Leverett To Get Wireless Internet

When Leverett House residents return in September, they will be able to surf the web while sunning in the courtyard or grazing in the dining hall—if all goes according to plan.

In large part due to the interest in technology of House Master Howard Georgi ’68, Leverett is the pilot site for a project that aims to make wireless ethernet access available in the common areas of all Houses.

Frank M. Steen, director of Harvard Arts and Sciences Computer Services (HASCS), said he hopes to have Leverett wired by early summer and the other Houses wired by the end of this calendar year.

“It won’t be anything anyone will notice,” said Coordinator of Residential Computing Kevin S. Davis ’98, who is also a Crimson editor. “We’ll put wireless infrastructure in the common areas. We are targeting those open spaces where students are taking their laptops and working.”

The change would allow those with 802.11b-compatible laptops, or those with wireless cards or built-in wireless technology, to access the Internet without having to plug into an jack in House common areas. Instead, individual laptops could use devices called “access point” to connect to the Internet.

In Leverett, access points are scheduled to be installed in the House library, computer labs, courtyard and dining hall, Davis said.

Wireless ethernet access is already available at several locations across campus, including Lamont and Hilles libraries, Loker Commons and Maxwell-Dworkin.

Davis said the success of wireless service in these locations, coupled with student support for wireless technology, was a factor in the Committee on Information Technology’s decision to finance the project. The committee oversees HASCS.

“[Wireless technology] was far and away the most requested computer service,” David said of the results of the Undergraduate Computer Survey, conducted earlier this year.

In addition, the survey showed that nearly one-sixth of students with laptops own ones that are 802.11b-compatible, a statistic Davis called “extraordinary” given the recent introduction of the technology.

Excitement about the project runs high in Leverett House.

“In large part, my enthusiasm for wireless is related to the heavy use of the Leverett dining hall as a study space in the evenings,” said Georgi. “I think that having wireless there will make the dining hall even more useful for this.”

Leverett House resident Olaoluwa O. Fayanju ’03 said he is excited about the change.

“It’s about time,” he said. “If you had a laptop it would [otherwise] be really difficult to enjoy a nice day...It’ll also be really nice when we are doing work in the dining hall or in the library.”

Leverett House resident Kelley E. Morrell ’02, a psychology concentrator who logged many hours in her room working on her senior thesis, said wireless technology might have made working on her thesis more convenient.

“It probably would have been easier to work in a public environment— I probably would have gotten more work done,” she said.

But Naresh Ramarajan ’04 said he didn’t think the new technology would have a large impact, at least not immediately.

“I don’t see people rushing and jumping for the technology,” Ramajaran said, citing the typical costs of $70 to $100 to buy a wireless card. But he said future classes would probably be able to better take advantage of wireless access.

“People who do wireless computing find a whole new way of working,” Steen said. “You’re not bound to your desk. It really does make it a whole lot of difference. It makes your computer a lot more useful.”

—Staff writer Mollie H. Chen can be reached at mhchen@fas.harvard.edu.