Simulation Tools Enabling Research in Convergence of Fixed and Mobile Networks

The massive increase of mobile handsets in conjunction with the new and more demanding services deployed over wireless networks lead to huge bandwidth requirements for both the wireless and the backhaul networks. Ethernet Passive Optical Network deployment has already been started to replace E-l/T-1 lines. In addition wireless broadband access is taking place mostly with the use of WiMax. Integration and convergence of the above technologies had been proven to have many benefits. Due to the nature and the complexity though of the scenarios in this area, a large scale simulator, supporting multiple services and QoS is needed in order to validate new network and resource management algorithms. In this paper a simulator developed using OMNet++ framework is presented. The designed modules and their functionality are listed. A discussion on how these could be used to form different convergence architectures and the major outcome/results of such a simulation are explained.