This web site contains files developed by or describing the activities of the Federal Communications Commission's Technological Advisory Committee's working group on spectrum management (SWG) during the first term of the TAC (1998-2001). Current SWG activities are at www.jacksons.net/~tac.
If you have observations on this web page or questions, you can contact me at chuck@jacksons.net.
Chuck Jackson
Quick links to regions on this web site: General and introductory, Noise Floor, Ultra Wideband, Software defined radio, Other documents.
Updated 11 March 2001.
Dewayne Hendricks has sent a paper from the organization Net@edu describing
concerns that they have with the deployment of 802.11b systems on campuses.
See this link.
Updated 7 February 2001. The Association of Maximum Service Telecasters (MST) filed a petition with the FCC in 1989 regarding interference to television reception. That petition provides interesting background reading on the noise floor issue. See this link.
Updated 29 January 2001. Dewayne Hendricks sent me a paper from Yank, Shanker and Weizen of Adaptive Broadband regarding the use of unlicensed bands. I have only looked at it quickly, but it looks quite informative. See this link.
Updated 14 January 2001. The TAC met 6 December 2000. I have been a little slow on updating this web page. Joe Nowack of Motorola gave a presentation on 4th generation architectures. See this link.
Updated 28 September 2000. The TAC met 26 September 2000. Both Konston and Hendricks gave presentations. Saj Durani arranged for George Harn to give a presentation on noise measurement. See this link.
Updated 9 July 2000. The TAC met on 28 June 2000. The SWG delivered two presentations, one by Hendricks on possible congestion at in the unlicensed bands, the other by Jackson regarding regulation of receivers. See this link.
Updated 2 April 2000. The TAC met on 24 March 2000. The SWG delivered three presentations. They are at the following link in both PDF and powerpoint.
Updated 20 March 2000. Added two documents from the original spread spectrum rulemaking supplied by Dewayne Hendricks. (Due to improvements in my computer system I have not been able to preview these files.) Link
Updated 10 March 2000. Added a subdirectory containing ex parté documents filed by Time Domain at the FCC showing the results of their measurements. The link to this directory is in the UWB section below. Added a paper by Mike Marcus discussing some policy issues created by software defined radios. This link is in the SDR section below.
Updated 2 January 2000. Posted a document from Lucent that expands upon Lucent’s earlier statement, “There are a variety of emerging wireless technologies such as BLAST, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing and spatial multiplexing which should be considered as alternatives to wideband CDMA as they provide potentially superior alternatives for ultrahigh speed, spectrally efficient wireless communications.” This document is posted in the Ultra Wide band section.
Updated 14 December 1999. The TAC met yesterday, and the Spectrum Working Group provided four presentations together with brief introductory comments. Copies of those presentations are below under the topics noise floor, ultra wideband (two presentations), and SDR. The introductory comments are here.
Spectrum Working Group Status 13 Dec 99.pdf
Spectrum Working Group Status 13 Dec 99.ppt
Updated 30 November 1999. Added a history of ultrawideband provided by Dewayne Hendricks and added a status report and updated noise study proposal submitted by Dennis Roberson.
Updated 2 October 1999. Added an earlier paper, Maxwell, Shannon and Economics, by Arthur Ross.
Updated 1 October 1999. Added a paper by Arthur Ross and a copy of a memo I sent to Chairman Lucky and to other TAC members interested in the activities of this working group. Also added, at Dwayne Hendricks’ suggestion, the FCC original Notice of Inquiry on spread spectrum devices.
Updated 21 September 1999 Added a copy of the presentation for the 21 September TAC meeting.
The following files are available on this site
A memo describing the activities of this group
ChairIntroMemo.doc 12-May-99 09:57 27k
A listing of the subgroups in the TAC
TAC Subgroups.doc 12-May-99 09:58 20k
The FCC requests for the TAC
TACRequests.doc 12-May-99 09:58 41k
Agenda for the first TAC meeting
agenda4991.doc 12-May-99 09:58 35k
Cover memo from the FCC
cover499.doc 12-May-99 09:58 36k
Directions to the FCC
fcc-directions.doc 12-May-99 09:58 20k
Powerpoint presentation for the second TAC meeting
Status22Sept99.ppt 21-Sept-99 20:37 1.2 M
Memo to Bob Lucky following up on second TAC Meeting
Memorandum To R Lucky, 1 Oct 99.doc 1 October 1999 43k
Papers by Arthur Ross
ahmr_Comments_to_TAC1.pdf 1 October 1999 307k, PDF
MSE.pdf Maxwell, Shannon and Economics, posted 2 October 1999, 63k, PDF
The 1989 MST petition. Note this is a 2 Mbyte PDF file.
