QOLSR multi-path routing for mobile ad hoc networks based on multiple metrics: bandwidth and delay

Research on multi-path routing protocols to provide improved throughput and resilience in comparison with single-path routing has been explored in detail in the context of wired networks. However, the multi-path routing mechanism has not been explored thoroughly in the domain of ad hoc networks. We propose the path selection criteria and QOLSR multi-path calculation based on bandwidth and delay. QOLSR is an extension to the single-path routing protocol known as the optimized link state routing (OLSR) protocol; it uses bandwidth and delay to satisfy end-to-end QoS requirements. The resulting protocol computes multiple loop-free and node-disjoint paths. The loop-free property is guaranteed by using the shortest-widest path algorithm. The node-disjoint property of multiple paths is achieved using our proposed algorithm. We also present an evaluation comparison of QOLSR multi-path routing against QOLSR single-path routing using a scalable simulation model.