Mobile Inter-networking with IPv6 : Concepts, Principles and Practices

13

Network Mobility

There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.    –Ken Olson, founder, chairman and president of DEC, 1977

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13.1 INTRODUCTION

In the previous chapters, we discussed the mobility of a mobile node in great detail. Beginning from the basic concepts of mobility to multiple ways of supporting mobility to IP mobility using Mobile IP, we have studied the functional elements and their behaviors corresponding to protocol specifications. In this chapter, we consider network mobility, in which an entire network moves from one location to another on the Internet. As an example, consider Alice taking a network in her car on her vacation; it should be possible for her vehicular network to maintain seamless connectivity with her home network. We consider how Mobile IP can be extended so that individual mobile nodes do not have to run the Mobile IP protocol when the network they are attached to moves.

Let us consider applying Mobile IP directly when an entire network moves. Examples of networks that move include personal vehicular networks, networks on transportation systems such as a train and airline systems, and personal area networks. When the network attaches itself to a new point of attachment, each node has to perform Mobile IP operations. That is, each node has to first detect that it has moved to a new network, configure a new IP address and send Binding ...