NeTS: Small: Collaborative Research: Infrastructure Mobility

NetS：小型：协作研究：基础设施移动性

• 批准号: 1421697
• 负责人: Srihari Nelakuditi
• 金额: $ 4.34万
• 依托单位: University of South Carolina at Columbia
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-10-01 至 2016-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1421697&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: NeTS; Small; Collaborative; Research; Infrastructure

Mobile computing has traditionally implied mobile clients connected to a static infrastructure. This project breaks away from this point of view and envisions the possibility of injecting mobility into infrastructure. The PIs envision a WiFi access point on wheels that moves to optimize desired performance metrics. Movements need not necessarily be all around the floor of a home or office, neither do they have to operate on batteries, or connect wirelessly to the Internet. At homes, they could remain tethered to power and Ethernet outlets while moving in small areas (perhaps under the study table). In offices of the future, perhaps APs could move on tracks installed on top of false ceilings. The cloud could perhaps coordinate their mobility based on how users move within the environment, or how traffic and interferences change in the network. This project explores the viability of this vision and will present thorough measurements from various home/office environments.Initial measurements with moving WiFi APs in residential and enterprise environments exhibit promise. Analysis finds that complex multipath characteristics of indoor environments cause large fluctuations in link quality even when the antenna moves in the scale of one foot. Mobile APs can leverage this spatial variation by relocating to a pixel that is strong for its own clients and yet weak from its interferers. When multiple APs are coordinated by a central controller, the motion paths of the APs need to be jointly planned to optimize global network parameters. Heuristics will be developed that first assume the knowledge of AP locations; based on the outcome of this heuristic, the assumption might be relaxed. The project will also consider client mobility and how APs adapt to them, perhaps based on the quality of channel changes available from channel state information (CSI) in today's WiFi cards. If mobility proves to offer additional gains despite the advances in current technologies, robotic wireless networking might become an important and exciting direction of the future.

移动计算传统上意味着移动客户端连接到静态基础设施。该项目打破了这一观点，并设想了为基础设施注入流动性的可能性。 PI 设想了一个带轮子的 WiFi 接入点，可以移动以优化所需的性能指标。移动不一定需要在家庭或办公室的地板上进行，也不需要使用电池运行，也不需要无线连接到互联网。在家里，他们可以在小范围内（可能在学习桌下）移动时仍然连接到电源和以太网插座。在未来的办公室中，接入点也许可以在安装在假天花板顶部的轨道上移动。云也许可以根据用户在环境中的移动方式或网络中的流量和干扰变化来协调它们的移动性。该项目探讨了这一愿景的可行性，并将展示各种家庭/办公环境的全面测量结果。在住宅和企业环境中使用移动 WiFi AP 进行的初步测量显示出良好的前景。分析发现，室内环境复杂的多径特性，即使天线在一英尺尺度内移动，链路质量也会出现较大波动。移动接入点可以通过重新定位到对其自身客户端较强但对其干扰源较弱的像素来利用这种空间变化。当多个AP由中央控制器协调时，需要共同规划AP的运动路径以优化全局网络参数。将开发启发式方法，首先假设了解 AP 位置；根据这一启发式的结果，假设可能会放宽。该项目还将考虑客户端移动性以及接入点如何适应它们，可能基于当今 WiFi 卡中信道状态信息 (CSI) 提供的信道变化质量。尽管当前技术取得了进步，但如果事实证明移动性能够提供额外的收益，那么机器人无线网络可能会成为未来一个重要且令人兴奋的方向。