Mobility simulation of connected objects in a heterogeneous wireless data transmission system

We consider a simulation model of a warehouse with three types of wireless communication links: device-to-device (D2D) links, drone-assisted and infrastructure-based links (via the base station). In all study cases three types of mobile objects are considered: employees (humans), wireless access points in the form of flying robots (drones) and stationary devices (machines). As a result of the conducted research we propose a software tool which provides the graphical representation of mobility of the objects inside the warehouse with given parameters. It allows to assess the network coverage area and allows to study the Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity issues. The developed algorithm and its software implementation allowed to study the impact of different mobility models on the system-level performance of the considered data transmission system in terms of its network connectivity, defined as the ratio of connected devices. Our evaluation results demonstrate that the use of Reference Point mobility model under the same parameters setting of the system ensures the increase of coverage up to 10%. Therefore the additional area under the RP model is in average less than that under the RW model. Analysis of the obtained graphical results allows to estimate the impact of the number of flying wireless access points in the active state to the coverage area of the considered heterogeneous wireless communication system. © 2018 CEUR-WS. All Rights Reserved