DATA LINK LAYER EXTENSIONS TO A HIGH LATENCY WIRELESS MAC PROTOCOL

摘要

A method is provided for communication between a plurality of stations in a communication network using media access protocol, in which medium access is granted to stations obtaining a successful reservation of the medium and in which data transmission verification is performed by the protocol within the reservation. In the method a station sends a request message on the communication medium for a reservation of the medium to a recipient station in the network. The recipient station sends a reservation confirmation message back to the sending station which receives it and responds to the reservation confirmation message by sending an ordered sequence of data frames to the recipient station. After sending the ordered sequence of data frames the sending station sends an end of transmission message to the recipient station, which replies by sending back an end of transmission confirmation identifying the number of frames received in their original sequence. If the number is not correct remedial action can be taken by the sending station to resend missing data. Address conflict resolution is also provided by another aspect of the invention. The invention has embodiments which handle unicast and groupcasting transmissions.