Quality of service based routing protocol design and implementation on mobile ad-hoc networks

Wireless mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a network of mobile devices that can communicate directly with each other in a wireless environment. The need for communication with each other without any central control and the diversity of devices reveal the importance of MANET's. It is widely used in military networks, emergency situations, disaster relief, rescue operations, smart vehicles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). Wireless devices in the network also act as a router when necessary which differentiates them from other networks. The ability for transferring data through the network requires these devices to have routing process in the communication. On the other hand, QoS-based routing protocols are needed to ensure successful time-sensitive data flow such as multimedia applications, based on the special constraints. MANETs have several challenges such as limited network resources, battery problems, dynamic topology and a variety of other technical challenges. Todays, many QoS-based routing protocols have been implemented to address such problems. Routing in MANET is very challenging process because the nodes in the network move randomly, and these nodes often have limited energy, computing, and storage resources. In MANETs, traditional routing protocols perform routing by taking the shortest route or the least cost by taking into the consideration. In addition, a secondary route is not reserved or alternative routes are not searched as long as the used route is not broken. Therefore, across increasing the size and complexity, there need for new approaches considering additional constraints besides cost and shortest path metrics. In this thesis, a new routing protocol has been designed by considering the energy level, coverage, location, speed, movement and link stability parameters for QoS constrained applications. Network simulations were performed from small scale to increasing scale networks and results are discussed. Performance evaluations were made by comparing new protocol with AODV and DSDV state of the art protocols with considering the several criteria such as throughput, control packet overhead, delay and energy level. According to the results from the simulation experiments, the QEAODV protocol has a better network performance than AODV and DSDV in path selection, energy consumption and link life time. Also end-to-end latency and packet losses are also enhanced due for routes become stable according to the other protocols.