Patent ID: 8073449

Claim:
A method of overlaying a Macro Cell wireless network on a Micro Cell wireless network comprising a controller, a macro cell manager process, and at least one access node having at least one radio comprising: initializing the access node in Micro Cell mode, establishing a communications link between a radio in the access node and the controller using a first identifier, recognizing the identifier of the access node by the macro cell manager, sending commands to the recognized access node by the macro cell manager to switch the recognized access node to macro cell mode and supplying the recognized access node with an over the air Basic Service Set Identifier (BSSID), and switching the access node to macro cell mode in response to the commands, and initializing wireless macro address translation to translate messages sent to the access node using the first identifier to the over the air BSSID, and translating messages received by the access node from the over the air BSSID to the first identifier.