Useful Terms - Dell PowerConnect W-Airwave User Manual

Useful Terms

VisualRF - The service within AMP that calculates location, calculates path loss, and provides floor plan
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editing capabilities.
VisualRF Plan - Makes the planning portions of VisualRF available in an offline software package that does
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not require a server.
QuickView - Flash front-end for VisualRF which displays information generated by the backend service.
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mW - 1/1000 of a Watt. It is a linear measurement (always positive) generally used to represent transmission.
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dB (Decibels) - difference/ratio between two signal levels.
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dBm - dB as compared to 1 mW. It is a logarithmic measurement (integer) which is typically used in place of
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mW to represent receive-power level. AMP normalizes all signals to dBm, so it is easy to evaluate performance
between various vendors.
RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indicator) - IEEE defines RSSI is a mechanism by which RF energy is to be
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measured by the circuitry on a wireless NIC (0-255). RSSI is not standard across vendors. Each vendor
determines their own RSSI scale/values.
AP-to-AP Signal (Neighbor) - Some APs/Controllers have the ability to report the signal strength of APs that
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they hear. AMP uses these signal strength readings to dynamically attenuate floor plans to increase the
accuracy of client locations and heat maps.
Unassociated Client Information - Some APs/Controllers have the ability to report the signal strength clients
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they hear, but are not associated with a radio on the AP. AMP also uses these signal strength readings to more
accurately place clients.
Client Surveys - Client surveys within VisualRF use access points to understand which clients they hear and
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at what signal strength.
Rogue Surveys - Rogue surveys are facilitated by AMC, VisualRF and the client's radio to understand which
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access points they hear and what signal strength.
AWMS is the only WLAN management application that understands unique RF characteristics for every
enterprise WLAN manufacturer. This includes receive sensitivity at all data rates, antenna characteristics, and
supported transmit power levels for every architecture and individual model.
AWMS normalizes signal metrics which might come as RSSI or SNR into dBm enabling customers to visualize
and compare different vendors, models, and architectures as shown in
Figure 1 Example Vendor-Specific Implementation of RSSI
6 | Overview of VisualRF
Figure 1:
Dell PowerConnect W AirWave 7.2 | VisualRF User Guide