Chapter 6: Virtual Surveys Using VisualRF Plan

VisualRF Plan is the Aruba AP planning software package. VisualRF Plan is available as part of the AirWave server product and as a free standalone planning tool for Windows®. The software is available for download from the Aruba support site for those with an Aruba support account at http://support.arubanetworks.com, under Download Software > AirWave > VisualRF Plan.

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VisualRF Plan relies on Adobe Flash. Be sure that Flash is installed and up to date on your machine.

When you plan a new facility, Aruba recommends using VisualRF Plan even when you expected to use a passive, active, and/or spectrum clearing survey later. The tool allows you to quickly access the facility and develop a plan and bill of materials. Later the plan can be used as the basis for other types of site survey if required. If you choose to use the offline version when planning is complete, you can import the floor plan directly into the AirWave software. Import the plan after the network is installed for use by network managers. If you do the virtual plan in AirWave, then nothing else needs to be done. This tool shows real time “heat maps” of RF coverage and allows devices to be located via triangulation. For the purposes of this guide, the offline version of the VisualRF Plan tool will be used. Using the offline tool allows users to play “what if” scenarios without disrupting the VisualRF maps on the AirWave server. This can be helpful if you are looking at changing the plan for an existing deployment.

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The offline version of VisualRF Plan is a Microsoft Windows® only software package. For Mac OS X users, running VisualRF Plan under VMware Fusion® or Parallels® requires that you disable disk sharing between the Mac and virtual machine while using VisualRF Plan.

Virtual Survey Methodology

To perform a Virtual Site Survey:

1.   Complete the environmental assessment described in Chapter 3: Environmental Evaluation.

2.   Obtain a current electronic floor plan of the facility.

3.   Walk through the facility or obtain images of the site to compare to the floor plan. Pay particular attention to RF obstructions and building materials.

4.   Ask the facilities group about building age, building materials used, and any specially shielded areas.

5.   Use either Aruba VisualRF Plan or AirWave Visual RF to complete an initial placement APs on the map based on input variables collected in the environmental assessment.

6.   Adjust the AP placement to account for things such as elevators, restrooms, ceiling lights, or other obstructions.

7.   Save the plan and review the predicted RF coverage.

8.   Add any additional APs if needed to account for coverage requirements based on the changes made to AP placement. Additional APs may be needed for high-capacity areas such as presentation rooms.

Case Study: Planning the PoC Lab Facility Using VisualRF Plan

The Aruba proof of concept (PoC) facility is used to test designs for deployment. Often it hosts customers who are visiting our executive briefing center (EBC). This dual-purpose facility acts as a test bed for large-scale roaming tests, capacity testing such as our 100 iPad demonstration, and test customer deployment scenarios for sales teams. Our goal in performing this virtual site survey is to decide on the placement of the APs for roaming testing.

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Figure 24   Aruba POC lab

For a video tutorial on planning a site, see the video on AirHeads Social at: http://community.arubanetworks.com/t5/AirWave/How-to-plan-a-site-using-VRF-Plan-7-4/td-p/20032

Creating a Campus, Building, and Floor

When you open VisualRF Plan, a list of default campuses is listed. A campus is a group of buildings in a common location. To create a new campus, click the button and name the campus. (See Figure 25.) At this time, you can safely ignore the client transmit power and desired speed drop-down boxes. Those inputs are deprecated and will be removed in a later release.

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Figure 25   Create a new campus

After the campus is created, it appears in the upper left corner of the screen. Click the campus. In the new screen, enter the data you have about a building to add it to the campus. (See Figure 26.)

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Figure 26   New building info

After the building is defined, the next step is to define the floors. In this case, we have only a single floor for the PoC facility. You are prompted to upload a floor plan. If you have a CAD drawing with dimensions exported from any of the major CAD software programs, the tool automatically sizes or calibrates the drawing. In this case, we are using an exported PNG graphic, so we measure the floor using the Manually Measure Floor button. The floor plan graphic used here contains multiple architectural measurements that we can use to do the calibration. If your floor plan lacks these features, use a known distance such as a doorway or cubicle wall. It is also important to enter a fairly accurate height for the ceiling so that RF propagation calculations between floors are accurate.

