Wireless

A handheld on-board communication station of the maritime mobile service

Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information (telecommunication) between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most common wireless technologies use radio waves. With radio waves, intended distances can be short, such as a few meters for Bluetooth, or as far as millions of kilometers for deep-space radio communications. It encompasses various types of fixed, mobile, and portable applications, including two-way radios, cellular telephones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and wireless networking. Other examples of applications of radio wireless technology include GPS units, garage door openers, wireless computer mouse, keyboards and headsets, headphones, radio receivers, satellite television, broadcast television and cordless telephones. Somewhat less common methods of achieving wireless communications involve other electromagnetic phenomena, such as light and magnetic or electric fields, or the use of sound.

The term wireless has been used twice in communications history, with slightly different meanings. It was initially used from about 1890 for the first radio transmitting and receiving technology, as in wireless telegraphy, until the new word radio replaced it around 1920. Radio sets in the UK and the English-speaking world that were not portable continued to be referred to as wireless sets into the 1960s.[1][2] The term wireless was revived in the 1980s and 1990s mainly to distinguish digital devices that communicate without wires, such as the examples listed in the previous paragraph, from those that require wires or cables. This became its primary usage in the 2000s, due to the advent of technologies such as mobile broadband, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth.

Wireless operations permit services, such as mobile and interplanetary communications, that are impossible or impractical to implement with the use of wires. The term is commonly used in the telecommunications industry to refer to telecommunications systems (e.g. radio transmitters and receivers, remote controls, etc.) that use some form of energy (e.g. radio waves and acoustic energy) to transfer information without the use of wires.[3][4][5] Information is transferred in this manner over both short and long distances.

  1. ^ U.S. Army (1944). Technical Manual. US War Department. Retrieved 13 August 2022. In definitions given in the index, p. 162, the term "radio set" is listed as synonymous with the term "wireless set"
  2. ^ Paulu, Burton (1956). British Broadcasting: Radio and Television in the United Kingdom. U of Minnesota Press. ISBN 9781452909547. Retrieved 13 August 2022. (p.396) In a public opinion poll in Sweden in 1942, 31.4 percent answered 'Yes' to the question "Do you usually listen to the foreign news on the wireless?'
  3. ^ "ATIS Telecom Glossary 2007". atis.org. Archived from the original on 2 March 2008. Retrieved 16 March 2008.
  4. ^ Franconi, Nicholas G.; Bunger, Andrew P.; Sejdić, Ervin; Mickle, Marlin H. (24 October 2014). "Wireless Communication in Oil and Gas Wells". Energy Technology. 2 (12): 996–1005. doi:10.1002/ente.201402067. ISSN 2194-4288. S2CID 111149917.
  5. ^ Biswas, S.; Tatchikou, R.; Dion, F. (January 2006). "Vehicle-to-vehicle wireless communication protocols for enhancing highway traffic safety". IEEE Communications Magazine. 44 (1): 74–82. doi:10.1109/mcom.2006.1580935. ISSN 0163-6804. S2CID 6076106.

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