802.11n draft standard closer to final approval
Those extremely smart folks who make up the IEEE have given their unanimous blessing to the second version of the Wi-Fi specification we've come to know as 802.11n, following a meeting in London Monday.
According to Wi-Fi Networking News, the draft proposal for 802.11n received a unanimous 100-0 vote, sending it forward to the last stages of approval. Wireless standards evolve over several years, with engineers voting several times on different technical proposals for implementing the technology.
This particular standard has been held up a few times, but reached a key milestone this morning. Companies have already shipped products based on the first draft of the standard, and the Wi-Fi Alliance is getting ready to certify products based on the draft. Final approval is expected later this year.
The 802.11n standard delivers an upgrade in bandwidth speeds and wireless range over 802.11g, the current top of the Wi-Fi heap. It's backwards compatible with the older standards, as well.
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Internet search, including Google, Yahoo, online advertising, and portals, as well as the evolution of mobile computing. He has written about traditional PC companies, chip manufacturers, and mobile computers, spending the last three years covering Apple. E-mail Tom. 
