8,041 research outputs found
Building Programmable Wireless Networks: An Architectural Survey
In recent times, there have been a lot of efforts for improving the ossified
Internet architecture in a bid to sustain unstinted growth and innovation. A
major reason for the perceived architectural ossification is the lack of
ability to program the network as a system. This situation has resulted partly
from historical decisions in the original Internet design which emphasized
decentralized network operations through co-located data and control planes on
each network device. The situation for wireless networks is no different
resulting in a lot of complexity and a plethora of largely incompatible
wireless technologies. The emergence of "programmable wireless networks", that
allow greater flexibility, ease of management and configurability, is a step in
the right direction to overcome the aforementioned shortcomings of the wireless
networks. In this paper, we provide a broad overview of the architectures
proposed in literature for building programmable wireless networks focusing
primarily on three popular techniques, i.e., software defined networks,
cognitive radio networks, and virtualized networks. This survey is a
self-contained tutorial on these techniques and its applications. We also
discuss the opportunities and challenges in building next-generation
programmable wireless networks and identify open research issues and future
research directions.Comment: 19 page
LTE Spectrum Sharing Research Testbed: Integrated Hardware, Software, Network and Data
This paper presents Virginia Tech's wireless testbed supporting research on
long-term evolution (LTE) signaling and radio frequency (RF) spectrum
coexistence. LTE is continuously refined and new features released. As the
communications contexts for LTE expand, new research problems arise and include
operation in harsh RF signaling environments and coexistence with other radios.
Our testbed provides an integrated research tool for investigating these and
other research problems; it allows analyzing the severity of the problem,
designing and rapidly prototyping solutions, and assessing them with
standard-compliant equipment and test procedures. The modular testbed
integrates general-purpose software-defined radio hardware, LTE-specific test
equipment, RF components, free open-source and commercial LTE software, a
configurable RF network and recorded radar waveform samples. It supports RF
channel emulated and over-the-air radiated modes. The testbed can be remotely
accessed and configured. An RF switching network allows for designing many
different experiments that can involve a variety of real and virtual radios
with support for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna operation. We
present the testbed, the research it has enabled and some valuable lessons that
we learned and that may help designing, developing, and operating future
wireless testbeds.Comment: In Proceeding of the 10th ACM International Workshop on Wireless
Network Testbeds, Experimental Evaluation & Characterization (WiNTECH),
Snowbird, Utah, October 201
Enabling virtual radio functions on software defined radio for future wireless networks
Today's wired networks have become highly flexible, thanks to the fact that an increasing number of functionalities are realized by software rather than dedicated hardware. This trend is still in its early stages for wireless networks, but it has the potential to improve the network's flexibility and resource utilization regarding both the abundant computational resources and the scarce radio spectrum resources. In this work we provide an overview of the enabling technologies for network reconfiguration, such as Network Function Virtualization, Software Defined Networking, and Software Defined Radio. We review frequently used terminology such as softwarization, virtualization, and orchestration, and how these concepts apply to wireless networks. We introduce the concept of Virtual Radio Function, and illustrate how softwarized/virtualized radio functions can be placed and initialized at runtime, allowing radio access technologies and spectrum allocation schemes to be formed dynamically. Finally we focus on embedded Software-Defined Radio as an end device, and illustrate how to realize the placement, initialization and configuration of virtual radio functions on such kind of devices
The learner centric ecology of resources: a framework for using technology to scaffold learning
This paper is based upon a Keynote presentation at CAL07 and extends previous introductory descriptions of the Ecology of Resources model of educational contexts. The relationships between the elements in the Ecology of Resources are a particular focus for discussion here. In particular, we consider how we might use the Ecology of Resources model to scaffold learning so that a wide range of the resources available to a learner within their context can be used to best support their learning needs. Resources here include people, technologies and artifacts. We look for ways in which they can be linked and marshaled in a learner centric manner and draw on the HOMEWORK and VeSEL projects as practical examples of the way the Ecology of Resources framework can be used
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