Wireless Internet HotspotsPh: 0861-BUTTON

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Thursday, December 11, 2008

RedButton Free WiFi Revolution Continues

After a series of arduous night marches, we file this dispatch from our Cape Town HQ. Over the last few weeks, the advance of our Free WiFi network has continued unabated. Hard work has met its reward and our hearts stir with gratitude over every inch of ground liberated. This is however just the beginning, our noble cause is yet to reach its highest tide as the fighting spirits of our heroic comrades soar with each new client served.


By now you might be thinking that we're suffering from delusions of grandeur, its just WiFi we're talking about right? Well, we're quite passionate about what we do and in all seriousness we have been working hard on a number of projects over the last few weeks and are overjoyed at the results.

When it comes to our Free WiFi product, launched earlier in the year, we have been delighted to have a number of new restaurants join our network over the last few weeks, some of which have been in business for over a decade, no mean feat in the restaurant business!

One of the chains that have joined our network is the Saul's Group. Saul's is an icon in Cape Town, with the tasty, gigantic burgers available at Saul's Saloon & Grill in Sea Point stirring fond and often very recent memories for many Cape Townians. The Saul's group has variety in their chain of restaurants that is unbelievable, from Italian at Saul's Piccolo Mondo, to sushi at Saul's Sushi @ Vegas. Apart from enjoying the great food, you can also take your laptop along to any restaurant and enjoy 10MB free daily.


Besides new installation projects, we've also made significant updates to our system pertaining to Free WiFi as well as other enhancements. When it comes to the Account Manager, you can now view the Free WiFi allowances (or privileges) you have claimed at supporting RedButton hotspots. When you log in, click on 'Hotspot privileges' in the Reports section in the left hand panel. We'd greatly appreciate any feedback you have, so please let us know what your thoughts are.

The next dispatch will hopefully follow sooner rather than later, in the mean time, happy surfing!

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Remote Network Monitoring @ RedButton

At RedButton remote network monitoring and on site management is a key part of the service we provide to our clients. We actively monitor every single managed router in our network and take action to resolve any technical issues.

What you might be interested in is how our technicians keep their eagle eyes on the network. Well we've got an internal interface for just that purpose, key information listed on it is the percentage of routers online and routers that are offline. When we see routers that are down we get on it like a company that gets paid by the Megabyte, pronto! The green icons below mean that all is well, the red icons with the doctors briefcase means help is needed.


As you can see we don't only monitor the central hotspot device but also all repeaters that have been set up behind it to increase the wireless signal coverage. What's more, as long as all these devices are online, we have dedicated remote access to the respective firmware web interfaces so that we can quickly and efficiently troubleshoot problems and undertake reconfigurations remotely. Without the need for complex port forwarding, dmz or any other hard to maintain workarounds.

Everything is automated and built-in - a technician (or even a customer in case of a self-install) plugs a preconfigured RedButton device into the network and it magically appears on our monitoring system once the orange light goes on, see previous post on our custom firmware. None of our competitors currently offer a similarly feature-rich, powerful and yet easy to maintain system.

The monitoring system as it stands is already quite advanced but we'll continue to add to it over time. Knowing whether a router is online or not, when we last saw it if online and so on is critical information yet its only the tip of the ice berg when it comes to ongoing high quality service. Watch this space!

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

So how do I really check my usage?


From time to time users query the amount of credit used up during a session. This is only natural when logging on to check email and seeing usage that does not fit earlier patterns. In this post, which is generally applicable whether using RedButton or not, we discuss what may cause usage spikes, how to keep them in check and how you can monitor usage in fine grained detail.

In terms of your exact usage you may verify it yourself by logging into your RedButton account ("Buy Credits" from the portal page) and clicking on "Internet Usage History" on the left. It will show you when you logged in, for how long and especially what your uploads/downloads and credit usage was per session. This aggregate information is useful but does not provide fine grained detail in terms of which programs ended up using the connection.

When it comes to usage specifics, unfortunately there are many programs in the background that use bandwidth without your explicit instruction. Examples are Windows or Mac automatic security related system updates, automatic anti-virus/firewall updates, java updates, VoIP programs using bandwidth behind your back to route other people's phone calls, iTunes downloading movies and many more. Such usage is sporadic in nature, one day there will be zero available updates (though anti-virus programs tend to update itself daily) and the next your Windows Update will try to download the next service pack which may take up tons of MB's (Windows XP SP3 is 48MB for instance).

