Meraki's posted comparsion chart of functions

[Kevin Beretta]

They posted what the differences will be. The things we lose;

- Whitelisting
- Bandwidth throttling
- Multiple admins
- Splash page

http://meraki.com/oursolution/editions/comparison/

K

[Kevin Beretta]

[Joe Bowser]

So far we still have access to the whitelist, multiple admins and the splash page.  I believe that we still get bandwidth throttling with the new package, and we lose the ability to boot people.  This is HUGE, since this is what I disagree with the most.  I couldn't care less about bandwidth throttling if I lost the ability to boot abusive users.

Of course, we're not downgrading Legacy to Standard.  We're also not upgrading to Pro.  I got a response from Meraki Support, and I will be talking with them at some point tomorrow.  I don't know if they are going to listen to me, but I am hoping that we can work some special deal out with Meraki.  They still are a small company, and haven't entirely been absorbed by Google and Sequoia Capital.  I have both the WRT150N and the possible threat of the Software Freedom Law Center to bring up regarding their firmware and their recent behaviour.  Their version of Linux is covered by the GPLv2, and I will be asking them about reflashing the device, and why my serial port doesn't work properly.  I did buy the serial directly from them, after all.

I have quite a few talking points to bring up with their engineers, and I hope to  get some final answers before we go our separate ways.  I'm really hoping it doesn't have to come to that, but I'm not sure.

At the end of the day, I'll sleep better knowing that I tried my best to work with them, and that we tried our best before going completely on our own.

Joe

[Kevin Beretta]

A few quetions for them, if the conversation allows:

- Can legacy units in one legacy network be put on another legacy
network? I presume yes, as I can still create a legacy network, I just
tried.
- Can non-activated units still work on newly created (legacy)
network?
Key would be to find out if the standard units be reflashed to work
with the legacy network.

And if they are unresponsive, tell them the next billion people will
use something else than Merakis :-)

K

On Oct 4, 4:52 am, "Joe Bowser" <bows...@gmail.com> wrote:
> So far we still have access to the whitelist, multiple admins and the splash
> page. I believe that we still get bandwidth throttling with the new
> package, and we lose the ability to boot people. This is HUGE, since this
> is what I disagree with the most. I couldn't care less about bandwidth
> throttling if I lost the ability to boot abusive users.
>
> Of course, we're not downgrading Legacy to Standard. We're also not
> upgrading to Pro. I got a response from Meraki Support, and I will be
> talking with them at some point tomorrow. I don't know if they are going to
> listen to me, but I am hoping that we can work some special deal out with
> Meraki. They still are a small company, and haven't entirely been absorbed
> by Google and Sequoia Capital. I have both the WRT150N and the possible
> threat of the Software Freedom Law Center to bring up regarding their
> firmware and their recent behaviour. Their version of Linux is covered by
> the GPLv2, and I will be asking them about reflashing the device, and why my
> serial port doesn't work properly. I did buy the serial directly from them,
> after all.
>
> I have quite a few talking points to bring up with their engineers, and I
> hope to get some final answers before we go our separate ways. I'm really
> hoping it doesn't have to come to that, but I'm not sure.
>
> At the end of the day, I'll sleep better knowing that I tried my best to
> work with them, and that we tried our best before going completely on our
> own.
>
> Joe
>

[Joe Bowser]

Again, I direct you to:

http://forums.meraki.com/viewtopic.php?t=1841&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

Currently Legacy units will be able to use units that have been purchased and are out in the world before Oct 3, 2007.  Anything bought from Meraki after Oct 3, 2007 will have to go to Standard or Pro Units.  Legacy customers can go to Pro at no cost, but after we do that, we have to buy pro.  This is where the problem exists.

As for the flashing with an earlier Meraki firmware, I don't see that happening.  This could happen in theory, but we'd have to hack the auto upgrade stuff to not issue anymore upgrades somehow, and I think that Meraki would be upset with us and sick GoogleLawyers on us.

I'd rather flash them and take them off the network than try to scam their back end stuff.  I'm mostly concerned about Tivoization of the Meraki, since this is exactly what Richard Stallman warned us about.  (I'm also feeling kinda foolish by taking Linus's side of the GPLv3 debate as of late).  However, I will talk to Meraki and check the  licences on what is included in the Merkai.  If they claim that they relicenced a GPL component, I will be in talks with the Software Freedom Law Center and the authors of that software.

I want to hear them out first, to see what their views are and see if we can work something out.

Joe

[Nigel Gregoire]

I'm not entirely sure this is a firmware issue anyway. I wouldn't be
surprized if legacy nodes are those registered with Meraki (ie, added
to a network) before October 3rd, so it'd be a database thing on the
dashboard. If anyone has an older node that hasn't been activated
yet, we could test this out.

--
Nigel

[Kevin Beretta]

I posed the question to Meraki as to whether we can still register pre-
Oct 3rd units under the old terms of service, ie the now so called
Legacy edition and get the options available at that time. The answer
will tell us a lot re the firmware versus portal-driven limitations. I
suspect as well that the registration process is what limits things,
not the box itself. In that case, maybe some hack will allow us to use
new $49 Merakis in the future on our own network.

On Oct 4, 8:19 am, "Nigel Gregoire" <nigelgrego...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm not entirely sure this is a firmware issue anyway. I wouldn't be
> surprized if legacy nodes are those registered with Meraki (ie, added
> to a network) before October 3rd, so it'd be a database thing on the
> dashboard. If anyone has an older node that hasn't been activated
> yet, we could test this out.
>
> --
> Nigel
>

> On 04/10/2007, Joe Bowser <bows...@gmail.com> wrote:> Again, I direct you to:
>
> >http://forums.meraki.com/viewtopic.php?t=1841&postdays=0&postorder=as...

>
> > Currently Legacy units will be able to use units that have been purchased
> > and are out in the world before Oct 3, 2007. Anything bought from Meraki
> > after Oct 3, 2007 will have to go to Standard or Pro Units. Legacy
> > customers can go to Pro at no cost, but after we do that, we have to buy
> > pro. This is where the problem exists.
>
> > As for the flashing with an earlier Meraki firmware, I don't see that
> > happening. This could happen in theory, but we'd have to hack the auto
> > upgrade stuff to not issue anymore upgrades somehow, and I think that Meraki
> > would be upset with us and sick GoogleLawyers on us.
>
> > I'd rather flash them and take them off the network than try to scam their
> > back end stuff. I'm mostly concerned about Tivoization of the Meraki, since
> > this is exactly what Richard Stallman warned us about. (I'm also feeling
> > kinda foolish by taking Linus's side of the GPLv3 debate as of late).
> > However, I will talk to Meraki and check the licences on what is included
> > in the Merkai. If they claim that they relicenced a GPL component, I will
> > be in talks with the Software Freedom Law Center and the authors of that
> > software.
>
> > I want to hear them out first, to see what their views are and see if we can
> > work something out.
>
> > Joe
>