A low-cost, IP-based mobile network emulator (MNE)

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) mobile network emulator (MNE) is a low-cost, flexible wireless mobile internetwork protocol (IP) test environment that provides flexible, dynamic topology control and manipulation for testing of both IPv4 and IPv6 dynamic network scenarios, direct and indirect software support for network node motion modeling is supported. The emulation design and various software and hardware support components are described. A case example of how the mobile emulation system has been applied is also provided with a set of ancillary visualization tools, motion generators, and network analysis tools. Finally, it is discussed how such an emulation environment provides a valuable engineering tool supplementing more abstract simulation studies and costly, time-consuming field trials of mobile network systems and software.