A Cluster-based Quality-of-Service Optimized Link State Routing protocol for Mesh Networks

Abstract

This paper tackles the problem of cluster head and Multi-Point Relay (MPR) selection for the Quality-of-Service Optimized Link State Routing (QoS-OLSR) protocol in mesh networks. Mesh networks emerged to extend the connectivity of users and to enable the exchange of messages in an adhoc manner. Mesh networks apply routing protocols such as Better Approach to Mobile Adhoc Networking (BATMAN) and Optimized Link State Routing (OLSR) where the latter was deemed more suitable for high mobility networks. Research efforts have proposed extending the OLSR protocol to a QoS-OLSR protocol that takes into consideration metrics such as bandwidth, connectivity, remaining energy, and velocity in QoS computation. The proposed QoS is used for cluster head and MultiPoint Relays (MPRs) selection. In this work, we propose and implement a cluster-based QoS-OLSR protocol for mesh networks. A QoS metric that aggregates the average estimated transmission count and the reachability of a node is defined. The proposed protocol is implemented by modifying the Linux OLSR distribution to perform emulations using meshnet-lab under different mobility models. In a static network, the proposed protocol outperforms BATMAN and OLSR in terms of Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR) and Round Trip Time (RTT). In addition, the proposed protocol outperforms BATMAN in terms of RTT and provides comparable results to OLSR in networks with low and high mobility nodes.