Virtual port-based channel level mobility management middleware in heterogeneous wireless networks

The future communication trend in the Internet is rapidly moving towards mobile and pervasive computing. This emphasizes the network-dependency of terminals and applications, thus making a seamless and ubiquitous connectivity highly feasible. The mobility management of heterogeneous wireless resources is a key issue for this emerging paradigm. This paper presents the design and implementation of a middleware-based software architecture that enables terminals to adapt to fluctuations experienced in heterogeneous multi-access networks. This adaptation includes the dynamic selection of the most suitable connection for each application, as well as coping with a disconnection. Furthermore, it allows the applications to dynamically adapt their behavior according to the QoS-related changes in the underlying network interface. A test version was implemented based on the architecture. Experiments were conducted in a GPRS-WLAN test environment, from which the results were collected and analyzed.