Review of Simulators for Wireless Mesh Networks

The research of computer networks construction of models that reflect the current audited environment to carry out practical research is extremely dicult and often involves signicant costs. Hence, the popularity of simulation tools that help developers to determine as early as at the stage of the simulation whether a given solution can be deployed in a real network. However, over time many dierent simulation tools have been developed, each with dierent characteristics, dierent uses, dierent strengths and weaknesses. It is the task of the researcher then to select, before starting the actual research, one of the available simulators in accordance with the needs and adopted criteria of evaluation. In the article the authors present issues related to the simulation tools and the main advantages of simulation as well as their drawbacks. To help researchers select an appropriate simulation environment, the authors present statistical information gathered during a literature survey of a number of research articles from the most popular publishers in which the selected simulators were used in initial system design.