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It is important to be as accurate as possible when you measure a floor plan. VisualRF Plan uses the size of the building to determine AP count. If the calibration measurement is incorrect, your plan will contain the wrong number of APs.

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Figure 27   VisualRF Plan building floor plan setup

After your floor plan has been loaded, calibrated and saved, you can enter the floor plan and begin to plan your site. First create a deployment region. Click the Edit tab, and then click the lock icon to unlock the floor plan for editing. Then click the Draw Region icon to create a polygon that encloses the coverage area. (See Figure 28.)

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Figure 28   Unlock and draw region dialog icons

The deployment region tells the tool where APs need to provide wireless service. In this case, we outline our building and exclude our warehouse, which we will not use. To plan the region, click the exterior wall points and then double-click to complete the region. When you are finished, give the region a name and select the Planning option. (See Figure 29.)

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Figure 29   Completing the planning region

Now that the region is defined, you can plan your AP deployment. Right-click the floor plan and choose Reprovision APs. The AP planning dialog box is displayed, which you can populate with the information you have previously gathered. (See Figure 30.)

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Figure 30   Provisioning an AP

In the provisioning dialog box, we modified the items as shown in Table 4

Table 4   Autoprovision APs

FeatureSetting
AP Type AP-105
Radio 1 EIRP 15 dBm
Radio 2 EIRP 15 dBm
Environment Midway between cubicles and offices (3.3)
Plan by Coverage 300 Mb/s
Client Info 150 clients with 20 clients per radio
Save Region as Walls Concrete

When we make these selections, we modify how the tool determines the coverage radius of each AP. We need the tool to understand our AP characteristics and planned maximum transmit power, so we selected the appropriate AP and set the power to match the default maximum configured in the Aruba Mobility Controller. We told the tool to assume we have a mix of open cubicle space and some offices when we adjusted the slider in the middle of the two markers.

We selected our minimum speed, but also told the tool the number of clients we expect. We did this because areas of high client density can oversubscribe an AP, which means that we need more APs than would be called for by the RF power budget alone. Providing client count information causes the planning algorithm to select the greater of the AP count for coverage or capacity required. Finally, we told the tool to assume that we have concrete walls around our planning region, which makes the tool adjust the coverage that we would expect to see outside of the building as shown in Figure 31.

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Figure 31   Generated AP plan

With this input, the tool generates an initial plan that is its idea of where the APs should go, given our parameters. The autoprovisioned plan does not know about things like elevator cores, cafeterias, and X-ray imaging suites. So a few things must be adjusted in the plan for it to work. The AP in the upper left corner can be pulled down to provide better coverage for that area. Also, the map does not show some of the obstructions in the building. The obstructions will have an impact on coverage, which is why we strongly recommend either a walk through or many pictures of the facility.

The three APs on the left side of the building happen to be placed right next to steel beams that run floor to ceiling (see Figure 24). So, we moved those over about 6 feet (1.83 meters) to the right. We chose this direction because it places the APs over more user workspaces. The plan shows that APs on the right side are placed on top of a row of overhead lights, so we must adjust those slightly as well. The AP at the center top is in a series of server and storage rooms, so we must move that down to provide better coverage to areas where people will actually work. After we make those modifications, we can save and refresh the map to see the adjusted heat map as shown in Figure 32.

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Figure 32   Adjusted AP layout

This completes the virtual site survey using VisualRF Plan. The installers can use this plan to install the APs in the facility. If you will be doing an onsite physical site survey to confirm coverage, you will use this beginning plan to start the survey locations. Continue to the next chapter, which describes how to verify the AP placement onsite.