Interworking between WLAN and WMAN: an Ethernet-Based Integrated Device

This paper addresses the issue of the efficient interworking between a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) and a Wireless Metropolitan Area Network (WMAN), in particular High Performance Local Area Network (HiperLAN) and High Performance Metropolitan Area Network (HiperMAN) standards. The dual mode interworking must guarantee Quality of Service (QoS) through the whole system. One of the main conditions to make the solution feasible and commercially interesting is to require few/none changes to the current standards. To accomplish this goal and keep low the implementation complexity, an Ethernet bridging mechanism is proposed. In particular, this paper gives a detailed description of the User Plane and Control Plane of an integrated device that implements an Ethernet-based interworking. The advantages with respect to Internet Protocol (IP) bridging and Data Link Control (DLC) bridging are carried out.