EWTRP: enhanced wireless token ring protocol for small-scale wireless ad hoc networks

Wireless token ring protocol (WTRP) built on top of IEEE 802.11 DCF (distributed coordination function) provides guaranteed QoS in terms of throughput and delay when traffic load is high, but it consumes more power at light load conditions. In order to improve the performance in a small-scale wireless ad hoc network, an enhanced wireless token ring protocol is proposed; it employs a preemption mechanism, a hibernation mechanism and a contention mechanism. A comparison between EWTRP and WTRP has been carried out through analyses. Results show that EWTRP produces higher throughput while it consumes less power, and is more suitable to operate in small-scale wireless ad hoc networks.