PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTICS OF AODV IN A HIGHLY

CONSTRAINED WIRELESS ENVIRONMENT: A SIMULATION STUDY

Shwetha Ramasamy
Division of Computing Studies, Arizona State University
sramasam@asu.edu
Abstract - A communication network that
handles many-to-many connections and one
that is capable of dynamically updating and
optimizing these connections is a wireless
mesh network (WMN). It is an arrangement
of peer-to-peer wireless nodes and access
points. The access points form a mesh of selfhealing link among themselves. These devices
can be deployed in fixed or high speed mobile
and internet devices and could be used in
gamut of applications ranging from
geographical
explorations
to
national
surveillance. This technology is mainly aimed
towards achieving higher bandwidth network
at an inexpensive rate with higher resistance
to network congestion and comparatively
lower radio interference. It is also intended to
offer secure and seamless roaming beyond the
capabilities of a tradition WLAN. The IEEE
802.11s Extended Service Set (ESS) Mesh
Networking Task Group is working on
creating a standard for WMNs and one of the
routing protocols that they are considering is
Ad-Hoc on Demand distance Vector (AODV).
These protocols initiate route discovery only
when a route is required and maintain active
routes only when they are used, unused routes
are deleted. In other words, it discovers and
maintains routes on demand. The routing
protocols would be evaluated in the forms of
metrics like User Datagram Protocol (UDP)
traffic by utilizing the Network Simulator
(NS2). This project is aimed at analyzing
AODV
routing
protocol
at
various
configurations in different constraints for a
set of network topology and mobile nodes.
Index Terms- AODV, NS2, WMN
1.

Introduction

A mesh network is a network that employs one

of two connection arrangements, full mesh
topology or partial mesh topology. A WMN is
network that handles many-to-many connections
and one that is capable of dynamically updating
and optimizing these connections. Mesh network

is self-organizing and simple enough so that

users are able to deploy, and maintain with
limited technology experience. Mesh networking
technology also provides numerous and unique
capabilities that can facilitate the deployment of
public access wireless networks, as it enables
higher reliable Internet access services by
providing a fault tolerant infrastructure and
redundant access links with respect to traditional
wired methods. Moreover, wireless mesh
networks enable advanced applications/services
through ubiquitous access and reliable
connectivity. The dynamic management of
complex routing procedure includes information
about external networks. AODV was designed
specifically for wireless mobile nodes
communicating in an ad-hoc fashion to find
routes on an as needed basis with minimal route
acquisition latency and control overhead. A
wireless mesh network can be visualized as a
type of wireless ad hoc network which does not
experience direct mobility and they are
considered to be static. WMNs diversify the
capabilities and functionalities of ad-hoc
networks. Based on the architecture [1], wireless
mesh networks could be classified into three
types:
Infrastructure/Backbone: These can be built
using various types of radio technologies,
besides to the mostly used IEEE 802.11
technologies. The mesh routers form a mesh of
self-configuring, self-healing links among
themselves. The work proposed in [5] uses
AODV to form a new concept from existing
networks called
localized self healing
community, such a network tries to mitigate the
adverse effects caused by malicious nodes by
distributing the network service to other
members. With gateway functionality, mesh
routers can be connected to the Internet.
Client: In this architecture the client nodes
constitute the actual network to perform routing
and configuration functionalities as well as
providing end-user applications to customers.
Hybrid: This is a combination of infrastructure
and client meshing and they can access the
network through mesh routers and mesh clients.

Figure 1[1] Hybrid WMNs

The authors in [14] have discussed methods to
aid researchers to develop on demand protocols
and assisted users in determining the
implementation design that fits their needs. The
projects aim is to provide a better understanding
of some research challenges like throughout
value for a scenario of developed network
topology. Some of the factors that are be taken
into consideration are as follows: 1. Packet
Delivery Ratio: Ratio of packets delivered to that
transmitted by the source. 2. Changing the
HELLO packet intervals 3. Changing the
Network_Diameter 4. Changing the Allowed
HELLO Loss and 5. Changing the
Active_Route_ Timeout.
Working of AODV
The AODV Routing protocol uses an on-demand
approach for finding routes, that is, a route is
established only when it is required by a source
node for transmitting data packets. It employs
destination sequence numbers to identify the
most recent path. AODV offers quick adaptation
to dynamic link conditions, low processing and
memory overhead, low memory utilization, and
determines unicast routes to destinations within
adhoc network. The major difference between
AODV and Dynamic Source Routing (DSR) is

