Multicast routing for ad hoc networks with a quality of service scheme for session efficiency

The conceptual shift in expectations of wireless users from voice towards multimedia, from availability towards acceptable quality, and from stand-alone towards group-oriented computing has a big impact on the needs of today´s networks in terms of mobility, quality of service (QoS) support, and multicasting. Ad hoc networks can provide users with these features. However, it is necessary to develop QoS multicasting strategies for them. This paper defines the building blocks of an ad hoc QoS multicasting (AQM) protocol, which achieves multicasting efficiency by tracking resource availability in a node´s neighbourhood based on previous reservations, and announces the QoS conditions at session initiation. When nodes join a session with certain QoS requirements, this information is used to select the most appropriate routes. AQM is compared to a non-QoS scheme with emphasis on service satisfaction for sessions. By applying QoS restrictions, AQM improves the multicasting session efficiency. The results show that QoS is essential for and applicable to ad hoc networks.