Independent Node

Had a few blackouts today, lost the 364 day uptime on the Air-Stream-CLG Minitar :(
Not happy, Jan!

Still, pretty impressive not to have any blackouts or power interruptions in 364 days (my A-S gear isn't on a UPS).

So I've been thinking about what services I need to put up on my node(s).
You know there is the now old saying, "Content is King", there are references
on wikipedia, that describes what this means. In a nutshell its, people come back
to you web site if there is interesting or relevant content.
There is also the community factor to, maybe its not just the content but the
community that contributes the content.

Anyhow, so I've been scribbling down ideas for services to put up on the
server attached to the node. Obviously a web server, Jabber, VoIP ... erm ...

What else do folks use on their nodes and use from other peoples nodes?

Brain dump follows...

So over the last couple of weekends I've been tinkering with my node(s) after finally getting some phat coax sorted for the minitar APs that Rob give to use on the slotted wave guides. Along with a much shorter mast I'll be putting up something this weekend after taking it all down after the big winds!

Also in the last week I noticed a car load of bloke with laptops and small antenna driving around my block slowly. There was also a lot of DHCP traffic and lots of ICMP action against the node. So this is either good or not. Haven't decided, so I've dropped my node of my internet gateway/VPN end point in the mean time. I'm going to change the way it all connects anyway, so its pre-empted the decision about how I want to set it all up.

Which leads me to spending a bit of time scouring the net to see whats current after being quite a bit pre-occupied with other issues over the winter. This always happens. Spring is way more productive as I get to spend some quality time making in the shed =)

I won't be running a mini conf at LCA09. Didn't have the bandwidth to get a proposal together. So will probably be attending as a regular punter. Which will mean that I get to play with actual tech and watch whats going on rather than running about like a nutter organising stuff like I did this year. This year I setup much of the network and helped organise the Access Points and it was a long hard slog. Lots of cool stuff to see and do, but I missed out on a lot that went on. I didn't get to see any keynotes, and only a handful of talks. Not to worry, next year should be pretty amazing.

Some of Winters distractions involve selling my car, large work load, getting another, large work load, the new one being off the road in need of repairs, being a radio op at ROSA, illness, large work load, illness, car problems, too cold to work in the shed... you know, the usual winter fun. Not to mention it was too cold to work in the shed!

Projects ahead for the next couple of months; put up mast on the car port, setup AS-MtB-node1, AS-MtB-node6, AS-MtB-node11, with the slotted wave guides, dig real foundations, put up a propper tower, move nodes to new tower, setup nodes at a friends place, get my 2M gear moved to the shed and get that setup on the tower, build better power supplies, get permanent power to the shed, insulate the shed, move the rack to the shed, get the UPS repaired and running again ...

Are there ever enough hours in a day? That reminds me, need to finish of the podcast stuff and get that up now that the replacement cabls for my headphones came in today and ... erm ... stickers that right, got to get those stickers sorted... but wait theres more my file server went pop recently after a power up/down/up/down/up thing last week and need to build that up in a more redundant way. Also would like to setup something with the WIA guys that stream the news and work on something podcasty/streaming related... folks keep asking me about video of AS meetings etc, so video is something I'm going to have to have a look at soon too.

That will do for now. 73's

I have a small quantity of chimney antenna mounts. These are all 'as new' condition. Very quick and easy to setup. No drilling required. Best and easiest way of mounting an antenna on older style houses.

I have used one of these at a setup for the last two years supporting a 3m tall mast with a 15dB antenna. It has proved to be strong enough to survive through the storms in winter.

Each kit comes with:
antenna Bracket
wire strap
wire clamp
x2 I-bolts
x2 U-bolts
x6 nuts
x6 washers

$15 each (normally around $33 at Bunnings)

Pickup from Seaton or DryCreek (depending what time/day)
Delivery *may* be available for little to no extra charge depending on your location and amount purchased

Well I've got my node up and running. Testing out a few things, and need to find a more permanent way to get power and ethernet mounted ...

Any folks in Mount Barker interested?

I Mounted the AP in its box on the mast this morning. Its at about head hight, so I can work on it.

The purpose of todays test is to see of the 10 meter PoE cable works with 5 volts. It seems to be ok.
Also to get an idea of how the box and antenna cable up. Looks good so far.

Below is a photo of the AP mounted on the mast with the Omni hidden behind it;

So with the car back on the road, after some exceptional diagnosis from Lyn, we aquired some ready mix concrete, nuts, washers, bolts and an appropriate "tornado mounting bracket", the big steel thingy.

I had a pretty good idea about where and how I wanted to mount everything, details aside. I had made several trips to the hardware store, got an idea about brackets and things, did lots of measuring.

On the day however, things don't quite go to plan and you have to improvise. The hole moved because the iron on the roof stuck out more than expected and the shovel slipped, so then the the mounting brackes weren't the right length anymore, but thats another story ...

So here is some photos along the way ...

A suggestion from adhoc lead me to installing Nagios, http://www.nagios.org on my G3 wifi router.
Basic install was a few simple make cmds and I was happy to get no dependencies pop up - too easy!
The config files are a few and one must dig thru to uncomment a few basics to get anything to work.

I have yet to fully dig thru however setting up some simple host ping checks was straight forward and I look forward to some pretty maps and graphs once I sus out the set up.

PS: The environment seems guest unfriendly yet I hope to allow some access once I RTFM properly ...

Air-Stream-CLG is located in Adelaide’s southern suburbs at Colonel Light Gardens.

The new site has been established by Damien (know as Drift) one of Air-Stream Wireless youngest members and his setup is an excellent example of ingenuity and how coverage of the network can be extended on a very modest budget.

Don’t be mislead by its modest construction as it is a fully routed node with usual AS BGP router configuration using a Mitsubishi R100 which has been re-flashed with OpenWRT to allow fully routed user connections via its AP into the wider network.

The site is backboned to Air-Stream-Pasadena, with a not to shabby backhaul of 700KB/s using a modified Pacmon grid dish antenna that reports a signal gain of around -76dBm.

Seaton links to Pasadena in the southern foothills and to Grange.

For information on connecting please contact Sebby at sebby at sebbynet dot net