Monitoring Dynamic Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks: A Fully Distributed Hybrid Architecture

Abstract

The mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) represent a broad area of study and market interest. They provide a wide set of applications in multiple domains. In that context, the functional and non-functional monitoring of these networks is crucial. For that purpose, monitoring techniques have been deeply studied in wired networks using gossip-based or hierarchical-based approaches. However, when applied to a MANET, several problematics arise mainly due to the absence of a centralized administration, the inherent MANETs constraints and the nodes mobility. In this paper, we present a hybrid distributed monitoring architecture for mobile ad-hoc networks in context of mobility pattern. We get inspired of gossip-based and hierarchical-based algorithms for query dissemination and data aggregation. We define gossip-based mechanisms that help our virtual hierarchical topology to complete the data aggregation, and then ensure the stability and robustness of our approach in dynamic environments. Further, we propose a fully distributed monitoring protocol that ease the nodes communications. We evaluate our approach through a simulated testbed by using NS3 and Docker, and illustrate the efficiency of our mechanisms.