Design and Implementation of AQM Evaluation Suite for ns-3

Abstract

Excessive buffering in network devices should be avoided because it leads to a series of performance issues such as high queuing latency and variations in delay. Active Queue Management (AQM) algorithms play a vital role in monitoring and controlling the queue length in these devices. Recently there has been a significant progress in the design and development of new AQM algorithms. However, thoroughly evaluating the performance of AQM algorithms is a nontrivial task. In an effort to simplify this, the Active Queue Management and Packet Scheduling Working Group at IETF have proposed informational guidelines in RFC 7928 to test the applicability, performance and deployment complexity of AQM algorithms. This paper presents the design and implementation of an AQM evaluation framework for ns-3 which helps to quickly study the performance of AQM algorithms based on the guidelines mentioned in RFC 7928. The proposed framework automates simulation setup, topology creation, traffic generation, program execution, results collection and their graphical representation using ns-3, based on the scenarios mentioned in the RFC.