Dynamic Offloading Algorithm in Intermittently Connected Mobile Cloudlet Systems

The emergence of mobile cloud computing enables mobile users to dynamically offload applications to nearby mobile resource-rich devices (i.e., cloudlets) to reduce energy consumption and improve execution efficiency. However, due to mobility, the connections between a mobile user and mobile cloudlets can be intermittent. As a result, offloading actions taken by a mobile user may fail (e.g., the user moves out of transmission range of cloudlets). In this paper, we model and develop an optimal offloading algorithm for the mobile user, considering the users' local load and availability of cloudlets. We formulate and solve a Markov decision process (MDP) model to obtain an optimal policy for the mobile user with an objective to minimize the computation and offloading cost. The numerical results show that the proposed dynamic offloading algorithm outperforms conventional baseline schemes.