Performance analysis of channel assignment policies in WLAN hot-spots

In this paper we study mechanisms to scale the capacity of Wireless LAN "hot spots" to a scenario with multiple APs and many wireless users. We first study the impact of separating each AP at the physical layer using multiple overlapping channels as provided by the IEEE 802.11 standard. Then perform an extensive set of ns-2 simulations to study the impact of such factors as channel conditions, node density, channel allocation policies, and MAC protocol on throughput scaling and fairness.