EWANT: the emulated wireless ad hoc network testbed

In this paper we demonstrate a wireless 802.11 testbed. This testbed allows for direct comparison between mobile wireless routing protocols without affecting their routing or MAC layer protocols or inter-layer interaction. We have built a low cost environment to facilitate such wireless network research. The core idea is "compressing" the network and emulating mobility without actually moving the nodes. We successfully emulate the RF effects along with mobility. The viability of this test bed is checked with the help of a click implementation of the dynamic source routing protocol. Our experiences show that such a testbed provides valuable feedback not available through simulation.