On Sep 15, 2015, at 10:21 AM, jim bell <[1]jdb10987@yahoo.com> wrote:

   Has anyone heard of an idea to use individual WiFi routers to
   communicate in a mesh net?

   Yes .. but usually using proprietary routing or 802.11s.

   (Or, at least differently than it may have been done before.)   If you
   look at a map of WiFi routers ([2]www.wigle.net) in any given area, you
   will see that the vast majority of routers are physically close to many
   other routers, certainly close enough to communicate with each other,
   and ultimately over a long distance.  A crowd-sourced communication
   system, one that wouldn't necessarily go through the Internet backbone.
    Conceptually related to the Bittorrent system.    I just  found this:
     [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_Direct

   This technology is intended for ‘direct’ peer-to-peer links and is
   being used for a few applications like phone to TV video streaming.
   It’s not really a P2P technology in that one device always becomes the
   equivelent of a normal ‘AP’.  It makes it difficult to scale to larger
   topologies.
   A better Wi-Fi P2P solution
   is: [4]http://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-aware
   It’s new, but hopefully we’ll be seeing rapid incorporation into
   products.  For a change, the specifications are free and worth a
   browse.  The P2P discovery model is intentionally blinded to a degree
   by the use of truncated hashes of the ‘service names’ (6 octets).  P2P
   data exchanges are possible pre-association (no connection overhead).
   Paul

               Jim Bell
   From that URL:
   "Wi-Fi Direct, initially called Wi-Fi P2P, is a Wi-Fi standard enabling
   devices to easily connect with each other without requiring a wireless
   access point.[1] It is usable for everything from internet browsing to
   file transfer,[2][3] and to communicate with more than one device
   simultaneously at typical Wi-Fi speeds.[4] One advantage of Wi-Fi
   Direct is the ability to connect devices even if they are from
   different manufacturers. Only one of the Wi-Fi devices needs to be
   compliant with Wi-Fi Direct to establish a peer-to-peer connection that
   transfers data directly between them with greatly reduced
   setup.[citation needed]
   Wi-Fi Direct negotiates the link with a Wi-Fi Protected Setup system
   that assigns each device a limited wireless access point. The "pairing"
   of Wi-Fi Direct devices can be set up to require the proximity of
   a near field communication, a Bluetooth signal, or a button press on
   one or all the devices. Wi-Fi Direct may not only replace the need
   for routers, but may also replace the need of Bluetooth for
   applications that do not rely on low energy.[5]"

References

   1. mailto:jdb10987@yahoo.com
   2. http://www.wigle.net/
   3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_Direct
   4. http://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-aware