Airtime Usage Control in Virtualized Multi-Cell 802.11 Networks

This paper investigates the station (STA)-access point (AP) association and airtime control for virtualized 802.11 networks to provide service customization and fairness across multiple Internet service-providers (ISPs) sharing the common physical infrastructure and network capacity. More specifically, an optimization problem is formulated on the STAs' transmission probabilities to maximize the overall network throughput, while providing airtime usage guarantees for the ISPs. Subsequently, an algorithm to reach the optimal solution is developed by applying monomial approximation and geometric programming iteratively. Illustrative results confirm the superior and robust performance of the developed association and airtime control scheme in terms of both throughput and fairness.