Wireless Networks – (8227)

Final Examination – Semester 1 2020

On March 11th 2020, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared COVID-19 a pandemic
as the number of global infections continued to rise. Since then, governments throughout
the world have enforced strict social distancing policies to prevent the spread of the virus,
bringing many industries to a standstill. At the time of writing, nearly half of the global
population is on some form of lockdown, with millions of people being encouraged to stay
indoors and work from home where possible. 

As a result, we’re seeing demand moving away from cellular networks and onto home Wi-Fi
networks in an unprecedented way. It represents a huge shift in consumer behaviour that
could never have been predicted and presents a great challenge to home broadband
providers. However, new challenges also present new opportunities, and the Wireless
Broadband Alliance (WBA) and its members are working hard to ensure that Wi-Fi technology
steps up and delivers. 

That means the pressure is now on the wireless industry to deliver fast and dependable
worldwide connectivity at a time when self-isolation and quarantine are becoming the
norm. Following are some strategies identified by the WBA as possible solutions:

1. OpenRoaming 
2. Wi-Fi 6
3. Wi-Fi 6E

Task : Your task is to design a solution for the aforementioned problem using the
proposed strategies. You need to justify how your solution can deliver a more stable and
dependable broadband service and solve the connectivity problems of a home network,
enabling seamless and secure Wi-Fi roaming. You have complete freedom to design a
solution to improve the capacity of a home Wi-Fi network. Remember, less is more: simple
solutions are the best solutions.

Method : You must familiarize yourself with the current literature published under the
above topic. Therefore, you must first perform a literature survey. Publications can be
accessed via UC Library’s A-Z Databases. A recommended database for this task is IEEE
Xplore. If you have difficulties in remotely accessing the UC Library databases, please
contact the library and they will be able to help you. If you are unable to access UC Library
databases as recommended, Google Scholar may be an alternative option. However, not all
documents from Google Scholar can be considered as peer-reviewed publications from
legitimate sources. Next, you may proceed with the designing of your novel architecture.

Format : The final report must be prepared according to the guidelines of the attached
template. It must have an approximate word count of 1100 (excluding references) and
reference up to 8-10 peer-reviewed publications (preferably from 2010 onwards). IEEE
referencing format must be followed.
Due : 1.00 pm, Monday, 25 May (Week 16)

Optional Resources
[1] M. S. Afaqui, E. Garcia-Villegas and E. Lopez-Aguilera, "IEEE 802.11ax: Challenges and
Requirements for Future High Efficiency WiFi," in  IEEE Wireless Communications, vol. 24,
no. 3, pp. 130-137, 2017.
 
[2]  Haider Bokhari, Syed Measum, Introduction and Architecture of Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax), 2019.
 
[3] Muhammad, Siraj & Zhao, Jiamiao & Refai, Hazem, An Empirical Analysis of IEEE 802.11ax,
2020.
 
[4] E. Khorov, A. Kiryanov, A. Lyakhov and G. Bianchi, "A Tutorial on IEEE 802.11ax High
Efficiency WLANs," in IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 197-216,
2019.

[5] N. Šepić, E. Kočan, Z. Veljović and M. Pejanović, "Assessment of novel solutions for
throughput enhancement in IEEE 802.11ax networks," 27th Telecommunications Forum
(TELFOR), Belgrade, Serbia, pp. 1-4, 2019.

[6] Lee KH, “Performance Analysis of the IEEE 802.11ax MAC Protocol for Heterogeneous Wi-Fi
Networks in Non-Saturated Conditions,” in Sensors, vol. 19, no.7, 1540, 2019.

[7] D. Deng, S. Lien, J. Lee and K. Chen, "On Quality-of-Service Provisioning in IEEE 802.11ax
WLANs," in IEEE Access, vol. 4, pp. 6086-6104, 2016.

[8] N. Šepić, E. Kočan and M. Pejanović-Djurišić, "Evaluating spatial reuse in 802.11ax networks
with interference threshold adjustment," in Proc of 24th International Conference on
Information Technology, Montenegro, pp. 1-4, 2020.

[9] C. A. Grazia, M. Klapez and M. Casoni, "BBRp: Improving TCP BBR Performance Over
WLAN," in IEEE Access, vol. 8, pp. 43344-43354.

[10] T. Ahmed B, M. S. Krishnan and A. K. Anil, "A Predictive Analysis on the Influence of WiFi 6
in Fog Computing with OFDMA and MU-MIMO," in Proc of Fourth International Conference
on Computing Methodologies and Communication (ICCMC), India, pp. 716-719, 2020.