Multicasting in Ad-Hoc Networks

Abstract

Multicast communication has been used for a wide range of applications. Multicast is a more efficient method of supporting group communication than unicast, as it allows transmission and routing of packets to multiple destination using fewer network resources. Within the wired network, well established wired protocols exist to offer an efficient multicast service. As node becomes increasingly mobile, protocols need to evolve to provide efficient service in the new environment.

MAODV protocol is based on the AODV unicast routing protocol, which is a tree based multicast routing protocol and uses a group leader to maintain a multicast group. Mainly two approaches are studied and analyzed, one is to make the group leader node static and then measure the parameters like Packet Delivery Ratio and Latency. And the other, in which, new packet format of RI (Receiver Identification) is designed, which is sent periodically by sender to check that the receiver node is in the range of the sender node; if it is in the range of the sender node than sender can directly send packets to receiver rather than sending it through intermediate nodes. Petri Net model approach has been used to show that MAODV is a complete and safe protocol.

Network Simulator 2 tool is used for coding and simulation purpose of the modified MAODV protocol. The newly implemented MAODV is being used in this project to analyze its performance in different scenarios and are compared with the MAODV protocol without changes.