ABSTRACT

Muliadi, Wireless Education Network Using Worldwide Inter-operability for Microwave Access (WIMAX) Technology (supervised by Zulfajri B. Hasanuddin and Rhiza S. Sadjad).

The goal of this study is to investigate the feasibility of applying the Worldwide Inter-operability for Microwave Access (WIMAX) Technology (IEEE Standard 802.16) as an alternative to the conventional Wireless Metropolitant Area Network (WMAN) in the Indonesian Smart School System (Sistem Sekolah Cerdas Indonesia, SSCI) Project. The case of a group of ten highschools in Makassar metropolitant area, South Sulawesi, Indonesia, is taken into consideration. 

The existing system is a network of 9 (nine) state highschools and an Islamic school (madrasah). The network operation and control center is located at the Makassar Cyber Education Center (MCEC). The original design is to link all ten schools to the MCEC with a 64 kbps wireless link to provide them with an integrated information system. This integrated information system includes a 512 kbps Internet access through a router at the MCEC. A server at the MCEC also provides several application packages for school management information system and integrated distant learning and multimedia (e-learning) system. The total of 292 computer clients in all ten schools are connected to the network. The conventional wireless network used in the existing system has constrained the operation and the expansion of the network to cover more schools in Makassar due to the bandwidth limitation and the quality of services.  

A network simulation by the Radio Mobile Wireless version 7.6.3. software package is developed to investigate the feasibility of applying the WIMAX Technology. The simulation shows that the nearest school to the MCEC among the ten schools, SMA Negeri 2 Makassar (0.44 km from the MCEC) has the smallest free space loss of 95.76 dB, while the farthest one, SMA Negeri 15 Makassar (13.62 km from the MCEC) has the largest free space loss of 125.57 dB, which is still has an SOM (System Operating Margin) of 17.1 dB. All other highschools in Makassar are located in the area with the distance to the MCEC between the SMA Negeri 2 Makassar and the SMA Negeri 15 Makassar. Therefore, the application of the WIMAX Technology is expected not only to solve the constraints of the existing network, but also to enable the expansion of the wireless education network to other highschool in Makassar. 

Keywords: wireless education, MCEC, WIMAX, WMAN, Smart School