Unified Multi-Abstraction-Level Functional Testing and Performance Measurements for Industrial IoT in Spatially Distributed Narrow Band-Wireless Wide Area Networks

Narrow Band-Wireless Wide Area Networking (NB-WWAN) technologies are becoming more popular across a wide range of application domains due to their ability to provide spatially distributed and reliable wireless connectivity in addition to offering low data rates, low bandwidth, long-range, and long battery life. For functional testing and performance assessments, the wide range of wireless technology alternatives within this category poses several difficulties. At the device level, it is necessary to address issues such as resource limitations, complex protocols, interoperability, and reliability, while at the network level, challenges include complex topologies and wireless channel/signal propagation problems. Testing the functionality and measuring the performance of spatially distributed NB-WWAN systems require a systematic approach to overcome these challenges. Furthermore, to provide a seamless test flow, it is also critical to test and compare the performance of wireless systems systematically and consistently across the different system development phases. To evaluate NB-WWAN technologies comprehensively across multiple abstraction levels-network simulators, emulated lab testbeds, and field test environments-we propose a unified multi-abstraction-level testing methodology. A detailed technical description of the prototype implementation and its evaluation is presented in this paper.