Thinking Your Network Plan Through

One of the most common errors we see with friends and family setting up a network is that even when they do plan out the usage as shown in the previous section, they typically only consider how they will use the network the day it is installed. Consider, though, all the advances that have been made in both computing and networking in just the past few years. New capabilities are being added all the time, and what was considered “advanced” yesterday is pretty much the norm today, so much so that putting a network together without the new technologies seems odd. For example, a few years ago it was not really possible to have a wireless printer on your network. Now it’s quite easy to set one up and well worth the small effort. Because of this, it’s important to sit down with some blank sheets of paper and think about what you have today, what you are likely to have six months from now, and what you would love to have two years from now, in your home network.