2021 Content Contribution of the Year Finalists
Jennifer Minella
Jennifer “JJ” Minella knows how to take a topic that is a challenge to many folks and make it easily digestible for the masses. Jennifer’s also known for introducing mindfulness-based leadership to individuals and organizations in infosec. She is an author, dynamic speaker, thought leader and so much more. She champions security in the industry to bring understanding and light to a critical component of networks. In addition to being a CISSP, Jennifer holds several vendor-specific certifications such as HP Master ASE in Networking, Security & Mobility and Juniper JNCIA for Access Control. Her technical expertise with multiple vendor technologies gives her unique insight into the industry and frequently leads to speaking engagements on network security topics throughout the US.
Twitter: @jjx
Blog Site: SecurityUncorked.com
Mac Deryng
Blogger, trainer, consultant, CWNE and podcaster extraordinaire Mac Deryng brings MANY perspectives to his blogs, episodes and presentations. In addition, he does a great job discussing topics that are relevant and at the top of mind of the industry. Mac has channeled his knowledge into his podcast, as well as his training. According to Mac, “There is no better way to learn than to teach. Teach, share the knowledge and make wireless more fun that it already is.” Mac’s presentation at Wi-Fi Design Day really highlighted his abilities, and we are excited to see what he does next.
Twitter: @MacDeryng
Blog Site: wifininjas.net
Matt Starling
Matt does a great job presenting all angles and not influencing others but allowing for conversation. In addition, he is always interested in leading conversations, and bringing relevant topics to Wi-Fi engineers. The presentation he and fellow podcaster and Wi-Fi Awards nominee, Mac Deryng, did at the Wi-Fi Design Day was outstanding. Whether he is blogging, speaking, or podcasting, Matt believes there should be more awareness and education for wireless planning and deployments. Pursuing and furthering his knowledge has been a core focus for Matt ultimately earning his CWNE certification. Additionally, we always enjoyed hearing how others have started in wireless, what tips they have for those just getting started, and what tools they use.
Twitter: @mattstarling
Blog Site: wifininjas.net
Peter Mackenzie
Peter Mackenzie (President of the WLAN Association) is an internationally recognized expert in Wi-Fi and co-author of the CWAP study guide published by Wiley. Peter is currently the Head of Technical Operations for UK company MarQuest, where he is the principle instructor for the CWNP courses. Peter has taught courses in various countries around the globe. When not instructing courses, Peter provides consultancy services specializing in wireless networking and network analysis, to many industries including local government, education, and retail. Peter also heads up the wireless installation team at MarQuest working with many different wireless vendors and holding many of their certifications, along with the vendor natural CWNE and CWNT certifications. Peter is CWNE #33.
Twitter: @MackenzieWiFi
Blog Site: mackenziewifi.com
Rowell Dionicio
Rowell Dionicio is a Wi-Fi superhero and does it all from podcasting, blogging, speaking, consulting, to running huge networks. During the day he works as a network engineer in higher education. Outside of those duties has his own consulting side business where he helps organizations with their Wi-Fi needs. On a weekly basis, he co-hosts a Wi-Fi centric podcast with previous Wi-Fi Awards winner, François Vergès. Rowell has a passion for technology and using it to improve our lives, create change, and encourage growth. No matter what he is doing, Rowell delivers interactive, relevant topics with a unique perspective that captivates audiences.
Twitter: @rowelldionicio
Blog Site: rowelldionicio.com
2021 Rookie of the Year Finalists
Gjermund Raaen
Gjermund Raaen has been a significant contributor to the wireless community. He has authored several blog articles regarding bits and bytes in the 802.11ax protocol, trying to describe how OFDMA works and how to interpret captured 802.11ax frame. In addition he has put together a WiFi AirTime calculator to visualize airtime usage for OFDM (non-HT), HT, VHT and HE TXOPs. His engagement and questions on social media, webinars, and conferences are pointed directed and are helping make the wireless community stronger.
Twitter: @GjermundRaaen
Blog Site: www.gjermundraaen.com
John Deegan
John Deegan has been passionate about the wireless community ever since introduced to the technology. He has accomplished more in the last few years in terms of knowledge gained and level of professional enjoyment than any other point in his career. In the last 2 years,, he achieved four new certifications (not counting the updated ECSE), including his CWNE. He is constantly looking to improve himself and support anyone in the community any way that he can including starting a podcast to share his knowledge and use it as a platform for others to learn and share.
Twitter: @wifi_john
Blog Site: www.wifijohn.com
Kori Younger
Kori is a well rounded individual who always acts professional. She asks great questions to understand and engage with the community. She is passionate about wireless technology and learning everything she can. She started TotalPackets with her mom Rita, an industry expert. Kori was a pre-med student and once she attended HP Discover, VMworld and CiscoLive she was hooked and changed her major to IT and has worked as a CDW intern for 18 months. Kori is currently working on her bachelors degree and can be found working DevOps projects.
