Adaptive Network Coding In MANET

Network Coding provides some benefits in terms of performance efficiency and throughput in dynamic environments such as Mobile Ad Hoc networks. However Network Coding also adds considerable overhead and computational complexity at the transmitter and receiver. Hence the need to come up with an algorithm to provide the optimum performance with minimum overhead and computational complexity arises. We propose an adaptive network coding technique that enables the source node to switch between storing and forwarding the original packets into the network and performing Random linear network coding (RLNC) of the packets of a file and send the coded packets into the network. We evaluate the performance of this adaptive technique by comparing it with MANETs with and without network coding. According to the adaptive Network Coding strategy, the source nodes, make the decision of switching network coding ON and OFF based on the size of the file, the estimated link expiration time between the nodes and the data rate of the network. We propose to switch off Network Coding in the nodes transmit the packets of the file directly when the File size is lesser than the maximum data that can be transmitted with the given data rate of the link and the estimated link expiration time. Otherwise the nodes switch On Network Coding and send coded packets into the networks