Enabling experimentation in mobile sensing scenarios through 4G networks: The NITOS approach

Wireless technologies have evolved rapidly over the past years, directly affecting our everyday living with the wide penetration of smart mobile devices. As such, the research community has placed major efforts in shaping and forming the future wireless technologies for enhanced end-user experience. Nevertheless, protocols and algorithms over wireless networks are better evaluated in real world scenarios, where simulations and complex theoretical models fail to characterize and emulate their behavior. Networking experimental facilities (testbeds) fill this gap by allowing experimental network measurements to serve as a basis for extracting valuable findings. In this paper, we present the extensions to the NITOS testbed for supporting experimentation in mobile sensing scenarios, by employing smartphones in vehicular environments, communicating using WiFi and 4G networks. We emphasize on the ease of configuration, execution and reproducibility of these experiments, leveraging the hardware and software tools provided by the NITOS testbed.