Twitter: @SDNdaughter
Blog Site: www.totalpackets.com
Landon Foster
Landon Foster continues to make a big impact on and in the community. From his positive interactions on social media, and his humble, friendly attitude, Landon is a great ambassador for the wireless community. He has worked hard and in a short time become a CWNE and is clearly passionate about his work and his community. He along with his co-host built a platform on his podcast to share thoughts, experience and engage with other community members. Landon is truly one of the rising stars in the wireless community.
Twitter: @acehighwifi
Michael Hilton
Michael is currently in high school graduating in May of 2021. At a young age, he has not only received his CCNP & CCNA Routing & Switching, CCNP Enterprise (among many others), but currently is working on achieving his CCIE as well. He has worked on network infrastructure including Cisco, Juniper, Extreme Networks and others. He actively participates in conversations and seeks to learn all he can as an aspiring Network Architect.
Twitter: @vMikeNetworking
2021 Innovation of the Year Finalists
AI for IT™ - Mist
Mist continues to innovate and change the wireless landscape by building an AI engine right into the platform. This eliminates the need for overlay sensors, data collector hardware, and extra software. AI for IT™ allows you to configure new sites in minutes with no human errors. In addition, AI for IT™ provides the capability to correlate user events and dynamically capture packets for fast troubleshooting, create automated workflows for rapid troubleshooting and notifications, and automatically self-correct and/or optimize the WLAN in real-time. AI for IT™ integrates as part of Mist's platform and products to build an effective portfolio of products that help build a modern high performing network.
For more information visit www.mist.com.
Ekahau Analyzer
Spectrum Analyzers are critical for wireless professionals when troubleshooting. Ekahau’s innovate Analyzer app puts a spectrum analyzer in the palm of your hand with your smartphone. This simplifies your troubleshooting and the gear you need to lug around to help fix any problems that arise. In addition, Ekahau Analyzer provides mobility and convenience for troubleshooting the most common network problems — with the mobile device right in your pocket. By using your mobile device as a powerful Wi-Fi tool, you can diagnose your network faster, be more mobile and safer. And with spectrum analyzer in the palm of your hand, you can troubleshoot more quickly.
For more information visit www.ekahau.com.
Hybrid Workplace Solutions (Contact Tracing) - Aruba
Aruba’s Hybrid Solutions allow you and your co-workers to move seamlessly back and forth from the home and the office. In a world that has been halted and turned upside down by a global pandemic, Aruba is helping innovate and provide solutions to keep everyone safe. As users move through the workplace, Aruba APs listen for users, Wi-Fi devices, or Bluetooth tags. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) location data is taken in and analyzed, then displayed in a cloud-based dashboard. Once HR is notified that someone is sick, they can easily sort contacts by the total contact minutes with each person. Locations can be traced with dwell times at each AP pinpointing the exact locations for the sick person. Heat mapping can also help identify hot spots where people congregate, helping to optimize space usage and cleaning schedules.
Aruba’s network-based approach uses both proximity and location telemetry to perform contact and location tracing, and the advanced AI capabilities ensure pinpoint accuracy so you’re able to see which people intersected and the exact location of the interaction.
For more information visit Aruba’s Hybrid Solution.
WinFi Lite – Helge Keck
WinFi Lite: Professional Wi-Fi Analyzer for Windows 10, improves WLAN professionals ability to get RSSI information among many other important details from the beacon IEs on the Windows platform. It leverages built-in adapters through Microsoft's Native Wifi / wlanapi.h APIs for protocol analysis software. It can use the various built-in adapters, or it can get info from external USB adapters. It provides an excellent overview for learning about and troubleshooting the 802.11 protocol for professionals.
For more information visit, www.helge-keck.com.
WLAN Pi
One of the problems with trying to find a small platform on which to install performance testing software is that it needs to have enough performance to make it worthwhile. A limiting factor of most of the single board computer options, like the Raspberry Pi, is that very few can actually push anything close to a gigabit of throughput, even if they have a gigabit Ethernet interface. They just lack the horsepower. - Enter the WLAN Pi. It changes all that!
The WLAN Pi is a portable wireless analysis and performance testing device. It is a single board computer with a gigabit Ethernet interface that can push almost 900Mbps! This provides a great platform for testing throughput of both wired and wireless networks. There is nothing else like it.
For more information visit www.wlanpi.com.
2021 Product of the Year Finalists
AirMapper Site Survey App (NetAlly)
The AirMapper app is ideal for quick site surveys of new deployments, change validation, and performance verification. Complete faster and easier Wi-Fi site surveys with an entirely mobile platform that also features in-depth analysis tools. Perform enterprise-grade surveys without the need of a dongle or tethered device.
AirMapper Site Survey on AirCheck G2 or EtherScope nXG provides accurate and complete heat maps by measuring Wi-Fi performance from the perspective of other mobile devices. Users can map RF signal coverage and visualize Wi-Fi network performance at every location on the floor. The ease and portability of this solution enable technicians to quickly troubleshoot or validate the Wi-Fi network by measuring the real-world experience of mobile device users.
For more information visit www.netally.com.
Airtool - (Intuitbits - Adrian Granados)
Capturing Wi-Fi traffic is an essential task of protocol analysis. Whether you’re trying to resolve Wi-Fi connectivity, roaming or configuration problems, analyzing the performance of your network, or simply learning about Wi-Fi, you will certainly need to perform frame captures. Airtool gives the ability to just do that in the easiest way possible.
With advanced features such as remote capture, automatic data frame slicing, and a seamlessly integration with Wireshark, Airtool is a tool every wireless LAN professional must have.
For more information visit www.intuitibits.com.
Ekahau Analyzer
Ekahau Analyzer turns the Device in Your Pocket into a Powerful Wi-Fi Tool! It provides mobility and convenience for troubleshooting the most common network problems — with the mobile device right in your pocket. By using your mobile device as a powerful Wi-Fi tool, you can diagnose your network faster, be more mobile and safer. In addition, it puts a spectrum analyzer in the palm of your hand allowing you to be more mobile to troubleshoot more quickly.
For more information visit www.ekahau.com.
Warehouse Antenna (Ventev)
Ventev's 2.4/5GHz 13dBi Wi-Fi Directional (H:115/V:11) Warehouse Antenna with 4 N-Style Connectors provides true coverage for long and narrow warehouse isles. It can connect to any manufacturer's 802.11ac Wave I, II or Wi-Fi 6 access points (APs) with four (4) ports. The antenna provides a high gain with narrow vertical and wide horizontal beamwidths which allows concise coverage for aisles and makes it ideal for warehouse deployments. The antenna ships with the Ventev 10” Strong Arm Mount (SAM). Optional Ventev mounts that are compatible with this antenna include: Industrial Articulating, Universal Articulating and High Strength Universal. Ventev SKU # 246112
For more information visit www.ventevinfra.com.
WLAN Pi
The WLAN Pi is a portable wireless analysis and performance testing device. It is a single board computer with a gigabit Ethernet interface that can push almost 900Mbps! This provides a great platform for testing throughput of both wired and wireless networks. There is nothing else like it. It can test utilizing a separate cable to test any wired or wireless network. You can run a whole suite of speed tests, including iPerf 3 and a very nifty HTML5 based test that you run right off the WLAN Pi! Plug it in anywhere in a network and you can use any web browser to verify that the speeds through the network are what you expect. If you add a wireless card to the WLAN Pi, things get really interesting. The system has a development version of the web-based Kismet.
For more information visit www.wlanpi.com.
2021 Company Leadership of the Year Finalists
Aruba
Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, is recognized as a global leader in the networking industry, currently serving as a leader on numerous technology standards bodies including Chair positions on the IEEE, ETF, and many others. Aruba is also driving standards decisions on key wireless capabilities like Wi-Fi 6, including 802.11ax, WPA3, Enhanced Open (OWE) and Wi-Fi Easy Connect (DPP).
Aruba is recognized across the industry as having played a key role in shaping the future of Wi-Fi. Aruba is also actively involved with the Dynamic Spectrum Alliance in driving conversations with the FCC and other global entities in opening up the 6GHz spectrum for unlicensed (Wi-Fi) use, and is also playing a leading role among network vendors in partnering with leading communications service providers to deliver Wi-Fi 6 as an onramp to 5G.
For more information visit www.arubanetworks.com.
Cognitive Systems
Born from a passion of wanting to disrupt and strengthen the industry, Cognitive Systems has pioneered a completely new way to use Wi-Fi, genuinely changing its course and impact on our daily lives forever. With 100 patents to date and over 200 filed, Cognitive Systems owns most of the intellectual property in the motion detection space and is well positioned to lead this exciting new frontier in our industry.
Cognitive Systems has been instrumental in advancing new standards for the Wi-Fi industry. They are currently working on a whitepaper, due before the end of 2020, that will focus on testing standards which are considered crucial to the further scalability of the technology and the Wi-Fi industry as a whole. Cognitive Systems is proud to be the catalyst behind this major industry advancement.
For more information visit www.cognitivesystems.com.
MetaGeek
MetaGeek believes in building an exceptional company around exceptional people and exceptional products. They treat each other as close family, their customers as welcomed friends and embrace their work as the relentless process of making hard things easy. And have fun doing it. Through training, and community engagement. They strive to listen, provide strong solutions that are dependable, and work when needed.
For more information visit www.metageek.com.
Mist, a Juniper Company
Mist Systems built the first AI-driven Wireless LAN (WLAN), which makes Wi-Fi predictable, reliable, and measurable and enables scalable indoor location services like wayfinding, proximity messaging and asset visibility. Now, the Mist next-generation Wireless LAN (WLAN) platform is combined with Juniper’s best-in-class wired LAN, SD-WAN and security solutions to deliver unsurpassed end-to-end user and IT experiences. In addition, the Mist AI technology plays a key role in bringing automation and insight across the full IT stack, delivering seamless end-to-end user experiences and substantial IT cost savings.
For more information visit www.mist.com.
Tech Field Day (Gestalt IT)
Tech Field Day displays leadership in the community by bringing both venerable wireless professionals together with up-and-coming content creators. This interaction allows for mentoring relationships and knowledge transfers that can enrich the entire community and keep positive interactions happening for everyone. We are one of the only events that puts the focus on the community and the way it interacts with vendors and providers of solutions.
For more information visit www.techfieldday.com.