| With growing interest in wireless ad hoc personal area communications, a technological standard for implementing these types of communications is essential. In ad hoc network, wireless devices connect to each other without the use of infrastructure network or a fixed proprietary backbone. The Bluetooth technology is used to wirelessly interconnect home and office electronic devices. The Bluetooth specification specifies the simultaneous communication of only eight Bluetooth enabled electronic devices. This limitation of the number of devices becomes critical in applications (airport, industries, etc) where multi-wireless device connectivity is required. In addition, Bluetooth is a voice-oriented technology even though the technology also handles data transmission. A voice-oriented network means that the primary data source is voice. Only few, if any, data communications can take place. In applications such as messaging or video conferencing, Bluetooth performance is poor. In addition, the coverage area of Bluetooth is very limited: 10 meters as opposed to other competitive technologies, such as the IEEE 802.11 and Home RF. This article discusses the use of Bluetooth standard technology and proposes mechanisms and algorithms for providing more device communications and more data connectivity. Three algorithms are proposed: Full Capacity Increasing (FCI), Partial Silence Detection (PSD), and Full Silence Detection (FSD). The FCI algorithm resolves the capacity limit problem and at the same time expands the range of the overall network while the PSD and FSD algorithms provide the means to add more data capability. To accomplish these goals, simulation models using Matlab and OPNET were developed. In addition, analytical analyses, using queuing and probabilistic theory, were carried out. The implemented models were compared with some selected literature articles. More research work is still required in order for Bluetooth to remain competitive in the market. Besides the limitations mentioned above, Bluetooth provides a very low data rate: 1 Mbps, as opposed to its competitors, particularly the IEEE 802.11b and the Ultra Wide Band technology. |