In order to prevent this from happening you may temporarily turn off these services though we do not recommend turning off security related service upgrades (operating system, anti-virus/firewall upgrades etc.). If you do it will expose your computer to a whole bunch of security vulnerabilities and problems which could ultimately cause more damage than the additional bandwidth expense is worth. For example we have had confirmed cases in the past where virus checkers were not updated, customers' laptops got infected with viruses that then proceeded to upload heavy amounts of data resulting in their credits disappearing quicker than they could look.

One thing you can do is download Netlimiter Monitor (http://www.netlimiter.com/download.php), a freeware third party tool that let's you monitor which program uses up what bandwidth and how much. It is only 2.3MB large and will help you greatly in tracking down what's using up all your credits. A word of caution, this tool will give you slightly lower total upload/download figures than our system (especially uploads) because it counts the data on a different network layer than we do.

We hope we have clarified why sometimes our system, or any other, shows more usage than you yourself have explicitly initiated. If you have any questions or feedback please let us know.

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Cape Town's New Free WiFi Super Circuit @ Beleza

A picture says a thousand words and so this post consists of the picture below recently taken @ Beleza - a popular restaurant that forms a part of Cape Town's Free WiFi Super Circuit as mentioned in our previous post. Thank you to Ronald from Beleza for the picture.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Cape Town's New Free WiFi Super Circuit



We launched the RedButton Free WiFi product a few weeks ago and are pleased to report that you can now get the potent combination of free wifi and great food at a number of prime establishments in Cape Town's new Free Wifi Super Circuit. Read on to see where you can experience culinary nirvana whilst doing your business online.

Beleza - 20MB free daily

Beleza is a trendy Portuguese & Italian restaurant on the corner of Kloof Nek and Burnside roads in Tamboerskloof. They lay claim to the best deals in town and back that up with a creative list of specials, such as their famous breakfast, and a wide array of menu options. 'The proof of the pudding is in the eating' and that's exactly what we recently did, the Peri burger is out of this world.

With their RedButton Free Wifi hotspot service users get 20MB free daily, this serves as a further example of Beleza's commitment of providing fantastic deals, the following comment by an end user pretty much sums it up "I am sitting at Beleza eating the tenderest Prego steak ever, using their free wi fi, it's fantastic."

Depasco - 20MB free daily

Depasco is a cafe bakery on the corner of Kloof and Buitensingel. Not only do they have an array of freshly baked breads and other treats but also a selection of wraps that are out of this world. Try their breakfast wrap whilst checking your email using the free wifi, you'll love it.

Andiamo - 20MB free daily

Andiamo, situated in the Cape Quarter, 72 Waterkant street, is well known for the wide variety offered by its deli with over 2000 local and important delicacies on offer. We have fallen for their Parma Ham filled tramezzinis, they are irresistible. Visit Andiamo.co.za for a comprehensive coverage of what this prime establishment has to offer.

Long Street Cafe - 20MB free daily

Long Street Cafe is a Cape Town icon that has been operating for over 12 years. If you haven't been here you are missing out! We launched our Free WiFi product at Long Street Cafe and it was the perfect choice. They have since built up a loyal base of free wifi costumers who soak up the unique long street cafe ambiance. Long Street Cafe had a plain wifi router prior to using RedButton Free WiFi and now benefit from a branded and automated solution.

Kauai Shortmarket - 20MB free daily

Kauai's menu is unparalleled in terms of the nutritious smoothies, burgers, wraps and soup & sandwich combos on offer. You can not only eat healthy but also surf for free at Kauai Shortmarket, located just off Greenmarket Square.


Wimpy Rondebosch - 50MB free daily

Wimpy Rondebosch was one of the very first establishments to use RedButton Free WiFi. Wimpy is well known for their burgers and are particularly popular at breakfast times when queues are not uncommon. Wimpy Rondebosch management initially chose to give end users a 50MB free allowance but only after 3 p.m, this was later extended to 50MB free all day long. With this the RedButton's Free WiFi product is used exactly as intended, as a product that is flexible and able to meet the venue's changing requirements.

