Wi-Wi is wireless time sync at 1 nanosecond

When you drive through the Texas Pandhandle at night, squaremiles of electric windmills blink together – like fireflies stirring across flatlines of [L]one-star horizon.

They've been simultaneous for decades... and remains a breathtaking detour (if you're out there, schedule night-travel).

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I like the similar project which uses GPS signal offsets, captured on a RaspberryPi, to then broadcast (e.g:) a local-network-timeserver.

With GNSS+PPS and a hardware timer latch you can easily sync internal microcontroller timers to 2 to 3-digits nanoseconds against the global standard with a tightly controlled loop. But cannot get better than the PPS signal itself (roughly 30-100nS).

Everything below needs that a huge amount of engineering. CERN&friends developed the "White Rabbit" (https://ohwr.org/projects/white-rabbit/) system for this. This allows sub-Nanoseconds syncing of netwoked devices.

I've wondered if you could have an array of "firecrackers", each timed very precisely, with perfect spatial knowledge of each, and synchronize their ignition to produce arbitrary shaped pressure waves.

Why does the title say 1ns but the body of the article says 30ns (with hopes to eventually get it down to 5)?

That is cool. I use a gps NTP server on my home network and live with sub-millisecond time sync. I’d go PTP but the equipment is a bit too expensive if the only value add is better time sync and I don’t need additional bandwidth. Prices coming down would be nice.

> Wi-Wi stands for Wireless 2Way interferometry

> 2Way

Does that mean you won't get to know the time unless you let them spy on your physical location too? That's what the diagram implies: https://www.gps.gov/sites/default/files/2025-06/CGSICMeeting...

GNSS time is still cooler because you can have extremely accurate time and a reading of your position without the broadcasting satellites knowing you're there.

I've wondered if something like this could ever be used for VR tracking, though it seems it is much bulkier in than IR methods.

Maybe silly question, why we care about nanosecond speed, don't we only need to sync once and the other system can count the time by itself?

Most important question: Is it pronounced Why-Why, or Wee-Wee?

Better signal penetration with Wi-Wi could be a game changer for battery life.

thats insane