An Emulated Test Framework for Service Discovery and MANET Research Based on ns-3

In this paper we present our framework for emulated evaluation of service discovery protocols in mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs). Emulation is preferable to simulation when evaluating real world software implementations, as it provides a controlled network environment without requiring modifications to the software. We base our work on the open-source simulator ns-3, which also has support for network emulation. Our own test framework consists of a set of scripts running in Linux Containers, providing a means to bootstrap and populate service discovery protocols with services and queries. Our setup allows us to perform controlled and repeatable service discovery protocol experiments in MANETs with a high degree of automation. Experiment series are set up, controlled, and statistics calculated by scripts, thus enabling complex, large, and real-time evaluations to be performed without human interaction.