Internet topology measurement

The Internet is a vital tool in all aspects of today’s life. Its operation, however, is far from being optimal, and only in some cases satisfactory. In order to understand its operation and suggest ways to improve it, one needs to know the fundamental characteristics of the interactions in the network at all levels: packets, flows, devices, and entire networks. However, the Internet was not built with measurement as a fundamental feature, thus tools and techniques had to be built to enable measuring and analyzing various aspects of its operations. This tutorial will give the participants a review of Internet measurement techniques at various levels. After a short review of basic Internet features, we will discuss the reasons for measuring the Internet, what can be measured, how, where, and when it can be done, with examples from previous projects. The tutorial will also touch on modeling issues. A large part of the tutorial will focus on topology measurements, and will discuss the main challenges in this area.