A comprehensive approach to vertical handoff in heterogeneous wireless networks

A multi-criteria vertical handoff system sensitive to various mobile-terminals’ mobility parameters including distance and velocity in a heterogeneous wireless network is analytically formulated and validated via simulations. It is targeted to estimate the essential handoff parameters including outage probability, residual capacity, and signal to interference and noise threshold as well as network access cost. In order to avoid the ping–pong effect in handoff, a signal evolution prediction system is formulated and its performance is examined. Moreover, the handoff scheme is triggered using an on line handoff-initiation-time estimation scheme. When initiated, the handoff procedure begins with a network scoring system based on multi-attribute strategy which results in selection of potentially promising network parameters. Simulation results are shown to track well the analytical formulations.