Patent ID: 8228927

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for a mobile device to perform as a messaging bridge between two or more networks in a dynamically changing ad-hoc topology, the method comprising: performing discovery to determine one or more neighboring mobile devices according to a listen and announce protocol; maintaining storage for metadata including storage for an expected path length, the expected path length from a source node to a destination node over time is an expectation time defined by a pair of the source node and the destination node, such that the source node sends a message at time 0, and a distribution of probability that the destination node receives the message is determined by a topology of a stochastic model; choosing a neighbor device for receipt of one or more messages, the choosing comprising: deriving the stochastic model of the dynamically changing topology wherein the mobile device is a node in the topology; using the stochastic model, evaluating routes for delivering the messages according to the expected path length, and assigning a probabilistic weight representing a probability of a connection between two nodes in the topology; determining a shortest expected path route from the evaluated routes, where the path with the shortest expected path length is the primary path; delivering messages to another device to propagate messages between the networks; and purging a cache of messages having a high probability of delivery.