Summary

Managing your wireless network falls under both the operating and optimizing phases of the solutions lifecycle. It is an ongoing effort that will help ensure the success of your WLAN.

When defining your management strategy, one of the first decisions you should make is whether to handle support in-house or to outsource this activity to a trusted partner. You can use the FCAPS model to help define your management strategy. The underlying architecture of your network will help guide you when considering centralized WLAN management versus a distributed model. Centralized WLAN management avoids having to configure and manage each access point but usually requires dedicated WLAN controllers or switches.

There are three common topics when considering WLAN management. You must be able to manage the RF portions of your WLAN, you must be able to manage the physical infrastructure or hosts, and you must also consider client management, which is often the most challenging aspect of all.

WLANs, by their very nature, are more difficult to manage than regular wired networks. Client devices on a WLAN are constantly on the move, create more load on your AAA as they repeatedly authenticate and reauthenticate, and are not as predictable in their location as normal wired network clients such as desktop computers. WLANs are also based upon radio frequency technologies, and radio is a very dynamic and constantly changing medium, subject to interference, contention, and environmental factors.

Another important topic that you should not overlook is managing the security framework of your WLAN. Because WLANs transmit their traffic via radio waves, you must ensure that you have a strong security architecture to maintain the integrity of your network and the data on it. Do not overlook security management because this is an area where you will most likely need to regularly audit, fine-tune, and revise.

You can address all these challenges with a robust management framework and tools. Many options are available to you, including those provided by the manufacturers of the equipment you installed all the way to independent third-party solutions that you can purchase and integrate with existing systems you might already have. Finally, do not overlook the possibility of using dedicated wireless diagnostic tools for your IT staff and even developing some tools and utilities in-house if you have the technical resources available.