MOBILE COMPUTING SYNOPSIS

UNIT-1
Introduction to Mobile Communications and Computing:
mobile phone is a portable telephone that does not use a wired connection. It is also known as a wireless phone, cell
phone, or cellular telephone. In many developing countries, mobile technology is a substitute for traditional fixed
services. The evolution of cellular communication systems is commonly known by the 1G, 2G, 3G, and 4G
designations.
We are currently in the fourth generation (4G) cellular communication systems. The cellular network provides wireless
connection between mobile phones or between a mobile phone and landline phone using radio waves. These mobile
phones connect to the cellular networks which are further connected to the public switched telephone network (PSTN).
The cellular network uses a number of low-power transmitters called base stations (BSs) and each BS covers a unit area
called a “cell”.
Generations of wireless mobile systems

Cellular geometry
The main reason for defining cells in a cellular land mobile radio system is to outline areas in which specific
channels and specific cell sites are used.
Cell shapes
There are only certain patterns of cells or tessellations which can be repeated over a plane: the regular hexagon, the
square, the circle, and the triangle.

Introduction to cellular concept

The cellular concept was developed in response to the limitations of conventional mobile radio services. The main
limitations of the previous mobile communication systems are as follows:
1. High-power transmitters were used to cover very large area.
2. Inefficient use of allocated radio spectrum.
3. If a user leaves the coverage area, they had to reinitiate the call on a different frequency channel.

In the beginning, there were no handoffs and the cellular system’s size depended on how much power the centralized BS
could transmit and receive. Users who stepped out of range of one system had to re-establish the call in the next system.
The capacity of these systems was severely limited because only a small number of radio channels (available bandwidth)
were available for mobile systems. Therefore, they had to find a way to reuse radio channels in order to carry more than
one conversation. Repeatedly reusing the radio frequencies over a given geographical area provides number of
simultaneous conversations. The basic idea of the cellular concept is frequency reuse.

Frequency reuse
Frequency reuse refers to the use of radio channels on the same carrier frequency to cover different areas that are
separated from one another by sufficient distances. Since the users in different geographical areas (cells) may
simultaneously use the same frequency, this technique maximizes the number of mobile phones served in a given
geographical area and spectrum efficiency. Frequency reuse causes CCI which is a trade-off link quality versus
subscriber capacity. Cells with the same letter (A) use the same set of frequencies. A cell group or cluster is outlined in
bold and replicated over the coverage area.

Handoff
Notion of handoff is a crucial component in cellular concept. The mobile users by definition are mobile i.e. they can
move around while using the phone. Hence the network should be able to provide them continuous access as they move.
This will not be a problem if the user is moving within the same cell. But when the user moves from one cell to another,
a handoff is required.
Handoff is one of the important concepts in the cellular mobile communications. The mobile user can move around while
using the mobile phone, which is the main advantage of mobile phones. Even when the mobile user is moving, the access
to the network should be continuous. This problem does not arise if the user is moving within the same cell, but when the
user is moving from cell to cell, a handoff is needed.
Handoff is the process of transferring an active call from one cell to another as the mobile unit moves from the first cell
to the other cell without disconnecting the call. When a mobile moves into a different cell while the call is in progress,
the mobile switching centre (MSC) automatically transfers the call to a new channel belonging to the new BS. Handoff
operation involves identifying a new BS along with the allocation of voice and control signals.

Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM)

GSM is most widely used and globally implemented digital cellular technology. It is used for transmitting data and
mobile voice services. As was mentioned earlier it is the name of a standardization group formed by CEPT. It is basically
a circuit-switched system in which every 200 kHz channels are divided into 25 kHz time slots. In GSM, time division
multiple access (TDMA) technique is used for transmitting voice and data through air interface. TDMA is a digital
technology and support data rates in the range between 64 kbps and 120 Mbps. As mentioned in the standard it supports
roaming service, which makes it possible to use one GSM mobile phone number in another GSM network.
• Good subjective speech quality
• Low terminal and service cost
• Support for international roaming
• Ability to support handheld terminals
• Support for range of new services and facilities
• Spectral efficiency
• ISDN compatibility
Features of GSM:
Flexibility and increased capacity
Frequency, channel spacing, and transmission rate
Improved security and confidentiality
Flexible handover processes
Switching and control
Noise robust
User services
ISDN compatibility in GSM

GSM Network architecture

• The MS
• The base station subsystem (BSS)
• The network switching subsystem (NSS)
• The operation and maintenance/support system (OSS)

GSM operation
Call from mobile phone to PSTN
Call from PSTN to mobile phone

Channels on the air interface or Radio Interface

The main reasons why GSM uses a digital air interface are as follows:
• It is “noise robust” enabling the use of tighter frequency reuse patterns and minimizing interference problems.
• It incorporates error correction, thus protecting the traffic that it carries. It offers greatly enhanced privacy to
subscribers and security to network providers.
• It is ISDN compatible, uses open standardized interfaces and offers an enhanced range of services to its subscribers.

Modulation techniques: There are three methods of modulating a signal so that it may be transmitted over the air:
• Amplitude modulation (AM): Amplitude modulation is very simple to implement for analogue signals but it is prone to
noise.
• Frequency modulation (FM): Frequency modulation is more complicated to implement but provides a better tolerance
to noise.
• Phase modulation (PM): Phase modulation provides the best tolerance to noise but it is very complex to implement for
analogue signals and therefore is rarely used.

Physical and logical channels

The physical channel is the medium over which the information is carried. In the case of a terrestrial interface, this would
be a cable. The logical channels consist of the information carried over the physical channel.
GSM physical channels
A single GSM RF carrier can support up to eight MS subscribers simultaneously. The diagram opposite shows how this
is accomplished. Each channel occupies the carrier for one-eighth of the time. This is a technique called time division
multiple access (TDMA).
GSM logical channels
There are two main groups of logical channels: traffic channels and control channels.
GSM traffic channels (TCH): The traffic channel carries speech or data information. The different types of traffic
channels are listed below:
Full rate
TCH/FS : Speech (13 kbps net, 22.8 kbps gross)
TCH/EFR : Speech (12.2 kbps net, 22.8 kbps gross)
TCH/F9.6 : 9.6 kbps of data
TCH/F4.8 : 4.8 kbps of data
TCH/F2.4 : 2.4 kbps of data
Half rate
CH/HS : Speech (6.5 kbps net, 11.4 kbps gross)
TCH/H4.8 : 4.8 kbps of data
TCH/H2.4 : 2.4 kbps of data
Acronyms
TCH : Traffi c channel
TCH/FS : Full rate speech channel

GSM protocol stack configuration

In any telecommunication system, signaling is required to coordinate the necessarily distributed functional entities of the
network. The transfer of Signaling information in GSM follows the layered OSI model. The GSM protocol architecture
used for the exchange of signaling messages pertaining to mobility, radio resource, and connection management
functions. The protocol layering consists of the physical layer, the data link layer (DLL), and the Layer 3. It is noted to
the OSI-minded reader to be careful in not confusing the Layer 3 protocol functions defined by GSM with what is
normally defined to be the Layer 3 functions in the OSI model. The GSM Layer 3 protocols are used for the
communication of network resource, mobility, code format, and call-related management messages between the various
network entities involved. Since, in the OSI model, some of these functions are actually provided by the higher layers,
the term “message layer” may be a more appropriate term for referring to the Layer 3 in GSM.

