Performance comparison of cache invalidation strategies for internet-based mobile ad hoc networks

Internet-based mobile ad hoc network (IMANET,) combines a mobile ad hoc network (MANET) and the Internet to provide universal information accessibility. Although caching frequently accessed data items in mobile terminals (MTs) improves the communication performance in an IMANET, it brings a critical design issue when data items are updated. Prior cache invalidation strategies, proposed for cellular networks, are not suitable for an IMANET, where frequent link disconnection and changing network topology due to mobility of MTs can cause serious cache consistency problem. In this paper, we analyze several push and pull-based cache invalidation strategies for IMANETS. A global positioning system (GPS) based connectivity estimation (GPSCE) scheme is first proposed to assess the connectivity of an MT for supporting any cache invalidation mechanism. Then, we propose a pull-based approach, called aggregate cache based on demand (ACOD) scheme, to find the queried data items efficiently. In addition, we modify two push-based cache invalidation strategies, proposed for cellular networks, to work in IMANETS. These are a modified timestamp (MTS) scheme, and an MTS with updated invalidation report (MTS+UIR) scheme. Simulation results indicate that our proposed strategy provides high throughput, low query latency, and low communication overhead, and thus, is a viable approach for implementation in IMANETS.