Next Generation Networks (NGN) and Applications are constantly pushing network boundaries in terms of Quality of Service (QoS) and Quality of Experience (QoE). Delivering QoS at the highest level correlates to the individual end user application QoE performance. ‘Per flow’ test and measurement is the only mechanism to guarantee performance at these levels, on this granularity.

Delivering real world proof of concept, demonstration and testing of NGN environments requires stateful traffic emulation, with the most realistic traffic flows representing actual deployments of several thousand individual clients utilizing many application types, over common services such as DHCP / PPPoE / VLAN Tagging is necessary.

DHCP / PPPoE / VLAN Tagging sessions are critical enablers for many services, not forgetting the scalable demand on current access network segments of several thousand subscribers. The services delivered in these sessions (Voice, Video or Data) are interactive by nature with functionality that is critical to defining QoE performance.

As individuals we are different, therefore there is a high probability that no two subscribers are likely to use the same service in the same manner or less likely to use the same interactive features in a similar manner concurrently. Next Generation Networking has advanced test requirements, the blanket test or the one shoe fits all, is no longer a feasible measurement of performance.

The most effective method of defining the performance limitations of Next Generation Networks is to build, test and measure on a Per Client ‘Per flow’ basis. Emulate stateful clients with multiple unique individual applications such as voice, video and data, emulate and measure performance of real world user scenarios with meaningful end user activity. Test with diversifEye!

An effective method of testing IPTV and Triple Play is to build, test & measure on a ‘Per Client / Per flow’ basis with several unique individual voice, video & application data clients behind each residential gateway.

Some key steps in testing IPTV with diversifEye are outlined here:

As per the real world, diversifEye provides emulation and test with unique MAC & IP addresses per client (critical to validate security in many environments).  In some networks part of the overall security will include authentication such as establishing DHCP sessions on a per client basis with external DCHP servers.

An effective test in diversifEye for IPTV over triple play environments includes emulating multiple individual clients inside multiple individual VLANs (with priority bits enabled), in addition diversifEye has the ability of double VLAN tagging.

diversifEye emulates client and server side. Users may test individual voice, video & application data clients against diversifEye voice, video & application data servers. But more importantly users may run the individual voice, video & application data clients against actual deployed servers through the network. This demonstrates real world performance & QoS as the clients are interacting with the real thing.

diversifEye enables scale testing, as a further step in understanding individual client QoE emulate surges in usage by adding individual clients into the environment in real time, without stopping the test. Ultimately measure the effect of one client on another client on the same Residential Gateway / across multiple Residential Gateways.

Some specific reasoning behind the need to test such tests include :
-        What happens when two IPTV STB are on the same channel and one IPTV STB changes channel? Is there any effect on the IPTV STB that does not change channel?
-         What happens when you have both IGMP V2 and IGMP V3 STB in the same household? What is the performance difference between these IPTV STB?

diversifEye measures IPTV STB’s; leave, join latency, zap rate & other performance metrics on a per client basis for each set top box (STB), plus scales to realistic home scenarios of multiple IPTV STB per residential gateway / household.

Use diversifEye to determine the maximum channel zap loads in relation to the IPTV STB and IP network, this test scenario includes emulating IPTV STBs leaving the IPTV channel immediately after the join.

After establishing the effective IPTV performance QoE results on a per flow basis, use diversifEye to create client variability to match real world use of voice, video & application data services.

Further advance IPTV performance by mitigating against security attacks, use diversifEye to run both regular (HTTP, IGMP, POP3, SMTP etc) application flows and disruptive flows (P2P, DDOS, spam, viruses). Include real documents for email, URLs, attachments for realistic, per client web traffic flows, spam, viruses etc.

To future proof the network and technology advance testing by mixing IPv4 and IPv6 application flows.

diversifEye per-flow architecture has been certified by video-on-demand (VoD) Server Vendors as the only test product to provide a uniquely flexible platform to emulate and measure each individual VoD client behind residential gateways.

