All your base are belong to us!
We will have a slightly higher access point density this year compared to TG16. While it might make sense on paper to introduce more APs we seem to forget how much work it actually is to prepare them in such large quantities…
Earlier today we unboxed 276(!) base stations/access points and prepared them for for their journey to Vikingskipet, Hamar.
A big thank you to Avantis for lending us their facilities!
The beacons are lit!
We are happy to report that the internet connection for TG17 is up and running.
Tech:Net decided to take the “pre-TG” preparations one step further this year by building our backbone network and installing our DHCP/DNS servers a week before schedule! This gives us the opportunity to tweak and polish all the nuts and bolts of our most critical infrastructure without being on site.
What does this mean for us? It means that we’re able to deploy and provision our edge switches from day 1 without waiting for internet access or the DHCP/DNS-servers to be installed on the first day.
Pretty sweet!
Stay tuned – we will post details about our network design later on..
Do you do Tech-stuff at a computer party? Any computer party? Then this is for you.
We are looking to put together an informal “Tech-meetup” during The Gathering 2017. The exact program is yet to be decided, the only thing we know is who we want there: Anyone who are part of a tech crew at a computer part or similar event.
This is the result of seeing just how many great people there are out there. And to be more open about what we do at The Gathering, or any other computer party.
The idea is simple: We meet up during the event. Most likely some time during Friday (daytime), but that’s subject to change. We perhaps do a small presentation of TG tech crew with a twist of some sort, Q&A, and then open the floor to discussion about whatever. There’s no super-hard agenda. We can talk about TCP checksum mechanics, DHCP lease times, cable termination, how to best store switches, what candy makes for the best NOC-candy, pros and cons of renting equipment versus buying it. Or just exchange “war stories”.
Does this sound interesting? Then drop me a mail at kly@gathering.org and let me know. This isn’t an application, just a “I want in! I’ve been setting up the network at this local party with 40 participants for the last few years and this would be fun!” thing.
I’m sure we should’ve put together a better sign-up process, but we’re lazy.
Well, I’m lazy anyway. If my mail-box explodes due to this, we might have to rethink this.
From “our” side you can expect me and whoever I manage to kidnap. I know several people in the NOC have expressed an interest. We’ll also obviously provide some sort of room.
Hello!
This year, the Info:System has had some major changes. The structure of The Gathering has been changed, and in that process the Info:Systems crew has been renamed Core:Systems (read more about the change here, in Norwegian..). Oh, and another thing, no one from the old Info:Systems crew is participating this year. That means the entire Systems crew is new blood. Of course, this is not without some challenges.
Christian, aka lizter, has been so nice to help with the transition. He has been with the old Info:Systems crew for many years and has a lot of information and experience that we in Core:Systems really appreciate. Together with reading code, understanding documentation and sorting through config files, we have managed to somewhat get control over the potentially messy situation. I mean, everyone with some programming and/or IT-background knows it can be a messy thing to take over the work of a group of people.
We are pretty sure TG17 will be a really nice experience for all of us new bloods, and we really hope that the transition has not been too obvious. Well… Apart from closing down the forum. And did you notice the front page has SSL now? More on that later!
Just wanted to let you all know that The Gathering Tech crew is actually here working.
After working for almost two full days, some tasks require more thought than others.
Our partners is also here, working with us to deliver you the best possible network experience!
http://stats.tg15.gathering.org/
The image below is an example of how channel layers can be deployed to support high client density areas such as a open space like TG. For this we will use different ESSIDs, some deployed on multiple channels some may only be needed on one or two channels. The ESSID used for video broadcasting may be at just one channel. This channel is then “in the air” reserved for this purpose only. Do we need capacity it’s all about adding in AP’s and maybe using more channels for this ESSID.
This can in general actually for TG be handled by just one wireless controller, but for density and RF reasons we can spilt the channels and ESSID we need across multiple controllers also. We have also placed in a redundant controller ready if one of the master controllers should fail.
In addition we use the unique Airtime Fairness technology Meru provides by default.
Meru’s Airtime Fairness governs Wi-Fi access so that every client gets the same amount of time, ensuring consistent performance for the users. With Meru Airtime Fairness(r), the speed of the network is not determined by the slowest traffic. By allocating time equally among clients, Airtime Fairness allows every transmission to move at its highest potential. At TG this is very useful since we will serve many wifi clients in same RF space ☺. So we will most likely use all the possible RF bandwidth, but dived equal to the clients based on air time.
Network Management:
For getting the option to monitor and follow the wireless network at TG we use Meru Network Manager
We can then track down clients, usage per AP/radio, controller and so on. This will give a good insight where to fine-tune and optimize the entire installation at TG.
Here is the latest revision of the wireless design, the different colors indicates different layers:
(we will make the final version in high quality format available after TG).
Here are some relevant links to Meru resources, if you are interested in wireless networking:
This is the 10Gig fiber optical transceivers provided by SmartOptics. These transceivers run on different wavelengths and therefore can “talk” over the same pair of fiber from Hamar to Oslo. SmartOptics; awesome people that deliver awesome equipment <3 🙂
Most of the Tech:Net-crew is traveling up to Vikingskipet already tomorrow to establish the internet-connection and some of the most critical components of the infrastructure. From Saturday morning we’ll be working on getting the core equipment up and running so that we are absolutely sure that we can provide the best and the most stable networking services for our users when they arrive on Wednesday.
Here is the last revision of the network design:
(we will make the final version in high quality format available after TG).
For some years now, The Gathering has utilized different methods for automatic provisioning of the edge switches that the participants connect to. The first iteration of this system was used to configure ZyXel switches, and was called ‘zyxel-ng’. Then, in 2010, The Gathering bought new D-Link edge switches with gigabit ports. New wendor, new configuration methods. ‘dlink-ng'[1] was born. It had lots of ugly hacks and exception handling. This was due to several reasons, but mainly because the D-Link’s wouldn’t take configuration automatically from TFTP/FTP/similar.
Five years had passed. We’d outgrown the number of switches that was bought in 2010, and we needed more. After thorough research and several rounds with RFQ’s, we decided to buy new switches for TG15. We ended up buying Juniper EX2200’s as edge switches. This meant, once again, a new configuration tool. We had this in mind when writing the RFQ, so we already knew what to expect. After some testing, trial and error, we landed on a proof-of-concept. It involves DHCP Option 82, custom-made DHCP-server and some scripts to serve software- and configuration files over HTTP. The name? Fast and Agile Provisioning (FAP)[2].
With this tool, we can connect all the edge switches on-the-fly, and they’ll get the configuration designed for that specific switch (based on what port on the distro they connect to). If the switch doesn’t have the specific software we want it to have, it’ll automatically download this software and install it.
It’s completely automated once set up, and can be kept running during the entire party (so f.ex. if an edge switch fails during the party, we can just replace it with a blank one, at it’ll get the same configuration as the old one).
[1] https://github.com/tech-server/tgmanage/tree/master/examples/historical/dlink-ng
[2] https://github.com/tech-server/tgmanage/tree/master/fap
TG - Technical Blog is the unofficial rambling place for The Gathering.