GSM basic call flow or Localization

Call flow from the MS to land (PSTN)
When a mobile subscriber makes a call to a PSTN telephone subscriber, the following sequence of events takes place:
• The MSC/VLR receives the message of a call request.
• The MSC/VLR checks if the MS is authorized to access the network. If so, the MS is activated.
If the MS is not authorized, service will be denied.
• MSC/VLR analyses the number and initiates a call setup with the PSTN.
• MSC/VLR asks the corresponding BSC to allocate a traffi c channel (a radio channel and a time slot).
• The BSC allocates the traffic channel and passes the information to the MS.
• The called party answers the call and the conversation takes place.
• The MS keeps on taking measurements of the radio channels in the present cell and neighbouring cells and
passes the information to the BSC. The BSC decides if handover is required, if so, a new traffic channel is allocated to
the MS and the handover is performed. If handover is not required, the MS continues to transmit in the same frequency.
Call flow from the land to MS
When a PSTN subscriber calls a MS, the sequence of events is as follows:
• The gateway MSC receives the call and queries the HLR for the information needed to route the call to the
serving MSC/VLR.
• The GMSC routes the call to the MSC/VLR.
• The MSC checks the VLR for the location area of the MS.
• The MSC contacts the MS via the BSC through a broadcast message, that is through a paging request.
• The MS responds to the page request.
• The BSC allocates a traffi c channel and sends a message to the MS to tune to the channel.
The MS generates a ringing signal and, after the subscriber answers, the speech connection is established.
• Handover, if required, takes place, as discussed in the earlier case.
 UNIT – 2
Wireless LANs
Wireless technology is an alternative to wired technology, which is commonly used for connecting devices in wireless
mode. Wireless local area networks (WLANs) transfer data through the air using radio waves instead of cables. The key
advantages of the wireless LAN are that it eliminates the laying of cables and wiring cost, and that it accommodates
mobile PC workstations. WLANs use the industrial scientific and medical (ISM) frequency bands 900 MHz, 2.4 GHz,
and 5 GHz, for wireless LAN products and they need not obtain license to operate in this band. Wireless networks are
standardized by IEEE. Under IEEE 802 committee, the wireless LAN and metropolitan area network (MAN) standards
are developed. The first wireless network standard was created by IEEE in 1997 and had been named as 802.11. It uses
2.4 GHz frequency and the supported maximum network bandwidth is 2 Mbps. Later, IEEE 802.11b was created in July
1999 and the supported network bandwidth is 11 Mbps. The 802.11b uses radio frequency (2.4 GHz) as same as the
original 802.11 standard. Wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) is a generic term that refers to the IEEE 802.11 communications
standard for WLANs. Wi-Fi is used to connect computers to communicate each other, to the wired network, and to the
Internet.

Advantages and disadvantages of wireless local area network

The following are some specific advantages of wireless LANs over wired LANs:
• Mobility: Wireless LANs support mobility. This improves the real-time access to information even when the user is
moving from one place to another within the range of an access point (AP).
• Different topologies: Different wireless networks are configured in two different modes: ad-hoc mode and
infrastructure mode. “Ad-hoc” mode provides peer-to-peer communication between wireless devices. “Infrastructure”
mode provides communication between wireless device and a central node, which in turn can communicate with wired
nodes on that LAN. In wired LAN, Ethernet cables must be run from each computer to another computer or to the central
device. It can be time-consuming and difficult to run cables under the floor or through walls, especially when computers
are placed in different rooms.
• Flexible architecture: It is easier to add or remove workstations.
• Cost effective: Although the initial investment required for wireless local area network (WLAN) hardware can be
similar to the cost of wired LAN hardware, installation expenses can be significantly lower.

The following are the disadvantages of WLANs:

• Less security: Wireless LANs are less secure than wired LANs, because wireless communication signals travel through
the air and can easily be intercepted by others using the same frequency band and by multipath fading. Automatic repeat
request (ARQ) and forward error-correction (FEC) techniques are used to increase reliability.
• Low data rates: The data transfer rate decreases with increase in the number of devices.
• Need for energy efficient: In mobile applications, battery power is a scarce resource. Therefore, the devices must be
designed to be energy efficient.
• Limited coverage: Devices will only operate at a limited distance from an AP, with the distance determined by the
standard used and buildings and other obstacles between the AP and the user.

Introduction to wireless local area network standard IEEE 802.11

The IEEE 802.11 is an international standard that describes WLAN characteristics. The Wi-Fi corresponds to the
certification name issued by the Wi-Fi Alliance group. The IEEE 802.11 standard ensures the compatibility between the
hardware devices. Wi-Fi provides high-speed connections to laptops, desktop computers, and personal digital assistants
(PDAs) located within a radius of 20–50 m for indoor and 100 m for outdoor communication applications. Wi-Fi
providers started providing the Internet APs in public locations such as train stations, airports, and hotels with wireless
networks. These Internet access areas are referred to as “Wi-Fi hotspots”.
The 802.11 is a specific standard that defines the MAC and PHY layers of a WLAN. The original 802.11 standard is a
MAC standard plus a low data rate PHY which supports only 1 and 2 Mbps data rates. This first version of the standard
operates at the 2.4 GHz ISM (industrial, scientific,
and medical) band and allows the vendors to choose between a direct-sequence spread spectrum (DSSS) and a
frequency-hopping spread spectrum (FHSS) implementations.
802.11b is a PHY extension to the original 802.11 standard. It also operates at the 2.40 GHz band and allows for higher
data rates of 5.5 and 11 Mbps. It uses a technique known as complementary code keying (CCK).
The 802.11a is another PHY extension to the 802.11 standard. It operates at the 5 GHz unlicensed band and allows for
data rates of 6–54 Mbps. It uses a technique known as orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM).
The 802.11g was the next extension to the 802.11 standard. It operates at the 2.4 GHz ISM band and allows for data rates
ranging from 1 to 54 Mbps. The 1 and 2 Mbps rates are operated in the DSSS mode whereas the 5.5 and 11 Mbps rates
are operated in CCK mode. In addition, rates at 6–54 Mbps are operated in OFDM mode. The 802.11g standard borrows
the OFDM technique and data rates from the 802.11a standard but operates at the 2.4 GHz ISM band. It can therefore
operate at very high data rates while being backward compatible with the 802.11b standard.
In addition to these standards, which have already been approved, the 802.11 committee has “working groups” to evolve
and enhance the standard. All three versions share the same MAC layer that uses carrier sense multiple access with
collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) for contention data, a request-to-send/clear-to-send (RTS/CTS) mechanism to
accommodate the hidden terminal problem, and an optional mechanism called point coordination function (PCF) to
support time-bounded applications. The 802.11 standard supports both infrastructure WLANs connection through an AP
(AP) and ad-hoc operation allowing peer-to-peer communication between terminals.
Compared with wired LANs, WLANs operate in a difficult medium for communication, and they need to support
mobility and security. The wireless medium has serious bandwidth limitations and frequency regulations. It suffers from
time and location dependent multi-path fading. It is subject to other interference from other WLANs, as well as other
radio and non-radio devices operating in the vicinity of a WLAN. Wireless standards need to have provisions to support
mobility that is not shared in the other LAN standards. The IEEE 802.11 body had to examine connection management,
link reliability management, and power management – none of which were concerns for the 802 standards. In addition,
WLANs have no PHY boundaries, and they overlap with each other, and therefore a standard is needed to define
provisions for security of the links.

