Technology Review has an article on MIT’s Roofnet. “a project to create a self-organizing wireless network in which an amorphous, unmanaged collection of cheap Linux computers equipped with Wi-Fi cards collaborate to efficiently route data packets.”
Each computer and roof-mounted antenna at students apartments and MIT buildings is a node on the network and the arrangement in which they are connected to each otherthe topology of the networkis constantly changing. We want to understand how a whole bunch of computers with short-range radios can self-configure a network, forming order out of chaos, says computer science professor Robert Morris, who coordinates the project. The network has now more than 30 nodes in a 4-square kilometer area surrounding the MIT campus. We hope to reach a hundred nodes within a few months, he says.
Asks Reuben: “I have to wonder whether something similar would work in India, of for that matter in any part of the world where there is a reasonable dense population, enough anyways to justify the cost of installation.”
