Quote:
Originally Posted by DELurker
From the 2013 competition manual...
Quote:
Teams are not allowed to set up their own 802.11a/b/g/n/ac (2.4GHz or 5GHz) wireless communication (e.g. access points or ad-hoc networks) in the venue.
A wireless hot spot created by a cellular device would be considered an access point.
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Since they specifically mention 2.4GHz, I would assume that anything which looked like a 802.11 network in the 2.4GHz ISM range would be treated as one. This assumption would include both 802.15.1 and 802.15.4. Given what happened to the Einstein guy (discussed elsewhere in this thread) in 2012, I would not want to even hint at arguing with the FTA over the difference between 802.11 and 802.15.4 networks, especially since they occupy the same frequency space and can (and do) interfere with each other. |
I would think the fact they mentioned 2.4GHz or 5GHz, is that Wifi can operate in both, covers the bases with teams trying to use any kind of wifi.
Also adding on the fact that from the
documents I have seen (and can quickly find) the control system on the field uses the 5GHz range, which would be unaffected by anything in the 2.4 range. So in ideal situations, a 2.4Ghz network will not cause issues with network traffic for robots.
Since such is the case it may seem silly for FIRST to ban Wifi outright, but it is much easier for them to simply outlaw it then to risk the chance of someone accidentally forgetting to shut 5GHz off in an access point.
Another reason I've read but can't tell how much effect it would have, is that the access points on the robots would still see SSIDs in the 2.4GHz range, which if there are enough of, may cause issues with the AP trying to keep track of them all and hurt performance.