document: Long distance wireless mesh network planning : problem formulation and solution Several research efforts as well as deployments have chosen IEEE802 .11 as a low-cost , long-distance access technology to bridge the digital divide . In this paper , we consider the important issue of planning such networks to the minimize system cost . This is a non-trivial task since it involves several sets of variables : the network topology , tower heights , antenna types to be used and the irorientations , and radio transmit powers . The task is further complicated due to the presence of network performance constraints , and the inter-dependence among the variables . Our first contribution in this paper is the formulation of this problem in terms of the variables , constraints and the optimization criterion . Our second contribution is in identifying the dependencies among the variables and breaking-down the problem into four tractable sub-parts . In this process , we extensively use domain knowledge to strike a balance between tractability and practicality . We have evaluated the proposed algorithms using random input sets as well as real-life instances with success . We have been able to show detailed planning of network topology , required tower heights , antenna types , and transmit powers for the Ashwini project , a long distance WiFi network under deployment in Andhra Pradesh , India , In this case , we are able to achieve within 2 % additional cost of a lower bound estimate .
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