WIRELESS OPEN-ACCESS RESEARCH PLATFORM
Rice University's
WARP is a scalable and extensible programmable wireless platform, built from the ground up, to prototype advanced wireless networks. The open-access WARP repository allows exchange and sharing of new physical and network layer architectures, building a true community platform. Xilinx FPGAs are used to enable programmability of both physical and network layer protocols on a single platform, which is both deployable and observable at all layers.
The WARP project has two broad goals.
- Open-Access Research: WARP opens both hardware and software needed to research, build and prototype next-generation of wireless networks. This is enabling a community of researchers to pool their ideas in undertaking clean-slate prototype networks.
- Put "wireless" in wireless curricula: Most students learning digital communication never get to see a real wireless link in a lab; it all stops at baseband or starts above wireless drivers. WARP is an excellent vehicle for undergraduate and graduate education labs, to allow both non real-time wireless communication (via WARPLab) and real-time communication (see WARP workshop materials).
We're pleased to have the following institutions using WARP, with more on the way:
If you will like to acquire WARP MIMO kits, they are now available for purchase (see details). If you have technical questions, please check our repository website or public forums. For all other questions, please send us an email at warp-project[at]rice.edu.
See videos of WARP hardware in action (at Vimeo and YouTube).
WARP is funded by the NSF and Xilinx, with support from Texas Instruments, Maxim and Analog Devices.
