Investigations on IP-based mobility for wireless LANS with the network simulator ns

Future Wireless Networks will be based on the IP protocol. In contrast to fixed networks, a wireless network has to handle roaming and handover, i.e., macro- and micro-mobility must be supported. A mobile user should, therefore, be reachable at any location without manual reconfiguration and as little as possible data packets should be lost, when a handover in a structured net-work occurs. Furthermore wireless networks may be both structured and ad hoc type networks. These requirements can not be fulfilled with the standard IP protocol. Several extensions for mobile application exist. Protocol modifications can efficiently be investigated with the network simulator NS on the network (IP) level. One drawback of the network simulator is that it produces output signals in so called trace files which may have different formats for different environments and simulator versions. A common trace file formal, however, could allow to efficiently investigate both wired and wireless network structures.