Your wireless design process has three stages or phases. They are the planning phase, rough design phase, and wireless site survey. It is imperative that you carefully evaluate the requirements of your business, users, and applications in order to determine the feasibility of a wireless solution in your environment. Be sure to evaluate the application traffic that you may expect on the wireless LAN, the types of applications used and the number of users in a given cell. User expectations should be set throughout your design and implementation processes to ensure the support and success of your final implementation. Establishing the expected performance of your wireless LAN with your users will not only help you during implementation, but also will ease support of your wireless LAN after the installation. Build a business case for your proposed wireless implementation to include return on investment, productivity benefits, and cost savings resulting from more efficient processes.

A thorough wireless site survey and test of your initial wireless LAN design is your best bet to ensure the success of your implementation. The site survey will provide you with the information necessary to turn your initial design into a completed design that is ready for implementation. It will allow you to factor in previously unknown environmental variables, such as interference from other radio frequency devices and obstructions, and it will allow you to verify coverage areas, channel settings, throughput, antenna/radio placement, wired network availability, and power requirements prior to a permanent installation. When performing...