Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

[burnett AT pobox.com]

On Wed, 3 Sep 2008, Michael Czeiszperger wrote:

> I've been tasked with getting wifi into our new school (The Riverrock School 
> on the Haw), and on a limited budget everyone is asking me why we can't just 
> use the wifi signal from the  Saxapahaw General Store which is in the same 
> building given we have permission from the store owners.  The problem is this 
> is an old textile mill, with really thick walls and floors, and we're 300 
> feet at least from the store directly through many walls and two floors. 
> Even if I could convince the people responsible for the rooms between us to 
> put in wifi repeaters, we'd still have to get the signal through two floors 
> and several walls, and I can't imagine that would work well.
>
> The people renting the rooms right next to ours do have a strong wifi signal 
> into our office, but they've refused to let us use it, so its either the 
> General Store or our own connection.
>
> I had convinced my fellow parents to just pony up for a cable modem, but as 
> with so many organizations, just after I:
>
> 1. Proposed a plan
> 2. Requested feedback
> 3. Gave notice I was buying the hardware
> 4. Purchased the hardware
> 5. Scheduled the installation with TW.
>
> Its at this point that suddenly the issue came up again with everyone who was 
> too busy to notice the first time.  Everyone has a story about a "guy they 
> know" who did something amazing with wifi with some sort of booster, but the

"Great! I'm turning this task over to you and the guy you know."

*mumble mumble*

"Ok, then we'll go ahead with the plan I already proposed and purchased 
the hardware for."

> 'ol pringles can trick seems woefully inadequate here.
>
> So, is there some obvious solution here I'm missing?  I already looked into 
> cabling, and given the age of the mill this would be a very long and 
> complicated cable pulling job, outside of my league at least.