Abstract:
The multicasting technique supports a variety of
applications that require data to be instantaneously trans-
mitted to a set of destination nodes. In environments with
continuously moving nodes, such as mobile ad-hoc networks,
the search for e cient routes from sources to the projected
destinations is a common issue. Proposed Windmill proto-
col provides a scalable multicast solution for mobile ad-hoc
networks. Windmill aims to improve routing protocol's per-
formance by introducing a hierarchal distributed routing al-
gorithm and dividing the area into zones. Additionally, it
attempts to demonstrate better scalability, performance and
robustness when faced with frequent topology changes, by
utilizing restricted directional
ooding. A detailed and ex-
tensive simulated performance evaluation has been conducted
to assess Windmill and compare it with multicast ad-hoc on-
demand distance vector (MAODV) and on-demand multicast
routing protocols (ODMRP). Simulation results show that the
three protocols achieved high packet delivery rates in most sce-
narios. Results also show that Windmill is capable of achiev-
ing scalability by maintaining the minimum packet routing
load, even upon increasing the nodes' speed, the number of
sources, the number of group members and the size of the
simulated network. The results also indicate that it o ers
superior performance and is well suited for ad-hoc wireless
networks with mobile hosts. The trade-o of using Windmill
consists in slightly longer paths { a characteristic that makes it
a good choice for applications that require simultaneous data
transmission to a large set of nodes.
