Location Aware Optimized Link State Routing protocol

Radio tactical scenarios are rapidly evolving and MANETs (Mobile Ad-hoc NETworks) are more and more frequently adopted because of their recognized advantages (absence of infrastructure, mobility management, traffic forwarding, etc.), also pushed by the rapid evolution of Software Defined Radio (SDR). The impact over network performances of fast and continuous topology changes due to nodes´ mobility, together with other constrains (such as adverse e.m. propagation environment, available bandwidth, nodes´ computational capacity and power consumption) is anyhow still one of the major issues to be faced in MANETs. Traditional routing protocols have been adapted in recent times to cope with the above mentioned constraints and in particular our attention was focused on the well-known and widely adopted Optimized Link State Routing (OLSR) protocol. This paper presents an improvement of the Quality of Service (QoS) features of the “standard” OLSR protocol, in terms of packet loss and delay. The so-called “Location Aware” OLSR protocol is based on the introduction of two concepts: the “Perceived Coverage Radius” and “Perceived Coverage Area”. In simple terms, the basic idea behind those concepts is to “judiciously” exclude from the one-hop neighbor set of a node, those nodes which will presumably move out in a little time of the e.m. coverage area of the node. Benefits of the innovative method has been demonstrated and validated through simulations of typical tactical applications.