Pareto Optimized EDCA Parameter Control for Wireless Local Area Networks

The performance of IEEE 802.11e enhanced distributed channel access (EDCA) is influenced by several interactive parameters that make quality of service (QoS) control complex and difficult. In EDCA, the most critical performance influencing parameters are the arbitration interframe space (AIFS) and contention window size (CW) of each access category (AC). The objective of this paper is to provide a scheme for parameter control such that the throughput per station as well as the overall system throughput of the network is maximized and controllable. For this purpose, a simple and accurate analytical model describing the throughput behavior of EDCA networks is presented in this paper. Based on this model, the paper further provides a scheme in which a Pareto optimal system configuration is obtained via an appropriate CW control for a given AIFS value, which is a different approach compared to relevant papers in the literature that deal with CW control only. The simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed method which shows significant performance improvements compared to other existing algorithms.