that DSR uses source routing in which a data

packet carries the complete path to be traversed.
The message types defined by the AODV
protocol are Route Requests (RREQs), Route
Replies (RREPs) and Route Errors (RERRs).
However, in AODV, the source node and the
intermediate nodes store the next-hop
information corresponding to each flow for data
packet transmission. In an on-demand routing
protocol, the source node floods the RREQ
packet in the network when a route is not
available for the desired destination. It may
obtain multiple routes to different destinations
from a single RouteRequest. The major
difference between AODV and other on-demand
routing protocols is that it uses a destination
sequence number (DestSeqNum) to determine an
up-to-date path to the destination. A node
updates its path information only if the
DestSeqNum of the current packet received is
greater than the last DestSeqNum stored at the
node.
A node offers connectivity information by
broadcasting local Hello messages as follows.[6]
During every Hello interval milliseconds, the
node checks whether it has sent a broadcast
within the last Hello_Interval. If it has not sent

one, it broadcasts a RREP with TTL = 1, called a

Hello message, with the RREP message fields set
as follows: The destination IP Address would be
the node's IP address, the destination Sequence
Number would be the node's latest sequence
number. The value of hop count would be the
Lifetime Allowed_Hello_Loss * Hello_Interval.
AODV makes sure these routes do not contain
loops and tries to find the shortest possible route.
AODV is also handles changes in routes and can
create new routes if there is an error. These
message types are received via UDP, and normal
IP header processing is applied. So, the
requesting node is expected to use its IP address

as the Originator IP address for the messages.

For broadcast messages, the IP limited broadcast
address (255.255.255.255) is used. AODV
operation does require certain messages (RREQ)
to be disseminated widely. The range of
dissemination of such RREQs is indicated by the
TTL in the IP header.
Figure 2 shows a set of nodes on a wireless
network. Circles represent the communication
range for each node. Due to limited range, each
node can only communicate with the nodes next
to it.

Figure 2 [2] Packet Broadcast in the AODV protocol

Nodes which could communicate with directly
are considered to be Neighbors. A node keeps
track of its Neighbors by listening for a HELLO
message that each node broadcast at set
intervals. When one node needs to send a
message to another node that is not its Neighbor
it broadcasts a RREQ message. The RREQ
message contains several key bits of

information: the source, the destination, the

lifespan of the message and a Sequence
Number which serves as a unique ID. In Figure
2, [2] Node 1 wishes to send a message to Node
3. Node 1s Neighbors are Nodes 2 + 4. Since
Node 1 cannot directly communicate with Node
3, Node 1 sends out a RREQ. The RREQ is
heard by Node 4 and Node 2. When Node 1s

Neighbors receive the RREQ message the

nodes have two choices; if they know a route to
the destination or if they are the destination they
can send a RREP message back to Node 1,
otherwise the nodes will rebroadcast the RREQ
to their set of Neighbors. The message keeps
getting rebroadcast until its lifespan is up. If
Node 1 does not receive a reply in a set amount
of time, it will rebroadcast the request except at
this time the RREQ message will have a longer
lifespan and a new ID number. In AODV, the
network is silent until a connection is required.
The network node that needs a connection
broadcasts a request for connection. Other
AODV nodes forward this message, and record
the node that they received it from, creating an
explosion of temporary routes back to the node
which requires the connection. This node then
begins using the route that has the least number
of hops through other nodes. Unused entries in
the routing tables are recycled after a time. The
main advantage of this protocol is that routes
are established on demand and destination
sequence numbers are used to find the latest
route to the destination. The connection setup
delay is less. AODV provides loop-free routes
even while repairing periodic routing
advertisements, the demand on the overall
bandwidth available to the mobile nodes is
substantially less than in the protocols that do
necessitate such advertisements.
The Network Scenario
AODV [8] borrows route establishment and
maintenance mechanisms from DSR [9]
(Dynamic Source Routing) Protocol and
sequence numbers and hop-to-hop routing from
DSDV [10] (Destination Sequenced Distance
Vector) protocols. This project, as described in
this paper, only uses AODV for unicast route
establishment. This project was initially started
by developing a wired environment and the
simulation was studied for a defined set of 9
nodes. Node 3, 4, 5, and Nodes 6, 7, 8 are
sources and they are attatched to sinks 2 and 1
respectively. Figure 3 shows the packets
travelling from the sources to the final sink 0.

