Simulate networks in Android Automotive OS (AAOS)

This page describes how to simulate different network conditions on Android Automotive hardware devices in a scalable, low-maintenance way. This environment agnostic network simulation uses commonly available Linux tools that can run on Android Automotive hardware devices.

The following sections describe how to set up and run a network simulation on Android Automotive hardware devices.

Kernel requirement

To enable network simulation on a device under test (DUT), the Linux ifb and netem modules must be configured in the kernel config file, as shown below:

# Network simulation config fragment start
CONFIG_NET_SCH_NETEM=y
CONFIG_IFB=y
CONFIG_NET_ACT_MIRRED=y
# Network simulation config fragment end

Set up simulation

All network simulations or throttling simulations must be conducted on a device under test (DUT). This simulation uses the Linux tc and NetEm utilities to control network traffic on the network interface controller (NIC) based on the control policy and rules.

To set up the simulation, do the following:

  1. Connect the DUT and the host server to the internet.
  2. Create the NetworkSimulation.sh script by copying it from the code provided in the NetworkSimulation.sh script section and download it on the host server.
  3. Connect the host server to the DUT. Ensure that the DUT appears in the list of connected devices by running adb devices -l.

For an illustration of the setup architecture, see the following figure:

nw-sim

Figure 1. Setup architecture.

NetworkSimulation.sh script

The NetworkSimulation.sh script file contains adb commands that run the network simulation. Copy the following into a file named NetworkSimulation.sh:

  #!/bin/bash

  latency=$1
  bandwidth=$2
  packetloss=$3

  # root device and set it to permissive mode
  adb root
  adb shell setenforce 0

  #Clear the current tc control
  adb shell tc qdisc del dev ifb0 root
  adb shell ip link set dev ifb0 down
  adb shell tc qdisc del dev wlan0 ingress
  adb shell tc qdisc del dev wlan0 root

  # Create a virtual device for ingress
  adb shell ip link set dev wlan0 up
  adb shell ip link set dev ifb0 up
  adb shell tc qdisc del dev wlan0 clsact
  adb shell tc qdisc add dev wlan0 handle ffff: ingress
  adb shell tc filter add dev wlan0 parent ffff: protocol all u32 match u32 0 0 action mirred egress redirect dev ifb0

  # Throttle upload bandwidth / latency / packet loss
  adb shell tc qdisc add dev wlan0 root handle 1: htb default 11
  adb shell tc class add dev wlan0 parent 1: classid 1:1 htb rate "$bandwidth"
  adb shell tc class add dev wlan0 parent 1:1 classid 1:11 htb rate "$bandwidth"
  adb shell tc qdisc add dev wlan0 parent 1:11 handle 10: netem delay "$latency" loss "$packetloss"

  # Throttle download bandwidth
  adb shell tc qdisc add dev ifb0 root handle 1: htb default 10
  adb shell tc class add dev ifb0 parent 1: classid 1:1 htb rate "$bandwidth"
  adb shell tc class add dev ifb0 parent 1:1 classid 1:10 htb rate "$bandwidth"

Execute simulation

To execute a network simulation, the adb commands in the NetworkSimulation.sh script file use command line arguments to set values.

To specify the latency, bandwidth, and packet loss you want to simulate, run the NetworkSimulation.sh script with the following command line arguments:

  • Latency, specified in ms.
  • Bandwidth, specified in kbit or mbit.
  • Packet loss, as a percentage.

For example, to set a 300ms latency, 100kbit bandwidth and 50% packet loss, run:

bash NetworkSimulation.sh 300ms 100kbit 50%

To set a 100ms latency, 1mbit bandwidth and 0% packet loss, run:

bash NetworkSimulation.sh 100ms 1mbit 0%

Verify simulation

After executing the NetworkSimulation.sh script, verify that the network simulation is configured correctly and is running as expected using the Linux ping and curl commands. Use the ping command to verify the latency and the curl command to verify the bandwidth.

For example, the following is the expected output of ping for a simulation executed with bash NetworkSimulation.sh 100ms 500kbit 10%:

BUILD:/ # ping -c 20 www.google.com
PING www.google.com (172.217.5.100) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=1 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=2 ttl=119 time=105 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=3 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=5 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=6 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=7 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=9 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=10 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=11 ttl=119 time=185 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=12 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=13 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=14 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=15 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=16 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=17 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=18 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=19 ttl=119 time=103 ms
64 bytes from sfo03s07-in-f4.1e100.net (172.217.5.100): icmp_seq=20 ttl=119 time=103 ms

--- www.google.com ping statistics ---
20 packets transmitted, 18 received, 10% packet loss, time 19040ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 103.394/108.307/185.756/18.791 ms

This example shows that ping reports a packet loss at 10% and average latency close to 108ms, which is as expected for the 100ms value specified in the simulation. It's normal for the reported latency to differ from the specified value by a small amount.

For the same example, the following is the expected output of running the curl command.

BUILD:/sdcard/DCIM # curl https://images-assets.nasa.gov/image/PIA15416/PIA15416~orig.jpg -o foo.jpg
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100 6598k  100 6598k    0     0  49220      0  0:02:17  0:02:17 --:--:-- 47574

This example shows that curl reports the average download speed at 49220 Bps, which is as expected for the 500kbit specified in the simulation. It's normal for the reported bandwidth to differ from the specified value by a small amount.