Abstract :
Presents a 100-slide tutorial on wireless multihop networks. Wireless mesh networks, mobile ad-hoc networks and wireless sensor networks are some of the names related to a more general concept that can be described as wireless multihop networks. Recently, the research community has devoted a lot of attention to this topic since now it may become applied in a general manner leaving the niche market it has had since its origins. Sometimes, the research community is overoptimistic about the application of this technology, and in fact, in the technology itself. This enthusiasm brings to unrealistic research scenarios and, so, to unrealistic models and conclusions. The topic of the tutorial is motivated for this feeling of lack of connection between reality and theory in the study of this kind of networks. The main ideas presented are based on practical experiences in using this technology and in some well known papers that cover the same issues. The tutorial starts with an introduction to some applications and the technologies available. From this point, different key aspects such as mobility, range, interference, metrics, routing or power consumption are presented considering different degrees of complexity and realism. The tutorial presents measurements from real systems (e.g. WLAN mesh networks and wireless sensor networks) related to range, packet losses, reconfiguration times and the effects of mobility. The tutorial is intended to focus the research in the area, avoiding too general scenarios that provide no clear solutions and to provide some reference behaviors and values to validate simulation or theoretical results.
