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Cisco Aironet 1100 Series Access Point Hardware Installation Guide
OL-4309-07

GLOSSARY

802.11 The IEEE standard that specifies carrier sense media access control and physical
layer specifications for 1- and 2-megabit-per-second (Mbps) wireless LANs
operating in the 2.4-GHz band.
802.11a The IEEE standard that specifies carrier sense media access control and physical
layer specifications for wireless LANs operating in the 5-GHz frequency band.
802.11b The IEEE standard that specifies carrier sense media access control and physical
layer specifications for 5.5- and 11-Mbps wireless LANs operating in the
2.4-GHz frequency band.

A

access point A wireless LAN data transceiver that uses radio waves to connect a wired
network with wireless stations.
ad hoc network A wireless network composed of stations without Access Points.
antenna gain The gain of an antenna is a measure of the antennas ability to direct or focus
radio energy over a region of space. High gain antennas have a more focused
radiation pattern in a specific direction.
associated A station is configured properly to allow it to wirelessly communicate with an
Access Point.

B

beacon A wireless LAN packet that signals the availability and presence of the wireless
device. Beacon packets are sent by access points and base stations; however,
client radio cards send beacons when operating in computer to computer (Ad
Hoc) mode.
BOOTP Boot Protocol. A protocol used for the static assignment of IP addresses to
devices on the network.
BPSK A modulation technique used by IEEE 802.11b-compliant wireless LANs for
transmission at 1 Mbps.
broadcast packet A single data message (packet) sent to all addresses on the same subnet.