Dynamic packet beaconing for GPSR mobile ad hoc position-based routing protocol using fuzzy logic Raed Alsaqour a,n , Maha Abdelhaq a , Rashid Saeed b , Mueen Uddin c , Ola Alsukour d , Mohammed Al-Hubaishi e,f , Tariq Alahdal e a School of Computer Science, Faculty of Information Science and Technology, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia b College of Engineering, Sudan University of Science and Technology (SUST), Khartoum, Sudan c Kulliah of Information Communication Technology, International Islamic University Malaysia, Jalan Gombak, 50728 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia d Department of Computer Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, University of Jordan,11942 Amman, Jordan e Faculty of Computer Science & Information System, Thamar University, Thamar, Republic of Yemen f Department of Computer and Information Engineering, Institute of Science and Technology, University of Sakarya, 54187 Sakarya, Turkey article info Article history: Received 11 June 2013 Received in revised form 28 February 2014 Accepted 29 August 2014 Available online 11 September 2014 Keywords: Mobile ad hoc network Position-based routing protocols Neighboring node Node moving speed Beacon packet interval time Fuzzy logic abstract Greedy perimeter stateless routing (GPSR) is a well-known position-based routing protocol in mobile ad hoc network (MANET). In GPSR, nodes use periodic beaconing (PB) strategy in broadcasting beacon packets to maintain up-to-date information on the geographical position of their neighbor nodes within their transmission boundary range. The nodes that receive beacon packets save all known neighbor nodes, along with their geographical position information, in their neighbor list to make effective routing decisions. Most recent studies on position-based routing protocols assume that the position information in the neighbor list of a node is accurate, although only a rough estimate of such position information is actually available to the node. Node mobility causes frequent network topology changes in MANETs. Thus, neighbor-to-neighbor relationships change frequently. Using the PB strategy leads to inaccurate node position information in the neighbor list of a node. In addition, it may cause the routing protocol to make suboptimal decisions and not route packets through the best-located neighbor within the transmission range of the node. This study presents an analysis of the influence of position information inaccuracy caused by network parameters such as beacon packet interval time (BPIT) and node moving speed (NMS) on the performance of GPSR position-based routing protocols. To overcome the effect of position information inaccuracy in the neighbor list of a node, we proposed a fuzzy logic dynamic beaconing (FLDB) strategy to improve the reliability of the neighbor list of a node by optimizing time between transmissions of beacon packets in position-based routing protocols. Optimization is based on the correlation between NMS, number of neighboring nodes (NoNNs) and BPIT using fuzzy logic control (FLC) mechanism. The simulation experiment shows the effectiveness of the FLC mechanism in improving overall performance of GPSR position-based routing protocol in terms of beacon packet control overhead, end-to-end delay, non-optimal hop, and false node position. & 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction In mobile ad hoc network (MANET) position-based routing protocols (Mauve et al., 2001; Bilal et al., 2012), data packet routing decision is based solely on local geographical position information of the neighbors of a node. To use a position-based routing approach, each node that forms the network must be able to determine its own geographical position information (x, y coordinates) by using a global positioning system (GPS) service (Kaplan and Hegarty, 2006). Routing function of a node must also know the position of all the neighbors of the node within its transmission range by using periodic beaconing (PB). In the PB strategy, each node periodically sends beacon packets to test and verify the connectivity and availability of other nodes. In position-based routing protocols, each node selects the subsequent hop for data packet routing through neighboring nodes by accessing the neighbor list. However, only the geogra- phical position information is required for geographic routing of data packets from the source node to the destination node. Thus, the accuracy of available geographical position information in the neighbor list of a node is crucial and fundamental in determining protocol performance. In position-based routing protocols (Mauve et al., 2001; Stojmenovic, 2002; Giordano and Stojmenovic, 2004; Fonseca and Contents lists available at ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jnca Journal of Network and Computer Applications http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jnca.2014.08.008 1084-8045/& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. n Corresponding author. Tel.: þ60 126897019; fax: þ60 389256732. E-mail address: raed.ftsm@gmail.com (R. Alsaqour). Journal of Network and Computer Applications 47 (2015) 32–46