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Internet Performance and Troubleshooting Lab
01HFTBG, 01HFTOV
A.A. 2023/24
Course Language
Inglese
Degree programme(s)
Master of science-level of the Bologna process in Communications Engineering - Torino
Master of science-level of the Bologna process in Ingegneria Informatica (Computer Engineering) - Torino
Course structure
| Teaching | Hours |
|---|---|
| Lezioni | 20 |
| Esercitazioni in laboratorio | 40 |
Lecturers
| Teacher | Status | SSD | h.Les | h.Ex | h.Lab | h.Tut | Years teaching |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mellia Marco | Professore Ordinario | IINF-05/A | 20 | 0 | 40 | 0 | 2 |
Co-lectures
Context
| SSD | CFU | Activities | Area context | ING-INF/03 | 6 | D - A scelta dello studente | A scelta dello studente |
|---|
2023/24
This is a laboratory and experimental course in the field of Internet traffic measurements. Most of the classes will be given in laboratories, with few introductory lessons for each field. Students will be guided to setup experiments, run active or passive measurement tools in real networks, and apply methodologies learned in previous classes. Students will use both passive traffic analysers, and active traffic generators to characterise and load the network. They will face lab sessions of increasing complexity, maturing a critical approach and scientific methodology toward the understanding of complex systems such as the Internet is.
During the class, students will also learn basic machine learning methodologies to support the data analysis, following a data driven approach. In this second group of laboratories students will follow a hands-on approach, where the fundamentals of supervised machine learning for classification problem will be introduced and then applied in the context of Internet measurements.
The Internet Performance and Troubleshooting Lab is experimental. Students will work in groups in laboratories and face different experiments of increasing complexity. The professor will guide them in setting up the experiments, use proper measurement and traffic generator tools, and challenge the students in understanding wrong setups or malfunctioning scenarios.
Students will learn how to configure LAN or WiFi networks, interconnect networks using routing protocols, use passive traffic analyzers and high-performance traffic generators to measure the web or application performance and identify and solve problems. Students will face lab sessions of increasing complexity, acquiring a critical approach and the scientific methodology toward understanding complex systems such as the Internet.
Students will work in the Laboratory using PCs running Linux OS. Working in groups of three students, they will set up experiments by configuring LANs with Ethernet switches and WiFi access points, and learn how to configure routing and routing protocols. At the end of the course, students will use real traffic traces collected from real networks to understand how complex application services work on the Internet.
Students will mature a critical view and acquire the fundamentals of machine learning - applied to network measurements. In particular, students will get
1. the knowledge of the analysis of Internet configurations and misconfigurations, and protocols like IP, TCP, UDP, HTTP, DNS.
2. the knowledge of performance related problems in local and wide area networks via delay and throughput measurements
3. the ability to process real traffic traces and to extract information related to both performance and troubleshooting issues from real traffic.
4. the ability to use understand and use properly machine learning tools to solve some classification problems applied to internet traffic analysis.
5. the ability to use modern tools and programming languages like Python and Jupyter Notebook for quick prototyping of high level machine learning problems.
The ability to apply the gained knowledge will be verified by the preparation of lab reports, and its discussion during an oral examination at the end of the course.
Students will mature a critical view of Internet technologies, their performance implications, and the bottlenecks or possible misconfigurations that can occur. In detail, students will learn:
1. the fundamentals of protocols like IP, TCP, UDP, HTTP, QUIC and DNS, and the way to properly configure them;
2. how to configure, troubleshoot and identify network configuration errors like duplicated addresses, misconfigured line cards, implementation bugs, etc.
3. how to properly engineer a “speed test” experiment to measure the performance in Ethernet and WiFi networks;
4. the impact of delay and packet loss on the performance of a download, or a video stream application, and of virtualization (VMs) or hardware acceleration techniques;
5. the proper configuration of routing protocols and the impact of link failures on the network topology;
6. the ability to process significant traffic traces and extract information related to performance and troubleshooting issues from real traffic.
The ability to apply the gained knowledge will be verified by preparing lab reports and discussing them during an oral examination at the end of the course.