Café Sofia Kloof & Sea Point - free 20MB voucher with your order

Café Sofia is a rapidly growing and group of Meze and Tapas bars that bring together exquisite decor and their trademark menu that includes various tapas, fine wine cocktails and various specials. They have coupled the launch of their Free WiFi service at their Kloof street & Sea Point branches with a selection of fantastic breakfast specials.

Cafe Chameleon, Plattekloof - 10MB free daily

Cafe Chameleon
is another Cape Town icon nestled just below the Tygerberg Hills in Plattekloof. It has been in business for over a decade, step inside and you'll see that the reasons for this impressive stint are self evident. Great food, ambience, specials (such as their current "R1 a cup" special before 9 a.m.), a fantastic view over the mother city and of course Free WiFi.

Final word - maps coming soon

In addition to our existing list of hotspot locations, we'll be releasing a national Free WiFi map in the next couple of weeks so you can see exactly where to go. With this you'll be able to either map out your route in Cape Town's Free WiFi Super Circuit or just find the nearest spot where you can get your fix. Happy surfing!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

New Default Prepaid WiFi and Free WiFi Portal Pages

The current default RedButton portal page, a stalwart that put in a good 16 months worth of service, is due for a face lift and so from coming Friday you'll see the new default RedButton Prepaid WiFi and RedButton Free WiFi portal pages go live at relevant hotspots.

If you have any feedback or suggestions we'd greatly appreciate it, in fact we'll send each of the first 10 users to comment a free R50 voucher as a token of appreciation for your time. Please click on the images to enlarge them before your review, some of the changes are subtle but we'd rather not point them out.

NEW Portal Page @ RedButton Prepaid WiFi Hotspots



OLD Portal Page @ RedButton Prepaid WiFi Hotspots


NEW
Portal Page @ RedButton Free WiFi Hotspots



OLD Portal Page @ RedButton Prepaid WiFi Hotspots

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

RedButton's Cutting Edge Network - Fully Upgraded


We're proud to announce that the upgrade of each and every router in our network has now been completed. Each router in our network now sports the production release of version 0.9.12 of our hotspot firmware bringing a multitude of improvements in service levels to our customers.

We completed the beta testing phase of version 0.9.12 of the RedButton Hotspot Firmware, mentioned in an earlier post, a few weeks a go and subsequently started the roll-out of the production release.

A primary benefit to our customers has been that RedButton is now able to pro-actively attend to network health issues, rather than an inadequate reactive approach. That's valid even for repeaters deployed at hotspots to increase signal coverage. So if there is an issue at any one of the more than 200 routers in our network we know which one is affected, where it is located and when it last reported in. With this our network has truly reached the cutting edge.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Prepaid WiFi Rate Announcement

We have some good news for our end-users, we are in the process of standardising our RedButton Prepaid WiFi hotspot rates into three rate classes - promotion, standard and premium.

Regardless of the rate class at any particular hotspot users also enjoy the following benefits:

  • Free 12 month carry-over on credit purchased
  • No monthly contract required
  • Only pay for the megabytes needed
  • Convenient prepaid payment by credit card or voucher
  • Convenient wireless Internet
  • Use standard, inexpensive WiFi equipment
RedButton Prepaid WiFi rate classes, as of July 2008 onwards, are:
  1. Promotion rate: 12c/MB bulk to 15c/MB default
  2. Standard rate: 24c/MB bulk to 30c/MB default
  3. Premium rate: 48c/MB bulk to 60c/MB default


The default rates are displayed on the portal pages and users benefit from bulk rates with discounted credit purchases.

Please note that even the premium rate is significantly lower than those offered by our major WiFi competitors, the best prepaid wifi rate you'll get from from one in particular is 72c/MB and your credit expires after 30 days to boot.

Please note that there are exceptions to these rates at selected hotspots:
  • legacy locations with existing agreements with stakeholders
  • locations that use the Free WiFi product - highly variable since the venue owner can change the rate at will

Friday, June 20, 2008

Enterprise grade, high quality hardware

At RedButton we run a network of hundreds of routers with our hardware platform of choice predominantly being the Linksys WRT54GL and also MikroTik Routerboards. In both cases the devices run RedButton firmware resulting in a fully integrated, managed and monitored network. Both devices are used by a plethora of local and international hotspot and wireless Internet service providers (WISPs).




