Portability Versus Efficiency Tradeoffs in MAC Implementations for Microsensor Platforms

Author

Schoofs, Anthony ; Van der Stok, Peter ; Stanley-Marbell, Phillip

Author_Institution

CLARITY (Centre for Sensor Web Technol.), Univ. Coll. Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

Volume

1

Issue

1

fYear

2009

fDate

5/1/2009 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

24

Lastpage

27

Abstract

Medium access control (MAC) implementations control access of network devices to a transmission medium. For emerging communication protocols, the MAC is typically implemented in software, to enable adaptation to evolving de-facto or industry standards. Software MAC implementations are typically realized as state machines, executing code related to successive MAC states within periodic interrupts. This software construct yields minimal memory footprint and energy efficiency, but the resulting implementations are often tightly coupled to the platform´s system software, and are thus nonportable across hardware and system platforms. This article presents an architecture that decouples MAC and system software, enabling portability, while preserving software efficiency.

Keywords

access protocols; finite state machines; microsensors; systems software; telecommunication computing; MAC implementations; communication protocols; energy efficiency; medium access control; microsensor platforms; minimal memory footprint; network devices; portability versus efficiency tradeoffs; software efficiency; state machines; system software; transmission medium; Embedded systems; medium access control (MAC); personal area networks; sensor networks;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Embedded Systems Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1943-0663

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LES.2009.2028040

Filename

5170182