Utility-Aware Cognitive Network Selections in Wireless Infrastructures

Operators of wireless infrastructures should maintain their users "always-best-connected". This concept means that applications should be offered to users at the best possible Quality of Service (QoS) level, taking into account profile, context and policy information. The profiles provide the user requirements and preferences, the terminal capabilities, and the application requirements. The policies provide the objectives, constraints imposed by various stakeholders, for instance the network operator (NO). The context of operation designates relevant applications, available networks and their QoS capabilities. The "always-best- connectivity" concept can be achieved by directing user terminals to the most appropriate networks of the heterogeneous infrastructure of the NO. In this respect, advanced terminal management functionality is required. This paper presents management mechanisms for utility-based cognitive network selections. The utility is used for expressing the user desire for a QoS level. Cognition mechanisms are applied for learning the QoS capabilities of candidate networks, and therefore increasing the reliability and seamlessness of the network selections. Extensive results are provided, which show the behaviour of the scheme in terms of network selections made, and computational effort required for the acquisition of the knowledge.