AlgoPlus//networking / aloha
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ALOHA · Random Access

Stations transmit at will; overlaps collide and back off. Slotting halves the collision window.

Mode
Pure
Success
Collisions
Mode
Legend
Success
Collision
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In a nutshell
ALOHA lets stations on a shared channel transmit whenever they have data, with no checking first. If two transmissions overlap they collide and both are lost, so each sender waits a random time and tries again. Pure ALOHA allows starts at any instant and tops out around 18% channel usage; Slotted ALOHA forces every transmission to begin on a fixed time boundary, which removes partial overlaps and roughly doubles that to about 37%.
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Just talk whenever you want and hope nobody else is. When two overlap, both lose and retry after a random pause. Aligning to slots means you either miss completely or clash completely — never a partial graze.
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