How´s My Network? A Java Approach to Home Network Measurement

As part of a project to develop a user-centered network measurement platform that limits impediments to participation, this work focuses on using the execution of a signed Java applet for home network measurement. We have developed a Java applet tool to understand the capabilities of such a tool for measuring characteristics of a user´s network environment from the browser. This paper reports on the capabilities of the tool, the measurement methodology employed, and initial results obtained for a set of residential users employing the tool. Despite the sandbox-type restrictions in Java, the results include information about the configuration of the user´s testing machine, wireless connectivity of the testing machine, available upload and download throughput, DNS performance and the number and type of devices on the user´s network.