Data replication approaches for ad hoc wireless networks satisfying time constraints

Abstract

Recent advances in technology have enabled the development of ad hoc wireless networks in which a collection of wireless mobile hosts (nodes) may move freely and self-organize into arbitrary and temporary network topologies in areas where communication infrastructures do not exist. In such networks, hosts frequently need data items to finish a certain task. The hosts chosen to store data items are called data servers. If the data items are stored too far away from the requiring host, multiple intermediate hosts are needed to relay the data. This creates a certain amount of delay which is not insignificant in time-critical applications. In this paper, we propose replica allocation schemes to let each host obtain data items in at most k(k ≥ 1) hops using minimal number of data servers in the network. Simulation results show that our schemes can generate a small number of data servers satisfying the k-hop time constraints.

Keywords:

• Ad hoc wireless network
• Data server
• Dominating set
• Wireless transmission range

Acknowledgements

The author wants to thank all the reviewers of their valuable comments, and Prof. Jian Shen in the Mathematics Department at Texas State University for his excellent suggestions on the paper.