The ''wlan slovenija'' open wireless network of

Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...

is an initiative for deployment of open and free

community wireless network Wireless community networks (WCNs) or wireless community projects or simply community networks, are non-centralized, self-managed and collaborative networks organized in a grassroots fashion by communities, NGO's and cooperatives in order to prov ...

across all Slovenia through collaboration and with use of off-the-shelf widely available equipment. The main idea is that if everyone deploys a node of the open network in their home and share part of their Internet connectivity with others around them, then whole Slovenia will be covered with the

wireless network A wireless network is a computer network that uses wireless data connections between network nodes. Wireless networking is a method by which homes, telecommunications networks and business installations avoid the costly process of introducing c ...

which will allow everyone free basic connectivity to Internet. With this idea it operates since 2009 onward. The network is based on

open source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Open ...

and hardware which has been developed by participants as well. It is one of largest Slovenian open source projects and has participated multiple times in

Google Summer of Code The Google Summer of Code, often abbreviated to GSoC, is an international annual program in which Google awards stipends to contributors who successfully complete a free and open-source software coding project during the summer. , the program is ...

General description

''wlan slovenija'' open wireless network is an example of a

wireless community network Wireless community networks (WCNs) or wireless community projects or simply community networks, are non-centralized, self-managed and collaborative networks organized in a grassroots fashion by communities, NGO's and cooperatives in order to provi ...

. It uses common and widespread wireless technologies based on IEEE 802.11 standards, open source systems and because of its wireless and innovative organic nature its spread and access to the network is limited only with participation of users in it: more users there is more the network is spread and useful, for more purposes users can use it, more and richer content it provides. Around the network, which is in the first place an initiative, a community of people and organizations is forming and thus ideas, motivations and concepts around the network are various as participants in the network are various. But mostly all agree about common reasons for the network: free access and sharing of knowledge and information, building an alternative media and because it is interesting, educational and fun. More people put up nodes of the wireless networks, more people share their Internet uplinks with others, more everybody gains. ''wlan slovenija'' tries to attract also people without technical skills but who still share common philosophy. Because of this ''wlan slovenija'' focuses on ease to use, proven good practices, polished open source technologies which not just work but also have good user experience, combined with education, lectures and workshops to teach people about wireless technologies and possible ways of contributing to the network. Nodes used are open and accessible and they protect shared uplinks with using

VPN A virtual private network (VPN) extends a private network across a public network and enables users to send and receive data across shared or public networks as if their computing devices were directly connected to the private network. The be ...

to connect to the rest of the network. The network is constantly growing around Slovenia and other countries. For example, in Croatia it is known under the nam
Otvorena mreža
Participants are developing open technologies for use in the network to make wireless technologies better and easier to use:
nodewatcher
helps with coordination with deployment of the network and its monitoring
Tunneldigger
provides performant VPN system * Koruza, equipment for wireless optical connections * some participants add to their nodes also various sensors, which data is then collected by ''nodewatcher''

nodewatcher

For easier planning, deployment and maintenance of the network ''nodewatcher''

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

system has been developed. It allows coordination between participants in the network without requiring them to know each other. It is a centralized web user interface which enables easier coordination and planning of a network with monitoring at the same time. Furthermore, it is also a web based firmware image generator which generates a customized image of a system for a given network node, so no node configuration after flashing is necessary. The idea is that for participation in the network almost no technical skills are required. Users can simply register location of a new node and select some basic properties of a new node, where system fills more technical properties with good-practice defaults (the system also allows customization if the user wishes so). ''nodewatcher'' system then produces customized

OpenWrt OpenWrt (from ''open wireless router'') is an open-source project for embedded operating systems based on Linux, primarily used on embedded devices to route network traffic. The main components are Linux, util-linux, musl, and BusyBox. All com ...

based

firmware In computing, firmware is a specific class of computer software that provides the low-level control for a device's specific hardware. Firmware, such as the BIOS of a personal computer, may contain basic functions of a device, and may provide h ...

image with all configuration already included so the user just have to flash the

wireless router A wireless router is a device that performs the functions of a router and also includes the functions of a wireless access point. It is used to provide access to the Internet or a private computer network. Depending on the manufacturer and mode ...

, connect the node to electricity and possible uplink and node is connected to the network over VPN or wirelessly if there is a neighboring node somewhere in vicinity. Afterward, ''nodewatcher'' monitors the node and displays gathered data about its performance in intuitive and graphical ways so users can understand how their node is working, how many users are using it, how much of their shared bandwidth is consumed... And all this through longer periods of time so better understanding of how the node interacts with the rest of the network is possible and easier planning of future nodes.

General description

nodewatcher

External links