Sinks 2 and 1 now act as sources when they

collect the packets from their neighbbour sources
and transfer them to sink 1.
Simulations Conditions
The major constraints was testing with a date
size of 100 Kilobytes / second (0.1 Megabyte /
second). The data size is the product of packet
size x number of packets transmitted / sec. To
acheive this data size, we had to choose the
values of packet size and number of packets
transferred / second.
Default scenario:
500 packet size x 200 bits /sec
0.8 Mb / sec
Our scenario:
Keeping bits constant:
Packet Size X 200 bits = 0.1 Mb /
sec
Packet Size = 62.5 bytes.
Keeping packet size contant:
500 X Bits = 0.1 Mb / sec
Bits = 25 packets.
Interval : 0.04.
A UDP agent is crated and attached to the source
nodes, and a constant bit rate (CBR) traffic
generates traffic to the UDP agent. According to
our above calculations, the packet size is being set
to 500 bytes and a packet will be sent every 0.04
seconds (that is, 25 packets per second). The CBR
acts as the application layer in our topology. A
duplex link is attached to the nodes to make it a
wired network and that enhances the traffic flow
between the nodes. A Null agent is attached to the
sink and then the sources and the sink are
connected to one another to generate the flow of
traffic between the nodes. The graphs are plotted
with total packets on y axes and time in the x axis.

Figure 3. Wired Network and Packets Passing to Sink 0.

Figure 4 Network Throughput Graph of AODV at 500 bits / sec and 25 packets

Wireless Scenario
To implement AODV, a wireless scenario was
configured with a similar set of 9 nodes. The
nodes move about within an area whose boundary
is defined in this example as 800mX800m. A
mobile node consists of network components like
Link Layer (LL), Interface Queue (IfQ), MAC
layer, the wireless channel nodes transmit and
receive signals.
At the beginning of a wireless simulation, the
types for each of these network components have
to be defined. The type of antenna, the radiopropagation model, sand the type of routing
protocol used by mobile nodes is some of the
other parameters that are defined. Random traffic
connections of UDP and CBR are setup between
mobile nodes using a traffic-scenario generator
script. We create CBR and UDP traffics
connections between wireless mobile nodes.

-macType Mac/802_11 \
-ifqType Queue/DropTail/PriQueue \
-ifqLen 50 \
-antType Antenna/OmniAntenna \
-propType Propagation/TwoRayGround\
-phyType Phy/WirelessPhy \
-topologyInstance $topo \
-channel Channel/WirelessChannel \
-agentTrace ON \
-routerTrace ON \
-macTrace OFF \
-movementTrace OFF
The default values for all the above options are
NULL except addressing type whose default
value is flat.
AODV routing process
The header files present in the standard ns2
directory has certain files which define various
parameters as follows:
aodv.h
aodv_packet.h

Timing and structures for

route table
Structure for AODV packet
formats

There are some external files which provide

support for the function implementation which
are related to the above header files and they are
related as follows:
aodv.h
Figure 5 The AODV packets flowing between the
nodes at the set time interval.
To create a traffic-connection file, the type of
traffic connection, the number of nodes and
maximum number of connections to be setup
between them, a random seed and incase of CBR
connections, a rate whose inverse value is used to
compute the interval time between the CBR
packets are defined. We performed the simulation
using the NS2 [4] simulator.
The node-configuration for a wireless, mobile
node than runs AODV as its ad-hoc routing
protocol is as shown below:
$ns_ node-config -addressType hierarchical \
-adhocRouting AODV \
-llType LL \

aodv_packet.h

aodv_rtable.h
aodv_rtable.cc
aodv_rqueue.cc
aodv_rqueue.h
aodv_rqueue.o

Certain changes have been made to the packet

formats in the header files and their respective
external support file functions. The external files
have functions which allocate memory for the
packet formats create pointers and eventually
free the memory. The RREQ and RREP are the
packets that carry hop count information. This
mutable information is protected via hash chains.
Type: Indicates the type of packet as an
integer
Length: The length in bytes of the extension
excluding the type and length field.

