Interactive analysis and simulation of VANETs using MOWINE

We present a mobile wireless network evaluation tool (MOWINE) that can analyze mobility and wireless connectivity traces to quantify performance of different network protocols in a given application scenario. We model the highly dynamic connectivity of mobile networks using time-expanded graphs which allow us to study the best-case performance of network protocols. MOWINE also integrates with a network simulator that can evaluate the performance of recent VANET routing protocols with a user specified network load. This combination of network modeling and simulation enables users to gain deeper insights into the performance of routing protocols, for example, by distinguishing the limitations of a particular routing protocol from the fundamental limitations of the underlying network. Network engineers can use MOWINE to study and fine-tune performance of real-world network protocols in different scenarios before deploying the network, and hence engineer the mobile ad hoc network. We demonstrate the effectiveness of MOWINE by analyzing and understanding the performance of six different VANET routing protocols using real-world taxi cab traces collected in San Francisco.