2 PARs for 802.11
Colleagues,
This e-mail is to disseminate the 2 PARs from IEEE 802.11, intended for
approval at the March 6-10, 2000 meeting of IEEE 802.
In July 99, we started a study group on the subject of enhancement of the
802.11 MAC.
In November we extended the time of the Study group till March.
The following two PARs have been approved by the November Plenary meeting of
802.11:
Supplement to STANDARD [for] Local and metropolitan area networks-Specific
requirements-Part 11: Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical
Layer (PHY) specifications: Medium Access Method (MAC) Enhancements
The scope of this PAR is:
Enhance the 802.11 Medium Access Control (MAC) to improve and manage Quality
of
Service, provide classes of service, and enhanced security and
authentication mechanisms.
Consider efficiency enhancements in the areas of the Distributed
Coordination Function (DCF)
and Point Coordination Function (PCF)
And the purpose is:
[To enhance the current 802.11 MAC to expand support for applications with
Quality of Service
requirements. Provide improvements in security, and in the capabilities and
efficiency of the
protocol. These enhancements, in combination with recent improvements in PHY
capabilities
from 802.11a and 802.11b, will increase overall system performance, and
expand the application space for 802.11
The second PAR is titled:
Recommended Practices for Multi-Vendor Access Point Interoperability via
Inter-Access Point Protocol across Distribution Systems supporting IEEE
P802.11 operation.
The scope is:
To develop recommended practices for an Inter-Access Point Protocol (IAPP)
which provides
the necessary capabilities to achieve multi-vendor Access Point
interoperability across a
Distribution System supporting IEEE P802.11 Wireless LAN Links. This IAPP
will be
developed for the following environment(s):
1) A Distribution System consisting of IEEE 802 LAN components supporting an
IETF
IP environment.
2) Others as deemed appropriate
This Recommended Practices Document shall support the IEEE P802.11 standard
revision(s)
<fill in official title of docs
The purpose is:
IEEE P802.11 specifies the MAC and PHY layers of a Wireless LAN system and
includes the basic architecture of such systems, including the concepts of
Access Points and Distribution Systems. Implementation of these concepts
where purposely not defined by P802.11 because there are many ways to create
a Wireless LAN system. Additionally many of the possible implementation
approaches involve concepts from higher network layers. While this leaves
great flexibility in Distributions System and Access Point functional
design, the associated cost is that physical Access Point devices from
different vendors are unlikely to inter-operate across a Distribution System
due to the different approaches taken to Distribution System design.
As P802.11 based systems have grown in popularity, this limitation has
become an impediment to WLAN market growth. At the same time it has become
clear that there are a small number of Distribution System environments that
comprise the bulk of the commercial WLAN system
installations.
This project proposes to specify the necessary information that needs to be
exchanged between Access Points to support the P802.11 DS functions. The
information exchanges required will be specified for, one or more
Distribution Systems; in a manner sufficient to enable the
implementation of Distribution Systems containing Access Points from
different vendors which
adhere to the recommended practices.
To review the complete PARs and 5 Criteria, please visit our web site at:
http://www.ieee802.org/11/PARs/9273-r1-8W-PAR-and-5-Criteria-MAC-enhancement
s.pdf
and
http://www.ieee802.org/11/PARs/9275-r1-8W-PAR-and-5-Criteria-IAPP.pdf
Thanks for your attention
----------
Vic Hayes,
Chair, IEEE P802.11, Standards WG for Wireless Local Area Networks
Lucent Technologies Nederland B.V.
Zadelstede 1-10
3431 JZ Nieuwegein
The Netherlands
voice phone number: +31 30 6097528 (Time Zone UTC+1)
fax phone number: +31 30 609 7556
e-mail: vichayes@lucent.com