8 Jul
2004
8 Jul
'04
1:31 a.m.
>> In our experience, wireless is fine for casual
internet
>> connections, thin clients (terminal services, citrix, rdp)
>> but much too slow for anything that involves any level of
>> data transfer. We sell and support medical software that
>> transfers very large databases. I have lost count of how
>> many offices have implimented wireless networks without
>> checking with us first. They usually scream bloody murder
>> when we inform them they will have to revert back to wired
>> networks. It seems mostly the doctors brother-in-law
>> reccomended wireless.
Wireless communicatios do have significant issues, but can play an
invaluable role in many business situations.
You are 100% correct that almost every client WILL have problems if they
take a heavy traffic application what was designed for
high-speed/high-reliability connections and just decide to run it over a
wireless connection. On the other hand, I have been involved in the
development of a number of applications [including imaging] that moves
significant data over a wireless link. The big difference is that these
applications were designed from the ground up to work with this type of
link. Among other things this required: background processing of all
transfers, ability to resume transfers over broken connections, additional
steps to secure the data.
For my development environment, I am lucky. My core develop [currently 11]
run on a 1GB switched [combination fiber and copper] environment. My other
fixed machines [currently 5] run on wired 100MB [fully switched] and I am
running 802.11g for the mobiles (this is scheduled for an upgrade to Super
802.11g once the market stablizes a bit).
David.