Improving TCP Performance in Heterogeneous Mobile Environments by Exploiting the Explicit Cooperation Between Server and Mobile Host

In recent years, many different kinds of wireless access networks have been deployed and become inseparable parts of the Internet. But TCP, the most widely used transport protocol of the Internet, was designed for stationery hosts. It faces severe challenges when user moves around in these networks and handoff occurs frequently. In this paper, the authors investigate the potential benefits of bringing explicit cooperation between TCP server and mobile host. For this purpose, TCP Hand-Off (TCP-HO), a practical end-to-end mechanism, is designed for improving TCP performance in heterogeneous mobile environments. TCP-HO assumes that a mobile host is able to detect the completion of handoff immediately and has a coarse estimation of new wireless link's bandwidth.