WLAN Manager (WM): a device for performance management of a WLAN

We propose a Split MAC (see RFC [1]) architecture based solution to enhance the quality of service (QoS) experienced by the wireless nodes in an 802.11b/e based WLAN. Our proposed solution achieves the objectives of a) providing a fair sharing of the wireless channel time among stations (STAs) while maximizing channel utilization in a situation where STAs are associated at different data rates with the access point (AP), b) exercising connection admission control (CAC) for two-way voice calls, c) supporting policy based service differentiation among the flows within one 802.11e access category (AC), and d) maintaining performance levels during inter-AP roaming of STAs. The proposed solution is implemented on an extraneous device, called WM (WLAN Manager), which in the CAPWAP (see the RFC [1]) parlance can be termed as an Access Controller (AC). We report simulation and test-bed results.