Generating and Evaluating network performance

[jlwmanagement]

Hi All,

<Long Version>
I am using C#.net and am looking for a good way to generate network traffic and measure the aspects of it (latency, dropped packets, etc). Basically I am trying to write a custom packet structure that allows for a specific type of prioritization at Level 3 of the OSI model.

Before I can do that I need to know exactly what kinds of delays I am overcoming, otherwise there is no way to tell if my prioritization algorithm is worth implementing.
</Long Version>

<Short Version>
I basically just need to simulate many nodes on a network generating different loads of traffic on that network. I need to measure things like latency, dropped packets, etc. My Google-Fu has failed me, only finding techniques that limit the bandwidth itself and not simulate traffic itself.

Any thoughts?
</Short Version>

Thanks in Advance!

 

[Ken g6]

Sounds like you need to do "load testing". The last network load testing product I used was SoapUI/LoadUI. Looks like LoadUI is the system that can have distributed "load generators", which I think is what you're after.

There are other, potentially more advanced, load testing systems, like HP's LoadRunner, but they are rather expensive.

 

[Markbnj]

The only thing that comes to mind is iperf (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iperf). It will measure the parameters you mentioned between two endpoints in client/server mode. But it sounds like what you want is a graph. You could potentially set up a number of different iperf client/server pairs and run them simultaneously, but still I'm not quite sure whether that gets you what you need.