Commanding mobile robots via wireless ad-hoc networks — A comparison of four ad-hoc routing protocol implementations

Future applications of mobile robot teams or robot teleoperation require highly dynamic network topologies. One promising approach is the use of relay nodes in wireless ad-hoc networks which require special routing protocols to provide a transparent communication network to the user. This work tests and compares four different existing ad-hoc routing protocol implementations with respect to aspects of mobile robot teleoperation. The reactive routing protocols ad-hoc on-demand distance vector (AODV) and dynamic source routing (DSR), the proactive optimized link state routing (OLSR) and B.A.T.M.A.N. are used in test scenarios to command a mobile robot via an ad-hoc network of several communication relay nodes. For all four ad-hoc routing protocols, the route reestablishing behavior is observed. In particular the packet loss and the duration of route reestablishing during test runs with real hardware in an outdoor environment are analyzed.