Performance Analysis of IEEE 802.11 DCF Based on a Macroscopic State Description

Xiang LI  Yuki NARITA  Yuta GOTOH  Shigeo SHIODA  

Publication
IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Communications   Vol.E101-B   No.8   pp.1923-1932
Publication Date: 2018/08/01
Publicized: 2018/01/22
Online ISSN: 1745-1345
DOI: 10.1587/transcom.2017EBP3277
Type of Manuscript: PAPER
Category: Terrestrial Wireless Communication/Broadcasting Technologies
Keyword: 
IEEE 802.11 DCF,  computer network performance,  continuous-time Markov chain,  

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Summary: 
We propose an analytical model for IEEE 802.11 wireless local area networks (WLANs). The analytical model uses macroscopic descriptions of the distributed coordination function (DCF): the backoff process is described by a few macroscopic states (medium-idle, transmission, and medium-busy), which obviates the need to track the specific backoff counter/backoff stages. We further assume that the transitions between the macroscopic states can be characterized as a continuous-time Markov chain under the assumption that state persistent times are exponentially distributed. This macroscopic description of DCF allows us to utilize a two-dimensional continuous-time Markov chain for simplifying DCF performance analysis and queueing processes. By comparison with simulation results, we show that the proposed model accurately estimates the throughput performance and average queue length under light, heavy, or asymmetric traffic.