Why do we point this out?

Well, we've recently had an amusing report of a competitor claiming that the we do not use enterprise grade, high quality hardware. While this claim in itself is laughable, as most hotspot and WISP companies would point out, it also misses the point in terms of what consumers want, and that is good service. Hardware in itself, regardless of technical merits, will never equate to good service. One company that just about anybody would bow down to when it comes to service is Google - who incidentally use off the shelf hardware, weaved together in ingenious ways.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

And We Have Lift-Off - RedButton Free WiFi Product Launched

We had a highly successful launch of our Free WiFi product at Long Street Cafe yesterday. To top it off ITWeb today published an excellent article Dining out on restaurant WiFi which effectively follows up on an ITWeb article Free WiFi is 'hard model to get right' published nine months ago.

We spent the time in between the publication of the above mentioned articles working on our Free WiFi product. Our intention has always been to get the Free WiFi model right, to make sure that venues are provided with a product that is flexible enough to make it work for them in their unique environment. Market feedback is certainly showing that we have got it spot on but we won't rest on our laurels, the work continues.

If you'd like to find out more you may be interested in our news release Boost your business with RedButton's new Free WiFi product.

Thursday, May 29, 2008

RedButton Free WiFi Product Preview


We are officially launching our new RedButton Free WiFi Product on the 9th of June and it is available for preview. The product has been specifically built to cater for the needs of the hospitality industry, its all about boosting traditional sales and brand loyalty. Restaurateurs and hoteliers have the control needed to use free Internet as a flexible and effective tool to boost their business.

The following picture of a display outside Wimpy Rondebosch serves as a prime example of how RedButton's Free WiFi product can be used. In this case, since Wimpy is generally chock-a-block serving their legendary breakfasts in the mornings and burgers at lunch time, management decided to make the automatic 50MB free wifi allocation available after 3pm only.

The advantage of an automatic allocation is that little intervention is needed from restaurant staff. Should fine grained tracking be required one can correlate product sales with the free Internet allowance by using venue specific vouchers - for example you get a free 50MB voucher if you order a drink.

We've worked hard on this product. Earlier editions, without all the features currently available but with the fundamentals, have been in operation for nearly eight months now. In the process we have spent time listening to what venue owners have been telling us, listening to what their needs are, rather than what we think they are.

With this product we hope to have once again shown our commitment to flexibility and adapting to market needs. Thanks for listening.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Three WiFi Gadgets That Will Change Your Life

In this grandiosely entitled post we have a look at three WiFi gadgets that could make your mobile life easier, or just help you glow in the dark.

Eye-Fi - Wireless Memory Cards


Eye-Fi produces memory cards with WiFi built in. In essence you are able to upload your pictures automatically to your PC or favourite photo sharing website (e.g. Flickr, Facebook) once you come within range of your regular WiFi network(s). The service that allows for automatic uploading to photo sharing websites, called WebShare, sounds particularly useful. Imagine all the pictures you would finally be able to share effortlessly instead of leaving them on your hard-drive or worse, still on your camera after months, gathering virtual dust.

Eye-Fi comes in 3 versions, Home, Share and Explore. With Home you can upload to your PC at home, share throws in access to WebShare and finally Explore gives you geotagging functionality and complimentary hotspot access in the USA. We can't wait to get our hands on an Eye-Fi SD card, the Share option looks like the one to go for since with Home the pictures will still be stuck on you PC only it will largely happen transparently.

It seems Eye-Fi SD cards have not yet reached South African e-tailers, search results on Digital Planet, kalahari.net and pricecheck.co.za only showed plain vanilla SD cards. The only place we could find Eye-Fi was here on Amazon.com.

Unfortunately Eye-Fi cards will not work with any hotspot network, such as RedButton's network, that require the user to log in via a web browser splash screen (see this Eye-Fi FAQ entry). Allowing access without a browser based login process is something we are not currently working on but we may in future.

Hotspot Detectors / Wi-Fi Finders

There are a number of manufacturers that have released Hotspot Detectors that allow you to check for signal without having to power on your laptop. Why would you ever need one? Well hotspots are not always very well advertised, for various reasons, and these devices make it easy to pick one up. Imagine being in the middle of some town square in a town you don't know and you need to get connected fast and free if possible, you'd look for open networks on your Wi-Fi Finder and probably head to the coffee shop that tops the list in terms of signal strength.

