Development of an energy and geographic aware opportunistic network coding scheme

Thesis (MIng (Computer and Electronic Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013The evolution of communication networks has led us to an era where you cannot only perform surgery halfway across the world, but do so while being in the comfort of your own home. By eliminating the need for wires, wireless networks revolutionised communication networks by enabling nodes to communicate while being in a mobile state. The concept opened many doors to new applications and possibilities. Network Coding is a technique that optimises the throughput of a network by coding packets. Geo-Routing is a routing method that operates by using the geographical distances between nodes as the routing metric. Opportunistic Routing is a routing method that exploits the broadcast characteristics of wireless networks. In this thesis, we developed a routing scheme that incorporates Network Coding, Geo- Routing and energy aware conditions. It accomplishes this task by using one of the key phases constituting Opportunistic Routing. The developed routing scheme was implemented in OMNeT++. Various simulation experiments were conducted in OMNeT++ pertaining to the implemented scheme. The results indicate significant increase in performance metrics such as throughput and survivability.Master