OverSim is an
OMNeT++-based open-source
simulation framework for
overlay and
peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer ...
networks, developed at the Institute of Telematics,
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT; german: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie) is a public research university in Karlsruhe, Germany. The institute is a national research center of the Helmholtz Association.
KIT was created in 2009 w ...
, Germany.
The simulator contains several models for structured (e.g.
Chord
Chord may refer to:
* Chord (music), an aggregate of musical pitches sounded simultaneously
** Guitar chord a chord played on a guitar, which has a particular tuning
* Chord (geometry), a line segment joining two points on a curve
* Chord ( ...
,
Kademlia,
Pastry
Pastry is baked food made with a dough of flour, water and shortening (solid fats, including butter or lard) that may be savoury or sweetened. Sweetened pastries are often described as '' bakers' confectionery''. The word "pastries" suggests ...
) and unstructured (e.g.
GIA)
peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer ...
protocols. An example implementation of the framework is an implementation of a
peer-to-peer SIP
Peer-to-peer SIP (P2P-SIP) is an implementation of a distributed voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) or instant messaging communications application using a peer-to-peer (P2P) architecture in which session control between communication end points i ...
communications network.
OverSim Features
Some of the main features of the OverSim simulation framework include:
Flexibility
The simulator allows to simulate both structured and unstructured overlay networks (currently
Chord
Chord may refer to:
* Chord (music), an aggregate of musical pitches sounded simultaneously
** Guitar chord a chord played on a guitar, which has a particular tuning
* Chord (geometry), a line segment joining two points on a curve
* Chord ( ...
,
Pastry
Pastry is baked food made with a dough of flour, water and shortening (solid fats, including butter or lard) that may be savoury or sweetened. Sweetened pastries are often described as '' bakers' confectionery''. The word "pastries" suggests ...
,
Koorde
In peer-to-peer networks, Koorde is a distributed hash table (DHT) system based on the Chord DHT and the De Bruijn graph (De Bruijn sequence). Inheriting the simplicity of Chord, Koorde meets hops per node (where is the number of nodes in the D ...
, Broose,
Kademlia, and GIA are implemented). The modular design and use of the Common API facilitate the extension with new features or protocols. Module behavior can easily be customized by specify parameters in a human readable configuration file.
Interactive GUI
In order to validate and debug new or existing overlay protocols you can make use of the GUI of
OMNeT++, which visualizes networks topologies, messages and node state variables like the routing table.
Exchangeable Underlying Network Models
OverSim has a flexible underlying network scheme, which on the one hand provides a fully configurable network topology with realistic bandwidths, packet delays, and packet losses (INETUnderlay), and on the other hand a fast and simple alternative model for high simulation performance (SimpleUnderlay).
Scalability
OverSim was designed with performance in mind. On a modern desktop PC a typical
Chord
Chord may refer to:
* Chord (music), an aggregate of musical pitches sounded simultaneously
** Guitar chord a chord played on a guitar, which has a particular tuning
* Chord (geometry), a line segment joining two points on a curve
* Chord ( ...
network of 10,000 nodes can be simulated in real-time. The simulator was used to successfully simulate networks of up to 100,000 nodes.
Base Overlay Class
The base overlay class facilitates the implementation of structured peer-to-peer protocols by providing a RPC interface, a generic lookup class and a common API key-based routing interface to the application.
Reuse of Simulation Code
The different implementations of overlay protocols are reusable for real network applications, so that researchers can validate the simulator framework results by comparing them to the results from real-world test networks like PlanetLab. Therefore, the simulation framework is able to handle and assemble real network packets and to communicate with other implementations of the same overlay protocol.
Statistics
The simulator collects various statistical data such as sent, received, or forwarded network traffic per node, successful or unsuccessful packet delivery, and packet hop count.
Criticism
The framework is outdated and requires an older version of the INET framework. Also, the code contains reported bugs.
References
{{reflist
External links
The OverSim home pageby Dilum Bandara
Distributed data storage
Computer network analysis