The ZyXel AG-225H Wi-Fi Finder is one that looks half decent. It can do more than just find WiFi, it takes the logical next step and functions as a WiFi adapter.

And Finally...

If Eye-Fi and Wi-Fi Finders don't work for you, why not get the ultimate, a WiFi Detector Shirt? It sports glowing animated
bars on the front that dynamically change as the surrounding WiFi signal strength fluctuates. Walk down any WiFied city street at night, perhaps throwing caution to the wind with a quick sprint down a dark alley, and you'll be lighting up like a christmas tree.

Monday, May 5, 2008

Beware the flood trojan - amongst other programs lurking in the shadows

From time to time we have users who have background programs consuming portions of their credit balances at unusually high rates. While some of this traffic is legitimate in the sense that the user may have at some time given their consent to for example automatic operating system updates, in some cases a flood trojan has used the user's computer without their knowledge or will. This is one of many security issues Internet users have to be aware of, irrespective of their service provider.

So what is a flood trojan? In fact what is a trojan? Will RedButton try to punt a PC Security Suite? First lets go into what they can do by way of an example. While assisting in diagnosing a problem on a particular client's laptop, our records showed that it managed to upload 310MB in only 24 minutes. To get a better idea of what was happening we gave the customer a free 10MB, asked him to log in and closely monitored his data flow. It turned out that all 10MB were used up in no less than 33 seconds by some program sending data to a particular Internet server whose hostname ends with "static.theplanet.com". A google search on this topic quickly revealed that a trojan virus was at fault, one with a demonstrably insatiable appetite. It was like feeding a crocodile with goulash. While this illustrates the high upload speed of the underlying broadband connection, consider that background programs such as trojans can consume large amounts of data that a subscriber had paid for without their consent. Flood trojans add insult to injury by using the hijacked connection for malicious activities.

We are going to skip the details of what trojans and particularly flood trojans are, click here to read more, the gist of this post is that the need to continuously secure your desktop to ensure its integrity cannot be overstated. Without a secure desktop you run the risk of having your bandwidth used up and in some cases this can happen at lighting speed. There are some basic security practices that you need to adhere to if you have an operating system such as Windows XP

  • Make sure your firewall is enabled
  • Make sure your virus scanner is updated and scans your PC regularly - if you don't have one, get one
  • Make sure you install operating system updates - security holes are often fixed in these
There are many anti-virus programs out there, but one free version you could start with is AVG Free, another tool you might want to use is Spybot Search & Destroy.

If the above practices seem like too much hassle, consider an alternative operating system like Ubuntu Linux, it may just be that you can be even more productive with an operating system that is arguably inherently more secure.

Finally please note that RedButton cannot be held liable for any loss or damage incurred through viruses and trojans on customers' computers as their security and administration is clearly beyond our control. This is stated clearly in our terms and conditions that every RedButton customer agreed to (available here).

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

RedButton's cutting edge hotspot firmware - now even sharper

In an earlier post we unveiled RedButton's firmware with its focus on making it easy to set up reliable hotspots that deliver the world class service our end users expect. Well things have just gotten even better with version 0.9.12 beta being released, hold on to your seats.....

End-users can effortlessly connect to our service, regardless of network settings

A small portion of our end-users arrive at our hotspots with misconfigured network settings that results in them being unable to connect. We currently assist these users with telephonic support but with version 0.9.12 of our firmware such support incidents will be eliminated since all affected users will be able to connect regardless. Should the user have a static IP address or static DNS servers set they will still be redirected to the portal page where they can sign up or login. Eureka!
Not only does this cut down on general support, but it also enhances the user experience at a hotspot. Using a competitor's solution a user not being able to connect would either phone for support or worse just leave the hotspot and never use it. We are okay with the former (supporting the user) but the latter (a user leaving the hotspot) is absolutely unacceptable and the "dark figure" of the number of such cases seems high. Our new firmware certainly addresses this problem resulting in increased revenues for resellers and venues apart from higher customer satisfaction.