IEEE 802.11 architecture

The architecture comprises of the station, AP, wireless medium, basic service set (BSS), distribution system (DS), and
extended service set (ESS). The architecture also includes station services and distribution services.
• Station: The component mobile, portable, or stationary that connects to the wireless medium in a network is referred to
as station. All stations are equipped with wireless network interface controllers (WNICs) and consist of MAC and PHY.
• BSS: The BSS is a set of all stations that can communicate with each other. There are three types of BSS:
• Independent BSS (IBSS) • Infrastructure BSS • Extended service set (ESS)

IEEE 802.11 architecture and services

The IEEE 802.11 architecture specifies nine services. These services are divided into two groups: station services and
distribution services.
There are four station services and five distribution services.
1. Station Services
Services that are common to all stations are referred to as station services. The four station services are authentication,
de-authentication, privacy, and data delivery. The authentication and de-authentication services allow only the authorized
users to use the network. The authentication service provides the identity of one station to another. So a station without
the identity is not allowed to use WLAN services. The de-authentication service is used to eliminate a previously
authorized user from accessing the services of the network. The privacy service of IEEE 802.11 protects the data only as
it traverses the wireless medium. It is not designed to provide complete protection of data between applications running
over a mixed network. Data delivery services ensure that data are transported reliably over the wireless medium. This
service provides reliable delivery of data frames from the MAC in one station to the MAC in one or more other stations,
with minimal duplication and reordering of frames.

2. Distribution Services
These services are also known as the DS services (DSS). There are five different services, and these services are
provided across a DS. The five distribution services are association, disassociation, distribution, integration with wired
network like LANs, and re-association. These services allow the users to move freely within an ESS and allow an IEEE
802.11 WLAN to connect with the wired LAN infrastructure. The distribution services determine how to forward frames
within the IEEE 802.11 WLAN and also how to deliver frames from one IEEE 802.11 WLAN to network destinations
outside of the WLAN. The wireless station uses the association and disassociation services to gain access and remove
access to WLAN services. The association service is used to make a logical connection between a mobile station and an
AP. Each station must become associated with an AP before it is allowed to send data through the AP onto the DS. The
connection is necessary in order for the DS to know where and how to deliver data to the mobile station. The mobile
station invokes the association service once and only once, typically when the station enters the WLAN. The
disassociation service is used either to force a mobile station to eliminate an association with an AP or for a mobile
station to inform an AP that it no longer requires the services of the WLAN. When a station becomes disassociated, it
must begin a new association by invoking the association service. An AP may force a station or stations to disassociate
because of resource restraints, the AP is shutting down or being removed from the network for a variety of reasons. When
a mobile station is aware that it will no longer require the services of an AP, it may invoke the disassociation service to
notify the AP that the logical connection to the services of the AP from this mobile station is no longer required
The re-association service enables a station to change its current association with an AP. The re-association service is
similar to the association service, with the exception that it includes information about the AP with which a mobile
station has been previously associated. A mobile station will use the re-association service repeatedly as it moves
throughout the ESS, loses contact with the AP with which it is associated, and needs to become associated with a new
AP. By using the re-association service, a mobile station provides information to the AP to which it will be associated
and information pertaining to the AP from which it will be disassociated. This allows the newly associated AP to contact
the previously associated AP to obtain frames that may be waiting there for delivery to the mobile station as well as other
information that may be relevant to the new association. The mobile station always initiates re-association. Distribution
is the primary service used by an 802.11 station. A station uses the distribution service every time it sends MAC frames
across the DS. The distribution service provides the distribution with only enough information to determine the proper
destination BSS for the MAC frame. The three association services (i.e. association, reassociation, and disassociation)
provide the necessary information for the distribution service to operate. Distribution within the DS does not necessarily
involve any additional features outside of the association services, though a station must be associated with an AP for the
distribution service to forward frames properly.
The integration service connects the 802.11 WLAN to other LANs, including one or more wired LANs or IEEE 802.11
WLANs. The integration service translates 802.11 frames-toframes that may traverse another network, as well as
translates frames from other networks to frames that may be delivered by an 802.11 WLAN.
Wireless PANs
A wireless personal area network (WPAN) is a network for interconnecting devices centered on an individual person’s
workspace – in which the connections are wireless. These might include a mobile phone, a laptop computer, pagers,
PDAs, and a personal stereo. There are many potential advantages of these devices being able to communicate to each
other, especially without wires. Typically, a WPAN uses Bluetooth technology, which was used as the basis for a new
standard, IEEE802.15. Bluetooth technology has been adopted as the IEEE 802.15.1 WPAN standards which are
commercially available in numerous devices ranging from cell phones, PDAs, laptops to wireless mouses, and cameras.
For example, today it is possible to link the laptop to a mobile phone through a cable connector and to wirelessly link
into a remote data network to retrieve e-mails or perform other actions. It permits communication within about 10 m,
which enables the use of low power, low cost, and extremely small-sized devices.
The concept of personal area networks (PANs) is that if each of these devices had a short-range communications tool
built into them, they could exchange information without wires and without any intervention from the user.
For example, the laptop, which was ostensibly in sleep mode, stored in a briefcase, could periodically talk to the cell
phone clipped to the user’s belt and ask it to check for e-mails. The cellular phone could retrieve these and send them to
the laptop over the short-range link. The laptop could then store them so that when the user turned the computer on, all
the e-mails would be available on the computer. As the user performs actions such as sending e-mails, the computer
would talk with the mobile phone and request transmission of these to the data network.

WPAN applications
The IEEE 802.15/WPAN technology applications are given below:
• WPANs are used to replace cables between a computer and its peripheral devices.
• WPANs can be used for transmitting images, digitized music, and other data.
• WPAN, popularly known as Bluetooth technology.