MST Petition.pdf
A memo by Dennis Roberson regarding plans for study of the noise floor
One version in MS Word, the other in HTML.
Noise Floor SWG Plan_..05-Aug-99 13:29 53k
Noise Floor SWG Plan_..05-Aug-99 13:29 63k (HTML version)
Updated Noise Floor SWG Plan 16-Sep-99 MS Word
Updated Noise Floor SWG Plan 16-Sep-99 HTML
Proposal for a literature study, etc. 16-Sep-99 MS Word
FCC TAC Noise Sub Committee Status 29 Nov 99.doc MS Word version
FCC TAC Noise Sub Committee Status 29 Nov 99.pdf PDF version
Noise Environment Proposal 24 Nov 99.pdf PDF version
Noise Environment Proposal 24 Nov 99.doc MS Word version
Noise Floor Presentation 13 Dec 99.pdf
Noise Floor Presentation 13 Dec 99.ppt
A paper from Lucent discussing software defined radios
Lucent Input on Spect..04-Aug-99 16:28 14k
(originally misindexed under noise floor issues. My apologies)
Initial progress report on the software radio task
TAC-WG-SoftwareRadio-..22-Jun-99 10:29 38k
A draft report for discussion (MS Word format)
FCC-TAC-SDR Report-main.doc
Appendix to above report (MS Word format)
FCC-TAC-SDR Report-AppendixA.doc
SDR Presentation 13 Dec 99.pdf Presentation at 13 Dec 99 TAC Meeting
SDR Presentation 13 Dec 99.ppt
Think piece on SDR regulatory issues by Mike Marcus
SDR Think paper by mike marcus.doc (MS Word format)
SDR Think paper by mike marcus.pdf (PDF format)
A white paper on ultra wideband
UWB White Paper 1 16-Sep-99 PDF
A second white paper on ultra wideband
UWB White Paper 2 16-Sep-99 PDF
The FCC’s NOI on Spread Spectrum (1981)
FCC NOI on Spread Spectrum Gen Dock 81-413.doc 1 October 1999 (MS Word format)
FCC NPRM on Spread Spectrum PDF
FCC Report and Order on Spread Spectrum PDF
Three papers on the history of Ultra wideband
A_Brief_History_of_UWB_Communications.pdf (PDF Format)
Presentations from the December 13, 1999 TAC meeting
Ultra-WIdeband Presentation 13 Dec 99.pdf
Ultra-WIdeband Presentation 13 Dec 99.ppt
Disparity Presentation 13 Dec 99.pdf
Disparity Presentation 13 Dec 99.ppt
Lucent paper reviewing promising new technologies
Lucent Input on Other Technologies.doc
Lucent Input on Other Technologies.PDF
Time domain materials
DH presentation on part 15 congestion June 28 2000.ppt
DH presentation on part 15 congestion June 28 2000.pdf
Receiver Regulation June 28 2000.ppt
Receiver Regulation June 28 2000.pdf
September 26, 2000 presentations.
DH’s second presentation on part 15 congestion, September 26, 2000
KK’s presentation on SDR and related issues. (PPT format)
Presentation on 4th generation mobile by Joe Nowak of Motorola
Paper by Yang et al., regarding efficient use of unlicensed bands
On the use of unlicesed frequency spectrum, use rule evolution, and interference mitigation research paper4.pdf
Pointer to a paper by Eli Noam on dynamic sharing
cite to Noam paper Be..05-Aug-99 13:30 23k
Paper reviewing dynamic sharing of radio spectrum
Discussion of dynamic..27-May-99 07:01 68k
Contribution by W. C. Y. Lee
W. C. Y. Lee Paper I..26-May-99 23:34 19k
W. C. Y. Lee letter 0..
Paper regarding concerns with the deployment of 802.11b systems on campuses.
Net@EDU Position Paper.doc MS Word
Net@EDU Position Paper.pdf PDF