An application-layer approach for multihop communication in IEEE 802.11 ad-hoc networks

In this paper, we introduce an application-layer approach for enabling unicast and multicast multihop communication in 802.11-based ad-hoc networks. This approach uses MAC/IP multicast for all transmissions and does not require any changes to the MAC or IP layer of the nodes in the network. Integrating multihop communication functionality into the application layer overcomes some of the drawbacks that typical ad-hoc networks suffer from. Furthermore, using MAC multicast for unicast multihop communication allows for efficient implicit acknowledgment techniques. We present details of a prototype implementation facilitating communication in small to mid-size ad-hoc networks. Furthermore, we analyze the efficiency of this approach.