[Ns-developers] management of wifi association in infrastructure mode

[Mathieu Lacage]

hi,

A while ago, gustavo reported bug 396 which describes a rather
pathological case:

a) ASSOCIATION_REQUEST: STA -> AP
b) ACK: AP -> STA
c) ASSOCIATION_RESPONSE (OK): AP -> STA
d) ACK: STA -> AP

The main problem is that the last transmission (d) fails which means
that the AP assumes that the station is not associated (because it did
not receive an ACK for the RESPONSE) and the STA believes that it is
associated (because it received the ASSOCIATION_RESPONSE and sent the
ACK).

The question, then, is, what should we do ? A couple of options:

1) assume that association is successful even when we don't receive the
ACK from the STA. This means that, at least in this case, the AP and the
STA will maintain the same state (association successful)

2) in the STA, periodically attempt to verify that it is associated. How
should it do this ?

Comments and bright ideas would be welcome.

Mathieu