Hiper LAN
The need for mobile broadband communications has increased rapidly in recent years placing new demands for the
WLANs. The requirements of mobile broadband communication include support for QOS, security, handover, and
increased throughput. To meet these requirements, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) has
come up with High Performance Radio LAN (HIPERLAN), which is an alternative for the IEEE 802.11 WLAN
Standards.
The HIPERLAN standards provide features and capabilities similar to those of the IEEE802.11 WLAN standards. In
HYPERLAN, there are a number of base stations, and devices can communicate either with the base station or directly
with each other. The base stations, or APs, can automatically confi gure their frequency so that there is no need for
manual frequency assignment.

Wireless local loop

Wireless local loop (WLL) is a system
that connects subscribers to the local
telephone station wirelessly. The other
names of WLL are radio in the loop or fi
xed-radio access.
 UNIT-III
Wireless Networking
There are two ways to connect a computer to a network: wired and wireless. Wired network uses cables and network
adapters. In wired networks, data travels as electrical signals in the case of a copper wire or coaxial cable and optical
signal in the case of fibre optic cable. Two computers can be directly wired to each other using a crossover cable. To
accommodate more computers in wired networks, network-connecting devices like hubs, switches, or routers are used. In
wireless networks, wires are not used and the signal travels as an electromagnetic wave (EM wave or radio waves) or
infrared light through the air. There are different techniques through which data is transferred between the sources to the
destination known as routing techniques.
These are based on (i) the type of traffic such as voice which needs a real time communication or data which may be
busty and (ii) the type of connection. Based on the type of connection, two types of networks are used in traffic routing
of both wired and wireless networks. They are circuit switched and packet switched.
Examples of wired and wireless networks are IEEE802.3 and IEEE802.11. IEEE802.3 is the wired local area network
(LAN) and uses carrier sense multiple access with collision detection (CSMA/CD) as media access control (MAC)
protocol. IEEE802.11 (or wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi)) is the wireless LAN and uses carrier sense multiple access with
collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) as the MAC protocol.

Various generations of wireless networks

Wireless communication technologies include various devices and systems with different standards, protocols,
architectures, modulation, and coding techniques. The most important technologies are listed below:
• Global system for mobile communications (GSM)
• General packet radio service (GPRS)
• Wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) IEEE 802.11
• Worldwide interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX) IEEE 802.16
Fixed network transmission hierarchy
Wireless networks rely heavily on landline connections. Several standard digital signaling (DS) formats form a
transmission hierarchy that allows high data rate digital networks which carry a large number of voice channels to be
interconnected throughout the world. These DS formats use time division multiplexing (TDM). The most basic DS
format is called DS-0, which represents one duplex voice channel which is digitized into a 64 Kbps binary pulse code
modulation (PCM) format. The second DS format is DS-1, which represents 24 full duplex DS-0 voice channels that
are time division multiplexed into a 1.544 Mbps data stream (8 Kbps is used for control purposes).
Digital transmission hierarchy is the T (N) designation, which is used to denote transmission line compatibility for a
particular DS format. DS-1 signaling is used for a T1 trunk, which is a popular point-to-point network signaling format
used to connect base stations (BSs) to the mobile switching centre (MSC). T1 trunks digitize and distribute the 24 voice
channels onto a simple fourwire full duplex circuit. In Europe, CEPT (European Conference of Postal and
Telecommunications administrations) has defined a similar digital hierarchy. Level 0 represents a duplex 64 Kbps voice
channel, whereas level 1 concentrates 30 channels into a 2.048 Mbps TDM data stream.

Differences in wireless and fixed telephone networks

Differences between wired and wireless networks are seen in terms of medium of communication (channel), speed, cost,
ease, capacity, reliability, and so on. The main difference between a wired and wireless data communication networks is
the existence of physical cabling. Wireless technology is very convenient, enabling a user to roam anywhere within the
vicinity. Wireless networks have been one of the fastest growing segments of the telecommunications industry. They
have become progressively faster over the years, and nowadays the speed at which they operate is almost
indistinguishable from wired connections.
The performances of both networks are compared in terms of the following parameters:
• Mobility: Wired networks make you immobile while wireless ones provide you with convenience of movement. Real-
time information can be accessed from anywhere at any time.
• Cost: Wired networks prove expensive when covering a large area because of the wiring and cabling while wireless
networks do not involve this cost.
• Transmission speed: Wired networks have better transmission speeds than wireless ones. In a wired network, a user
does not have to share space with other users and thus gets dedicated speeds while in wireless networks, the same
connection may be shared by multiple users.
• Dynamic versus static:
• Wireless networks are highly dynamic, that is, network configuration need to be changed every time a user changes
coverage region, this is to be done in fraction of seconds. For example, dynamic network configuration in wireless
cellular networks can be done by handoffs, roaming procedures.
• Wired networks are virtually static. When a user changes the region (place) all the (wired) connectivity needs to be
changed from one place to the other.
• Network capacity: In wired networks, the network capacity can be increased by simply increasing the copper cables or
optical fiber cables, whereas in wireless networks to increase the capacity extensive RF optimization needs to be done.

Traffic routing in wireless networks

Networking technologies can be distinguished on the basis of the method they use to determine the communication path
between the devices over which data will fl ow. There are two approaches to transfer data: one is circuit switching and
the other one is packet switching.
Circuit switching
Circuit switching is a technique in which a system seeks out the physical “copper” path from the source node to the
destination node. Telephone system follows circuit switching. In circuit switching, an end to end path is set before any
data is sent. That is why it takes several seconds between the end of dialling and the start of ringing for international
calls. During this interval, the telephone system is actually hunting for a copper path, and the call request signal must
propagate all the way to the destination and it should be acknowledged. In circuit switching, line is unused by others until
the call is terminated and each caller may make one call at a time. In circuit switching, once a connection is established it
remains throughout the session. Circuit-switched networks are based on TDM, in which numerous signals are combined
for transmission on a single communication line or channel.
Disadvantages of circuit switching are as follows:
• Circuits are not used when session is idle
• Inefficient for busty traffic
• Circuit switching usually done using a fixed rate stream (e.g., 64 Kbps)
• Difficult to support variable data rates
Packet switching
In packet switching, no specific communication path is used for transfer of data. Instead, the data is divided into small
units called packets and sent over the network. The packets can travel in different routes, combined or fragmented, as
required to get them to their final destination. On the receiving end, the process is reversed where the data is read from
the packets and re-assembled into the form of the original data. Circuit switching statically reserves the required
bandwidth in advance, whereas packet switching acquires and releases bandwidth when it is needed. Such type of
communication without a dedicated path between the transmitter and the receiver is termed as connectionless.
When a message is broken into packets, a certain amount of control information is added to each packet to provide
source and destination information and identification.
• Header – contains source address, destination address, packet sequence number, and other routing and billing
information.
• Trailer – contains CRC sum, which is used for error detection at receiver.

