Individual, Subscriber Population Independent Metrics for User and Traffic Characterization of Wi-Fi Hotspot Networks

The current characterization methodology for Wi-Fi hotspot networks analyzes parameters related to the entire subscriber population. It does not consider the impact of the fluctuating number of subscribers. In this paper we develop a methodology to characterize user specific, population independent parameters of a Wi-Fi hotspot network and apply it to data gathered from a nationwide commercial network operator. We discover interesting new facets of the data and find the proposed methodology a useful tool in comparing different networks.