next GSIM: Towards Simulating Network Resource Management for Beyond 5G Networks

Researchers have already begun experimenting with next-generation cellular technologies and algorithms to enable use cases that lie beyond the scope of the current 5G standard, e.g. XR, smart factories, AI networks ops, etc. The common denominator requirement of such scenarios is the joint (coupled) operation of radio channel and edge computing resources within the core network. While there are numerous tools that allow experimenting with various aspects of radio resource management and computing resource management individually, there is a lack of solutions that enable researchers to prototype and evaluate applications and technologies dependent on both aspects simultaneously. In this work, we present nextGSIM, a 5G and beyond network simulator that realistically models the radio access network and edge network jointly to provide an end-to-end service to various user devices running microservice-based application workloads. We detail our design decisions and modular architecture of nextGSIM which resembles real-world setup of cellular networks, enabling effective and detailed simulations of resource management algorithms. We demonstrate the effectiveness and capabilities of nextGSIM through indoor factory case study wherein we evaluate widely regarded radio and edge resource management algorithms. We compare these against a joint radio-compute scheduler which emphasizes the need and benefits of joint resource allocation decision making, which is only possible through tools such as nextGSIM.