IJCCCE Vol.13, No.

1, 2013

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator
Hayder R. Hamandi1
1

Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary2

Department of Information Technology, Technical College of

Management/Baghdad,
Foundation of Technical Education, Baghdad

Department of Internet Engineering, College of Information Engineering,

Nahrain University, Baghdad
email: [email protected]

[email protected]

Received: 24/05 /2011

Accepted: 22/7 /2013

Abstract As mobile computing is more and more widespread, mobility support for
Internet devices becomes very important. Mobile IPv6 (MIPv6) is a promising
technology that handles the mobility management and provides the seamless mobile
communications. It is expected that MIPv6, as a standard for mobile communication,
will open the Mobile Internet Age. In this paper, we will discuss the basic principles of
MIPv6 operation by means of handoff process and tunneling mechanism. We will also
show how to simulate a proposed MIPv6 network scenario. This work is based on a
specific simulator named OMNeT++ which includes simulation packages. Our
simulation results include the throughput of each router in the proposed MIPv6 network;
it also includes the handoff latency for each mobile node in the proposed MIPv6
network.
Keywords Mobile IPv6, OMNeT++, INET Framework, Home Agent, Foreign Agent.
.

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IJCCCE Vol.13, No.1, 2013

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator

Hayder R. Hamandi and

Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary

1. Introduction
Mobile IPv6 (MIPv6) is a protocol
developed as a subset of Internet Protocol
version 6 (IPv6) to support mobile
connections. MIPv6 is an update of the
Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
Mobile IP standard designed to
authenticate mobile devices (known as
mobile nodes) using IPv6 addresses
[1][2].
In traditional IP routing, IP addresses
represent a topology. Routing mechanisms
rely on the assumption that each network
node will always have the same point of
attachment to the Internet, and that each
node's IP address identifies the network
link where it is connected. In this routing
scheme, if you disconnect a mobile device
from the Internet and want to reconnect
through a different network, you have to
configure the device with a new IP
address, and the appropriate net mask and
default
router. Otherwise, routing
protocols have no means of delivering
datagrams (packets), because the device's
network address does not contain the
necessary information about the node's
network point of attachment to the
Internet. MIPv6 allows a mobile node
(MN)
to
transparently
maintain
connections while moving from one
subnet to another. Each device is
identified by its home address although it
may be connected to through another
network [3].
This paper is organized as follows:
Section 1 gives an introduction to the
MIPv6. Section 2 summarizes the
OMNeT++ simulation framework along
with all the necessary environments and
modules. The simulation of an MIPv6
network is discussed in section 3. Section
4 gives the conclusions obtained from the
results of simulation.

2. The OMNET++ Simulation

Framework
OMNeT++ is an extensible, modular,
component-based C++ simulation library
and framework, primarily for building
network simulators. "Network" is meant
in a broader sense that includes wired and
wireless communication networks, onchip networks, queuing networks, and so
on. Domain-specific functionality such as
support for sensor networks, wireless adhoc
networks,
Internet
protocols,
performance
modeling,
photonic
networks, etc., is provided by model
frameworks, developed as independent
projects.
OMNeT++ offers an Eclipse-based
IDE, a graphical runtime environment,
and a host of other tools. There are
extensions for real-time simulation,
network
emulation,
alternative
programming languages (Java, C#),
database
integration,
System
C
integration, and several other functions.
OMNeT++ is a discrete event simulation
environment for modeling communication
networks, IT systems, queuing networks,
hardware architectures, multiprocessors,
distributed or parallel processes and other
systems [4][5].
OMNeT++ aspires to be the optimal
solution between open-source, researchoriented simulators (like NS-2 [6]) and the
high-priced commercial softwares (like
OPNET [7]). Therefore OMNeT++ is
public source, and under the Academic
Public License it is free to use for nonprofit aims. OMNeT++ provides a
component architecture for models.
Components (modules) are programmed
in C++, then assembled into larger
components and models using a high-level
language called NEtwork Description
(NED). Reusability of models comes for
free. All the modules and files of the
OMNeT++ network simulator can be
configured using GUI view or source view

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IJCCCE Vol.13, No.1, 2013

Hayder R. Hamandi and
Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator

with no restrictions. OMNeT++ has

extensive GUI support, and due to its
modular architecture, the simulation
kernel (and models) can be embedded
easily into your applications.

Figure 1 shows a screenshot of

OMNeT++ simulation environment.

Figure 1. OMNeT++ Simulation Environment

Modules communicate with messages thus

message sending and receiving are the
most frequent tasks in simple modules,
see Figure 2. Messages contain common
attributes (like timestamps) and also
arbitrary ones (i.e. any other kind of user
data). Simple modules typically use gates
(input and output interfaces of modules
that can be linked with connections) for
sending messages, but direct send to
destination modules (using an invocation
from the OMNeT++ simulation kernel) is
possible as well. OMNeT++ messages can
be easily defined by specifying the fields
and other possible message content in
(.msg) files and by letting OMNeT++ to

take care of creating the necessary C++

classes from the (.msg) definitions [1].
A special topology description
language
called
NED
(NEtwork
Description) is applicable for users to
define the structure of simulation models
(the modules and their interconnection) in
OMNeT++. A typical (.ned) description
file consists of simple module declarations
(i.e. description of the modules
interfaces), compound module definitions
(i.e. declaration of the module's external
interfaces and definition of submodules
and their interconnection) and network
definitions (i.e. compound modules that
are self-containing simulation models). In
this way model behavior and model

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IJCCCE Vol.13, No.1, 2013

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator

Hayder R. Hamandi and

Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary

topology are separated: behavior is

defined in C++ code, while topology is
determined by the NED language.

this paper is based on OMNeT++ package

named as the INET Framework [2].

