A survey on mobility modelling & prediction in Wireless networks

Wireless networks have become increasingly popular in the computing industry since 1970. It is particularly true within the past decade, which has seen wireless networks being adapted to enable mobility. The area of wireless communication has been and is continuing to develop at a rapid pace over the years. The most wireless network of today consists of cells. Each cell contains (or is represented by) a base station, which is wired to a fixed wire network. The base stations interact with the portable handheld devices and provide these devices the wireless link to the network.

Mobility has a major effect on the channel holding time in circuit-switched services. The latter has in turn huge influence on the call blocking and dropping probability.

When evaluating mobility models for wireless ad hoc networks with respect to performance or functional correctness, several assumptions have to be decided upon. Such assumptions may include the size and shape of the area used by the wireless devices, their transmission ranges and their movement pattern including allowed directional changes and speeds.