Accuracy and Efficiency in Simulating VANETs

The evaluation of new communication protocols for Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANETs) is a hot topic in research. An efficient design and actual deployment of such software tools is crucial for any VANET. The design phase is difficult and often relies on computer simulation. The later evaluation of protocols in real VANETs is complex due to many difficulties concerning the availability of resources, accurate performance analysis, and reproducible results. Simulation is the most widely solution to make a good design but it presents also an important challenge: the fidelity of the simulation compared to the real results. In this article we measure the differences between the simulation versus the real results with actual moving cars in order to quantify the accuracy of the VANET simulations inside the European CARLINK Project. After a thorough revision of the state of the art, we here go for an analysis of JANE and VanetMobiSim/ns-2, two simulation frameworks. Later, we have defined the scenario where both, simulations and real tests, will be carried out. Our results show that JANE is more appropriate for simulating applications, while ns-2 is more accurate in dealing with the underlying mobile communication network.