MobileMAN Hardware and low-level software State of the work and outlook by Ivan Defilippis

1
MobileMANHardware and low-level softwareState
of the work and outlookbyIvan Defilippis
Alessandro PuiattiSUPSI Manno
2
MobileMAN hardware and low-level software
Contents

• SUPSI
• The MobileMAN problem(s)
• SUPSI-DIE goals in MobileMAN
• State of the Art
• How to begin
• Suggestions and discussion

3
MobileMAN SUPSI
SUPSIUniversity of Applied Sciences ofSouthern
Switzerland

• since 1999 (before STS, only teaching)
• 1000 students
• 220 work units (350 collaborators)
• Main locations
• Manno
• Lugano-Trevano

4
MobileMAN SUPSI (2)
Organisation
5
MobileMAN SUPSI (3)

• Department and Institutes
• DAA (Applied Arts)
• DCT (Civil Engineering)
• DEM (Economics and Management)
• DIE (Computer Science and Electrical
  Engineering)
• DLS (Social work)
• IST (Geology, Hydrology, Earth Science)
• ICIM (Manufacturing)
• IDSIA (Advanced Computer Science)

6
MobileMAN SUPSI (4)

• Mission
• Departments
• Basic education (BS, evt. ME)
• Continuous education
• RD and Technology transfer
• Institutes
• Continuous education
• RD and Technology transfer

7
MobileMAN SUPSI (5)

• DIE RD context and goals
• Technological support for Small and Medium
  Industry (SMI)
• Innovation in general
• Financed through
• Specific project oriented research programs
  (EU-FP5, FNSRS, Eureka, )
• Shared costs projects (KTI/CTI)
• Direct industry mandates

8
MobileMAN SUPSI (6)

• Collaborations and projects (DIE)
• EPFL, ETHZ, CSEM
• ST (FP5-iTTi, Eureka-Medea, agreement), FT,
  Philips,
• USI (Alari), PoliMi (Proff. Sami, Dadda)
• Microswiss Network (NKN)
• Local and national companies

9
MobileMAN SUPSI (7)

• DIE Laboratory of Microelectronics

10
MobileMAN The problem(s)

• The trend
• The emerging concept of Ambient Intelligence
  provides a vision of the information society
  where the enphasis is on support for human
  interaction
• Advances in wireless communication will enable a
  radical new communication paradigm
  self-organised information and communication
  systems ? mobile ad hoc networks
• The project innovation
• Immersive communication in a (possibly large)
  metropolitan area
• Autonomous, self-organised, wireless network,
  potentially built up solely from user devices
• No infrastructure is required to enable
  information exchange
• The only external resource needed ? bandwidth

11
MobileMAN The problem(s) (2)

• Technical limits
• IEEE 802.11 is the standard but it is not
  adequately to manage some characteristics of ad
  hoc network
• Dynamic topologies,
• Limited bandwidth,
• Energy-constrained operations,
• Wireless vulnerabilities.
• IEEE 802.11 shows inefficient utilization of the
  wireless channel with bursty users
• Dynamic configurations generate sever problems
  when using IEEE 802.11 in multi-hop mobile ad hoc
  networks
• Technical solution
• Enance the standard IEEE 802.11 protocol to
  increase the protocol stability and to optimise
  the power consumption in a high dynamic
  environment with bursty users

12
MobileMAN SUPSI-DIE project goals

• Provide a development platform for the new
  protocol
• Start with an existing state-of-the-art 802.11a
  or 802.11b solution. Modifiy the MAC protocol.
• Develop the required software (if necessary
  choose new processor ARM9?, DSP?)
• Provide a small amount of integrated test/demo
  devices
• PC-cards or at least small portable systems.
• Contribute to the development of the new
  standard
• Contribute to the new 802.11x standard which will
  be (perhaps) proposed by the project
• Provide guidelines for the hardware development
• Provide development system

13
MobileMAN SUPSI-DIE project goals (2)

• To develop
• Hardware frontend (RF, Base-band and possibly
  some MAClow-level parts
• Software

14
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (1)
Technical classification

1. Not integrated the chip set is achieved by three
   different chips, MAC, BB and RF
2. Integrated the chip set is achieved by only one
   or two chips and the MAC and BB are built in the
   same chip
3. Development systems systems produced for the
   developers
4. OEM products systems developed with chip set
   produced by other manufacturer
5. Application system thought for high level
   implementation with chip set produced by other
   manufacturer

