Application Cooperation in Wireless Mesh Networks

There are many challenges for enabling collaborations among municipal wireless networks (a.k.a., wireless mesh networks [WMN]) applications. First, mesh clients are highly mobile nodes with intermittent network connectivity. Second, collaborative applications are challenged by heterogeneity among devices in terms of operating system andhardware capabilities. In this chapter, we describe the role of middleware services in facilitating transparent resource sharing among devices in automated manner. We also describe our implementation of these technologies and how they may be deployed on an open and programmableWMN platform. Specifically, we describe a service-orientedwireless grid architecture (SOWGA) that allow wireless devices to autonomously share resources in a collaborative manner. SOWGA matches an application task’s need of resources with the most suitable set of available resources to serve this particular task. Transparent discovery of resources is facilitated by hiding possible heterogeneity of devices and resources. In addition, SOWGA transparently and efficiently manage connectivity so that devices remain optimally connected to required services. These distributed functionalities enable devices that have no prior knowledgeof each other to independently share resources and collaboratively execute application tasks that cannot be supported individually. In this chapter, we focus on service discovery, brokering, and roaming components of the architecture. The service discovery enable wireless devices to autonomously share their resources. The service brokering component matches the resource needs of application to available devices. The proposed context-aware Service Roaming Protocol uses an XML-based service profile to efficiently manage services within a highly dynamic and ad hoc wireless networks. The Service Roaming Protocol uses mobile user’s geographic location, terminal’s capabilities, network topology, and grid devices to provide efficient management of mobile users and services. As a proof of concept, the protocols are implemented for the IEEE 802.15 (Bluetooth) standards running on top a wireless mesh network deployment.