2nd International ICST Conference on Quality of Service in Heterogeneous Wired/Wireless Networks

Research Article

Smooth handoff with enhanced packet buffering-and-forwarding in wireless/mobile networks

  • @INPROCEEDINGS{10.1109/QSHINE.2005.56,
        author={ Chun-Ting  Chou and  K.G.  Shin},
        title={Smooth handoff with enhanced packet buffering-and-forwarding in wireless/mobile networks},
        proceedings={2nd International ICST Conference on Quality of Service in Heterogeneous Wired/Wireless Networks},
        publisher={IEEE},
        proceedings_a={QSHINE},
        year={2005},
        month={12},
        keywords={},
        doi={10.1109/QSHINE.2005.56}
    }
    
  • Chun-Ting Chou
    K.G. Shin
    Year: 2005
    Smooth handoff with enhanced packet buffering-and-forwarding in wireless/mobile networks
    QSHINE
    IEEE
    DOI: 10.1109/QSHINE.2005.56
Chun-Ting Chou1, K.G. Shin1
  • 1: Philips Res. USA, Briarcliff Manor, NY

Abstract

Packet buffering-and-forwarding is a simple but essential mechanism and has been widely used with other mechanisms to provide seamless handoffs in many wireless/mobile networks. However, some undesirable side effects of this mechanism, if not managed appropriately, can easily diminish its effectiveness in providing seamless inter-cell transitions during a handoff. We first examine these side effects and show how inappropriate buffer management by a mobility agent could affect the TCP performance. The throughput of TCP is then studied with special emphasis on the effects of a handoff. We enhance the conventional buffering-and-forwarding by proposing the last-come-first-drop (LCFD) buffer management policy (to be employed by mobility agents) and post-handoff acknowledgement suppression (to be used by mobile nodes). Our enhancements are backward compatible and suitable for the gradual/incremental deployment. By deriving an analytical model and conducting numerical analysis, we show that our scheme can improve the TCP throughput up to 30%. Finally, we conduct the ns-2 based simulation to confirm these numerical results, and demonstrate the applicability of the analytic model for predicting TCP throughput in other handoff schemes