Technology and business needs are rapidly changing due to the increase of mobility in the enterprise. Whether driven by employees bringing in mobile devices, or finding new agile ways to be more productive, mobility is changing the way enterprises work.

In this series of expert articles by Philip Clarke, a research analyst at Nemertes Research, the issues you need to consider when you're in the planning and beginning stages of deploying an enterprise wireless LAN (WLAN) architecture are addressed. These include:

• Understanding the necessary steps in planning a WLAN architecture upgrade;
• Knowing the benefits and challenges of using a WLAN for primary access to your network for some subsets of mobile workers, rather than wired Ethernet;
• Necessary WLAN architecture support components;
• Questions to ask vendors when choosing a WLAN solution;
• Evaluating your organization's WLAN requirements and;
• determining how to manage your WLAN after deployment.

Assessing the enterprise wireless LAN for the new mobile workforce

As employees become more mobile, businesses are re-evaluating the way they look at Wi-Fi. It is important for enterprise IT to weigh whether Wi-Fi is robust enough to provide primary access to the company network -- at least for some employees -- and understand why it is necessary to deploy.

Assessment should include the understanding that more employees are using