You may have noticed a new application on MetaGeek.net called inSSIDer. inSSIDer is a Wi-Fi network scanner similar to NetStumbler, but is designed for network troubleshooting and not wardriving. inSSIDer will list all available networks and graph their signal strength over time as shown below.

While in the process of figuring out how to extract Wi-Fi network information from Windows for use in Chanalyzer we created Inssider as a test application and then decided it was decent enough to publicly release. But since we may not always have time to keep it updated we decided to open source it under the Apache license. This allows the community to continue using and updating Inssider no matter what happens to us at MetaGeek.

If you’ve installed inSSIDer you’ve noticed that inSSIDer on Windows XP doesn’t give you any channel information… which was the goal of the application in the first place! Don’t worry, Steve and Brian have figured out how to wrestle the Wi-Fi network information out of Windows XP, so inSSIDer will be updated soon with the capability of showing channel information in XP as well as Vista (which it does currently).

So if you’re in need of a decent Wi-Fi network scanner for Windows XP or Vista check out inSSIDer.