7. Conclusion
Due to the highly dynamic topology of VANETs, modeling and predicting the vehicle mobility could play a key role in designing efficient communication protocols. Fortunately, the movements of the vehicles are usually constrained along roads and streets. Therefore, the future movements of the vehicles are predictable. In the literature, numerous predictionbased protocols are proposed to enhance several aspects of VANETs. In this paper, a literature review of prediction-based protocols for VANETs is presented with reference to their application, prediction objective, and performance metrics. Additionally, two novel taxonomies of these protocols are provided. The first one classifies the prediction-based protocols according to the main purpose of the proposed protocols, while the second taxonomy classifies them according to the prediction objective that the proposed protocols aim to predict. A discussion on each category is provided with a focus on the requirements, constrains, and challenges. In order to complement this study, usage analysis and performance comparisons of the prediction-based protocols in VANETs are presented. The analysis derives the suitability of the prediction objectives to the various applications.
In conclusion, predicting the link stability is vital to increase the performance of reactive routing protocols in VANETs, while predicting the future location or trajectory of the vehicles is useful to enhance the position-based routing and data forwarding protocols. Traffic management can be improved by predicting vehicle traveling time, and road safety could take the benefits of predicting the collision risk.