Bracher. Enhancing Mobile Ad Hoc Network Connectivity A MECHANISM FOR ENHANCING INTERNET CONNECTIVITY FOR MOBILE AD HOC NETWORKS

Mobile ad hoc networks are an emerging wireless technology which differs from other networking technologies in that they are infrastructureless, autonomous, stand-alone networks. Although these characteristics enable simple deployment, ad hoc networks are limited in terms of connectivity as communication is confined to the boundaries of the local network. Due to this constraint, plus the growing trend towards establishing an "all IP environment", efforts are being made to integrate ad hoc networks with Mobile IP in order to ultimately bridge ad hoc networks to the Internet. This paper focuses on the connectivity of ad hoc network hosts to the Internet and proposes a mechanism for extending the periods of reachability of these hosts from the viewpoint of external hosts. From the simulation tests conducted on the custom built network simulator used to implement this proposal, positive results were produced showing an overall increase in the reachability times of ad hoc network hosts plus a decrease in the percentage of packet loss of incoming packets to the ad hoc network.