HiperLAN/2 and the evolution of wireless LANs

Summary form only given. As the virtues of flexible wireless anywhere computing begin to be understood-there is a growing interest in wireless local area networking (LAN) technologies. Unlike their wide area cellular or PCS-based counterparts, wireless LAN offers significantly higher speeds and the cost-effectiveness of low power transmission in the unlicensed spectrum. This paper surveys existing wireless LAN technologies and their projected market impact on the corporate and home environments. Variants of the 802.11 specification and the evolution to the 802.11b, capable of 11 Mbps, are described. It touches on some of today's practical issues surrounding large-scale wireless LAN campus deployments and focuses primarily on HiperLAN/2, which support automatic frequency allocation, QoS/connection-orientation and is capable of physical layer rates of up to 54 Mbps. The architecture and structure of HiperLAN/2 are described along with the current standardization status. Additionally, the paper also touches on wireless LAN spectrum, chip set implementation and interoperability issues. Contrasts to wireless wide area and personal area networking (e.g. Bluetooth) technologies are also given.