I've been an avid reader of this list for some time(just re-subscribed), but my lack of experience on the *nix side of the world (relative to my experience in the Microsoft world) has been a bit of an achilles' heel for me. Having recently been laid off, I'm thinking of doing a selfish good deed by helping a local coffee shop install an AP.
The thing is, I think convincing a small coffee shop to pay a minimum $150/month or so to install a free service is going to be hard enough without bringing in a scary-looking PC and trying to convince them that it'll all be OK. The idea would be to buy a linksys/d-link box that didn't suck.
Off the top of my head, a few things I would want if I owned the shop.
1. A captive portal to display a EULA/liability waiver-kind of statement.
2. This part is tricky and something that is likely not to be taken well by the public networking community. I respect the objection of a business not wanting to simply give away its physical space to laptop users not buying any products. In a public space, it's different, but there's only so much available space in a coffee ship.
So, since I don't think people should be required to pay for internet access via wireless, I think a reasonable "rent" of, say, 1 purchase per hour or so is reasonable. I'm not sure how this would work - maybe the password rotates every x hours and you need to purchase something in order to receive it. This is very unlikely to be present in a turnkey solution, I realize. I suppose I'm asking partially to find out if such a tool is present in an existing, currently-in-use solution of any kind.
3. Some means - if such a thing exists - of minimizing the interaction from PC to PC, to prevent or at least minimize malicious/virus intrusion to the greatest degree possible.
4-x(?). Any other things you folks might find useful for a business that wants to mutually benefit with its customers by adding wireless internet access.
Anyway, I've had a gvery difficult time finding any reak discussion of how to do this sort of thing, especially with this sort of company in mind. The primary issues are minimizing the costs to the business, from learning curve to available "real estate" occupied by leeches, purchase price, to maintenance. Some all-in-one/turnkey. solutions are out there, like the SonicWall TZW and the Proxim AP-2500 (both in the mid-$500's)
This article ( http://mobilebusinessadvisor.com/doc/11166 ) also lists a few expensive and seemingly mediocre solutions from
http://www.ip3networks.com NA-50 (about $1000) http://www.nomadix.com/products/ag.asp Nomadix AG-2000w ($700)
I'm interested in people's experiences with all of these (and other similar) products and services.
Too many of the resources out there are either too simple (unencrypted linksys) or too complicated (configuration and maintenance of a *NIX box) for a business of this size. My very sincere apologies if a real cogent discussion of this topic is out there somewhere, but if it is I've had the damnedest time finding it.
If all it takes is a link, thanks. On the slim chance that I'm right and nothing much is out there, perhaps this thread could serve as the beginnings of a more comprehensive resource for people in need of the same thing, or the basis of a small page somewhere.
Thanks
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