The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Standards Association (IEEE-SA) standards board approved work to begin on IEEE P1640™, "Standard for Wireless Messaging Networks," to foster interoperability among various end uses. Work also began on amendments to the IEEE 802.11™ wireless local area network (LAN) standard regarding 5-GHz operation in Japan and higher levels of radio measurement, as well as on an amendment to the IEEE 802.15.3™ wireless personal area network standard to support a less complex, less expensive physical layer.
IEEE P1640 will provide interoperability protocols and other elements to support the wireless messaging historically used in the paging industry to provide connectivity for numeric display and alpha text display messaging devices, and from computers for messaging devices with application layer functionality. The standard will seek to ensure interoperability across a variety of applications, including the Internet, public switched telephone networks, local area networks, and private networks.
The three amendments begun to the IEEE 802.11 and 802.15™ standards are:
- IEEE P802.11j™ will extend the MAC and PHY layers of the IEEE 802.11 LAN for operation in Japan at 4.9 GHz and 5 GHz. The standard, "Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications: 4.9 GHz and and 5GHz Operation in Japan," will establish coexistence and interworking among the IEEE 802.11a, ETSI HiperLAN/2, MMAC CSMA and HiSWANa standards.
- P802.11k™, "Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications: Radio Resource Measurement of Wireless LANs," will enhance IEEE 802.11 wireless network measurement information by adding interfaces to higher layers. It will, for instance, consider the 802.11 MAC, the 802.11a high-speed PHY in the 5 GHz band, and the IEEE 802.11b higher-speed PHY in the 2.4 GHz band.
- IEEE P802.15.3a™, "Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications: Higher Speed Physical Layer Extension for the High Rate Wireless Personal Area Networks (WPAN)," will define a low-complexity, low-cost, low power consumption PHY alternate for IEEE 802.15.3. It will allow for coexistence and have a high enough data rate (110 Mb/s or more) to meet evolving consumer WPAN communication needs involving multimedia data in multiple co-located systems.
In addition, IEEE P802.1D™, "Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks: Media Access Control (MAC) Bridges," will be revised to reflect technical and editorial corrections and to consolidate all existing amendments into the base text. It will also incorporate the proposed standard, IEEE P802.1y™.
Also, the purpose of IEEE P802.17a™, "Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Common Specifications—Part 3: Media Access Control (MAC) Bridges," was changed to ensure that the IEEE 802.1D transparent bridge standard will support the bridging of 802.17 MACs.
The IEEE Communications Society sponsors IEEE P1640. The IEEE Computer Society sponsors all IEEE 802 projects. For further information on IEEE-SA, visit www.standards.ieee.org.