Enhanced service and technical support thanks to automated remote access


With version 0.9.12 we can ship our plug & play routers to any remote location and our clients can be assured that simplified network troubleshooting and customer support will be available on a plug and play basis. This is thanks to all routers being constantly accessible remotely 24/7 by RedButton technical staff and in future resellers, without the need for additional configuration settings such as DMZ or port forwarding.
This also enables RedButton to monitor each and every device 24/7, be it a hotspot router or a simple access point/repeater, as long as it runs our firmware of course. If an outage occurs our system will pick up the disconnection in under 3 minutes and notify the hotspot administrator via email after 10 more minutes of no activity.
Ultimately this means that network problems may be detected, attended to and resolved even before the customer calls in to complain - a feature that none of our competitors can currently offer.

The Cisco LED lights up orange whenever your main node or repeater is online

We predominantly use the Linksys WRT54GL. The picture above demonstrates this ability: We have one router (the top router) with the new firmware, and the bottom router with the old firmware. As one can see, the top router's Cisco LED is orange which means it has a valid internet connection. The light is off whenever the Internet connection is off. It is therefore not necessary to access the device's web interface to determine if the Internet connection is the source of the problem. This even works for repeaters or access points connected to the main hotspot router. Configuration and troubleshooting during both installation and maintenance related site visits is thereby greatly simplified and streamlined.

Greatly simplified hotspot installation

In addition to the above the process of hotspot installation by means of configuring your router has been drastically simplified. After having successfully flashed your router with our firmware there are very few steps that need to be carried out in order to get your hotspot up and running. In the majority of cases where you already have an existing Internet connection such as an ADSL line all you need to do is plug a cable from your ADSL modem to the Internet port of your RedButton router. Then connect to its web configuration interface, set the hotspot id which uniquely identifies your hotspot on the RedButton network, save and apply and you're in business. For more advanced setups there's always the firmware documentation to fall back on but even there the configuration is surprisingly simple. Of course if you opt for one of our plug & play routers everything has been preconfigured for you, you just have to plug in the cabling.

Fully automated remote firmware upgrade procedure

Ever tried upgrading your third party firmware to take advantage of new features or greater stability? It usually is a painful and frustrating experience as all carefully adjusted settings must be erased and everything reset to factory defaults. Even saved configuration images are useless as they are not compatible with newer versions. This means you have to do everything on site - a costly and time intensive exercise, especially if you have a large network like ours with hundreds of routers deployed.
With version 0.9.12 this entire process can be fully automated. You as the hotspot owner or reseller don't have to do anything, we take care of it. And for us the entire process has been streamlined to the point where within less than 10 minutes the entire upgrade may be completed. At any time of the day - and if there are any users currently logged into the hotspot the process will politely wait until all of them have logged off. This minimises inconvenience caused to the users, ensures high up time across our network and still enables RedButton to deploy exciting new features across its network whenever the need arises.

Finally...

In a few weeks time after the beta testing phase has been completed successfully we will roll out the production version, 0.9.12 final, across the RedButton network. Naturally our resellers and those opting for the Self Service option of our Prepaid WiFi Product will be able to enjoy the benefits as soon as it has been released.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

HSDPA marketing executive predicts HSDPA will triumph

We've commented on comparisons between HSDPA / 3G and Wi-Fi before in "WiFi loses out to 3G/HSDPA. Not Quite." and don't want to repeat the content here. Most of it is relevant to statements presented in recent articles that we believe would best have been entitled HSDPA marketing executive predicts HSDPA will triumph.

The articles in question are Ericsson predicts demise for hotspots and Ericsson predicts swift end for Wi-Fi hotspots. Commentary on Slashdot and the following blog on CNET News.com present a number of counter arguments in particular this one which points out that

Ericsson are a dealer in mobile internet devices. It is in their interest for people to move to mobile internet devices as people who buy mobile internet devices might by an Ericsson one. Ericsson don't do wifi hotspots, so there is no way using wifi hotspots puts money from your wallet into Ericsson's pocket. This displeases Ericsson, so they will now crow from the rooftops that wifi hotspots are dead, in a bid to drum up business for their absurdly-tariffed mobile internet devices.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Minister says 'no' but the ICASA hearings continue

It's not always easy to get a clear picture of the South African telecommunications regulatory landscape. We made a brief mention of some developments in our Happy New Year post and now follow up on recent developments.

