Wireless Fidelity Is a Cheap Date
Wi-Fi finds a place in trucking’s technology tool box.
John Bendel
Technology Editor
Wi-Fi burst on the scene just as the great Internet bubble was deflating. OK, it didn’t exactly burst. It kind of peeked out from the arcane world of advanced wireless electronics and slipped into the commercial mainstream.
In 1999, Wi-Fi showed up in an Apple iBook laptop computer and the rest is history. That history is still being written as Wi-Fi spreads across the consumer world and from one industry to another.
Wi-Fi is working its way into many trucking technologies. Drivers use Wi-Fi to access Internet at truckstops. Administrators use Wi-Fi to create wireless office computer networks that are cheaper than wire. Operations uses Wi-Fi to power RFID applications – gate management, yard management and cross-docking systems – and lower their cost. More applications are on the way.
WI-FI MOVES MUCH DATA FOR LITTLE
The appeal of Wi-Fi, particularly in trucking, is cost: It’s cheap. You can move lots of data for comparatively little money. Even a basic 802.11b linkup on a low-end Circuit City wireless router can transmit as much information as a DSL or cable Internet connection.
Wi-Fi is a marketing-savvy name for wireless standards known as 802.11. The number stands for a family of specifications developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Those specs comprise standards that enable manufacturers to create compatible products to communicate without wires. There are four such specifications: 802.11, 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g. They all operate in unregulated spectrum.
Ratified in 1997, 802.11b worked well with Ethernet, the dominant standard for wired computer networks, and caught on quickly with techies. Wireless 802.11b networks popped up in restaurants, offices and homes, where they are often used to share Internet connections. These networks – particularly those in public spaces – are known as “hot spots.”
Hot spots can extend from 750 to 1,000 feet from a typical Wi-Fi base station outdoors with a standard antenna, but performance (data throughput) declines with distance. Best performance will be within 150 to 350 feet of the base station.
In an office or warehouse, Wi-Fi will usually function acceptably between 250 and 350 feet of the base; maximum performance will be limited to 100 to 150 feet. Of course, everything depends on how open the area is. Walls and obstructions decrease range, though hotspots can be extended to cover large areas like truckstop parking lots using special antennas and repeating stations.
Within a hotspot, Wi-Fi-capable devices can log on to the network to send and receive information. The device can be a driver’s laptop at a truckstop, of course, but increasingly manufacturers are building Wi-Fi capability into other devices – handheld computers, or PDAs, and digital phones, for example. Chip maker Intel started building Wi-Fi into its line of Centrino computer chips for laptop computers in 2003.
Wi-Fi infiltration isn’t limited to generic phones and computers. Trucking technology providers are building Wi-Fi capability into their products as well. For example, Qualcomm said it will incorporate Wi-Fi into the new, multi-mode wireless communications system it is currently developing. The still un-named system will switch from satellite to ground-based cell to Wi-Fi, automatically selecting the least expensive option.
Qualcomm isn’t the only company that sees the potential of Wi-Fi. Technology providers including XATA, Cadec and Tripmaster already offer Wi-Fi in their fleet management products. PeopleNet provides a generic USB connection on its new g3 system that can be used for Wi-Fi.
WI-FI PROVIDES THE FINAL DRIVER LINKUP
One of the most ambitious Wi-Fi ventures in trucking is the network being built by technology provider SiriCOMM Inc. of Joplin, Mo. SiriCOMM is using Wi-Fi as the final link in a system to move large amounts of information between trucks and fleet managers. SiriCOMM is building its network for truckload and long-haul fleet customers.
SiriCOMM has established Wi-Fi hot spots at many truckstops, including the Pilot chain, where they are currently selling Wi-Fi Internet access, primarily to drivers to use with laptops in their cabs. But that’s just a sideline for SiriCOMM.
The company installs servers in each Wi-Fi hotspot location. Besides offering Internet service to subscribers, those computers provide a critical commercial link for SiriCOMM customers. Those fleets’ drivers typically use off-the-shelf, Wi-Fi capable PDAs instead of installed onboard computers. The PDAs automatically log on to any SiriCOMM hotspot they enter.
The PDA uploads whatever information it may have in memory. Depending on the application, that can be GPS locations, truck diagnostics data, driver logs or delivery details – including signature capture. The PDA then downloads any messages waiting for it – e-mail or pickup and delivery instructions, for example. The linkup can take place in a truckstop parking lot or as the truck rolls through a hotspot on the highway.
SiriCOMM hotspot servers can hold vast amounts of data. They can store all kinds of company information that is then available in that Wi-Fi hotspot to the driver in the truck. Thus a driver can easily access, say, company benefits, policies or payroll information. To the driver, it appears the data is coming from the Internet, but in fact it resides on the server at that hotspot.
Moving the same amount of information from a company to an individual over a standard satellite or even cellular system would be far more expensive. And SiriCOMM hotspot servers are capable of storing enormous amounts of information, not just for one or two fleet customers, but for many.
How does all that data get to the servers? Doesn’t that cost money?
Indeed it does. SiriCOMM talks to its hotspot servers from an operations center in Kansas City and it uses satellite communications – in this case something called VSAT technology. VSAT stands for Very Small Aperture Terminal and refers to a fixed – or geostationary, high-orbit – communications satellite. VSAT provides broadband communications.
But using VSAT in conjunction with SiriCOMM’s large capacity hotspot servers actually saves money. Anything a customer may want to send – from a simple e-mail to an entire company policy manual – will go up to the VSAT satellite through the SiriCOMM center. VSAT will then broadcast the information to all of the SiriCOMM hotspot servers at once, eliminating the need to send to each server individually – an expensive prospect.
In the case of that policy manual, the data can reside on all the servers for any company driver to access. The information can be updated or erased remotely. In the case of an e-mail, the communication will reside on all the terminals until the driver for whom it’s intended enters a hotspot and downloads the message onto his PDA. That server then sends a message back to SiriCOMM, which in turn sends a command to erase the message from all the other servers.
There isn’t anything quite like it in trucking, and in fact, SiriCOMM’s network is still being built. The company currently has servers in some 260 locations, but doesn’t intend to market its services beyond test fleets until it has between 400 and 500 hotspots. The company recently announced that it will be installing hotspots in more than 250 PrePass weigh station by-pass locations.
Of course, that points up the potential downside of the SiriCOMM idea, and brings us back to Wi-Fi. Drivers and devices can only communicate when they are in a hotspot. For trucks on the road, that necessarily means most communications will not be in real time but rather what techies call batch mode, in which stored data is downloaded at one clip.
But SiriCOMM anticipates that its sprawling network will mean that many trucks will either stop at or pass through a hotspot multiple times in any given day, which may represent more updates than many fleets allow using conventional communications. And, of course, the SiriCOMM system allows the exchange of far more data.
Wireless Fidelity continued...
