What is it with today’s students? You ask them about an Ethernet connection and they look blankly at you.

In loose terms it’s called ‘expectations of mobility’ and many universities and colleges are desperate to show potential students that they can have it in spades. Students are now almost universally equipped with laptops, so expect to be able to be on-line anywhere: in class, in study room, in library, in the canteen, walking along corridors, sitting out on the lawn of the quad.

The traditional mobility solutions, requiring an address change at each location, are not simply inadequate – they don’t mean anything to the average student consumer of IT service. Faculty and staff, of course, understand the established technology but they too are ready to accept the benefits from wireless LAN technology.

As one supplier, Aruba Networks, succinctly puts it: “People move. Networks must follow”.

The whole family of wireless LAN standards started just over ten years ago under the 802.11 label. Generally speaking, 802.11 is equivalent to WiFi. The most recent protocol is 802.11n, presently in Draft 2 but targeted for approved release in mid-2009. Where this mainly differs from previous standards is to introduce multiple-input, multiple-output features.

It is not simply to attract laptop- and notebook-wielding students that universities are going for WiFi. It is also economics as the cost of Ethernet sockets and installation are so much more expensive than WLAN access points (APs). Each AP provides many people with instant and reliable links to university servers, (admin, lectures, exams, messaging) and the Internet. The university has to ensure the installation is scalable, secure, compatible with existing network infrastructure and can be managed.

One of my industry contacts, Roger Hockaday of Aruba, (www.arubanetworks.com) says that the installation process itself is now so easy. After the APs are positioned and powered up, “we can go off for a good lunch". The APs automatically configure themselves and tune the network for user traffic, interference, and nearby networks and devices. There is an algorithm that enables each AP to be optimised for power and signal.

Aruba products are to 802.11n standard but the system delivers ‘Airtime fairness’ so that users with older, slower 802.11b/g clients have minimal impact on high speed clients as each AP can handle up to 100 clients. Cross channel interference is not normally an issue. On the normal BT set up, there would be three or four 20 MHz channels to use from about 15 available in the 2.4 GHz band. In the 5 GHz band there were many more channels so that interference was even less of a problem.

Universities have proved to be a rich field for WLAN suppliers. Perhaps the academic world will be the most profitable too. Why? Look at the failure to roll out WiFi across cities (see ‘MetroFi Plans Market Exit: Sale or Shutter’ in WiFi Net News www.wifinetnews.com ) and the reluctance of office managers to forgo 1 Gbps bi-directional at the same time on Cat 5e or 6 Ethernet cable.

The WLAN home market is a maybe – but it will require some careful market development.

When those pesky students return home, perhaps they’ll get mum and dad to upgrade to a multi-channel WLAN.