Smartphone user’s traffic characteristics and modelling
Journal
Transactions on Networks and Communications
Date Issued
2013-12-19
Author(s)
Abstract
The proliferation of smartphones and the demand for all-day connectivity has brought
exponential growth of global mobile data traffic. To survive the explosive progression and best
serve their customers, mobile network operators need to have a better understanding of the
nature of traffic carried by cellular networks. Understanding the characteristics of this traffic is
important for network design, traffic modelling, resource planning, and network control. In this
work we investigate the basic characteristics of smartphone traffic, identifying and
understanding the impact of context (location, time, physical interface) on smartphone usage
for calls, messages and data traffic. In order to identify and characterize patterns in the user
traffic generated by smartphone devices in the mobile networks, we employ naturalistic logging
methodology based on non-obtrusive background data collection while aiming for a highly
diverse study participant’s backdrop. Our statistical results present a comprehensive analysis on
user habits while using their smartphones on a daily or weekly basis. By taking advantage of the
gathered user logs and the statistical analysis of the traffic characteristics, we attempt to design
a mobile traffic generator that will create synthetic voice, message and data traffic according to
the observed real life traffic characteristics. The generated mobile traffic scenarios can be used
not only for modelling the mobile operators’ network (such as 3G and 4G), but also WiFi,
mobile ad hoc and sensor networks.
exponential growth of global mobile data traffic. To survive the explosive progression and best
serve their customers, mobile network operators need to have a better understanding of the
nature of traffic carried by cellular networks. Understanding the characteristics of this traffic is
important for network design, traffic modelling, resource planning, and network control. In this
work we investigate the basic characteristics of smartphone traffic, identifying and
understanding the impact of context (location, time, physical interface) on smartphone usage
for calls, messages and data traffic. In order to identify and characterize patterns in the user
traffic generated by smartphone devices in the mobile networks, we employ naturalistic logging
methodology based on non-obtrusive background data collection while aiming for a highly
diverse study participant’s backdrop. Our statistical results present a comprehensive analysis on
user habits while using their smartphones on a daily or weekly basis. By taking advantage of the
gathered user logs and the statistical analysis of the traffic characteristics, we attempt to design
a mobile traffic generator that will create synthetic voice, message and data traffic according to
the observed real life traffic characteristics. The generated mobile traffic scenarios can be used
not only for modelling the mobile operators’ network (such as 3G and 4G), but also WiFi,
mobile ad hoc and sensor networks.
Subjects
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