MACA Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance

This is a report on our implementation of MACA (Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance), which is a MAC layer media access protocol. We have tailored our implementation to a variant of this method found in IEEE 802.11 as DFWMAC (Distributed Foundation Wireless MAC). This report gives an overview of the MACA protocol and its variant DFWMAC, the details of our implementation and the analysis of result using key indicators.

Existing System

MAC (Media access control) is an important part of the wireless communications. It has to accommodate additional constraints than the wired communications because of the shared medium wireless communication use. Media access control comprises all of the mechanisms that regulate users access to a medium using SDM (Space Division Multiplexing), TDM (Time Division Multiplexing), FDM (Frequency Division Multiplexing) or CDM (Code division Multiplexing).

TDM technique allocates time slots for communication between different channels. TDM is used for both wired (Ethernet, Token Ring, ATM) and wireless networks. In TDM synchronization between the sender and the receiver is done in time domain, as opposed to frequency (FDM), space (SDM) or code (CDM). There are different types of TDM implementation, each of them suitable for certain types of communications and each with its advantages and disadvantages.

MACA (DFWMAC or Distributed Foundation Wireless MAC in IEEE 802.11) is one implementation technique of TDM. MACA stands for multiple access with collision avoidance. Below are two problems associated with media access in wireless communication.

SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS:

• J2ME 2.1 wireless tool kit
• J2SDK 1.4
• Windows 2000 or XP

HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS:-

• Pentium IV Processor.
• 256 MB RAM.
• 10 Hard Disk space or higher