Students must have very good knowledge of the protocols and mechanisms normally used in the Internet. In particular, students must be experts with LAN protocols (Ethernet IEEE 802.3, WiFi IEEE 802.3, CSMA/CD, direct and indirect delivery, LAN interconnections), of network (IP) and transport (TCP/UDP) protocols normally used in the Internet, routing protocols (RIP, OSPF), and application layer protocols (DNS, HTTP, HTTPS, multimedia streaming protocols, etc.).
Traffic models will be also used and students must be familiar with basic traffic modeling techniques (Poisson models, Markovian models, hypothesis tests, confidence interval evaluation).
Students must know the protocols and mechanisms normally used on the Internet. Students must have a solid knowledge of LAN protocols (Ethernet IEEE 802.3, WiFi IEEE 802.11, CSMA/CD, direct and indirect delivery, LAN interconnections), network (IPv4, IPv6, routing protocols), transport (TCP/UDP) protocols, and application layer protocols (DNS, HTTP, HTTPS, QUIC, multimedia streaming protocols, etc.).
Students will work in the Laboratory using PCs running Linux OS. Using Ethernet switches and WiFi access points, students will have to setup experiments configuring LANs. Each group of students will use 3 PCs.
Real traffic traces will be used to allow students to deal with more realistic scenarios. Students will go though the following group of laboratories:
• Configuration of hosts in Local Area Networks, IP addresses management, subnetting/supernetting (2 hours)
• Traffic monitoring using sniffers in LAN: TCP, UDP and HTTP (6 hours)
• Performance measurement for file transfers in wired networks (6 hours)
• Performance measurement for file transfers in WiFi setup (6 hours)
• Performance measurement for file transfers and impact of delay and packet losses (8 hours)
• Analysis of traffic traces collected from real networks and development of post-processing tools to extract information out of the raw data (15 hours)
• Usage of statistical methods and data mining techniques to find correlations and solve classification problems (15 hours)
Students will go through the following laboratories:
1. Configuration of hosts in Local Area Networks, IP addresses management, subnetting/supernetting (2 hours)
2. Traffic monitoring using sniffers in LAN: TCP, UDP and HTTP (4 hours)
3. Troubleshooting of local area networks: the presence of link failures, duplicated addresses, misconfigured interfaces, etc. (4 hours)
4. Network discovery and security: portscan and netscan using nmap (2 hours)
5. Engineering of “speed test” measurements:
a. file transfers throughput in wired networks (6 hours)
b. file transfers throughput in WiFi networks (6 hours)
c. impact of virtualization (4 hours)
d. impact and fairness of TCP and QUIC congestion control algorithms with packet loss and delay (8 hours)
6. Video streaming performance and impact of packet loss and delay (4 hours)
7. Routing configuration: manual routing setup and automatic configuration with OSPF protocol (6 hours)
8. Analysis of traffic traces collected from real networks and development of post-processing tools to extract information out of the raw data (14 hours)
The course is particularly useful for students enrolled in the Computer Networks and Cloud Computing and Cybersecurity tracks
The course is particularly useful for students enrolled in the Computer Networks and Cloud Computing and Cybersecurity tracks
In this course there is large number of laboratory activities on the topics of communication networks. Students perform these laboratory activities at the the LED laboratories of the Electronic and Communication Department. It will also possible to use your own laptop for laboratories.
Each laboratory will be introduced in classes, where the fundamentals of technologies and methodologies will be presented.
Most of the course will be held in laboratories where students will work in groups and face various experiments. They will work with Linux and the lab PCs, or use their own laptops, preparing and executing the lab experiments.
Before each lab session, the instructor will present the fundamentals of protocols, technologies, and tools to recap the involved technologies. At the end of each lab session, the instructor will discuss the results with students to understand and clarify the main takeaway messages and facts.
The teaching material will be made available by the class teacher on the Didattica web portal.
Description of the lab experiments will be provided, and reference documentation will be made available to students.
No textbook is available. Students must be familiar with Internet protocol and applications which can be found for example in A. Pattavina: Reti di telecomunicazioni, Mc.Graw-Hill (in Italian)
or J.F. Kurose, K.W. Ross: Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet, Pearson (in English)
The teaching material will be made available by the class teacher on the Didattica web portal.
The material will guide the students with a description of the lab experiments, reference documentation, and theoretical information.
No textbook is available.
