Patent ID: 7302256

Claim:
In a wireless network system comprising at least one wireless access element for communication with at least one remote client element, wherein the at least one wireless access element is operative to transmit neighbor messages, and at least one central control element for controlling and managing wireless connections between access elements and remote client elements, a method facilitating the initialization and configuration of an access element, comprising monitoring, at a wireless access element, for wireless neighbor messages from one or more neighboring wireless access elements, the wireless neighbor messages identifying a corresponding computer network address of at least one central control element; selecting a central control element identified in one or more detected wireless neighbor messages; transmitting, using a corresponding computer network address, a request to the selected central control element; associating the wireless access element with the selected central control element to cause the selected central control element to manage wireless connections between the wireless access element and one or more remote client elements; transmitting wireless management messages sourced from the one or more remote client elements to the selected central control element for processing, wherein the wireless management messages request initiation of wireless connections between the wireless access element and the respective one or more remote client elements; and tunneling network traffic corresponding to the wireless connections with the remote client elements to the selected central control element.