challenges in Internet simulation & modeling(2)


mathematical frameworks to find structure/patterns in traffic
a la scott's encouragement to `formalize some of what we (and providers) know' 
macroscopic as well as microscopic
theory of joint spatial/temporal locality
spectroscopy, tomography
ietf/ippm has been trying for a few years, but without dedicated funding

source modeling (for realistic inputs into simulations, models)
extract a set of source models from an aggregate trace 
feature extraction problem
10,000 gnutella port numbers are not 10,000 flows
ultimate goal: augment libraries of source level models w generation of own
calibrate models by evaluating their power for prediction

empirically validated simulation of a significant aspect of the Internet
already much work in large-scale simulations, but no recognized empirically validated simulation of any signficant piece of the Internet
note: large scale means in size as well as # of protocols
requires cooperation from providers and vendors to get default and configured parameters of OSes and algorithms.  govt could shepherd/foster this cooperation