 Hash_Function: An integer value for the

type of hash function used.
Max_Hop_Count: The TTL value from the
IP header.
Top_Hash: Repeated hash of the hop count
for verification.
Hash: Hash of the hop count
The Hello Protocol is responsible for establishing
and maintaining neighbor relationships. It also
ensures that communication between neighbors is

bidirectional. Hello packets are sent periodically

to out all the network router interfaces.
Bidirectional communication is indicated when
the router sees itself listed in the neighbor's Hello
packet. The Hello packets are sent out each
functioning router interface. They are used to
discover and maintain neighbor relationships. The
following page shows the node traversal scenario
at different position during the course of their
movements across the nodes.

Figure 9 showing movement from source to sink

Red bubble shows the source packets

Figure 10 showing some initial packet drops

Figure 11 showing significant packet bursts

Figure 12 showing two nodes overlap of 2 nodes

Red bubble indicate the overlap

Figure 13 showing Dual packet burst

Figure 14 showing distinct packet drops

Figure 15 Network Throughput Graph by changing AODV Hello_Interval to 1 second

Figure 15 shows the graph plotted for the default
AODV Hello_Interval. The graphs are plotted
with total packets on y axes and time in the x axis.
The graph in Figure 16 and 17 shows the
throughput by changing the Hello interval to 2
and 3 seconds respectively. From the above plots,
it could be inferred that the packets received
decreases with the change in the Hello interval
time. The total traffic is forwarded by the wireless
LAN MAC layers to the higher layers in all the
nodes in the network. It was also observed that

AODV requires more overhead for discovering

routes. The number of packets received and the
number of packets lost could be found from the
trace file at that particular time interval. Also they
were plotted using the X-graph tool available in
the NS2. The next parameter that was studied and
monitored was the network diameter. It is the
average minimum distance between two pair of
nodes. Net_Diameter actually refers to the
maximum possible number of hops between two
nodes in the network. Mobile nodes in ad hoc

networks may change values of certain

parameters, in particular the Net_diameter and
Node_Traversal values. These parameters may
affect the robustness of the flooding operation;
however there is not a considerable change in the
throughput values. Each node in the ad hoc
network is enabled to retransmit flooded packet

that it receives. There might be some additional

control signaling which reduces the number of
nodes that perform the retransmission. This
reduces the overall bandwidth consumption and
congestion which could have been caused by
excessive flooding.

Figure 16 Network Throughput Graph by changing AODV Hello_Interval to 2 second

Figure 17 Network Throughput Graph by changing AODV Hello_Interval to 3 second.

Figure 18 Allowed Hello Loss for the Value of 3 packets

Figure 19 Allowed Hello Loss for the Value of 5 packets

The value of lifetime field for Hello Packets is
Allowed_Hello_Loss. This was performed for 9

nodes making one of the nodes mobile and then

by varying the Allowed_hello_loss parameter. The

figure 18 and 19 shows the Allowed_Hello_Loss

graph for the values. The X-graph shows that as
the value of the packets received and value of
packets
loss
changes
when
the
Allowed_Hello_Loss parameter is varied. The
packets received in the latter case is less and the
packets lost are more than the default
Allowed_hello_loss value.
The next parameter that was analyzed was by
increasing the value of Active_Route_Timeout
parameter. Active_Route_Timeout is a static
parameter that defines how long a route is kept in
the routing table after the last transmission of a
packet on this route. This parameter is arbitrarily
set to 10 seconds. In the case of reactive ad hoc
network routing, the protocols attempt to

minimize the route discovery overhead by caching

the route information for some period of time
after a connection expires. Figures 20 and 21
show the graph plotted by changing the value of
Active_Route_Timeout. The route discovery time
for AODV when applied to this networks show
that for up to about 9 nodes the AODV has
different set of values for different values of
Active_route_Timeout. The graphs are, like the
rest of the above conditions, plotted with total
packets on y axis and time in the x axis. The
number of packets received in this is less in the
first case when the active_route_timeout was 10
seconds than in the second case when the value
was increased to 30 seconds. So with increasing
timeout values, the packets received also increases
and the packtes lost decreases.

