Reinventing WiFi Deployment for Scale

Disclaimer

This post assumes the reader has context of my first blog in the series, Reinventing WiFi Design for Scale. If not, I strongly recommend reading it first for important context and foundational concepts. To keep things simple this post focuses on access points and ignores wireless LAN controllers.

Challenges of Deployment at Scale

WiFi deployment – the installation of access points is the second phase of wireless network implementation. At this point the designs have been completed and necessary hardware procured. At scale, often tens of thousands of access points are installed every year as part of new builds or lifecycle management. The main challenges of deployment at scale can be categorized into 1. Inventory Management 2. Installation 3. Provisioning and 4. Validation, There are different ways to address each of these challenges. The solutions provided in this blog are meant to serve as a basis for building your own framework that fits your use case.

1. Inventory Management

The cookie-cutter designs created for new builds or lifecycle replacements provide an estimate of the hardware requirements for the year. In most cases, hardware is ordered in bulk once or twice a year to take advantage of volume discounts, and all equipment is typically shipped to a central warehouse. As inventory arrives, it is critical to document all MAC addresses, serial numbers, and claim codes (if applicable for your vendor). The cookie-cutter designs specify the exact model and quantity of access points and antennas required for each site scheduled for deployment that year. Use this data to assign inventory per site and prepare shipments that align with the installation schedule. Importantly, this inventory management system should be accessible through a UI to warehouse support resources, installers, and engineering teams, ensuring smooth coordination and visibility throughout the deployment process. This could be as sample as an excel file saved in cloud or a specialized software built for inventory management purposes. Having API access to inventory management can also help engineering with provisioning step that is described later.

When it’s time to deploy, ship the site-specific inventory from the central warehouse to the individual install locations. Access points should be labeled with their designated name and number (more on this later), which can occur at the warehouse or immediately prior to installation onsite. Labeling at the site, handled by installers, is recommended—it offers flexibility if last-minute changes or swaps are necessary and helps ensure accurate placement during the install process.

Maintaining an inventory management system can often be complicated and is certainly outside the skillset of a wireless network engineer. If this is not an option, at a minimum one can create a framework in which the install teams complete an excel worksheet containing below details

Name
MAC address
Serial number
Claim codes
Access point model
Antenna model
Install height
Allocated site
Ship date
Install date
Switch name
Switch port ID
Patch panel name
Patch panel port ID

The install teams can communicate the completed document with details either through an email or any file sharing methods. The fields in this worksheet can be used for provisioning.

2. Installation

The second challenge with deployment at scale often comes from the fact that the installation can take place across different time zones and often during non business hours. Depending on the size of the team, it may not be possible to provide engineering resources available for support. The worst case scenario is installers wont have anyone to contact with questions that might arise or for validation during the install and the best case scenario is the availability of Network Operations Center (NOC) with enough skilled staff that has 24×7 coverage. In both cases, wireless engineers need to create runbooks and install guides that provides answers to the most frequently asked questions. As described under “Pilot” and “General Availability” sections in the first blog Reinventing WiFi Design for Scale , developing such effective install guides requires constant conversations with install teams during the pilot phase where the cookie cutter design is being deployed in a geographically diverse handful of sites.

Here are some details that need to be included in installation guide package to minimize the errors in the field

High resolution design map indicating access pointlocation and name. The design should map should contain legend that distinguishes APs of different model with/without antenna combinations.
Worksheet containing the fields described in the earlier section. If none of them are populated, include a guide to scan the details from the hardware and complete the worksheet.
Installation procedures that include mounting height, AP/antenna orientation, label requirements (if not done in warehouse), step-by-step mounting instructions with photos, cable standard specifications and length limitations, cable slack requirement and grounding requirements if applicable

The runbook package should contain

Patching instructions like distribution of APs across multiple switches in the same IDF
Cable test validation between access point and patch panel and from patch panel to the switch prior to access point mounting
Basic validation criteria based on LED patterns on the access point and the required troubleshooting steps

The runbooks should also include instructions on how to communicate updated worksheets for proper access point provisioning. Once installation procedures are established, the next step is provisioning.