Students must be familiar with Internet protocols and applications, which can be found for example, in
-- A. Pattavina: Reti di telecomunicazioni, Mc.Graw-Hill (in Italian)
-- J.F. Kurose, K.W. Ross: Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet, Pearson (in English)
Dispense; Esercitazioni di laboratorio; Video lezioni dell’anno corrente; Video lezioni tratte da anni precedenti;
Lecture notes; Lab exercises; Video lectures (current year); Video lectures (previous years);
Modalità di esame: Prova orale obbligatoria; Elaborato scritto individuale; Elaborato scritto prodotto in gruppo;
Exam: Compulsory oral exam; Individual essay; Group essay;
...
During the laboratories, students are required to work in groups. At the end of the course, each group will have to deliver a written report on the laboratory experiences as indicated by the teacher during the course (group report). In total, the report focuses on 8 topics. The report must be delivered in a single PDF file, to be uploaded to the teaching portal by the end of the exam registration deadline. The report will be corrected to verify the correctness of the reported results, and the completeness in the description of the experiments performed. All students in the group will have the same mark, expressed in thirtieths, up to a maximum of 30/30.
The group report mark will be valid for all members of the group, and will be valid for two years. Once corrected, the report can be changed only in case all students agree.
Each student will also have to prepare and individual report, that have to be uploaded as a single PDF file on the teaching portal by the deadline for the student registration for the exam. The individual report will be discussed during oral examination.
Each student will be asked to discuss the content of the reports (both group and individual) during the oral exam. The oral exam is individual, and students will be asked to answer questions about both the practical and theoretical part of the course. The grade for the oral exam must be sufficient to pass the exam, with minimum 18/30 and maximum 30 cum laude.
The final vote will be a weighted average between the evaluations of the group laboratory report (70%) and oral examinations (30%).
It is possible to get additional points with specific topics reports, or preparing lessons notes to be reused in subsequent years.
Gli studenti e le studentesse con disabilità o con Disturbi Specifici di Apprendimento (DSA), oltre alla segnalazione tramite procedura informatizzata, sono invitati a comunicare anche direttamente al/la docente titolare dell'insegnamento, con un preavviso non inferiore ad una settimana dall'avvio della sessione d'esame, gli strumenti compensativi concordati con l'Unità Special Needs, al fine di permettere al/la docente la declinazione più idonea in riferimento alla specifica tipologia di esame.
Exam: Compulsory oral exam; Individual essay; Group essay;
GROUP REPORT
During the laboratories, students are required to work in groups of three people. At the end of each lab, each group will have to deliver a written report on the specific topics indicated by the instructor. In total, each group will prepare 6 group reports.
Each report must be delivered and uploaded to the teaching portal by a specific deadline.
The report will be graded evaluating the result correctness and the completeness of the performed experiments. All students in the group will obtain the same grade, up to a maximum of 27/30.
If all other reports are sufficient, students are offered the opportunity to revise at most one report. If some reports are insufficient, students must revise and resubmit them.
To be admitted to the oral exam, all reports must be sufficient and ready before the exam application deadline.
The group report mark will be valid for all group members and will be valid for two years.
INDIVIDUAL REPORT
Each student will also prepare an individual report that will be discussed during the oral examination. The instructor will define the topic of the individual report. Students will have to upload the individual report on the teaching portal website before the exam application deadline.
EXTRA POINTS by taking part in the discussion during labs
During classes and labs, students are invited to answer questions and discuss the results they obtained, gaining up to 2 extra points.
ORAL EXAM
During the oral exam, each student will be asked to discuss the content of the reports (both group and individual). The oral exam is individual, and students will be asked to answer questions about the course's practical and theoretical parts. The grade for the oral exam must be sufficient to pass the exam, with a minimum 18/30 and a maximum 30 cum laude.
The final grade will be a weighted average between the evaluations of the group laboratory report (70%) and oral examinations (30%).
It is possible to get additional points with specific topic reports or prepare lesson notes to be reused in subsequent years.
In addition to the message sent by the online system, students with disabilities or Specific Learning Disorders (SLD) are invited to directly inform the professor in charge of the course about the special arrangements for the exam that have been agreed with the Special Needs Unit. The professor has to be informed at least one week before the beginning of the examination session in order to provide students with the most suitable arrangements for each specific type of exam.