An Overlay Network for a SIP Servlet-Based Service Execution Environment in Stand Alone MANETs

Mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) are an example of new networks that are gaining more and more momentum because of their flexibility and easy deployment. Service execution is an important phase in the service life cycle. SIP servlets are a promising service provisioning framework for MANETs. However, MANETs are very challenging because of their characteristics (e.g. node heterogeneity, no permanent centralized entity, transient links). Using SIP servlets in MANETs requires distributing the servlet engine first, due to resource constraints. As the distributed components need to interact, a cooperation scheme including self-organization and self-recovery is needed. Overlay networks are an attractive approach to cooperation because of their scalability and flexibility. In this paper we propose an overlay network for a SIP servlets-based service execution environment in MANETs. We assume a servlet engine distribution scheme that we have proposed in previous work. The architecture of the overlay network and the related procedures are presented. Results of a formal validation using Promela/SPIN are discussed.