3. Provisioning

This step often happens at the same time or just prior to installation. This is one step where wireless engineers come with different solutions depending on the level of expertise in automation. I must call out that basic scripting skills is a requirement to be a wireless network engineer at scale even if the company has resources to hire automation experts / software developers to assist the network engineering team. I will describe a couple options that can be leveraged at various levels of automation skillset.

The first one is what can a wireless network engineer do to provision at scale with only basic scripting/programming skills. This is primarily considered backend development skill. At this level wireless engineers are comfortable with writing scripts that can make API calls and handle errors appropriately. Automation through API calls is one of the big reasons why cloud vendor deployments have grown exponentially over the years. One can write a script to take the excel worksheet that the warehouse/installers complete for a site as input to the script and provision the access points. Alternate options include making this script available on a shared resource like a jump server to support staff and NOC engineers who can trigger it based on runbooks. If the inventory management system supports data ingestion through APIs, then this manual process of someone sending in an updated worksheet and someone else triggering the script is not needed. The script can be developed to run periodically and do API calls to inventory management system to get the latest updates and trigger provisioning accordingly.

The second option requires a certain level of front end UI (User Interface) development skill. In this approach, the engineer develops a UI where installers/support engineers can upload the worksheet and initiate provision with a click of a button. This will mask the backend and adds a layer of abstraction that enhances the user experience for all parties involved. In case of more automated interaction with inventory management, once can leverage the UI to provide the status updates on provisioning for each site.

The challenge, then, is developing a provisioning process based entirely on worksheet data. At a high level, most vendors require settings such as radio profiles, device profiles, SSID mappings, VLAN configurations, and radio/channel parameters—but these are not directly mapped from the worksheet. A standardized naming convention for access points allows scripts or UI tools to reliably apply the correct settings to each group.

Just like cookie cutter designs have repeatable grid patterns, access point names or numbers should contain patterns that group settings together. For example, if the deployment requires all the mentioned settings to be applied by type of AP, internal antenna APs can have an expression like “IAP” and external antenna APs “EAP.” The script could use regex matching of these access point names or numbers mapped to corresponding configuration settings. If there are external antenna APs with different gain levels, their names could include “EAP7db” or “EAP8db” to further segment these groups.

Different AP sequence numbers can be used to distinguish groups of access points—for instance, IAPs might have numbers starting with 100, and EAPs with 200, and so on. It all depends on the use case, but the key idea is leveraging the access point name or number as the central key to configuration deployment.

4. Validation

Provisioning sets the stage for validation, ensuring each site meets performance and reliability standards before completion. In addition to basic validation through LED patterns on access points, it is always a good idea to provide installers with insights into the access point status (offline vs online / provisioned vs unprovisioned etc). This can be as simple as providing restricted read access to the access point status page (if you have cloud vendor) or a simple phone call to NOC or a more complicated but effective solution of custom developed UI depending on what fits best. After confirmation on provisioning installers can connect to different SSIDs to ensure the APs are working as expected. Additionally it would be ideal to have a post deployment validation survey done a day or two after the install is completed. Giving this bake time before the survey allows for the network RRM to converge on a more or less final channel and transmit power levels. The validation survey serves few purposes

Ensure the coverage is within the design guidelines/expectations
Identify any installation errors like improper AP/antenna orientation or loose connection between access point and antenna
Provides a snapshot of the environment right after deployment that can be used as reference in future troubleshooting scenarios
Final sign off before the install vendors can move on to the next site

Surveying every site in-house is not realistic at scale. Because of this, it is essential to include post-deployment validation surveys as part of the scope of work for installation vendors. When selecting vendors, ensure they are not only capable of installing access points but also have the skills and tools to perform accurate wireless surveys. This approach maintains quality and consistency across high-volume deployments while freeing internal resources for strategic oversight.

That’s a wrap for the tips on deploying Wi-Fi at scale. In the next post, I’ll focus on managing large-scale networks effectively, including details on data collection and building custom dashboards for real-time insights and operational efficiency.