Querying a wireless access point for nearby clients

[johnkeeney]

Hello,

Is it possible to query a wireless access for the list of clients it can "see" ?

I'm looking for a list of MAC addresses (or some ID) and the signal strength.

Can you suggest an access point that can support this?
Ideally I would like to perform this query remotely.

It's easy enough to have a client list the access points it can see, but is it possible for the access point to do the same?

Thank you very much in advance.
John

[Surendra BG]

Hi,

From the post what i can understand is.. you want the AP to start the initiation rather than Clients.. in that case, its not possible from my point of view..

because, 802.11 steps are..

Clinet >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< AP

1>>Probe Request    --------------->                                       

                                                          <-----------    2>> Probe response

3> Association Req ---------------->

                                                          <-------------- 4> Asso Response

and so on..

never a AP will initiate the probe.. its the clients who initiate..

I request you to let me know if my undrestanding are correct.. if not correct me by even more briefing ur requirement...

Regards

Surendra

[Nicolas Darchis]

Hi John,

I didn't understand your question the same way as Surendra. Let's see who got the right understanding :-)

If you want to list clients linked with an AP :

show dot11 assoc    (shows a summary view)

show dot11 assoc all (shows a detailed view with signal strength and so on).

On a controller environment, you can go on the WLC web page : monitor->clients and filter by AP mac address.

Nicolas

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[johnkeeney]

Hi Nicolas and Surendra.

Thank you so much for your replies.

Actually, I looking for something slightly different:

Not to initiate association or see who's associated .... rather see who's in range, even if not associated.

So if a client is nearby, can i query for the signal strength from the client and an identifier of some sort? (Maybe MAC?)

Thanks,

I really appreciate your help.

John

[Nicolas Darchis]

My answer still stands with the following add-on :

-IOS APs don't track non-associated clients

-Lightweight APs do, and the method to see them is the same. Their state will be "probing"

But this is only true if the clietn was indeed actively probing. If a client is silent, there is no way for the AP to "poke" it.