ToWards Enhancing 802.11 support of differentiated service LeVEls

TWELVE DIT-PRJ-05-001

Homepage http://twelve.unitn.it
Status NOT active project
DISI role Partner
Project type Research Project
Dimension National
Acquisition date 2005-01-05
Start date 2004-12-01
End date 2006-12-01

Project details

Project astract The 802.11 technology is experiencing an impressive market success, in both private (home/office)<br/>and public (HotSpots) environments. The acronym WLAN, today, means much more than simple <br/>cable replacement. It implies the concrete possibility to deploy innovative and unforeseen <br/>applications, devised to dramatically change the way mobile and roaming users work and live.<br/><br/>Cheap and easy-to-install components, unlicensed spectrum, broadband capabilities, <br/>interoperability granted by standards and certifications (WiFi): these are a few of the key <br/>factors that are driving the evolution of WLAN from niche technology to public access mean.<br/>The present challenge of WLANs is offering a portfolio of wireless mobile services, <br/>which might compete with (or integrate) that provided by 3G networks. <br/>Indeed, a large number of technical challenges lay behind this evolution. <br/>These encompass issues at several levels, ranging from high data rate PHY layer enhancements and <br/>support for Smart Antennas, up to support of priority mechanisms at the MAC layer,<br/>up to design and provisioning of location-aware services and service creation environments.<br/> Dealing with public spaces and commercial service offering, the keyword is provisioning differentiated <br/>levels of service. Service differentiation not only implies prioritised delivery mechanisms for different <br/>traffic classes (and users!), and support of quality of service objectives, but it also requires meeting <br/>the context-aware and location-aware service needs, as well as providing differentiated levels of <br/>security.<br/><br/>This research project is devised to explore and experimentally demonstrate advanced solutions <br/>for differentiated service provisioning and QoS support at the two levels (radio access level and <br/>network infrastructure level) of a realistic 802.11 network architecture.<br/>At the radio access level, the aim is twofold. On the one hand, it targets assessing the performance <br/>of currently proposed service differentiation mechanisms in the 802.11e task group. <br/>On the other hand, seeking, design and evaluate solutions (maybe relying on <br/>cross-layer optimization) going beyond the current proposals is the creative part of the project. Advanced traffic control, the support of space-division multiple access and Smart Antennas (a key <br/>hot topic in the extremely recent high data rate standardization evolutions carried out in the 802.11n <br/>task group), 802.11 multi-cell network planning and (self-)configuration, and traffic balancing <br/>and control in multi-hop and mesh-networking are all topic that still need fundamental research and <br/>that will be addressed in the project.<br/>At the network level, the aim is the definition of secure and viable service architectures devised to provide differentiated and personalized service offering to heterogeneous network customers, <br/>and do it on a secure communication infrastructure. To this purpose, we will study and propose <br/>architectures for context-aware, location-aware and quality-aware services, mechanisms to locate <br/>services, authentication solutions devised to operate in a scenario characterized by several, <br/>(possibly independent) HotSpot providers, and security mechanisms at various layers appropriate <br/>for different user categories.<br/>Finally, a primary project goal is the development of: i) an enhanced 802.11 NIC card supporting <br/>a custom FPGA implementation of a service-differentiation-enhanced MAC layer; ii) a nation-wide <br/>demonstration test-bed, composed of access networks placed at different research unit sites, <br/>and interconnected via the national IP backbone. With this test-bed, we pursue the challenging result <br/>of demonstrating new service provisioning/business models on a large-scale national basis. <br/>Moreover, each local access network will specifically demonstrate selected project topics, <br/>such as Wireless Distribution Service, TCP optimization, Router Access Point with<br/>channel-quality-aware IP scheduling, VPN and IPsec security solutions, etc.
Keywords 802.11, WiFi, Quality of Service, Sercice Differentiation, Wireless Networks
Fundings 371400 €
Partners
  • Universita` di Pisa
  • Universita` di Roma II "Tor Vergata"
  • DIT - UniTN
  • Universita` di Perugia
  • Universita` di Roma II Tor Vergata

DISI Sub-project details

Project astract The contributions of the RU (research unit) will be in the development of new algorithms, definition of the service and network architecture, user management procedures, including AAA and localization services. Moreover the RU will develop specific interaction models between level 3 service classes and service classes on the radio interface foreseen within the 802.11e standard, and will carry out measure campaigns for traffic characterization and modeling on 802.11 networks. Finally, the RU will contribute to the project demonstration, with a test-bed in Trento.<br/>Parametric studies will be carried out to assess the performance and robustness of system parameter settings as a function of the traffic patterns and conditions, as well as the radio channel conditions. <br/>Since the radio channel quality changes dramatically in time, especially when the user is roaming, schemes which take into account the instantaneous channel characteristics will also be considered. In particular, the RU aims at studying new channel-aware solutions which adapt the traffic scheduling to the radio channel conditions, so that a better use of the radio resources can be achieved. <br/>Both simulation and analytical techniques will be used in order to assess the effectiveness of the considered schemes. Analytical techniques will be considered as a mean to obtain guidelines for the system parameter settings. Simulation will be preferred for accurate performance evaluations, for the comparison of different schemes and as a means to validate the results derived by analytical approaches. <br/>In a HotSpot scenario, resource allocation to the different APs raises interesting problems too. Network planning and control are tightly coupled problems, especially when fast, dynamic planning is considered. The RU will specifically study problems related to scheduling for adaptive and dynamic traffic control. <br/>Based on the performance and on the characteristics of the considered approaches, traffic control mechanisms can be proposed and their effectiveness can be evaluated. The RU will investigate the possibility to exploit the overlapping structure of the network topology to improve the quality or the reliability of the provided services.<br/>In Task T21 the RU will tackle problems related to AAA support, focusing on architecture and protocols rather than algorithms, thus complementing the work done by other research units. This part is tightly coupled with the development of the project test bed. Quality of service in WLAN does not rely only on algorithms and local techniques: it also needs a global picture and a high level envision of services, including a viable and scalable network and business model. <br/>Finally measures on production networks, as well as on specific scenarios will be carried out to derive a traffic modeling process that can be used for performance evolution and provisioning purposes.<br/>These models will integrate specific modules (security, criptograpy, etc.) developed within the project framework by the different RUs.<br/>
Keywords WiFi, WiMax, WLAN, QoS
Fundings 94800 €
Manager Renato Antonio Lo Cigno