Research Article
Enabling Heterogeneous 5G Simulations with SDN Adapters
@INPROCEEDINGS{10.1007/978-3-030-43215-7_12, author={Thien Pham and Jeremy McMahon and Hung Nguyen}, title={Enabling Heterogeneous 5G Simulations with SDN Adapters}, proceedings={Testbeds and Research Infrastructures for the Development of Networks and Communications. 14th EAI International Conference, TridentCom 2019, Changsha, China, December 7-8, 2019, Proceedings}, proceedings_a={TRIDENTCOM}, year={2020}, month={3}, keywords={Simulation Cross domain Interoperability Network slicing SDN NFV LTE 5G NR}, doi={10.1007/978-3-030-43215-7_12} }- Thien Pham
Jeremy McMahon
Hung Nguyen
Year: 2020
Enabling Heterogeneous 5G Simulations with SDN Adapters
TRIDENTCOM
Springer
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-43215-7_12
Abstract
5G networks are expected to consist of multiple radio access technologies with a Software-defined networking (SDN) core, and so simulating these networks will require connecting multiple subnetworks with different technologies. Despite the availability of simulators for various technologies, there is currently no tool that can simulate a complete heterogeneous 5G network. In this work, we develop a novel SDN adapter to enable seamless inter-working between different simulation/emulation tools, such as NS-3, Mininet-WiFi, Omnet++, and OpenAirInterface5G. Using the adapter, we have built a large scale 5G simulator with multiple networking technologies by connecting existing simulators. We show that our adapter solution is easy-to-use, scalable, and can be used to connect arbitrary simulation tools. Using our solution, we show that Mininet-WiFi exhibits unreliable behaviour when connected to other networks. We compare our solution against other alternatives and show that our solution is superior both in terms of performance and cost. Finally, and for the first time, we simulate a large heterogeneous 5G network with all of the latest technologies using only a standard commodity personal computer.
