An Approximate Analysis of Buffered S-ALOHA in Fading Channels Using Tagged User Analysis

Tagged user analysis (TUA) is a generic approximate method of analyzing random access protocols for finite-user finite-buffer systems. This technique decouples the channel contention behavior from the user queuing behavior and allows the use of classical queuing theory results to be directly applicable to the analysis of finite-user finite-buffer random access methods. In this paper, we extend TUA to analyze finite buffer S-ALOHA operating over flat fading radio channels and derive expressions for system performance indices like throughput, average packet delay, blocking probability and queue length. It is shown that for a moderate number of active users, the simulation and analytical results fit closely