Device discovery in short-range wireless ad hoc networks

The performance of many envisioned applications in short-range wireless ad hoc networking will critically rely on the promptness of the self-configuring network procedures. In that sense, a fundamental problem in ad hoc networks, is device discovery and/or network initialization. We propose a randomized distributed algorithm for rapid device discovery during the deployment of an ad hoc network. The algorithm uses the approach of the non-blocked stack algorithm to resolve collisions, which ensures time-efficient execution when the number of devices in the network is large. The self-starting concepts used may be significant for inferring other self-configuring algorithms for ad hoc networks.