A method for access point selection in 802.11 networks

Nowadays, since devices can find more than one access point (AP) in wireless local area networks (WLANs), we are supposed to choose the access point which tends to provide the best performance based on the kind of usage for which it is specified. Currently, in order to select the most appropriate AP, computers utilize the received signal strength which is referred to as the Signal Strength Strategy (SSS). But this leads to the concentration of many nodes on the nearest AP; as a consequence, the throughput of the network decreases. However, there may be some APs at a nearby location which were still in the idle mode. In this paper, we have proposed a method for the access point selection by taking into account the throughput which is achieved from the specific servers over the Internet (not just the throughput of the node to an AP). This method was aimed at reducing the negative impact of the low throughput of one node on the others. Besides, to stabilize the wireless connection, the method benefited from the signal strength as well as the applied throughput based on the desired usage of the network and special QoS parameters, such as minimizing power consumption, UDP or TCP connection. Moreover, two different scenarios were simulated. In fact, the first one showed the importance of measuring the throughput of the Internet connection and the second one showed reduction of the negative influence.