Earlier this week, the communications minister Ivy Matsepe-Casaburri confirmed that VANS licenses will not be converted to ECNS licenses, as reported on in this ITWeb article. This in itself is nothing new but its not clear whether the 'no' means 'never'. Taking a look at the ICASA website and the latest media release, one sees that on the 17th and 18th of March ICASA will hold hearings on the matter of converting VANS licenses to ECNS licenses. From this one can gather that the 'no' is in fact 'maybe'.

Thats all very interesting, but why should consumers care? Well for one these developments affect how much choice you will have as a consumer. In fact in some areas it could come down to having no choice at all. You may be in some small town where no licensed network operator (ECNS license holder) is willing to provide you, or your local hotspot for that matter, with any kind of Internet connectivity purely because they haven't gotten on to it, perhaps never will, and you'll just have to wait. One should also consider that there are small network operators who are having to dedicate resources to fighting for their right to exists, at some level this must affect the quality of their service. The latter again affects you as the consumer, you are left with less choice.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

It's got something to do with rockets



We get asked about our company name from time to time and so in this post talk about its origins. Asking how we came to choose RedButton as our company name is a fair question. After all, we are a WiFi hotspot company and there are an infinite number of other concoctions we could have come up with that more clearly indicate that we are in the wireless Internet business.

The origin's of the name RedButton stems back from Nico's post-grad days (Nico is one of RedButton's co-founders). Red Button Solutions was the generic name given to a software house that was to develop mobile applications for smart phones. The idea of starting this firm was put on ice and revived at least once but never truly got off the ground. The initial attraction to a red button was that a red button would generally indicate that something of note would occur once pressed. As an example buttons that launch rockets tend to be red and anybody that has seen a Soyuz rocket launch would attest to the momentousness of the occasion.



When RedButton was in its infancy, its founders debated what the name should be, in the end it was between WiTech and RedButton. We thought the former would just be another random company name and in particular be difficult to remember. We chose RedButton and have never looked back.

Saturday, February 9, 2008

Hassle Free Networking on Ubuntu with NetworkManager

In this post, the first in a series covering various platforms (Linux, Windows, Mac), we look at networking on Ubuntu Linux using NetworkManager. We primarily use Ubuntu Linux at RedButton and so its only natural that NetworkManager comes under the spotlight first.

NetworkManager is the network configuration tool that you will generally use to connect to wireless and wired networks. The tool is there to make networking easy or pain-free and the official design goals are simplicity, visual clarity and automation. We believe it performs admirably in all departments, especially when considering the needs of the average desktop user who simply wants to get connected to their local office network or hotspot.

In order to use NetworkManager, or to see whether you are already using it, have a look at your network settings. Click on System > Administration > Network and the Network Settings screen will open. On most laptops you will see a Wireless connection and Wired connection under the Connections tab and perhaps even a Modem connection as is displayed below.



If NetworkManager is being used to manage the connection, you will see Roaming mode enabled displayed as you do with the Wired connection in the image above. As you can see, the Wireless connection displays something different and is thus not managed by NetworkManager, so we select the Wireless connection and click on Settings to see the following screen pop up.


Click on Enable roaming mode and the wireless and connection settings are no longer configurable, as is shown in the image below, as you will now be using NetworkManager to manage your network settings.


After you have done the above, you will click on the network icon that would usually be in the top right hand portion of your screen as is shown below.


Assuming that you want to connect to your local WiFi network, right click and select Enable Wireless:


Next click on the icon to view the list of available networks and select the network you want to connect to:

In the example shown above a connection has been made to RedButton Internet and it is an unencrypted network, as hotspots generally are since you authenticate using a web interface. You would be prompted for a passphrase or network key when connecting to an encrypted network.

There is more to NetworkManager, but mostly its operation is automated and intuitive. We leave you to discover the rest of it and enjoy networking on Ubuntu.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Here's looking at you next generation WiFi



Things are hotting up in the South African broadband landscape. The list of commercially available technologies is growing rapidly and truly getting to grips with the intricacies of each technology is something most consumers are unlikely to be interested in. Quality of service is the bottom line. Can I get the service that I need at the right price? That is the question. It's also a question we are not going to answer, in the context hotspots powered by next generation WiFi, until the very end of this post.

