[Commotion-dev] Building a Mesh Network in Rural Somaliland

[hello at ninabianchi.com]

This is awesome. Thanks for sharing. 

Nina

On Dec 12, 2013, at 8:03 AM, Dan Staples wrote:

> Many thanks to Dan Hastings for writing and photographing his experience
> setting up a Commotion network in Somaliland:
> http://oti.newamerica.net/blogposts/2013/building_a_mesh_network_in_rural_somaliland-98554
> 
> I also like how the map of network nodes is shaped almost exactly like
> the Commotion logo!
> 
> text below (but check the link for photos!):
> 
> """
> 
> Building a Mesh Network in Rural Somaliland
> Published:  December 11, 2013
> 
> by Daniel Hastings
> 
> I had heard about mesh networking before I arrived in Somaliland, but
> had never been in the position to actually build a mesh network. When I
> accepted the position as ICT instructor at Abaarso School of Science and
> Technology in Abaarso, Somaliland, I figured this may be my chance. I
> knew that the Open Technology Institute (OTI) had been developing a mesh
> firmware called Commotion, suitable for remote locations. Upon arriving
> in Somaliland I decided that building a mesh network using Commotion
> would be one of my top priorities.
> 
> It seemed like building a mesh network could be a difficult process. I
> experimented in the past with other firmware on a variety of routers,
> but found the configuration to be too time-consuming and difficult to
> set up.
> I knew Commotion ran on Ubiquti hardware, designed for rough outdoor
> environments like Somaliland. Unfortunately, finding Ubiquti routers in
> Somaliland -- for that matter, getting anything into Somaliland -- is no
> easy task.
> 
> Somaliland is an independent autonomous region of Somalia, and is an
> area that is safe compared to the southern regions of Somalia. While not
> internationally recognized as a country, Somaliland has its own
> currency, government, and military.
> 
> The analogy I like to use when it comes to traveling to Somaliland is no
> different than that of getting to Hogwarts. Instead of running head
> first into an imaginary platform at the train station, you have to land
> in Dubai, catch a flight that leaves only once a week and then travel
> across a desert on one of the worst-built roads you can imagine.
> 
> While back in the US this past summer I contacted OTI and found that
> they would be able to provide me with the proper equipment to run and
> set up a mesh network using Commotion. I was so excited about the
> possibility of actually getting all of the equipment into Somaliland
> that I carefully packed everything into my carry-on.
> 
> Before I go any further, I should explain my level of experience with
> building networks. My only experience with networking had been taking a
> class at a community college in San Francisco and spending the last year
> troubleshooting our Internet problems at school. However, Commotion is
> built in such a way that little if any advanced configuration is
> necessary to set up a mesh network.
> 
> I first began building my network by identifying where I wanted access
> points on campus and mapping out distances between each spot. Having a
> good line of sight between each node was extremely important. Luckily we
> have a lot of high guard and water towers on campus so placing nodes was
> not an issue.
> 
> One minor problem with placing nodes in towers was that I had to ensure
> a reliable power source was within range of the node. If all my nodes
> were solar-powered, I would not have had to worry about running any
> cable at all!
> 
> I next had to “flash” each router, which means loading the Commotion
> firmware on to each Ubiquti device. I had experience flashing firmware
> onto routers before but had never “meshed” wireless nodes together. To
> help with this I referred to the configuration examples on Commotion’s
> website, which I found extremely helpful. Open source software has been
> known to be tricky to configure and maintain but it certainly does not
> have to be. Commotion has proved this to be more than true.
> 
> While building the network, I made sure to include students as much as I
> could. I assembled together a computer club of my top ICT students to
> discuss and teach the basics of mesh networking, how to flash firmware
> onto routers, and how to add a node to the network. Together we ran
> cable and climbed water towers to place the nodes in their proper
> places. We also had to place some nodes in the guard towers which often
> times, the guards would unplug accidentally. Students trained the guards
> on the difference between the LAN and PoE ports as well as the
> importance of keeping the PoE cable plugged in at all times. A few weeks
> after school we put up the last two nodes for the girls’ dorms and the
> boys’ dorms.
> 
> Local Applications and Limited Bandwidth
> 
> Somaliland is currently the only country in Africa that lacks fiber
> optic access -- cables are laid but access is not predicted to be
> available until 2014. Somaliland receives its Internet connection via
> microwaves across the desert from Djibouti. All of the IP address ranges
> in Somaliland will tell you that you are in Djibouti. The distant
> gateway connectivity, not to mention unreliable ISPs, equates to some
> seriously slow Internet.
> 
> A lack of consistent access to the Internet is an ICT instructor’s
> nightmare. Not being able to teach the most current technologies can be
> frustrating, and it also hampers sharing files with students.
> Mesh networking is described as a “peer to peer network:” I wanted to
> use the full sense of the term and make file sharing among my students
> easy and manageable. In order to solve this communication problem I
> decided to rely less on the outside Internet and rely more on local
> applications installed on our servers.
> 
> I found the solution to our inconsistent and slow Internet by installing
> OwnCloud, an open source alternative to Dropbox, on our local server.
> Now students could share homework assignments with me and other teachers
> without having to rely on the Internet at all.
> 
> Creating a Self-Sufficient Network
> 
> As well as the network worked and as much fun as setting it up was, I
> cannot call this project successful until I can come back to Somaliland
> a year from now and see the same nodes in place running the same network.
> I used a few methods to make sure this would be the case. I was careful
> to document every aspect of the project and create detailed guides for
> teachers and future network administrators on everything from how to
> find your IP address on the network to how to ping a node, which is
> important for isolating a potential problem on the network. Even though
> mesh networks are “self-healing”, they are not perfect and still have
> their quirks.
> 
> Having all of the knowledge centered in one place with one staff member
> will only set an organization up for failure, so I've made sure to give
> a series of small trainings to the entire staff.
> 
> The more transparent you are about how the network works, the more
> likely the technology will last.
> 
> I repeatedly told my students that some of the greatest makers and
> technologists of our time were self-taught. The excellent support
> community centered around open source software makes projects such as
> Commotion sustainable. There is a good chance that if a problem arises,
> someone else already had that issue or someone in another community
> across the globe is working on a solution to that problem.
> 
> I would like to give my sincere gratitude to the Commotion Wireless
> Project for the support they gave me along with providing me with
> necessary tools to build this network. Not only did the students at
> Abaarso School get extremely enthused about mesh networking and learn
> the meaning of community technology, but now another small part of a
> country that, technically, does not even exist is more connected to the
> rest of the world.
> 
> """
> 
> -- 
> Dan Staples
> 
> Open Technology Institute
> https://commotionwireless.net
> OpenPGP key: http://disman.tl/pgp.asc
> Fingerprint: 2480 095D 4B16 436F 35AB 7305 F670 74ED BD86 43A9
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