A high-performance and fair scheduler for the wireless network with a multi-state channel

Many fair queueing algorithms have been proposed under the environment of wireline networks. However, these algorithms suffer difficulties in meeting some distinct characteristics, such as high error rate and location dependent or time varying channel capacity, that exist in wireless networks. In this paper, we propose a novel scheduler, exponential-rule fair queueing (EFQ), for wireless fair scheduling. Unlike the current schedulers which assumes that a wireless channel is of good or bad state, the EFQ aims to work with a multi-state channel. EFQ prefers the flow destined to a high-capacity channel or the flow with serious lagging. From simulation results, EFQ not only provides shorter delay, but also achieves more appropriate fairness, compared with the channel-condition independent fair queueing (CIF-Q) algorithm.