WiFi is effectively a set of wireless LAN (local area network) standards called the IEEE 802.11 standards. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is the body that does the standardisation and it is generally a lengthy process. The current WiFi standards are 802.11b and 802.11g with the latter offering higher data rates. The next generation of WiFi is 802.11n and it is not officially a standard yet not only due to standardisation being time consuming but also for various other reasons [1][2]. Even though it is not a standard yet, equipment manufacturers have begun making routers [3] that support the draft standard. The logo shown at the top of this post is what one should look for when buying such a router and the inclusion of the n with the word draft next to it means that the equipment has been certified, by the Wi-Fi Alliance, to be a router that is Wi-Fi Certified 802.11n draft 2.0 (click to get the official take on the meaning of the logo and term). The 802.11n standard is expected to be ratified by the IEEE by the end of this year.

Having touched on the status of 802.11n, lets jump straight to the key differentiators of 802.11n, what can it do for us all? The key advantages are:

  • Improved range - areas in a venue that would previously have had no or poor signal quality should have improved coverage when a certified 802.11n router is used as a drop in replacement for a 802.11b/g router
  • Improved performance - 802.11n offers higher data rates and speeds ranging from 100 - 200Mbps have been reported [3]. Multimedia applications, such as streaming video, require more bandwidth or "fatter pipes" and 802.11n delivers on these requirements. They not only require more bandwidth but also performance characteristics such as lower latency and 802.11n has the ability to deliver on this requirement.
Having mentioned that 802.11n offers improved range and performance, the next questions that come to mind are how much improvement is on offer and also, for the technically inclined, how is the improvement achieved?

To answer the first, with regards to range, a ball park figure is that 802.11n offers twice the range as 802.11b/g in the same environment. It is not possible to give a precise figure as every room or building is different, the material used in construction and other environmental aspects will affect the exact increase in range. The frequency used also effects the range but more on that later. From RedButton's perspective this is good news as it would make delivering on our commitment to providing signal coverage in all relevant areas of venues that much easier. With regards to bandwidth, one can expect roughly five times the throughput. This is certainly attractive when it comes to locally hosted services and activities such as streaming video on the local area network. At RedButton however we currently isolate clients from one another for security reasons and do not host any video services on our local area networks. That being said we still welcome the increase in throughput as at certain locations, where we have as many as 3 concurrent 4Mbps ADSL lines powering a single hotspot, clients would see improved performance when it comes to Internet access.

With regards to the technicalities behind 802.11n, we'll just touch on the key points, for in-dept , academic coverage, O'REILLY's 802.11 Wireless Networks is a good source. The key technical enhancements of 802.11n are:
  1. MIMO technology: This stands for "Multiple-in, Multiple-out" and involves the use of multiple antennas to send and receive more than one signal simultaneously.
  2. Effective use of multiple frequency bands: With 802.11b/g the 2.4GHz frequency band was used exclusively, with 802.11n both the 2.4GHz and the 5GHz frequency band are used [4]. The increases in performance offered by 802.11n have largely been seen when using the 5GHz band [3], not the 2.4GHz band.
We are quite excited about 802.11n and there is no doubt that we'll use it when most new laptops start shipping with 802.11n cards built in. This is only likely to happen once the 802.11n standard has been ratified by the IEEE and so only in the first or second quarter of 2009.

Can I get the service that I need at the right price?

Since the next generation WiFi, 802.11n, is only likely to start being widely adopted in 2009, the question is will I be able to get the service I need at the right price? When it comes to the service one needs, each person has different requirements but its a safe bet that each hotspot client wants good signal strength in all areas of a venue and an Internet that is as fast as possible. First of all, a 802.11n hotspot would still need to be powered by an Internet backbone (whether its WiMax, ADSL, satellite, iBurst, Neotel CDMA, metro Ethernet, the list goes on) and it's difficult to predict what prices will be like in 2009, we do know that they will drop. That being said with 802.11n from a hotspot operators perspective the capital expenditure at each hotspot is likely to be less as fewer routers would be required to provide the same coverage as with 802.11b/g routers. So in conclusion, we predict that you will be getting vastly superior service levels at significantly lower rates in 2009 and the deployment of 802.11n is likely to be a factor in price reductions.