Infrastructure Wireless Lan For Roaming Wireless Pcs - Enterasys RoamAbout RBT-4102 Configuration Manual

Network Topologies

Infrastructure Wireless LAN for Roaming Wireless PCs

The Basic Service Set (BSS) defines the communications domain for each access point and its
associated wireless clients. The BSS ID is a 48‐bit binary number based on the access point's
wireless MAC address, and is set automatically and transparently as clients associate with the
access point. The BSS ID is used in frames sent between the access point and its clients to identify
traffic in the service area.
The BSS ID is only set by the access point, never by its clients. The clients only need to set the
Service Set Identifier (SSID) that identifies the service set provided by one or more access points.
The SSID can be manually configured by the clients, can be detected in an access point's beacon, or
can be obtained by querying for the identity of the nearest access point. For clients that do not
need to roam, set the SSID for the wireless card to that used by the access point to which you want
to connect.
A wireless infrastructure can also support roaming for mobile workers. More than one access
point can be configured to create an Extended Service Set (ESS), as shown in Figure
the access points so that a continuous coverage area is created, wireless users within this ESS can
roam freely. All wireless network card adapters and RBT‐4102s, within a specific ESS, must be
configured with the same SSID.
Figure 2-3
2-4 Network Configuration
Infrastructure Wireless LAN for Roaming
2‐3. By placing