Fuzzy Location Service for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

Over the past years, location-based routing protocols have been studied extensively in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). However, how to efficiently provide the location information for nodes is still a challenge. So far, many protocols have been proposed to solve this problem, most of which offer exact routing location information, and are complicated to implement in practice. In this paper, we propose a fuzzy location service (FLS), which introduces fuzzy location information. In FLS, a network is divided into hexagon cells. A node regards the center of the cell where it resides as its own fuzzy location. A node´s location is not updated unless it moves into or out of a cell. This method is efficient and simple to implement. The simulation results show that FLS has better performance than GLS and HLS, in terms of routing waiting time and routing success ratio.