All computer networks come under packet switching. They use the following protocols:
• X.25
• Frame relay
• ATM
Packet switching is also called packet radio when used by a wireless link. It provides excellent channel efficiency for
data transmission, since the channel is utilized only when sending or receiving bursts of information.
Advantages of packet switching are as follows:
• Network supports many connections simultaneously
• Short messages not delayed by long messages
• More effi cient than circuit switching
Disadvantages of packet switching are as follows:
• Performance drops when many users share the same network

Wide area networks link connection technologies

A WAN is a computer network whose communications link cross metropolitan, regional, or national boundaries. WANs
use routers and public communications links. The largest and most well-known example of a WAN is the Internet.
WANs exchange information across wide geographic areas. They operate at three-layer open system interconnect (OSI)
model given below:
• PHY
• Data link
• Network
X.25 protocol
The first commercial product of packet switching technology was X.25 network. X.25 defines how a packet-mode
terminal can be connected to a packet network for the exchange of data.
X.25 protocol was adopted as a commonly used network protocol standard by the consultative committee for
international telegraph and telephone (CCITT). The X.25 protocol allows computers on different public networks (such
as CompuServe or a TCP/IP network) to communicate through an intermediate computer at the network layer level. X.25
defines the interface between data terminal equipment (DTE) and data circuit equipment (DCE). The DTE represents the
end user, or host system. The DCE represents the boundary node of the packet switched public data network (PSPDN)
and, in other words, the DCE is the point of access into the network
Frame relay
Frame relay is designated as a 2G X.25. It uses packet switching with VCs. The term VC is used most frequently to
describe connections between two hosts in a packet switching network. In this case, the two hosts can communicate as
though they have a dedicated connection even though the packets might actually travel very different routes before
arriving at their destination. An X.25 connection is an example of a VC. A permanent virtual circuit (PVC) is
permanently available to the user just as though it were a dedicated or leased line continuously reserved for that user.
The frame relay is a VC-based packet-switching service with no error recovery and no flow control.
Whenever a frame relay switch detects an error in a packet, its only possible course of action is to discard the data. This
results in a network with lower processing overheads and higher transmission rates than X.25, but requires intelligent end
systems for data integrity. Frame relay is extensively used today to allow LANs on different corporate campuses to send
data to each other at reasonably high speeds. As shown in Figure 26.10, frame relay interconnects LANs through IP
routers, with each IP router in a different corporate campus.

ATM
ATM is a standard for cell-based relay that carries voice, video, and data in small, fixed size cells. ATM networks are
connection-oriented networks that combine the benefits of circuit switching (guaranteed capacity and constant
transmission delay) with those of packet switching (flexibility and efficiency for intermittent traffic). Traditional circuit-
based networks use TDM, in which users are assigned a predetermined time slot; no other device can transmit during this
time slot. If a station has a lot of data to send, it can transmit only during its time slot, even if the other time slots are
empty. Conversely, if the station has nothing to transmit, the time slot is sent empty and is wasted. This arrangement is
called synchronous transmission.
ATM is asynchronous, which means that time slots are available on demand. This allows for a more efficient use of
available bandwidth. ATM uses small, fixed-sized cells (as opposed to the variable sized frames in frame relay), which
have 53 bytes (Figure 26.13). Computers usually define things in powers of two or eight. The 53-byte cell size represents
a compromise between the phone-standards folks and the data standards folks.
ATM networks use two devices. These are ATM switches and ATM endpoints. ATM switches accept cells from an
endpoint or another switch, evaluate the cell header, and quickly forward the cell to another interface toward the
destination. An ATM endpoint contains an ATM network interface adapter and is responsible for converting digital data
into cells and back again.
Examples of ATM endpoints include workstations, LAN switches, routers, and video coder decoders (codec’s).

ATM advantages
Several organizations that have a large investment in client/server technology are moving to implement ATM. New
demands to transmit voice and video data, as well as large database queries, require the bandwidth capabilities of ATM.
The five main advantages of ATM are as follows:
 • Accommodates high-speed telecommunication
• Dependable and flexible at geographic distances
• Handles data, voice, and video transmissions
• Provides potentially significant cost saving in network resources
• Encodes in fixed-length, 53-byte relay units of data called cells

Virtual private networks

The whole world is becoming a global village; this is due to the development in the communication world. This has also
led to the expansion of the businesses across the globe. Companies throughout the world instead of communicating with
the regional offi ces focused their attention towards developing their own private networks. Therefore, there is a need to
develop a private network to communicate to far-off places with encrypted and secure communication mode. Virtual
private network (VPN) is one such private network that companies use to communicate throughout the world.
A VPN is a secured connection between two devices over a shared, unsecured network. The security of the network is
established by encryption method.
There are three types of VPNs:
• Remote access VPN – VPNs have been used for some time for mobile devices such as laptops to connect to their
corporate headquarters over the Internet.
• Site-to-site intranet – when a gateway is established at various different locations but of the same company for secure
communication lines then we term it as site-to-site intranet. It helps internal users communicate with each other.
Site-to-site extranet – site-to-site extranet also has different communication gateways but the purpose is to communicate
with the external business partners. The extranet provides enough business security, because only authenticated users can
make use of it.

Wireless data services

Wireless data services can provide the traveler with the required network access in many situations where wired access to
the public network is impractical or inconvenient. 1G cellular system that provides data communications using circuit
switching is inefficient for dedicated mobile data services such as Fax, e-mail, and short messaging. Also, voice filtering
must be deactivated when data is transmitted over 1G cellular networks, and a dedicated data link must be established
over the common air interface. Until recently, the demand for packet data services has been significantly less than the
demand for voice services and, therefore, 1G subscriber equipment design has focused mainly on voice communications
only.

Common channel signaling

Common channel signaling (CCS) is a digital communications technique that provides simultaneous transmission of user
data, signaling data, and other related traffic throughout a network. CCS is signaling in which a group of voice and data
channels share a separate channel that is used only for control signals. Because control signals have a lower bandwidth
requirement than voice signals, the same control channel can be used for carrying the control signals of multiple voice
channels, hence the term common channel. In a multi-channel communications system, CCS is signaling in which one
channel in each link is used for signaling to control, account for, and manage traffic on all channels of the link.
Essentially, the CCS network is a highly robust sub-network that supports the operation of the primary communication
network. CCS is an out-of-band signaling technique that allows much faster communication between two nodes within
the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Instead of being constrained to signaling data rates which are of the
order of audio frequencies, CCS supports signaling data rates from 56 Kbps to many megabits per second. Thus,
network-signaling data is carried in a seemingly parallel, out-of-band, signaling channel while only user data is carried
on the PSTN.
CCS provides a substantial increase in the number of users, which are served by trunked PSTN lines, but requires that a
dedicated portion of the trunk time be used to provide a signaling channel used for network traffic. The most common
CCS signaling methods in use today are ISDN and signaling system 7 (SS7).
Out-of-band signaling is signaling that does not take place over the same path as the conversation. In 1G cellular
systems, the SS7 family of protocols, as defined by the ISDN is used to provide CCS. Since network-signaling traffic is
bursty and of short duration, the signaling channel may be operated in a connectionless fashion where packet data
transfer techniques are efficiently used. CCS generally uses a variable length packet sizes and a layered protocol
structure. The expense of a parallel signaling channel is minor compared to the capacity improvement offered by CCS
throughout the PSTN, and often the same physical network connection (i.e., a fi bre optic cable) carries both the user
traffic and the network signaling data. For 2G wireless communications systems, CCS is used to pass user data and
control/supervisory signals between the subscriber and the base station, between the base station and the MSC, and
between the MSCs. Even though the concept of CCS implies dedicated, parallel channels, it is implemented in a TDM
format for serial data transmissions.
CCS is used in all modern telephone networks. Most recently, dedicated signaling channels have been used by cellular
MSCs to provide global signaling interconnection, thereby enabling MSCs throughout the world to pass subscriber
information.

