A combined mobility and QoS framework for delivering ubiquitous services

From a network perspective, the major challenge in providing seamless connectivity whilst maintaining the required level of QoS to users results from the negative interactions that occur between mobility and QoS. These interactions, particularly those of mobility and QoS, have been the subject of much research. In this paper, we discuss the various approaches that have already been taken to combine QoS and mobility mechanisms, and present a new framework to combine such mechanisms with the aim of reducing the negative interactions that might arise between them. We propose the concept of enhanced nodes which is a special IP router with an extra sub-layer of mobility, QoS and security features. Our framework is illustrated with an example of a QoS-based mobility selection mechanism.