The techies and companies in Technopark will soon be connected just by a click. The park authorities have decided to start with a Wi-Fi connectivity across the entire campus, apart from setting up a high speed data centre. Whether it is laptop, tablet, smart phone or digital camera, the techies will soon enjoy the free and easy exchange of data over a wireless computer network.
“The Wi-Fi plan has been in the works for a while now, in continuation of our overall plan to ensure Technopark retains its status as the premier IT destination and to maintain its standing as the greenest IT park in the country,” says M. Vasudevan, Senior Manager, Business Development at Technopark. At present, most companies on campus do have Wi-Fi connectivity which is only accessible to their employees. We plan to set up 8GB connectivity outside companies, especially in common areas where the techies gather. It does not require much effort on our part and hopefully it should be up and running within the next six months, may be even less,” adds Vasudevan.
The Techies’ speak
With the advent of this much coveted project, the enthusiastic techies have come forward to say what they feel. Nadam R. Bhadran, a network engineer with E-Team Informatica at Technopark says: “I think it’s high time for WiFi connectivity on campus. It should have been done years ago.” According to him, Having Wi-Fi in an area like the food court will be very helpful. One need not chuck the food and rush back to office computers so as to deal with an urgent task. With laptops or smart phones the work will be finished off sitting at any part in the campus. Techie Vineesh P. is of the same opinion and he adds: “I think it will be especially beneficial to our clients who come from across the world to Technopark. Most of them would have 2G and 3G smart phones and would be connected to the net. However, working with Wi-Fi is any day better than working with a limited GPRS connection. Of course, you don’t have to pay the roaming bills too.”
Wi-FI: Few Questions
Anything new and promising would have its own boons and banes. That is the plight of the new age technologies. Although they are thrilled about having Wi-Fi on campus, the techies disclosed their anxieties about the feasibility of the project considering the vast area that it has to cover. The doubt has its own reasons-there are 40,000-plus potential users on campus. That amounts a fairly large number indeed. “It would have to have an exceptionally huge bandwidth,” says Nadam, a tad sceptically.
Another problem is regarding the security. An unrestricted access to Wi-Fi could cause potential threats to security of the data involved in the communications. “With such open connections where hundreds of people can connect on at the same time, it’s very difficult to keep track of who is viewing adult content; doing unauthorised downloads, checking out pirate software sites, and so on. It can open the door to potential hackers too,” says Rajesh G., a system administrator at Toonz, who monitors the company’s in-house network as a part of his daily routine.
Another question raised regarding it is on the productivity nightmare from a human resources perspective. “As of now social networking sites are not accessible on most office computers to ensure maximum productivity. I am sure everyone will utilise the Wi-Fi to log on to the same!” says Vineesh. Vasudevan, however, re-affirms that there should not be any undue worry regarding the social networking sites. “We will have active auditing, monitoring and filtering systems in place with firewalls, security codes and the like. Also we plan to restrict access to the network with passwords,” he explains. High time to go Wi-Fi it sounds.
The public people can enter into the campus through public transport with a lap or a tablet also can access wifi and can download so many stuff’s even though its protected with firewalls…
Then what is the meaning of secure wifi? How in park?
In an era of cloud computing and 100s of tools to collaborate, this is going to be extremely useful.