Various networks for connecting to the Internet

 Dial-up connection
 ISDN
 Broadband ISDN
 Digital subscriber line
 ADSL
 UNIT-IV & V
Data Issues and Data dissemination
Data management technology that can support easy data access from and to mobile devices is among the main concerns
in mobile information systems.
Mobile database
• Data management technology that enables the use of databases on the mobile computing environment.
• The database is more advanced and challenging than the fixed distributed databases.
Mobile Database Features
• Data are available anywhere independent of the availability of the fixed network connection.
– mobile users can virtually access any data, anywhere and anytime, even in the absence of fixed network
connection.
• Databases on both mobile and fixed hosts are sharable in seamless way.
– In order to support seamless data sharing among mobile and fixed hosts, we need to employ distributed
computing technologies that should also work properly even in the disconnection-prone environments.
Mobile Environment Model
• A mobile environment consists of two distinct sets of entities
– mobile hosts and
– fixed hosts.
• Mobile hosts are connected by wireless connections to the MSS of the cell where they currently exist.
• A mobile host can move within a cell or between two cells while retaining its network connection.
• Every host and cell in the system is associated with a unique identifier.
• A mobile host acts as a data client and a data server at the same time.
• A fixed host called location server keeps information of locations of all mobile hosts located within its management
coverage
Mobile Environment Model

Hierarchical structure of location servers

Peer –to-peer Environment model
• MANET applications can be considered as peer-topeer, meaning that a mobile unit is simultaneously a client and a
server.
– Transaction processing and data consistency control become more difficult since there is no central control in
this architecture.
– Resource discovery and data routing by mobile units make computing in a MANET even more complicated.

Mobile Database Characteristics

1. The environment where mobile databases are deployed is a mix of two different networks, i.e., the fixed network
and the wireless network.
– Fixed network characteristics
• Fixed host location,
• relatively high capacity,
• high reliability, and
• low connection cost.
– Wireless Network characteristics
• dynamic network topology,
• Relatively low capacity,
• low reliability, and
• high connection cost.
Techniques to avoid compromising database performance due to the use of wireless network
– Reducing the number of data exchanged via mobile network .
– Reducing the response time of accessing data via mobile network .
– Providing data cache on mobile host.
2. Limited resources available to mobile users
– Mobile hosts will likely bring only the fraction of data they need to access frequently during mobile.
– consistency requirement on databases (both on mobile and fixed hosts)
Techniques to address the problem
– Transaction management for mobile data bases .
– Allocation of mobile database replication on the fixed network.
3. Mobile hosts have low security.
– The worst case, for example, our data on the mobile host would be completely lost if the mobile hosts become the
subject of theft.

Data Management Issues

• Data distribution and replication
• Transactions models
• Query processing
• Caching
• Database Interfaces
• Recovery and fault tolerance
• Location-based service
• Security

Data distribution and replication

• Higher data availability and lower cost of remote access.
• More efficient access to data.
• Higher security. Generally the available replication technologies assume the deployment on fixed distributed
environment.

Replication issues
• Increasing the number of replicas will result in the increase of costs for updates and signaling.
• Mobile hosts can move anywhere and anytime.

Transaction Models
• All transactions must satisfy the ACID properties
– Atomic
– Consistent
– Isolated
– Durable
• Different concurrent transactions performed should be serializable – two-phase locking or timestamping
• Mobile transactions are, in general, distributed transactions where some actions are performed in mobile computers and
others in fixed hosts.
• ACID properties are hard to enforce, especially when the mobile computers are disconnected.

Query Processing
• Query processing is affected when mobility is considered.
• It is possible to formulate location dependent queries. For example: “where is the nearest gas station?” or “which are
the cinemas that project some film at 8:00pm in this city?” return different values depending on the location of the
mobile computer
• Query optimization methods try in general to obtain execution plans which minimize CPU, input/output and
communication costs.
• In centralized environments the cost that affects most is the input/output.
• In distributed environments, communication cost is the most important one.
• In a mobile distributed environment, the communication costs are much more difficult to estimate because the mobile
host may be situated in different locations.
• Dynamic optimization strategies are required in this mobile distributed context.

Caching
• Caching techniques for query processing can reduce communication costs dramatically.
• Difficult to apply caching techniques in mobile context because cache contents may change rapidly or get out-of-date
due to mobility.
• Updates to the cache memory may not be sent due to disconnections of the mobile unit.

Database Interfaces
• Design of query interface such as Query By Icons that
– are convenient to use.
– address the features of screen size.
– address limitations in memory and battery power and the restricted communication bandwidth.
• How the pen and voice can be used as substitutes for the mouse and keyboard.
• Implementation of a pen-based graphical database interface on a computer.

Recovery and Fault Tolerance

• Fault tolerance is the ability of a system to perform its function correctly even in the presence of internal faults.
• Faults can be classified as transient or permanent.
• A transient fault will eventually disappear without any apparent intervention.
• A permanent fault remains unless it is removed by some external agency.
• While it may seem that permanent faults are more severe, from an engineering perspective they are much easier to
diagnose and handle.
• The intermittent transient faults that recur often unpredictably are the most problematic.
• The mobile computing environment is characterized by
– limited resource availability,
– high mobility,
– low bandwidth and
– frequent disconnection.
• These features make the mobile computing environment more susceptible to transient faults.
• Software faults are the results of problems in software running on PDAs, e.g., mobile crash.
• Transaction recovery deals with the capability of ensuring failure atomicity.

Location based Services

• Determining the location of mobile users is one of the most challenging tasks which must be undertaken in order to
enable a locationbased service.
– Non-GPS positioning techniques
• Cell of Origin,
• Time of Arrival,
• Angle of Arrival, and
• Enhanced Observed Time Difference.

• Global Positioning System

– GPS is a relatively mature technology,
– Current receiver hardware is smaller, lighter, cheaper and uses less power than earlier-generation equipment.

