802.11s

IEEE 802.11s is an IEEE 802.11 amendment for mesh networking, defining how wireless devices can interconnect to create a WLAN mesh network, which may be used for static topologies and ad hoc networks.

802.11 is a set of IEEE standards that govern wireless networking transmission methods. They are commonly used today in their 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n and 802.11ac versions to provide wireless connectivity in the home, office and some commercial establishments.

802.11s extends the IEEE 802.11 MAC standard by defining an architecture and protocol that supports both broadcast/multicast and unicast delivery using "radio-aware metrics over self-configuring multi-hop topologies."

802.11s inherently depends on one of 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g or 802.11n carrying the actual traffic. One or more suitable to the actual network physical topology are required. 802.11s requires , or HWMP, be supported as a default. However, other mesh, ad hoc or dynamically link-state routed (OLSR, B.A.T.M.A.N.) may be supported or even static routing (WDS, OSPF). See the more detailed description below comparing these routing protocols.

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