8-network_simulation.pptVIP

Part 7: Network Simulation Motivation: Learn fundamentals of evaluating network performance via simulation Overview: fundamentals of discrete event simulation analyzing simulation outputs ns-2 simulation What is simulation? Why Simulation? goal: study system performance, operation real-system not available, is complex/costly or dangerous (eg: space simulations, flight simulations) quickly evaluate design alternatives (eg: different system configurations) evaluate complex functions for which closed form formulas or numerical techniques not available Simulation: advantages/drawbacks advantages: save lives, money find bugs (in design) in advance generality: over analytic/numerical techniques detail: can simulate system details at arbitrary level drawbacks: caution: does model reflect reality large scale systems: lots of resources to simulate (especially acurrately simulate) may be slow (computationally expensive – 1 min real time could be hours of simulated time) art: determining right level of model complexity statistical uncertainty in results The evaluation spectrum Numerical models Simulation Emulation Prototype Operational system Programming a simulation What ‘s in a simulation program? simulated time: internal (to simulation program) variable that keeps track of simualted time system “state”: variables maintained by simulation program define system “state” e.g., may track number (possibly order) of packets in queue, current value of retransmission timer events: points in time when system changes state each event has associate event time e.g., arrival of packet to queue, departure from queue precisely at these points in time that simulation must take action (change state and may cause new future events) model for time between events (probabilistic) caused by external environment Discrete Event Simulation simulation program maintains and updates list of future events: event list simulator structure: Simulation: example processes arrive (avg. interrarri