Simulation of 802.11 radio-over-fiber networks using ns-3

The radio-over-fiber (RoF) technology is a suitable solution to provide high bitrates and to improve the IEEE 802.11 WLAN coverage. Those systems use an optical network to distribute the radio signal from the access point to several remote antennas. Our research project consist in the investigation of the Medium Control Access (MAC) layer performance of those networks. We decided to achieve our work with ns-3 since it provides an accurate Wi-Fi model. However, there is a lack of model for RoF simulations in ns-3. As a result, we developed a new physical layer in ns-3 based on the existing Yans Wi-Fi modules to enable the simulation of such hybrid networks. This paper shows how ns-3 can be used for the simulation of 802.11 RoF systems and compare our simulation results achieved in ns-3 with the results obtained with Opnet by other research groups.