A distributed dynamic address assignment scheme for tactical mobile ad hoc networks

In this paper, we propose a distributed dynamic address assignment scheme for tactical mobile ad hoc networks (MANET). Efficient address assignment is an important issue in the MANET because a node may frequently leave the current network and join another network owing to the mobility of the node. The conventional schemes do not consider the features of the tactical networks: existence of a leader node and network activity on a group basis. Thus, they may not be suitable for military operations. In our proposed scheme, called grouped units dynamic address assignment protocol (G-DAAP), a leader node maintains the address information for the members in the network and any of the nodes can exploit the information for the assignment or request of the IP address by a simple message exchange procedure. This leads to fast address assignment with small overheads. We describe the delay performance of the G-DAAP and compare it with conventional schemes by numerical analysis and computer simulations. The results show that the G-DAAP significantly improves the delay performance as compared with the conventional schemes.