send an e-mail or SNMP trap based upon some things most folks would really like to know about. For example, if the noise floor gets greater than a certain DB it will let you know.  Pretty cool

Screen Shot 2016-05-06 at 12.23.21 AM (2)

These have a street price in the $40-50 range. This has just been a quick overlook.  I hope to get into some real world uses of these in the near future for a followup to this.

Categories
Data Center Networking WISP xISP

Helpful outages web-site for network admins

http://www.outages.org/

Direct from their web-site.

How to Report
By sending a tweet with any of the following hashtag/s:
#outages
#outage
#cablecut
#fibercut
#undersea

when reporting for a service outage. Once verified we will plot it on tracker.

For e.g. #outage #loc (street, city – location name) #start (time), followed by #back (time)#planned or #unplanned (if its a planned or unexpected outage).

Download the iOS/iPhone/iPad App “Ushahidi” and add http://tracker.outages.org/ to “Settings” to start reporting.
Download the Android App “Ushahidi” and add http://tracker.outages.org/ to “Settings” to start reporting.
By sending an email:
outages@outages.org
Click to View Reports

Send comments/feedback/feature requests tovirendra[dot]rode[at]outages.org

Follow us on Twitter @outagesdotorg

Help spread the word!
Categories
Networking Security WISP xISP

Calea and the ISP

The Communications and Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) passed in 1994 is a piece of legislation every U.S. ISP should know about and be in compliance with.  If for the simple fact the government can levy heavy fines if you aren’t compliant.

For those of you wanting some background please follow these links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_Law_Enforcement_Act

https://www.fcc.gov/public-safety-and-homeland-security/policy-and-licensing-division/general/communications-assistance

First of all CALEA isn’t simply sticking wireshark onto your network and sending a packet dump to a law enforcement agency. It is much more complicated than that. You have several things which the CALEA standard addresses.

1.The ability to send multiple streams, in real time, to different law enforcement agencies.
2.The ability to not interrupt the connection to a person of interest.  In other words you don’t want to interrupt their connection to insert a piece of hardware.
3.The ability to provide just the information on the warrant.  Too much information can actually violate the court order.
4.There is a difference between a typical “request for information” warrant and a CALEA request.  These are not the same.  CALEA almost always comes from a federal agency. They are expecting you to be compliant with CALEA.

Now, here is where things get a little subjective.  The FBI has https://askcalea.fbi.gov/ which is linked from the above fcc.gov web-site.  The askcalea web-site has not been updated since 2011.  The service provider login and service provider registration simply does not work. The information about CALEA is pretty outdated.

So what does this mean for you as a small ISP? Stay tuned for more information.

Categories
Uncategorized

Tower photo 

Categories
Mikrotik

Mikrotik wAP first looks

The routerboard at the USA Mikrotik User Meeting (MUM) this year was the wAP. For the official specifications on this little gem visit here.  Some highlights of this AP.
-802.11 b/g/n
-Weatherproof
-Secure mounting
-802.3at POE
-11-57volt
IMG_2872
As you can see a great deal of thought was given into the included parts with this unit.  Mount, screws, poe, and even a thick paper template for drilling the wall and ceiling mount.

IMG_2874

Whomever is in charge of package and documentation design at Mikrotik gets high marks in my book for this setup. Included is a little instruction sheet which has topics for first use, powering, booting, connecting are all included on the first page in a concise manner.  On the second page instructions on netinstall, bootloader, and even enabling CAPs mode are all explained.

IMG_2873

At a street price of $45 for this model these have many uses.  Outbuildings, work shops, patios, and many other places where an AP needs a little protection from the elements, are all good deployment choices.

Categories
Site News

MTIN announces new pricing tiers

MTIN is happy to announce support tiers for our clients.  This allows us to grow, while still being in budget range of the smaller operators.  This is our first rate increase in over 3 years.  By breaking our rates into two tiers this allows us to grow our increasing client base while still being an affordable client. The price levels allow us to add additional resources, automation, and tools to bring better service to clients.

