Combining wireless token ring protocol with IEEE 802.11 DCF in wireless ad hoc networks

IEEE 802.11 Distributed Coordination Function is widely used in wireless ad hoc networks, but it suffers from unfairness problems and is not able to provide guaranteed QoS, especially when the traffic load grows high. On the contrary, Wireless Token Ring Protocol produces high throughput and meets QoS requirements, but incurs larger delay and consumes more power. In this paper a solution is proposed which combines DCF with WTRP in a small-scale wireless ad hoc network. The proposed solution switches between the two modes according to the traffic conditions in the network. Simulations results show that this combination produces smaller transmission delay at light-load conditions while maintains high throughput and good QoS when traffic load grows high. It is expected to support multiple types of services such as voice and data on a single WLAN card.