• GPS limitations
– strong attenuation of the satellite signals by buildings.
– GPS does not operate well (or at all) in dense ‘urban canyon’ areas, or inside buildings. Yet, these are often the
very areas where demand for location based services is the highest.
– In order to use GPS, the mobile handsets must be modified to integrate GPS receiver chips.
• Assisted GPS – refers to the GPS positioning technique whereby there is assistance data provided from a special GPS
server/base station by the mobile telephony network. – A-GPS enables GPS positioning even in urban and indoor areas,
where the signal is too weak to be acquired using standard signal tracking procedures within the receiver.

• Issues – Diverse mobile mapping standards – Interoperability – Market capacity – User Privacy

ADAPTIVE CLUSTERING FOR MOBILE NTWORKS

WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORK
 WSN consists of spatially distributed autonomous sensors to monitor physical or environmental conditions,
such as temperature, sound, pressure etc.
 Collaborative Network of small Wireless Sensor devices, sensing a physical phenomenon.
 Formed by hundreds or thousands of nodes that communicate with each other and pass data along from one to
another.
 WHAT IS CLUSTERING ?
The process of organizing objects into groups whose members are similar in some way.
OBJECTIVE  Minimize the energy dissipation of the network.
 Increase the network life time.
 Clusters must be better balanced.
 Better distribution of cluster heads in the network.
CLASSIFICATION OF CLUSTERING
 Dominating-set-based clustering
 Low-maintenance clustering
 Mobility-aware clustering
 Energy-efficient clustering
 Load-balancing clustering
 Combined-metrics-based clustering

MAIN COMPONENTS IN CLUSTERING

 Clusters  Cluster Heads  Base Station  Sensor nodes

WHY CLUSTERING??
 Reduce routing table size.  Conserve communication bandwidth.
 Avoids redundant message exchanges.  Cluster head can aggregate data.
 Clusters can schedule activities so sensors can sleep.
ROUTING PROTOCOLS
 Location–Base Protocol  Data-Centric Protocol  Hierarchical Routing Protocol

ROUTING MODELS IN CLUSTERING

 Single –Hop  Multi-Hop
HOT SPOT PROBLEM  In single-hop communication:- Every sensor node will directly transmit the data to the base
station, so the nodes furthest away from the base station are the most critical nodes.
 In multi-hop communication:-Due to the limited transmission range, data’s are forced to route over several hops until
they reach the final destination nodes that are closest to the base station are burdened with heavy relay traffic and they
die first.
SOLUTION OF HOT SPOT PROBLEM EECU:- Energy- Efficient Unequal Clustering Algorithm In EECS a distance-
based cluster formation method is proposed to produce clusters of unequal size in single hop networks. A weighted
function is introduced to let clusters farther away from the base station have smaller sizes, thus some energy could be
preserved for long-distance data transmission to the base station.
ENERGY- EFFICIENT UNEQUAL CLUSTERING (EEUC)  EEUC partitions the nodes into Clusters of Unequal size,
and Clusters closer to the Base Station have smaller sizes than those farther away from the base station.  Thus Cluster
heads closer to the base station can preserve some energy for the inter-cluster data forwarding.

EEUC MECHANISM ENERGY SAVING SCHEMES IN CLUSTERING TECHNOLOGY

 Cluster Formation and Rotation
 Cluster Head Election and Rotation
 K-Hops Approach WORKING OF EEUC

CLUSTERING ALGORITHMS
 LEACH (Low Power Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy)
 HEED(Hybrid Energy Efficient Distributed )
 GAF
 WCA (Weighted Clustering Algorithm)
 K-MEANS (K-Hop Clustering Algorithm)
LEACH  It uses circular random clustering methods and each node in the network can be a cluster head in rotation,
this makes the energy- carrying of the network balancing to each node, extending the lifetime of the network.
BASIC BLOCK DIAGRAM (See net)
DISADVANTAGE OF LEACH
1.Applicable to only single hop communication mode.
2.LEACH assumes all the nodes to have same initial energy, which is not the case always in real-time problems. 3.It
cannot be applied for mobile nodes, failure of cluster-heads creates a lot of problems
COMPARISONS OF EECU WITH WCA ALGORITHM  WCA:-WCA is a classical algorithm based on node degree,
the number of single-hop neighbours.
 MAIN DRAWBACK :- The main drawback of WCA is that it needs to obtain the weight of the node and require each
node to save all the information of nodes before initializing network, so excessive amounts of computing and
communications may cause excessive consumption in clustering directly.

K-CLUSTERING ALGORITHMS  K-clustering algorithm can constitute maximum khop non-overlapping

clusters with partial networks topology information rather than the whole network topology. At the same time, it can also
save energy to prolong network survival time.
 PROBLEM :-The algorithm is more effective in restricting data forwarding distance, but it still doesn’t solve
unbalanced clustering (excessive clustering nodes). CONCLUSION Result shows that our unequal clustering mechanism
balances the energy consumption well among all sensor nodes and achieves an obvious improvement on the network
lifetime.
 UNIT-VI
Mobile IP and WAP
Mobile IP is an open standard, defi ned by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), which allows users to keep the
same IP address, stay connected, and maintain ongoing applications while roaming between IP networks. Mobile IP is
scalable for the Internet because it is based on IP. Any media that can support IP can support mobile IP.
Mobile IP functions
An important difference between mobile IP and mail forwarding is one that represents the classic distinction between
people and computers: people are smart and computers are not. To this end, mobile IP includes a host of special functions
that are used to set up and manage datagram forwarding. To see how these support functions work, we can describe the
general operation of mobile IP as a simplifi ed series of the following steps:
• Agent communication: The MN fi nds an agent on its local network by engaging in the agent discovery process. It
listens for agent advertisement messages sent out by agents and from this it can determine where it is located. If it does
not hear these messages it can ask for one using an agent solicitation message.
• Network location determination: The MN determines whether it is on its home network or a foreign network by
looking at the information in the agent advertisement message. If it is on its home network, it functions using regular IP.
To show how the rest of the process works, let us consider that the device just moved to a foreign network. The
remaining steps are as follows:
• CoA acquisition: The device obtains a temporary address called a CoA. This either comes from the agent
advertisement message from the FA, or through some other means. This address is used only as the destination point for
forwarding datagrams.
• Agent registration: The MN informs the HA on its home network of its presence on the foreign network and
enables datagram forwarding, by registering with the HA. This may be done either directly between the node and the
HA, or indirectly using the FA as a conduit.
• Datagram forwarding: The HA captures datagrams intended for the MN and forwards them. It may send them
either directly to the node or indirectly to the FA for delivery, depending on the type of CoA in use. Datagram forwarding
continues until the current agent registration expires. The device can then renew it. If it moves again, it repeats the
process to get a new CoA and then registers its new location with the HA. When the MN returns back to its home
network, it de-registers to cancel datagram forwarding and resumes normal IP operation.

