Skip to main content

Load Balancing Access Point Association Schemes for IEEE 802.11 Wireless Networks

  • Conference paper
Wireless Algorithms, Systems, and Applications (WASA 2011)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 6843))

Abstract

In a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), each station typically selects an Access Point (AP) with the strongest signal. This AP selection approach does not consider the AP’s load. In a hot spot scenario, however, the throughput of the entire network might be severely degraded if the APs’ loads are unbalanced. In this paper, we formulate an optimization problem whose objective is to minimize the load variance of the APs. This problem is NP-complete, and therefore we propose two greedy heuristics to derive load balancing AP associations. A comparison based simulation study is carried out to evaluate the performance of our design.

This research has been supported by the National Science Foundation of the US under grant No. CNS-0831852 and the NPST program by King Saud University Project No. 10-INF1184-02.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. IEEE 802.11: Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications. IEEE (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  2. Balachandran, A., Bahl, P., Geoffrey: Hot-spot congestion relief in public-area wireless networks. In: Proceedings of the Fourth IEEE Workshop on Mobile Computing Systems and Applications, WMCSA 2002, pp. 70–80 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Bianchi, G.: Performance analysis of the ieee 802.11 distributed coordination function. IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications 18(3), 535–547 (2000)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  4. Bejerano, Y., Han, S.-J., Li, L.E.: Fairness and load balancing in wireless lans using association control. In: MobiCom 2004: Proceedings of the 10th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking, pp. 315–329. ACM, New York (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Bejerano, Y., Han, S.-J.: Cell breathing techniques for load balancing in wireless lans. IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing 8(6), 735–749 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Ghini, V., Cacciaguerra, S., Lodi, G., Panzieri, F.: Enhancing mobile e-witness with access point selection policies. In: Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Information Technology: New Generations, pp. 372–377. IEEE Computer Society, Washington, DC (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Gong, H., Nahm, K., Kim, J.W.: Distributed fair access point selection for multi-rate ieee 802.11 wlans. In: 5th IEEE Consumer Communications and Networking Conference, CCNC 2008, pp. 528–532 (January 2008)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Guo, F.: Scalable and robust wlan connectivity using access point array. In: Proceedings of the 2005 International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks, ser. DSN 2005, pp. 288–297. IEEE Computer Society, Washington, DC (2005), http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2005.85

    Google Scholar 

  9. Ni, Q., Li, T., Turletti, T., Xiao, Y.: Saturation throughput analysis of error-prone 802.11 wireless networks: Research articles. Wirel. Commun. Mob. Comput. 5, 945–956 (2005), http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1103587.1103596

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Nicholson, A.J., Chawathe, Y., Chen, M.Y., Noble, B.D., Wetherall, D.: Improved access point selection. In: MobiSys 2006: Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Mobile Systems, Applications and Services, pp. 233–245. ACM, New York (2006)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  11. Sawma, G., Aib, I., Ben-El-Kezadri, R., Pujolle, G.: Alba: An autonomic load balancing algorithm for ieee 802.11 wireless networks. In: Network Operations and Management Symposium, NOMS 2008, pp. 891–894. IEEE, Los Alamitos (2008)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  12. Song, W., Zhuang, W., Cheng, Y.: Load balancing for cellular/wlan integrated networks. IEEE Network 21(1), 27–33 (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Taenaka, Y., Kashihara, S., Tsukamoto, K., Yamaguchi, S., Oie, Y.: Terminal-centric ap selection algorithm based on frame retransmissions. In: Proceedings of the 2nd ACM Workshop on Performance Monitoring and Measurement of Heterogeneous Wireless and Wired Networks, ser. PM2HW2N 2007, pp. 128–131. ACM, New York (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Vasudevan, S., Papagiannaki, K., Diot, C., Kurose, J., Towsley, D.: Facilitating access point selection in ieee 802.11 wireless networks. In: Proceedings of the 5th ACM SIGCOMM Conference on Internet Measurement, ser. IMC 2005, p. 26. USENIX Association, Berkeley (2005)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Wang, S., Cui, Y., Xu, K., Das, S.K., Wu, J., Xiao, Y.: Cell breathing based on supply-demand model in overlapping WLAN cells. In: Bartolini, N., Nikoletseas, S., Sinha, P., Cardellini, V., Mahanti, A. (eds.) QShine 2009. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol. 22, pp. 203–217. Springer, Heidelberg (2009)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  16. Yen, L.-H., Yeh, T.-T.: Snmp-based approach to load distribution in ieee 802.11 networks. In: IEEE 63rd Vehicular Technology Conference, VTC 2006-Spring, vol. 3, pp. 1196–1200 (May 2006)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Zhai, H., Kwon, Y., Fang, Y.: Performance analysis of ieee 802.11 mac protocols in wireless lans: Research articles. Wirel. Commun. Mob. Comput. 4, 917–931 (2004), http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/wcm.v4:8

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Henderson, T., Kotz, D., Abyzov, I.: The changing usage of a mature campus-wide wireless network. In: MobiCom 2004: Proceedings of the 10th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking, pp. 187–201. ACM, New York (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Bertsekas, D., Gallager, R.: Data Networks, pp. 524–529. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs (1987)

    Google Scholar 

  20. Wang, S., Liu, M., Cheng, X., Li, Z., Huang, J., Chen, B.: Coverage adjustment for load balancing with an ap service availability guarantee in wlans. Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Jain, R., Chui, D., Hawe, W.: A quantitative measure of fairness and discrimination for resource allocation in shared systems. Digital Equipment Institution, Tech. Rep. (1984)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

Le, Y. et al. (2011). Load Balancing Access Point Association Schemes for IEEE 802.11 Wireless Networks. In: Cheng, Y., Eun, D.Y., Qin, Z., Song, M., Xing, K. (eds) Wireless Algorithms, Systems, and Applications. WASA 2011. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 6843. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-23490-3_25

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-23490-3_25

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-23489-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-23490-3

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics