[mesh-dev] (mis)using SSID broadcasts for great convenience

[Marc Juul]

I just realized something that might be completely obvious to everyone
else, but I hadn't thought of it before:

Context:

  On the ad-hoc wireless network (the mesh) the SSID doesn't matter at all
since all nodes have the same BSSID set. I had initially turned the SSID
off, but realized that there is no simple command line tool for "please
list all nodes with this BSSID within range" which makes debugging easier.

Realization:

  Since the SSID doesn't matter for ad-hoc, other than for helping us
humans know which nodes are nearby, we can use the SSID to identify not
just the node but also the radio.

Example of SSIDs from dual-band home node with two extender nodes:

  [infrastructure open] peoplesopen.net
  [infrastructure WPA2] my-private-network
  [adhoc] ppls-n2n-node42-phy0-ch11
  [adhoc] ppls-n2n-node42-phy1-ch161
  [adhoc] ppls-n2n-node42-ext0-ch153
  [adhoc] ppls-n2n-node42-ext1-ch6

_but_ this would fill up people's wifi network lists with basically junk
entries

I seem to remember that there is a way to get some operating systems to not
list an SSID while still broadcasting? Something about prefixing the SSID
with a special character?

What's the behavior on current-gen operating systems for adhoc? I know
Windows 8.1 doesn't show adhoc networks at all and I know android 12 (at
least cyanogenmod) does show adhoc networks. Of course all linux-based
systems show adhoc networks. Not sure about Mac OS, iOS or later/earlier
windows versions.

Sorting is usually by signal strength, so we can't even put our SSIDs at
the bottom of the list easily.

What do?

-- 
marc/juul
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