Operation of mobile IP
Mobile IP has the following functional entities:
• Mobile node: This is the mobile device, the one moving around the Internetwork.
• Home agent (HA): This is a router on the home network that is responsible for catching datagrams intended for the
MN and forwarding them to it when it is traveling. It also implements other support functions necessary to run the
protocol.
• Foreign agent (FA): This is a router on the network to which the MN is currently attached. It serves as a “home away
from home” for the MN, normally acting as its default router as well as implementing mobile IP functions.

Mobile IP registration
Once a MN has completed agent discovery, it knows whether it is on its home network or on a foreign network. If on its
home network it communicates as a regular IP device, but if on a foreign network it must activate the mobile IP. This
requires that it communicate with its HA so information and instructions can be exchanged between the two. This process
is called HA registration, or more simply, just registration.
Wireless application protocol
Another open standard, besides mobile IP, providing mobile users of wireless terminals access to telephony and
information services is the WAP. However, WAP is not actually a protocol as the terms hypertext transfer protocol
(HTTP) and IP suggest. Instead, multiple protocols and complete network architecture are involved in WAP for delivery
of wireless content. The architecture specifi ed by the WAP is based on the layers that follow OSI model. WAP is
designed to work with all wireless network technologies such as GSM, CDMA, and TDMA.
In near future, the WAP applications may extend the function of telephone, for example, the user will be allowed to
answer the phone message with an e-mail. The news feeds, stock quotes, and weather forecasts were featured in early
WAP application. These developments are setting hopes in wireless industry that in e-commerce applications like online
banking, the WAP devices will become popular. Signifi cant backlash against the hype and optimism surrounding WAP
has certainly occurred as a result of the uncertainty about its future.
The WAP is a universal, open standard developed by the WAP forum to provide mobile users of wireless phones and
other wireless terminals such as pagers and personal digital assistants (PDAs) access to telephony and information
services, including the Internet and the Web. WAP is designed to work with all wireless network technologies (e.g.,
GSM, CDMA, and TDMA). WAP is based on existing Internet standards, such as IP, XML, HTML, and HTTP, as much
as possible. It also includes security facilities. Ericsson, Motorola, Nokia, and Phone.com established the WAP forum in
1997, which now has several hundred members.
The use of mobile phones and terminals for data services are the significant limitations of the devices and the networks
that connect them. The devices have limited processors, memory, and battery life. The user interface is also limited, and
the displays small. The wireless networks are characterized by relatively low bandwidth, high latency, and unpredictable
availability and stability compared to wired connections. WAP is designed to deal with these challenges.
The WAP specification includes the following:
• A programming model based on the WWW programming model
• A markup language, the wireless markup language, adhering to Extendable Markup Language (XML)
• A specification of a small browser suitable for a mobile, wireless terminal
• A lightweight communications protocol stack
• A framework for wireless telephony applications (WTAs)

WAP architecture
WAP is designed in a layered fashion so that it can be extensible, flexible, and scalable. The WAP stack is divided into
five layers. The WAP layered architecture enables other services and applications to utilize the features of the WAP stack
through a set of well-defined interfaces. External applications may access the session, transaction, security, and transport
layers directly.
The WAP programming model is based on three elements: the client, the gateway (GW), and the original server. HTTP is
used between the GW and the original server to transfer content. The GW acts as a proxy server for the wireless domain.
Its processor(s) provide services that free from the limited capabilities of the handheld, mobile, wireless terminals.
For example, the GW provides DNS services, converts between WAP stack and the WWW stack (HTTP and TCP/IP),
encodes information from the Web into a more compact form that minimizes wireless communication, and, in the other
direction, decodes the compacted form into standard Web communication conventions. The GW also caches frequently
requested information.
The layers in the WAP architecture are defined below.
• Application layer: This layer contains content developer programming languages, WML, WML script, device
specifications, etc. which are of great interest to content developers.
• Session layer: WAP forum has designed wireless session protocol (WSP) to provide fast reconnection and connection
suspension.
• Transaction layer: Like UDP, the wireless transaction protocol (WTP) runs at the top of the datagram services. The
WTP which is part of the standard suit of TCP/IP protocols provides simplified protocol suitable for low-bandwidth
wireless stations.
• Security layer: According to the transport layer security (TLS) protocol standard, wireless transport layer security
(WTLS) incorporates security features. These features include data integrity checks, privacy, service denial, and
authentication services.
• Transport layer: The WAP is made bearer-independent by adapting the transport layer of the underlying bearer which
is the feature provided by wireless datagram protocol (WDP). The consistent data format is presented to the higher layers
of the WAP stack by WDP. This offers the advantage to the bearer-independent application developers.

Application layer
WAPs application layer is the wireless application environment (WAE). WAE directly supports WAP application
development with WML instead of HTML, and WML script instead of Java script. WAE also includes the wireless
telephony application interface (WTAI or WTA) that provides a programming interface to telephones for initiating calls,
sending text messages, and other networking capability. The WAE is a general-purpose application environment based on
a combination of WWW and mobile telephony technologies. The primary objective of the WAE effort is to establish an
interoperable environment that will allow operators and service providers to build applications and services that can
reach a wide variety of different wireless platforms in an efficient and useful manner. WAE includes a micro-browser
environment containing the following functionality:
• Addressing model: Syntax suitable for naming resources stored on servers. WAP uses the same addressing model as
the one used on the Internet, that is, uniform resource locators (URL).
• WML: A lightweight mark-up language designed to meet the constraints of a wireless environment with low band
width and small handheld devices. The WML is WAP’s analogy to HTML used on the WWW. WML is based on XML.
• WML script: WML script is a light-weight scripting language. It is based on European Computer Manufacturers
Association (ECMA) Script, the similar scripting language that Java script is based on. It can be used for enhancing
services written in WML in the way that it, to some extent, adds intelligence to the services, for example, procedural
logic, loops, conditional expressions, and computational functions.
• WTA or WTAI: A framework and programming interface for telephony services. The WTA environment provides a
means to create telephony services using WAP.

WAP model
• The WAP client (the handheld device or WAP terminal)
• The WAP GW
• The Web server
WAP client
The client, also known as WAE user agent, is a component of the WAP terminal. It consists of a micro browser and the
WAP stack to handle the execution of all requests and responses going through the WAP layered structure.
For example, this includes
• Session establishment
• Connectionless or connection-oriented data transport
• Setting up a secure environment including Applying encryption and authentication Encoding of outgoing
requests
• Decoding of incoming responses to minimize bandwidth
Origin server
The client’s micro browser requests WML pages. These WML pages are stored on the origin server, which might be a
Web server, connected via the Internet or intranet. WML pages may also be stored in an application server installed in the
GW itself. A WML page consists of a WML deck. One WML deck is divided into one or more WML cards. A WML card
can be regarded as a unit of interaction. Services let the user navigate back and forth between cards from one or several
WML pages. WML, especially designed for WAP terminals, provides a smaller set of mark-up tags than HTML. It is
based on HTTP 1.1. WML decks may also contain WML scripts, another way of coding Web pages.