Brothers WISP Podcast with Preseem: Recap
To celebrate our recent sponsorship of the Brothers WISP podcast, our Chief Product Officer Dan Siemon and Senior Product Manager Jeremy Austin joined host Tommy Croghan for a discussion on QoE, traffic shaping, and many other network management topics.
Also joined by networking experts Greg Lipschitz and John Osman, this episode was a truly international affair, with guests beaming in from Waterloo, Ontario (Dan), Alaska (Jeremy), Oregon, Illinois (Tommy), Albuquerque, New Mexico (John), and Melbourne, Australia (Greg).
What We Talked About on the Podcast
To introduce Preseem to viewers/listeners, Dan provided an overview of how our system works. Specifically, he spoke about how Preseem measures quality of experience by extracting QoE metrics for every IP and every subscriber. As Dan mentions, this is the most accurate way to measure QoE, as opposed to pinging network elements.
Dan also explained how Preseem pulls information to build a topology of each access network, extracting data from APs, modulations, frequencies, and more. This data is then analyzed in the cloud to create models of expected behavior, e.g. ‘this access point model, these RF conditions, this configuration should behave like X.’ Crucially, we then tie the QoE metrics back to the topology. This means ISPs can tell which part of the network is delivering a poor experience.
Finally, we discussed our approach to traffic management. We optimize packets delivered to subscribers so that they still get good QoE. It’s important to note, however, that this has the most benefit when the access network is healthy. Traffic shaping alone is not QoE. We’ve built RF scores to help our customers find and solve network problems. This way, our traffic management can then have the biggest impact. Our tools are designed to help our customers take care of network issues proactively. As a result, they can then scale better with less expertise.
How Does Preseem Define Quality of Experience?
Helping ISPs provide their subscribers with a great quality of experience is really what Preseem is all about. Tommy asked what QoE means for Preseem, and Dan explained that our definition is more expansive than other companies. Specifically for us, it’s three things:
- Measuring the QoE in a way that correlates with the subscriber experience, e.g. not pinging APs or CPEs
- Getting a really deep understanding of the access network. We do this by tying QoE metrics back to the topology to understand what’s actually happening on the AP level
- Managing and shaping traffic, though this is not QoE on its own and only really helps if the access network is in good shape
Other Topics of Discussion
Some of the other questions Dan and Jeremy address during the episode include:
- How quickly can Preseem identify network issues once it’s deployed?
- How many queues can Preseem handle?
- Is Preseem only for fixed wireless, or can it be used in other types of networks (e.g. DSL, fiber)?
During the podcast, you’ll also learn how Preseem’s traffic shaping works and why Dan considers Active Queue Management (AQM) “one of the best advances in networking over the last 10 to 15 years.” We also chat about the specs for our inline hardware, how our billing integrations work, and the nuts, bolts, and benefits of our new RF scores and features. For example, did you know that Preseem can tell you which customers are consuming airtime inefficiently so that you can free up capacity to add more subscribers?
Finally, you’ll also hear this roundtable of experts talk about Mikrotik routers that include FQ-CoDel, multi-queuing, IPv6 and other transport technologies, and the WISP market in general.
Watch the video below to enjoy an insightful networking discussion, learn more about Preseem, and find out why Tommy calls our software “the easy button” for queue and bandwidth management!
