Slicenet: a Simple and Scalable Flow-Level Simulator for Network Slice Provisioning and Management

Network slicing plays a crucial role in the progression of 5G and beyond, facilitating dedicated logical networks to meet diverse and specific service requirements. The principle of End-to-End (E2E) slice includes not only a service chain of physical or virtual functions for the radio and core of 5G/6G networks but also the full path to the application servers that might be running at some edge computing or at central cloud. Nonetheless, the development and optimization of E2E network slice management systems necessitate a reliable simulation tool for evaluating different aspects at large-scale network topologies such as resource allocation and function placement models. This paper introduces Slicenet, a mininet-like simulator crafted for E2E network slicing experimentation at the flow level. Slicenet aims at facilitating the investigation of a wide range of slice optimization techniques, delivering measurable, reproducible results without the need for physical resources or complex integration tools. It provides a well-defined process for conducting experiments, which includes the creation and implementation of policies for various components such as edge and central cloud resources, network functions of multiple slices of different characteristics. Furthermore, Slicenet effortlessly produces meaningful visualizations from simulation results, aiding in comprehensive understanding. Utilizing Slicenet, service providers can derive invaluable insights into resource optimization, capacity planning, Quality of Service (QoS) assessment, cost optimization, performance comparison, risk mitigation, and Service Level Agreement (SLA) compliance, thereby fortifying network resource management and slice orchestration.