It would be nice if an installer could align a factory out of the box radio without having to make any configuration changes. Simply power up, tone in the alignment and walk away.
This would utilize Authentication Bypass on ICC for the AP's, of course, but that at least means the guy in the field doesnt really need to know anything about connecting a laptop to the radio.
**Ideally, it would be nice to see a voltmeter RSL read out from the aux port on the SM.**
Can you explain this sequence in some more detail? You want the installer to be able to take out a brand new SM out of the box, point it towards an AP, align it using the alignment tone, and never have to use a laptop. Correct?
If the SM starts off with factory default configuration, at what point does it get configured, who does this, and what mechanism is used (Administrator logs in to SM remotely via LUID, or onboard to cnMaestro and push a config template, or use PMP's original zero touch using DHCP options etc)
Who validates the install by running a link test? Is this again a remote administrator?
We are working an on Android app for streamlining PMP SM installation, and your feedback would help that effort.
Yes, a remote administrator works with the installer and commissions the radio via variety of means. Can explore the zero touch, but the means in which the radio is configured remotely is a separate issue.
The main thing here is reducing the requisite skills for an installer to the most base of physical install only which reduces the requisite skillset required of the remote administrator to walk the installer through the process.
Overall, it is a greatly simplified installation. Commissioning can take place at anytime after that via several methods.
New-in-box deployment has never worked out for us.
The SM has to be touched:
1) recent compatible/stable software release needs to be loaded
2) we don't use 5, 15 or 30 (yet) MHz - scanning takes too long
3) we use DES encrypt - scanning DES and AES would extend the scan time even more
Today we use ICC and NOC techs remote provision via LUID proxy. It works fine.
And I've posted about this here before. ICC auth bypass using the AP's management VID is not ideal. A dedicated VLAN ID for that would be great. But I do not want to mess with our management VIDs on our L2 domains, such as tunneling them back to the NOC. If I could do this we'd be using zero-touch.
I agree the SM currently has to be touched, which is why I posted this in the "Ideas" forum.
Also, there are so many software compatibility issues that it would be nice if the ICC made use of a base set of code that didnt break between major software jumps. I have other radios that can be many versions apart and still work just fine.
found this old post. with the new version 15.2, now out of the box radios will not connect with installation color code unless you log in and change it to AES encryption, since that is all the AP will support now. SM's should be able to bypass everything with the installation color code IMO so that you do not have to touch the SM config.
@doug_heberlee
thank you for revitalizing this post, this is still an important feature request. The installation color code is great but it’s still restrictive on three parts; software version, region setting and encryption.
cnArcher is the latest development I’ve see that will assist with field installations. But even that requires the tech to carry around a Wi-Fi router of some sort for local Ethernet access to the SM.
Hopeful we will see a version of SM that defaults to AES out of the box (I think this is coming??).
Then we need to be able to order a sku that ships with our region code set.
Slowly but surely....