A mobility and traffic generation framework for modeling and simulating ad hoc communication networks

We present a generic mobility and traffic generation framework that can be incorporated into a tool for modeling and simulating large scale ad hoc networks. The basic framework consists of the following components:1. A Mobility Data Generator (MDG) that generates positions and states of transceivers at specified times of the simulation clock. This module can support a variety of mobility models.2. A Graph Structure Generator (GSG) that constructs the graph corresponding to the ad hoc network from the mobility data provided by MDG. This module can generate directed or undirected graphs depending on the radio range and propagation models.3. A Terrain Modification Tool (TMT) that modifies the connectivity of the graph produced by GSG to allow for terrain effects or arbitrary obstructions.4. An Activity Data Generator (ADG) that generates sessions (i.e., packet transmission activities) for a specified fraction of the transceivers that are active at specified times of the simulation clock.The design allows a user to incorporate various realistic parameters crucial in simulating and modeling ad hoc communication networks. We illustrate the utility of our tool with two examples. The first example shows how purely synthetic movement patterns can be used in driving a simulation. The second example shows realistic movement patterns obtained via an urban population mobility modeling tool developed at Los Alamos.