3.

The Proposed MIPv6 Simulation

Scenario

When connecting through a foreign

network, a mobile device sends its
location information to a home agent
(HA), which intercepts packets intended
for the device and tunnels them to the
current location shown in Figure 3. Note
that the red line indicates the bidirectional
tunnel between the MN and the HA[8][9].
We have designed and simulated an
MIPv6 network using the OMNeT++
network simulator. This network consist
of three Mobile Nodes (MN[0], MN[1],
and MN[2]) moving in random directions,
thereby changing their points of
attachment to the five Correspondent
Nodes (CN[0] through CN[4]) as shown
in Figure 4. We have used Ethernet
connection to connect the wired nodes,
and we have designed the wireless
channel of the network to operate with a
frequency of 2.4 GHz, and 11 Mbps
which is the 802.11 wireless channel
standard.

Figure 2. Hierarchy of modules in

OMNeT++
Simulation parameters (i.e. initial
parameters of simulation runs which are
independent both from the C++ and the
NED codes) are specified in (.ini) files.
Separating initial inputs in this way enable
users to run simulations for each one of
the interested parameter combination
without modifying the existing codes.
OMNeT++ uses the configuration
(omnetpp.ini) initialization file to start the
simulation of the network. The work in

Figure 3. Simple MIPv6 Network Scenario

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IJCCCE Vol.13, No.1, 2013

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator

Hayder R. Hamandi and

Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary

Each mobile node will perform

multiple handoff operations between the 3
APs, AP_Home is the home network of
the three mobile nodes. We are assuming
that all the mobile nodes were connected
to the Home_Agent router, and after that
each device changed its position
randomly. Therefore AP_1 and AP_2 are
acting as foreign agents and are tunneling
the packets from the MNs to the home
agent via the router R_3.

shown in Figure 6. This was done by

subtracting the association request time
from the association confirm time as
shown in the following formula:
L2_HO_Delay = Association Confirm
Time Association Request Time
The association request / confirm time
are recorded in the scalar result files. Also
it is possible to calculate the handoff delay
using the authentication request / confirm
time, which is the time required for the
MN to authenticate the new AP during the
handoff operation, these values are also
recorded in the scalar file (results.sca).
From the results we conclude that the
handoff delay of each mobile node
depends mainly on the number of handoff
operations and the amount of data bytes to
be sent by each node. It also depends on
the number of authentication steps for
each handoff operation and in our case
this number was fixed to 4 steps.

4.

Results and Conclusion

After simulating the network above,
we have gathered the results in the
analysis file and organized them by
creating data sets for vector values of the
same type, for example Figure 5 shows
the number of Bytes/sec sent from the
three routers which is the throughput for
each router.
The handoff delays were automatically
calculated by the OMNeT++ simulator as

Figure 4. MIPv6 Network Simulation Environment in OMNeT++

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IJCCCE Vol.13, No.1, 2013

Simulation of Mobile IPv6

Using OMNeT++ Simulator

Hayder R. Hamandi and

Dr. Emad H. Al-Hemiary

Figure 5. Throughputs of the 3 Routers

Figure 6. Layer 2 Handoff Delays for each Mobile Node (MN)

[5] The Second International Workshop on
Mobile IPv6 and Network Based
Localized
Mobility
Management
(MobiWorld2010), Official homepage:
http://isyou.hosting.paran.com/mobiwo
rld10/. January 2010.

References
[1] OMNeT++
Network
Framework,
Official
http://omnetpp.org

Simulation
homepage:

[2] The
Mobility
Framework
for
OMNeT++,
Official
homepage:
http://omnetpp.org/doc/INET/neddoc/i
ndex.html

[6] The Network Simulator ns-2, Official

homepage:http://nsnam.isi.edu/nsnam/i
ndex.php/main_page

[3] D. Johnson, C. Perkins, J. Arkko:

Mobility Support in IPv6,IETF RFC
3775,
(http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3775.txt).
June 2004.

[7] OPNET Technologies Inc., Official

homepage:http://www.opnet.com
[8] ZhigangKan,
Dongemei
Zhang,
Runtong Zhang, Jian Ma: QoS in
Mobile IPv6, Nokia China R&D
Center, 2005

[4] J. Arkko, V. Devarapalli, F. Dupont,

Using IPsec to Protect Mobile IPv6
Signaling Between Mobile Nodes and
Home Agents, IETF RFC 3776,
(http://www.ietf.org/rfcs/rfc3776.txt).
May 2005.

[9] Guillaume Valadon: Mobile IPv6:

Architectures and Protocols, Ph.D
Thesis, June 2008.

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