Lamont To Get Wireless Ethernet

Harvard College Library (HCL) and Harvard Arts and Sciences Computing Services (HASCS) will initate wireless ethernet services on their laptop loaners in Lamont Library in early March, officials said yesterday.

Lamont already loans four laptops to students. Later this month, the library will send two of the loaners to have the necessary wireless upgrade installed.

Linda Collins, Lamont's head of access services, said she anticipates the

machines will be available for student use by early March.

Wireless networking "transcievers"--or stationary Internet access points--have already been installed in the main reading room and reference area on the third floor.

"The reception and speed is wonderful," Collins said.

The technology employed for the new services is the same that has enabled wireless networking at a few other colleges and universities over the past two years. The technology, called the "IEEE 802.11b specification," provides a connecting speed of up to 11 megabits per second.

Administrators said they expect that the next generation of wireless technology will also be compatible with the equipment that will be offered at Lamont.

"HASCS and HCL staff worked together to deal with the installation of the necessary technology, and we will work together on its support," said HASCS Director Franklin M. Steen.

The addition of wireless services will provide added flexibility to library laptop patrons, as students will now be able to work from the comfort of a Lamont lounge chair.

"It's for getting onto the network in an arbitrary location," said John Howard, Harvard's librarian for information technology. "The library recognizes that people use computers in academic work and need to access resources."

Harvard already offers wireless services inside the Harvard Stadium press box and in the new, state-of-the-art Maxwell-Dworkin Building, and Howard foresees the proliferation of such technology around the University in the future.

Howard specified older buildings around campus as targeted spaces for

future wireless installation, which would be significantly less costly

than standard wiring procedures.

Lamont already offers 24 datajacks for personal laptop users. Collins said

that the idea of wireless services has had a popular reaction.

"We hope that Lamont's wireless installation creates a sense of

connectedness and immediacy that supports study at Harvard," said Heather Cole, librarian of Hilles and Lamont libraries. "It follows the introduction of loaner laptops...a service that has proved enormously popular and is likely to grow, both in Lamont and Hilles."

The library's only concern, Collins said, is the risk associated with battery exhaustion, which she said has weighed heavily on the minds of administrators since Lamont began loaning laptops.

--Staff writer Justin D. Gest can be reached at gest@fas.harvard.edu.