A survey of performance enhancement of transmission control protocol (TCP) in wireless ad hoc networks

This Article is provided by the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund - Copyright @ 2011 Springer OpenTransmission control protocol (TCP), which provides reliable end-to-end data delivery, performs well in traditional wired network environments, while in wireless ad hoc networks, it does not perform well. Compared to wired networks, wireless ad hoc networks have some specific characteristics such as node mobility and a shared medium. Owing to these specific characteristics of wireless ad hoc networks, TCP faces particular problems with, for example, route failure, channel contention and high bit error rates. These factors are responsible for the performance degradation of TCP in wireless ad hoc networks. The research community has produced a wide range of proposals to improve the performance of TCP in wireless ad hoc networks. This article presents a survey of these proposals (approaches). A classification of TCP improvement proposals for wireless ad hoc networks is presented, which makes it easy to compare the proposals falling under the same category. Tables which summarize the approaches for quick overview are provided. Possible directions for further improvements in this area are suggested in the conclusions. The aim of the article is to enable the reader to quickly acquire an overview of the state of TCP in wireless ad hoc networks.This study is partly funded by Kohat University of Science & Technology (KUST), Pakistan, and the Higher Education Commission, Pakistan

Two Algorithms for Network Size Estimation for Master/Slave Ad Hoc Networks

This paper proposes an adaptation of two network size estimation methods: random tour and gossip-based aggregation to suit master/slave mobile ad hoc networks. We show that it is feasible to accurately estimate the size of ad hoc networks when topology changes due to mobility using both methods. The algorithms were modified to account for the specific constraints of master/slave ad hoc networks and the results show that the proposed modifications perform better on these networks than the original protocols. Each of the two algorithms presents strengths and weaknesses and these are outlined in this paper.Comment: 3 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ANTS'09 - Corrected typos and definition