Emerging Wireless LAN Mobility Protocols

Abstract

Wireless LANs have become the dominant device over the last few years. The initial goal was to remove cables from the network, but with the fast pace in technological development wireless networks became popular not only inside organizations, but also as hotspots throughout cities. Major governments are encouraging the institutes to deploy wireless LANs due to the increase in number of Internet users and online applications. Over the past few years, wireless LANs have grown tremendously from a small network to the enterprise level, installed across buildings and organizations to provide mobility. In addition, the mobility and convenience of wireless has been improved by the advanced throughput and range performance available in today’s products, extending the reach of wireless LANs to a broad array of applications. This has led researchers to work on protocols which provide smooth mobility to the mobile nodes. It has opened the door to develop protocols which can be used to provide mobility within an organization and between organizations. This paper discusses the existing mobility architecture and reviews some of the emerging wireless mobility protocols—specifically host-based and network-based mobility— with a focus on local and global mobility. It also serves as part of the ongoing research for the PhD program in the department of Computer Science at the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia.