Transaction processing in an asymmetric mobile environment

Transaction processing is useful in a mobile environment. The inherent support for broadcast channels together with conventional point-to-point paradigm dictates different mode of transaction processing in the mobile context. To improve system scalability, a transaction should utilize relatively high bandwidth broadcast channels for its read operations on hot data items. Read operations on cold data items and update operations would be carried out via point-to-point channels on demand. We devise a concurrency control protocol that exploits both types of channels. We address the disconnection problem by caching data items needed at a mobile client, performing transactions locally, and committing them upon reconnection. The performance of our protocol is compared with other protocols through simulation.