5 ms·

Airdrop is very nice when it works. Modern apple hardware has a second wifi modem for an ad-hoc connection so it can be faster than normal wifi as well. But Ap

by klabb3 3y ago

Airdrop is very nice when it works. Modern apple hardware has a second wifi modem for an ad-hoc connection so it can be faster than normal wifi as well. But Apple only.. makes it much less useful, even for “Apple people”.

saagarjha 3y ago
You sure about this? I seem to recall it shared the usual Wi-Fi hardware.
- creshal 3y ago
  Technically yes, it's a virtual device, but not all wifi hardware is capable of running two networks at the same time, Apple carefully selected the "usual" hardware to support this.
  - marwis 3y ago
    I think this is required for WiFi Direct and supported by all hardware?
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Almost all Wi-Fi chipsets released in the last couple of years support this. Many Windows and Android devices have been able to share a Wi-Fi network with other devices over another SSID, for example. The only thing that's complicated is if a device needs to be a 802.11 station on one frequency/channel, and a host or P2P device on another, but that's almost always avoidable. Everything else can be done purely in firmware or software.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
lxgr 3y ago
> Modern apple hardware has a second wifi modem Do you have any sources for that? As far as I know, it's just time-sharing the same baseband and hardware used for regular infrastructure-mode Wi-Fi.
- klabb3 3y ago
  > Do you have any sources for that? No, I should have picked my words more carefully. All I know is that they can be part of two networks at the same time.
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Ah, yes, they can! But that can be done by cleverly timing the usage of a single hardware interface as well :)
snickerbockers 3y ago
Has it ever been reverse engineered and reimplemented? I use apple's IP audio streaming protocol (forget what it's called, air-something) to play music over a couple of edifier-brand speakers from a Linux desktop which is running pipewire's FOSS implementation of the protocol. I don't even buy apple products but i ended up using it because there's no way to just netcat samples onto these things.
- stonegray 3y ago
  There is an open implementation of AWDL, see https://owlink.org/wiki/ https://owlink.org/wiki/

by klabb3 3y ago

saagarjha 3y ago

You sure about this? I seem to recall it shared the usual Wi-Fi hardware.

creshal 3y ago
Technically yes, it's a virtual device, but not all wifi hardware is capable of running two networks at the same time, Apple carefully selected the "usual" hardware to support this.
- marwis 3y ago
  I think this is required for WiFi Direct and supported by all hardware?
- lxgr 3y ago
  Almost all Wi-Fi chipsets released in the last couple of years support this. Many Windows and Android devices have been able to share a Wi-Fi network with other devices over another SSID, for example. The only thing that's complicated is if a device needs to be a 802.11 station on one frequency/channel, and a host or P2P device on another, but that's almost always avoidable. Everything else can be done purely in firmware or software.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

lxgr 3y ago

> Modern apple hardware has a second wifi modem Do you have any sources for that? As far as I know, it's just time-sharing the same baseband and hardware used for regular infrastructure-mode Wi-Fi.

klabb3 3y ago
> Do you have any sources for that? No, I should have picked my words more carefully. All I know is that they can be part of two networks at the same time.
- lxgr 3y ago
  Ah, yes, they can! But that can be done by cleverly timing the usage of a single hardware interface as well :)

snickerbockers 3y ago

Has it ever been reverse engineered and reimplemented? I use apple's IP audio streaming protocol (forget what it's called, air-something) to play music over a couple of edifier-brand speakers from a Linux desktop which is running pipewire's FOSS implementation of the protocol. I don't even buy apple products but i ended up using it because there's no way to just netcat samples onto these things.

stonegray 3y ago
There is an open implementation of AWDL, see https://owlink.org/wiki/ https://owlink.org/wiki/