Patent ID: 8537714

Claim:
A method for determining a route between two nodes of a wireless network comprising a plurality of nodes, said method comprising: calculating a weighted radio and load aware routing metric by a node in said wireless network; storing, by said node, said weighted radio and load aware routing metric; and using, by said node, said weighted radio and load aware routing metric to select said route for communication between said two nodes of said wireless network based on a sum of weighted radio and load aware routing metrics calculated by each node of said plurality of nodes of said wireless network, wherein said calculating further comprises: retrieving parameters of said wireless network, wherein said parameters include protocol overhead and a test packet size; selecting a form of a first weight factor based on channel load and selecting a parameter of said first weight factor; selecting a form of a second weight factor based on packet error rate and selecting a parameter of said second weight factor; retrieving an estimated channel bit rate; measuring a channel busy time, wherein said channel busy time is any time when any other node within an interference range performs transmission, said transmission being detected by physical carrier sensing or virtual carrier sensing; estimating said channel load, wherein said estimated channel load is said channel busy time divided by a measurement period; estimating said packet error rate of the channel; and calculating said weighted radio and load aware routing metric based on said wireless network parameters, said first weight factor, said second weight factor, said estimated channel bit rate, said estimated channel load and said estimated packet error rate.