Lightweight Client-Pull Protocol for Mobile Communication

Abstract

Abstract:Consumer mobile devices, such as cellular phones and PDAs, rely on TCP/IP as main communication protocol. However, cellular networks are not reliable as wired and wireless LAN, due to both users mobility and geographical obstacles. Moreover, limited bandwidth outside urban areas requires an application level data priority management, in order to improve user experience and avoid communication stack deadlocks. This paper presents early specification and first prototype of the LCPP (Lightweight Client-Pull Protocol), a UDP-based communication protocol specially designed to provide better performance, fast responsiveness and save processing power on mobile devices. Using some concepts adopted in the field of P2P file sharing, LCPP provides data priority management approach, which enables application to negotiate concurrent access to communication channel and to be notified about delaying, network congestion or remote device inability to process data.