Figure 20 Active_Route_Timeout for the Value of 10 seconds

Figure 21 Active_Route_Timeout for the Value of 30 seconds

were the selective transmission of data packets
which were allowed to be transmitted through
CONCLUSION
the nodes. Some standard default AODV values
were changed and observed the network of 9.
The area of ad hoc networking has been
The project was performed by introducing some
receiving increasing attention among network
changes to the existing AODV set-up and UDP
researchers in recent years. Many of the
was used as the transport protocol. With an
proprietary WMN devices (backhaul routers)
increase in value of Hello_packet, the packets
made by commercial vendors, like BelAir,
received decreases and packets lost increases.
Tropos, Strix Systems, Cisco and Nortel,
The packets received increases and that lost
perform routing based on protocols which derive
decreases when the Allowed_Hello_Lost values
from AODV [13], which is a popular on-demand
are increased from 3 to 5 packets. The packets
reactive protocol researched and used
received decreases and lost increases when the
extensively in MANETs. The IEEE 802.15.4 [12]
Active_Route_Timeout was increased from 10 to
standard is expected to enable a wide variety of
30 seconds. To increase the effectiveness of hello
envisaged low-cost control and monitoring
messages, their reception characteristics should
applications with relaxed throughput requirements
be equal to that of data packets. The reception of
and a strong emphasis on power conservation. This
hello messages will indicate that reception of
has been accompanied by an increasing
data packets will occur, and better throughput
availability of implementations for different
will result.
operating systems. However, it has been largely
unknown how such implementations perform
against each other and how different design
decisions affect the performance of transport
protocols. Some of the major constraints in this

FUTURE WORK
The authors in [11] have suggested that
AODV is a promising candidate for
WMNs, which needs to service a large
number of mobile clients with low
latency
and
high
bandwidth
requirements. However, the authors in
[7] have suggested that to improve the
performance of AODV, they have
modified AODV to include the source
route accumulation feature of DSR. This
is
known
AODV
with
path
accumulation.
REFERENCES
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Mesh
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[2] Luke
Klein-Berndt
Wireless
Communications Technology group - A
Quick Guide To AODV Routing,

http://w3.antd.nist.gov/wctg/aodv_ke
rnel/aodv_guide.pdf
[3] The Network Simulator manual
[4] The Network Simulator (NS2) website,

http://www.isi.edu/nsnam/ns/nsbuild.html
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M.Gerla, A Secure Ad-hoc Routing
Approach using Localized Self-healing
Communities, Proc. Of ACM MobiHoc,
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[7] Gwalani, S, AODV PA: AODV with path

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ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/innotes/rfc4728.txt, Feb.2007
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[14] Ian D Chakeras, Elizebeth M Belding Royer

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http://moment.cs.ucsb.edu/pub/wwan
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ACKNOWLEDEMENT
The author would like to thank Dr Bruce
Millard, Professor of Practice, Division of
Computing Studies, ASU Polytechnic, for his
support and guidance throughout this project
work. The author also would like to thank Dr
Tim Lindquist and Dr Alan Skousen, both
Professors of Practice in the Division of
Computing Studies for having agreed to be in the
graduation committee.

Bio: Shwetha Ramasamy graduated from the

SRM Engineering College, University of
Madras, India with a bachelors degree in
Instrumentation & Control Engineering in 2004.
She joined Arizona State University at the East
Campus in Spring 2007, majoring in Computing
Systems and would be completing her Masters
degree in Fall 2008. Her research interests
include Networking, Web development and
Object Oriented programming.