John Markoff writes about Etherlinx, a small Cupertino-based startup.
Mr. Holt, a 54-year-old software designer and engineer who began his career at the Lockheed Corporation in Sunnyvale, Calif., replaces the software that supports the Wi-Fi 802.11b standard with his own code, thereby dramatically extending the range of the cheap, mass-produced hardware. Each repeater contains two cards ˜ one that Mr. Holt has enhanced and another that is able to speak the 802.11b standard to a home computer.