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I'm running my R-Pi as an IoT server at the office, where it connects to the internet modem both via LAN and WiFi (just to be sure it'll work no matter what) on the network 192.168.0.0, and it connects to the IoT stations (ESP8266s) via WiFi (the R-Pi acts as an AP using a virtual interface, as discused here) using network 10.0.0.0. Everything works fine and we're all happy at the office, but now we need to install this system on the whole building, and clearly the R-Pi as AP is not powerfull enough. So we want to use the building's APs to extend this network, but I haven't the faintest idea how to do it.

So the question would be, how can I extend the range of the network generated by a R-Pi as AP using aditional APs? We're using D-Link APs managed by a CWM server.

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  • BTW, it's a R-Pi 3
    – Christian Rodriguez
    Aug 2 '17 at 15:03
  • rather than duplicating things, connect your pi and the ESPs to the existing network, and either get your network admins to give the pi a fixed IP or use name resolution on the ESPs to find the pi on the network. otherwise you would need a network of repeaters for a building that apparently already has network coverage
    – James Kent
    Aug 2 '17 at 15:24
  • @JamesKent Actually That's exactly what I want, to use the existing infraestructure as a network of repeaters. I don't want to connect the ESPs to the "public" network for some reasons. 1) There's a lot of them, and they would consume the network IPs. 2) I'd have to reprogram each of them. 3) Anyone would be able to access them, so it's a security concern. That's why they're connecting to a private hidden network.
    – Christian Rodriguez
    Aug 2 '17 at 15:41
  • Sharing the infrastructure but keeping the usage separate would be possible with VLan tagging, but I don't know if the ESP8266 will fit in there and if your current equipment will support that.
    – LotPings
    Aug 2 '17 at 21:35
  • without knowing what the infrastructure you have is it's impossible for anyone to tell you how to do this. in essence it sounds like you want each AP to broadcast 2 SSIDs, the normal network one and a hidden ESP only one, that is hardware specific and nothing to do with the ESP or the Pi. and then you'd need to route the hidden SSID to a VLAN to keep them separate on the network.
    – James Kent
    Aug 3 '17 at 11:01

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