Wireless Access Point and the OSI Model

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Ok, I'm stumped on this one. I've been up and down the web but can't find a definitive answer to this question. Is a wireless access point a layer 1 or layer 2 device in the OSI reference model? I've seen sites that go either way. It seems like it would layer 2 in terms of access control but of course, radio waves as a medium would be layer 1. If a WAP is as simple as a hub, then it would really be layer 1. I'm confused. Does anyone know the definate answer including references to support it? Thanks.

 

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I think I found the answer but it's not very straight forward. Apparently, at the antenna end of the AP, the device is layer 1 since radio waves are part of the electromagnetic scale. At the Ethernet end, because the AP processes information (rather than just passing it through like a hub) such as WEP, MAC address filtering, and SSID broadcasts, it functions as a layer 2 device.

 

try this site out trip. http://www.intelligraphics.com/articles/80211_article.html
http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/802/11/index.html