Some key steps in testing VoD with diversifEye are outlined here:

As per the real world, diversifEye provides emulation and test with unique MAC & IP addresses on a per VoD client (critical to validate security in many environments).  

diversifEye enables RTSP based VoD sessions over DHCP/PPPoE/VLAN Tagging.

diversifEye enables customers perform stateful, functional and scalability testing of both the control plane and media plane architecture of the VoD solution.

diversifEye tests VoD performance measuring characteristics such as rewind, pause times and buffer control on an idividual and aggregate level.

Assess unicast RTSP deployments versus multicast deployments, using diversifEye measure performance of true ‘on demand’ controls.

Use diversifEye to quantify the quality of the video offering on preload and download, on each available movie.

Utilize diversifEye to quantify the effect of mixed traffic environments on the quality of video flows right up to thousands of users at 10Gigabit Ethernet levels.

diversifEye enables Service Providers and Equipment Vendors to test end-to-end network SIP enabled VoIP system performances. Ultimately VoIP quality is assessed on actual voice or conversational performance, however quality of experience includes the call setup timing and the time to register on the network play a key role in the overall experience.

diversifEye's flexible VoIP test strategies offer normal behavioral tests with in-depth performance metrics on individual emulated VoIP User Agents (UA) to large scale aggregate tests with a large number of UAs and high volume call rates.

diversifEye’s award winning ‘Per flow’ architecture enables users comb through the large number of emulated UAs and high volume call rates, isolate an individual call flow and measure the performance of the call setup response times to the actual voice quality metrics.

Some of diversifEye’s key VoIP functionality includes:

UAC call functionality with Register, Initiate and Accept Calls. The UAC also supports Authentication (Registration, Invite, Bye).  

Choice of codec implementations, plus the flexibility of a custom codec template.

Voice call analysis in real-time, no need to wait and/or stop a test. diversifEye supports both PESQ and R-factor on all flows. View live performance metrics while tests are running.

Dynamically bring emulated UA in and out of service while tests are running.

Emulate and determine performance of device initiation, measure DHCP and/or PPPoE performance metrics.

Implement DTMF tests, with returned media performance analysis.

Adjustable Jitter Buffer sizes on a per individual emulated UA basis.

Determine performance limitations of SIP registration servers, implement SIP only call data for larger volume registration testing.

SIP IPv6 transition test strategies, dual IPv4/IPv6 stack functionality on emulated UAs.

diversifEye emulates real network VoIP calling activity with traffic profiling, such as busy hour calling attempts.

Implement Multimedia calls, with no reference performance analysis or MOS scores on the received media.

B2BUA (RFC3261) implementation for NAT boundary traversal.

diversifEye tests include determining the number of call attempts capable during peak hours, determining root cause and affect on quality when integrating different call origin devices or codecs.

diversifEye™ comprehensively tests converged IP network architectures for weaknesses in security and importantly provides a unique ability to determine the effects of attacks on both overall network quality of service and quality of individual experience. diversifEye™ unique per flow architecture not only enables emulation of regular client side and server side applications, but also provides for the insertion of malicious attack content onto the network and into IP traffic streams.

diversifEye™ generates a real world traffic mix of genuine and malicious content containing IPTV streams, VoD requests, VoIP calls, web or mail downloads in unfavorable conditions along with email virus/worm attacks, real spam generation, DDoS attacks on servers, malicious exploitation of protocols e.g. IGMP weaknesses, channel change requests and membership reports.

Testing DPI and WAN optimization devices requires individual, real world and stateful traffic flows.

Per flow application flow emulation with mixed P2P, VoIP, IPTV, VoD and security attack traffic (DDoS, SPAM, Virus) ensures performance and quality of experience for each application processed by a DPI or WAN optimisation device.

diversifEye is utilized to test and verify Data Loss Prevention (DLP) systems and algorithms through emulating thousands of “good” users with real or stateful TCP and UDP based applications and a small number of “bad” users.

diversifEye's Per Flow metrics can rapidly determine if the "bad" users activities are properly identified and blocked.

