NEW EVALUATION TOOLS TO INVESTIGATE IP-BASED WIRELESS LANS WITH NS-2

摘要

Future wireless networks will be based on the Internet Protocol (IP). The current version IPv4 was originally developed for fixed data networks. In contrast to such fixed networks, a wireless network has to handle different types of mobility and roaming and handover must be supported., which also requires efficient protocols from a signalling point of view. Furthermore, a mobile user should be reachable at any location. The solution of the described requirements will be aggravated by the fact that wireless networks may be both structured, i.e. infrastructure based, and ad hoc type networks. All these requirements can not be fulfilled with the standard IP protocol. Therefore, several extensions for mobile application exist. For developing new protocol extensions the networks simulator NS has proven to be a powerful evaluation tool. However, NS lacks efficient evaluation tools. In this paper new evaluation tools for the network simulator NS are described which allow to efficiently investigate new protocols for wired and wireless networks both for structured and unstructured topologies. Application examples of these new tools are given.