FIGURE 11 . Typical firewall port usage and configuration requirements
CONCLUSION In the modern digital world, whenever people come together to collaborate for business, for education, or to simply forge human connections, multimedia content and AV connectivity have central roles. In all of these settings, the odds are that a video screen is helping people get their points across. Also likely, the images on those screens are coming from portable devices accessing a premise network wirelessly. The future of collaboration is increasingly wireless. Wi-Fi is on a steady march to increase data transfer rate and bandwidth, with Wi-Fi 6 currently dominant and Wi-Fi 7 on the immediate horizon. There is growing momentum to integrate Wi-Fi and 5G networks, with Wi-Fi providing strong indoor coverage and 5G offering wide outdoor reach. BICSI Registered Communications Distribution Designers (RCDDs) and installers, being network experts, are at the nexus of these wireless trends. By applying their LAN and WLAN expertise, they can ensure that enterprise networks are equipped to deliver smooth collaborative experiences with informative and engaging audiovisual content. AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY : Anthony Cortes is the Director of Sales and Marketing, Education Classroom Systems for Extron. He is the key individual in the development and execution of classroom system programs and has spent more than 15 years focused on the education market. Anthony’s extensive work with universities and education resellers gives him a unique perspective on the current state and future direction of classroom AV systems. He can be reached at acortes@extron.com.
• Content Moderation : Although not strictly a security concern, content moderation has a role in who gets access to share content on the displays during presentations and collaboration sessions. Wi-Fi collaboration gateways have two presentation access modes that are controlled by the meeting director: Collaboration Mode and Moderator Mode. º Collaboration mode is usually the default mode. All connected users can send content to the gateway for display on the screen. Depending on the gateway, content from multiple users (up to a set limit) can be displayed on the screen simultaneously. º Moderator mode allows the meeting leader to log into the gateway and select which devices can share content, and how that content is displayed on the screen. Wi-Fi Collaboration Gateway Device Considerations Device Naming: Most collaboration gateways support device naming to make the address scheme easier for users to understand and remember compared to an IP address. The hostname can be resolved using the following methods. Consult the gateway manufacturer documentation for detailed device naming procedures and consult the web to learn more about these hostname lookup protocols: • DNS name resolution • DHCP option 12 (i.e., client hostname) or DHCP option 81 (i.e., client fully qualified domain name [FQDN]) • Dynamic DNS Update (NSUPDATE) for servers
FIGURE 10 . A typical Wi-Fi setup screen showing how Wi-Fi collaboration gateways can be configured to automatically select a Wi-Fi channel or manually set to a specific channel.
• Channel Management: Either allow the gateway to automatically select the best Wi-Fi channel available or manually select the channel as demonstrated for a typical gateway in Figure 10. Security Having the proper network security configuration is crucial for protecting the network infrastructure. Wi-Fi collaboration gateways provide several layers of protection. They support the IEEE 802.1X authentication standard for port-based network access control (NAC). Communication with user portable devices is protected by the Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) connection that includes AES 128-bit encryption. For environments with multiple Wi-Fi collaboration gateways, entry of a PIN can be required before users can share content to the display, assuring that users see only their own content in environments that may have multiple units in close proximity.
• Firewall Transversal : Wi-Fi collaboration gateway manufacturers have firewall rules that are unique to their devices that allow traffic to pass on the wired network. Consult the manuals and technical documentation for details about the use of each port. Figure 11 shows an excerpt of a typical firewall port configuration table. • Wireless Encryption : Wireless connections to users’ portable devices, whether provided directly from enterprise network WAPs or through Wi-Fi collaboration gateways, can be encrypted using HTTPS or datagram transport layer security (DTLS). HTTPS secures stream-oriented connections like TCP. DTLS provides secure data transmission in applications where packet loss might occur; making it suitable for real-time video applications where fast, low latency data transmission is crucial.
I
I
32
ICT TODAY
April/May/June 2025
33
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs