Supporting mobility with wireless ATM

An implicit assumption underlying most networking research has been that two Internet users would be connected only by fixed links (wire lines). Increased use of portable computers, wireless networks and satellites has generated interest in supporting “computing on the move”, or mobile computing. Instead of maintaining a fixed position in a network, users in this environment are free to roam. Mobile computing raises interesting issues, such as how to route packets as the mobile user (host) moves about and how to guarantee the quality of service (QOS) that an application running on such a mobile host may need. Other issues include the choice of a transport protocol to use on top of a mobile host and how to deal with poor performance in wireless links. There are two possible approaches to supporting mobile computing over the Internet. The first uses a mobile IP (Internet Protocol), whereby packets (datagrams) are forwarded by a designated stationary host to the mobile host. The second approach involves wireless ATM (asynchronous transfer mode), with host mobility supported by rerouting/rearranging the end-to-end ATM connection between mobile and stationary hosts