It's a big Wi-Fi news day before I head off to Maine til next Thursday; expect more news on my return (but not about Maine).
"802.11 has won" says Intel: an executive at the company kicks Bluetooth in its...well, that would be too obvious a metaphor. (via Jim Dalrymple at MacCentral)
Software pioneer Dan Bricklan on 802.11b: good to see what an intelligent guy who has been kicking around since developing VisiCalc has to say about the Next Big Thing.
First look at 802.11a: the folks at 802.11 Planet (more on them below) get a first look at the Atheros 802.11a chipset in action. Sounds promising. The short of it: higher bandwidth with better algorithms and many stepdown speeds produce more throughput than 802.11b at similar distances indoors.
Get rugged: integrated 802.11b in a serious laptop meant for being bashed, used outdoors, and otherwise beat up.
Wireless issues abound at Intel Forum: security, compatibility, co-existence
Remember the 802.11 Planet conference in early October!: yours truly will be there serving on one panel and moderating another. The conference looks truly interesting for businesses and ISPs, as well as those journalists and technologists who want to be on top of the latest news.
Apple chooses odd moment to upgrade AirPort cards to 128-bit WEP encryption keys: Apple's AirPort card - a kind of PC Card that fits in a special slot in all shipping Macintoshes - used to support just 40-bit WEP keys. The new version supports 128-bit keys for compatibility, but there is no word, according to the MacCentral article, on whether existing cards can be flash upgraded or whether the Apple AirPort Base Station (access point) will be similarly upgraded. Oddly, the 128-bit key is no more secure now than the 40/56/64-bit key, so the timing is strange.