15
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (2)
Investigated Companies
1) Agere systems 10) Linux-wlan 2) Agilent
Technology 11) Mobilian 3) Atheros Comunications
12) Resonext 4) Atmel 13) Synad
Technologies 5) Bops 14) Systemonic 6)
Bederov 15) Tality 7) DCM Technologies 16)
Texas Instruments 8) Envara 17) Virata 9)
Intersil
16
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (3)
Companies classification
Classification Companies
Not integrated Intersil (Prism-II) suitable complete chipset but no more on the market Systemonic only BB doesnt have the MAC
Integrated Intersil (other), Atheros, Envara, Mobilian, Texas Instruments, Synad, Atmel
Development systems DCM Tecnologies, BOPS, Tality
OEM products Agere
Application Linux-wlan, Virata
17
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (4)
Some examples Intersil Prism II
Variable data rates 1, 2, 5.5, 11 Mbps
Frequency band 2,4 ? 2,48 GHz
Categories Not integrated
18
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (5)
Some examples Systemonic Tondelayo1
Variable data rates 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps 1, 2, 5.5, 11 Mbps
Frequency band 2,4 ? 2,48 and 5,15 ? 5,825 GHz
Categories Not integrated
19
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (6)
Some examples Intersil Prism Indigo
Variable data rates 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps
Frequency band 5,150 ? 5,350 GHz
Categories Integrated
20
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (7)
Some examples Atheros AR5000
Variable data rates 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps
Frequency band 5,150 ? 5,350 GHz
Categories Integrated
21
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (8)
Some examples Texas Instruments TnetW1100B
Variable data rates 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps
Frequency band 5,150 ? 5,350 GHz
Categories Integrated
22
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (9)
Some examples BOPS WirelessRay
Variable data rates 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps 1, 2, 5.5, 11 Mbps
Frequency band 2,4 ? 2,48 and 5,15 ? 5,825 GHz
Categories Development systems
23
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (10)
Some examples Agere
Variable data rates 1, 2, 5.5, 11 Mbps
Frequency band 2,4 ? 2,48 GHz
Categories OEM products
24
MobileMAN State-of-the-art HW (11)
Positive Result of the Investigation

1. DCM Technologies they could give us all the
   source, software and firmware, just for 150000
   but third party Phy, (BB and RF), are not
   included
2. Atheros ...I would like to hear more about your
   research project as well as the parties involved
   
3. Amtel ...we would need to have a non-disclosure
   agreement implemented we would also like to
   know who your partners are andmore details about
   your project

25
MobileMAN State-of-the-art SW (1)
MAC software nature calls for hard RT-OS

• Ensure deterministic reaction time
• True preemptive task scheduling with task
  priorities
• Memory protection scheme
• Provide mechanisms for clean data exchange
  between processes (queues, mailboxes, semaphores,
  )
• Clean task switching with context protection
• Computing power requirements depends of course
  onchosen HW (from very low to very high)

26
MobileMAN State-of-the-art SW (2)
Solution for software

• Big Commercial system (e.g. VxWorks)
• Heavy and expensive
• Small commercial system (e.g. OnTime)
• Inexpensive but not on all processors
• Public domain (open source?) (e.g. µCOS)
• Preferable solution difficult support, problems
  for evt. commercial use
• Ad-hoc solution
• To be evaluated

27
MobileMAN How to begin HW (1)
Select the strategy

• Totally ad-hoc development we develop all the
  system components MAC, BB, RF
• Step-by-step development
• First we develop the MAC on a off-the-shelf
  microcontroller (e.g. ARM9, TMS320C55,). We use
  a commercial chip for the PHY, (BB and RF).
• Develop the PHY only later (follow-on project?)
• Customization of existing solution use a chipset
  which allow MAC customization (reprogram) (e.g.
  Atheros, Intersil PRISM-Indigo).

28
MobileMAN How to Begin HW (2)
Totally ad-hoc development

• Advantages
• Quick start (tomorrow morning?)
• Not affected by manufacturers production
  timetable
• Not affected by the market fluctuation
• Totally independent from the manufacturer product
• Disadvantages
• Too much time to reach the goals
• A high risk of failure

29
MobileMAN How to Begin HW (3)
Step-by-step development

• Advantages
• Quick start (tomorrow morning?)
• Development much more under control
• Less time to reach the goals
• Disadvantages
• Affected by Manufacturers production timetable
• Affected by the market fluctuation
• Partially dependent from the manufacturer product

30
MobileMAN How to Begin HW (4)
Customization of existing solution

• Advantages
• Very short time to reach our goals
• Development totally under control
• Time remaining to do something else
• Disadvantages
• Maybe too expensive
• Maybe (almost) impossible to have access to the
  technology (documentation, tools, support, )
• Affected by Manufacturers production timetable
• Affected by the market fluctuation
• Partially dependent from the manufacturer product

31
MobileMAN How to begin SW
Software development steps

1. Break-down (new) MAC algorithm into hard
   real-time requiring and not-hard-real-time
   requiring parts
2. Evaluate (estimate) computing time requirements
3. Define API
4. Depending on the chosen HW, select
   microprocessor/microcontroller (DSP?) suited for
   the task
5. Choose development system (tools)

Remark software analysis and development
(low-level parts) may start imediately (dont
wait for BB-RF selection)
32
MobileMAN Suggestion and Discussion

• Negotiation with the interested manufacturers
• What could we tell about the project and the
  partners?
• What could we negotiate, (technology transfer)?
• Otherwise we suggest the Step by Step solution
• Problem find a manufacturer that provide a BB RF
  chipset!