A TCP-tailored approach to location management in mobile ad hoc networks

The main location management proposals in mobile ad hoc networks have, as a common characteristic, two distinct phases: the location query of the position of a destination node and the transmission of a flow toward the destination node. This letter proposes to send the initial packet of a flow to learn the position of its destination instead of adopting a dedicated query packet. Such an approach specially benefits TCP flows. This TCP-tailored approach can be applied to previous proposals in location management with minor changes in their particular features. We show that the proposed TCP-tailored approach reduces the cost of location management for TCP flows with respect to conventional schemes. We also evaluate the benefits that different location services take from the TCP-tailored approach.