Towards characterization of wireless traffic in coexisting 802.11a/g and 802.11n network

The number of wireless devices and the traffic volume generated by these devices become significant today, and many devices begin supporting 802.11n protocol for higher-speed wireless access. However, the diversification in link types of end-hosts may degrade system performance. For example, hosts using 802.11 protocols had better not be relay nodes in a P2P live streaming system because 802.11 is a half-duplex protocol and usually less stable compared to modern wired links. Hence, understanding traffic characteristics of various link types is essential for improving or building network architectures. Moreover, estimation of the link type of a remote host possibly achieves better performance (e.g., higher throughput) in some network systems. Baiamonte et al. [1] have proposed an algorithm to detect wireless hosts from passive measurement by using the entropy of packet interarrival time (PIT). Wei et al. [2] have also proposed an algorithm to classify access network types. However, these algorithms pay no attention to new link types such as 802.11n, 3G, and WiMAX even though each of them has different characteristics and possibly degrades the performance of network systems.