Node State Multicasting in Wireless Ad Hoc Networks
October 2005
John A. Stine, The MITRE Corporation
ABSTRACT
Multicasting is an essential service in wireless ad hoc networks.
Applying multicasting concepts developed for
wireline networks is inappropriate since they create stateful
solutions (i.e. nodes learn to react to the receipt of a
multicast packet.) which are short lived when topology
varies. They require frequent exchanges among nodes
with an attendant overhead that increases dramatically
with the size of the network, its volatility, and the number
of multicast groups. Nevertheless, most proposals for multicasting
in ad hoc networks follow the same approach.
Our proposal creates a stateless solution that uses the
network state information that is already disseminated as
part of the Node State Routing* (NSR) protocol. Node
State Multicasting (NSM) uses this information and various
packet formats to enable a rich set of multicasting capabilities.
Multicast routing is implemented by explicitly
listing end destinations or regions in packet headers. Intermediate
nodes assume responsibility for the delivery of
packets to the end destinations or regions listed in the
header. Routing decisions are based on the NSR routing
tables. This approach is very generic and can support
both traditional wireline multicast scenarios and additional
scenarios typical of wireless applications.
* Patent pending
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