Shenick’s Complete TWAMP capabilities give equipment vendors the tools to verify the functionality of their TWAMP implementations prior to customer acceptance testing. For service providers, Shenick’s TWAMP capabilities provide a means for conducting vendor interoperability and large scale system testing prior to TWAMP network deployment.

DOCSIS® 3.0 is enhancing Cable Operator’s service offerings through increased bandwidth for applications; IPv6 enabled Customer Premise Equipment (CPE) and new service offerings through multicast applications. In addition, Cable Providers are now in the position to prioritize traffic through Quality of Service settings. This ensures the highest quality delivery performance for delay sensitive traffic such as voice or multicast multimedia applications.

These new services will deliver real-world applications or fully stateful two-way flows. As an example a telephone call is between two people, web users request pages from a server, to obtain Multicast Multimedia users submit leave and join requests, in social networking users now upload vast quantities of data while reading their friend’s profile. For DOCSIS 3.0 this means both the Upstream and Downstream channels are now always in use.

To ensure the highest quality of service, DOCSIS 3.0 performance testing should include stateful two-way interactive flows.  DOCSIS 3.0 Quality of Experience or service satisfaction requires a ‘Per flow’ test approach in which stateful CPE traffic is presented on the Cable Modem to CPE Interface (CMCI). These stateful flows enable Cable Operators and DOCSIS 3.0 compliant vendors test performance on an end-to-end basis from CMCI to CMTS-NSI.

DOCSIS 3.0 high quality bandwidth services require an intimate knowledge of channel bonding, load balancing and QoS prioritization mechanisms. Testing the efficacy and effectiveness of these features requires a large volume of stateful CPE traffic, in which each flow can be uniquely identified and measured for its application type e.g. voice, video, data, originating CPE address and overall quality.

diversifEye’s award winning ‘Per flow’ architecture is the only platform that delivers stateful application emulation and performance analysis on a per individual CPE, per application flow basis for DOCSIS 3.0. diversifEye is a flexible and scalable solution enabling Cable Providers emulate anything from a single flow to several thousand CPEs and flows, providing real-world usage test scenarios. diversifEye’s functionality includes both CPE and server side application emulation, providing the complete test structure for CMCI to CMTS-NSI.  

Defining the performance limitations of Next Generation Networks and Equipment requires the ability to test and measure on a Per Client ‘Per flow’ basis. Emulate stateful secure end points with multiple unique individual applications such as voice, video and data. Emulate and measure performance of real world user scenarios with meaningful end point activity over secure connections using the protocols TLS/SSL.

diversifEye’s emulated end points have the same attributes as real world end points, in a secure communication. The diversifEye client end point may negotiate the TLS/SSL cipher suites, with other emulated end points or with real world devices. These include ciphers, key exchange and authentication.

diversifEye supports the use of X509 digital certificates. The certificates are used by the end points to verify that the entity presenting the certificate is who they claim to be. diversifEye is capable of generating and signing certificates/keys for test entities or end points.

Key benefits of diversifEye’s TLS/SSL enabled flows in testing:

	Large scalability of RTP/SRTP sessions, while measuring in real time per each and every end point.
	Measure voice quality metrics (MOS) and other layer 7 voice statistics in real time per each individual end point.
	Measuring video quality metrics (VQM) and other layer 7 video statistics in real time per each individual end point.
	Test and measure per end point video and voice quality metrics (e.g. measuring JPEG, MPEG, H.261, H.263, H.263+, H.264, MPEG-4, VC-1 etc).

A sample usage scenario is to emulate real IP Phones as end points running a TLS session with Call Manager/firewall and traversing RTP using SRTP. diversifEye may emulate many individual unique end points and measures in real time per MAC, DHCP V6/V4 session establishment, individual TFTP registration with Call Manager, individual parsing of TFTP information per emulated VoIP end point model, SIP/TLS session, RTP/SRTP session with Call Manager.

diversifEye is used extensively in testing enterprise call management devices, firewalls, IMS Session Border Controllers and layer 4-7 application scalability. The key strength is diversifEye's ability not to do one secure session but thousands of sessions and applications with live performance measurements on a per session per application basis. Giving real world QoE measurements.