Tier I Support
Network/Server Work                               $97 per hour
Late night & Weekend support                 $125 per hour

Hourly Blocks
5 hours              $461   (5% discount)
10 hours            $899   (7% discount)
15 hours            $1310 (10% discount)

On-Site consulting services                      $700 per day plus expenses
On-Site tower work                                  $500-1500 per day plus expenses (job specific)

Tier1 emergency response times for Tier I customers with a time balance.
Normal working hours (2 hour maximum)
Late night and weekend (3 hour maximum)

 

 

Tier II Support
Network/Server Work                                $79 per hour
Late night & Weekend support                  $99 per hour

Hourly Blocks
5 hours                       $395
10 hours                     $790
15 hours                     $1067 (10% discount)

Tier2 emergency response times for Tier II customers with a time balance
Normal working hours (4 hour maximum)
Late night and weekend (5 hour maximum)

 

 

Contracts available
-Priority support
-Faster response times
-Late night & Weekend support rates don’t apply
-Access to backend monitoring and other services
Contact MTIN on details on contracts

Policy details

1.Late night and Weekend is defined as. 9PM-9AM EST MONDAY-FRIDAY & 8PM EST FRIDAY -9AM Monday. For West coast and customer in other time frames work can be schedule to meet your needs and not be charge for after hours.

2.All customers who don’t have pre-purchased time will be served on a best effort service. Priority will be given to contract customers, and then customers with a balance, and finally to “walk-in” customers.

3.All times stated are maximum times for response. Depending on workload, times are typically much less.

Categories
Networking WISP

pfSense 2.3 released

From the folks over at pfSense

We are happy to announce the release of pfSense® software version 2.3!

The most significant changes in this release are a rewrite of the
webGUI utilizing Bootstrap, and the underlying system, including the
base system and kernel, being converted entirely to FreeBSD pkg. The
pkg conversion enables us to update pieces of the system individually
going forward, rather than the monolithic updates of the past. The
webGUI rewrite brings a new responsive look and feel to pfSense
requiring a minimum of resizing or scrolling on a wide range of
devices from desktop to mobile phones.

You can find all the details in the release announcement here:
https://blog.pfsense.org/?p=2008

Thanks for your support

Categories
Uncategorized

SQL Lite: All you wanna know

Awhile back i did an article on cleaning the Dude database.  Alex Nordeen has a very in-depth article on SQL Lite and it’s many features.  Check out the article and Guru99.com for more stuff.

Categories
Mikrotik

New routerOS 6.34.4

From Mikrotik:

To upgrade, click “Check for updates” at /system package in your RouterOS configuration interface, or head to our download page: http://www.mikrotik.com/download

What’s new in 6.34.4 (2016-Mar-24 13:13):

*) bonding – fixed crash on bonding slave release;
*) bonding – fixed mac-address disappearance after reboot in specific setups;
*) chr – fixed reboots with license and queues;
*) console – allow unknown scan-list names on wireless configuration to fix import;
*) fastpath – fixed rare kernel failure;
*) ipsec – take into account ip protocol in kernel policy matcher;
*) mac-winbox – try to aggregate packets & resend all pending packets on timeout;
*) ppp – do not crash when received multiple CBCP packets;
*) ppp – fixed crash when ppp interface gets disconnected and user gets authenticated at the same time (most probable with slow RADIUS server);
*) quickset – fixed wan interface selection on devices with SFP interfaces;
*) quickset – use 5GHz interface instead of 2GHz interface on SXT Lite5 ac;
*) rb3011 – fixed high cpu load breaks ethernet stats;
*) rb3011 – fixed link down messages;
*) romon – fixed romon discovery after romon ID change;
*) timezone – fixed reboot by watchdog when selecting timezones from the end of list;
*) userman – fixed www crash;
*) winbox – allow to show revoked & authority flags at the same time;
*) winbox – correctly recognise if there is need to report fan information under system health;
*) winbox – do not use area v2 names instead of ospf v3 area names;
*) winbox – make mac-winbox work with RB850.

Categories
Uncategorized

Arin announces new fee schedule

https://www.arin.net/fees/2016_fee_schedule.html

Service Categories and Fees
Service Category Fee IPv4 Block Size IPv6 Block Size
3X-Small * $250 /24 or smaller /40 or smaller
2X-Small $500 Larger than /24,
up to and including /22		 Larger than /40,
up to and including /36
X-Small $1,000 Larger than /22,
up to and including /20		 Larger than /36,
up to and including /32
Small $2,000 Larger than /20,
up to and including /18		 Larger than /32,
up to and including /28
Medium $4,000 Larger than /18,
up to and including /16		 Larger than /28,
up to and including /24
Large $8,000 Larger than /16,
up to and including /14		 Larger than /24,
up to and including /20
X-Large $16,000 Larger than /14,
up to and including /12		 Larger than /20,
up to and including /16
2X-Large $32,000 Larger than /12,
up to and including /10		 Larger than /16,
up to and including /12
3X-Large $64,000 Larger than /10,
up to and including /8		 Larger than /12,
up to and including /8
4X-Large $128,000 Larger than /8,
up to and including /6		 Larger than /8,
up to and including /4
5X-Large $256,000 Larger than /6 Larger than /4