Ubiquitous Computing and Communication Journal

COLORED PETRI NET MODELING AND THROUGHPUT ANALYSIS

FOR WIRELESS INFRASTRUCTURE NETWORKS
H. Abdul Rauf,
Dean (CSE/IT), V.L.B. Janakiammal College of Engineering & Technology, Coimbatore
A. Ebenezer Jeyakumar
Principal, Government College of Engineering, Salem
harauf@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT
CPN model consists of a set of modules, each of which contains a network of
places, transitions and arcs. The modules interact with each other through a set of
well-defined interfaces, in a similar way as known from many modern
programming languages. The graphical representation makes it easy to see the
basic structure of a complex CPN model, i.e., understand how the individual
processes interact with each other. Throughput is a measure of the actual data that
can be sent per unit of time across a network, channel or interface. Throughput is
more often used in a practical sense, for example, to measure the amount of data
actually sent across a network.
Keywords: Throughput, Colored Petri Net, Access Point, Network Response Time,
Model Time Unit

INTRODUCTION

Colored Petri Net (CPN) is a graphical oriented

language for design, specification, simulation and
verification of systems. It is in particular well-suited
for systems that consist of a number of processes
which communicate and synchronize. Typical
examples of application areas are communication
protocols, distributed systems, automated production
systems, and work flow analysis. Throughput can be
a theoretical term like bandwidth, but in this paper it
is used to measure the amount of data actually sent
across a network in the real world.
The remainder of the paper is organized as
follows: Section (2) details the theory and
background of the paper. Section (3) focuses on
modelling of network components. Section (4)
emphasizes on throughput analysis and graphical
output. Section (5) the conclusion and future scope
of the paper.

Miorandi, Kherani A. A. and Altman E. (2004)

proposed TCP flow control over 802.11. The flow
control aspect of Transmission Control Protocol
(TCP) strongly influenced the Medium Access
Control (MAC) layer behaviour, including the
probabilities of packet collisions between wireless
stations. The method does not handle a wide variety
of network scenarios including the co-existence of
both upstream and downstream TCP flows.
Taka Sukari and Stephan Hanly (2004) proposed
that in the wider Internet, the large bulk of traffic on
a typical WLAN consists of applications such as web
browsing that are carried over the TCP and collision
between TCP packets are the main causes for the
performance degradation of the network. The TCP
throughput has been analyzed as a function of
number of TCP flows when transmitted over an
IEEE 802.11 WLAN and dependent on the number
of stations. The method validates the analytical
results with simulation.

BACKGROUND
3

Dmitry A. Zaitsev (2005) proposed Colored

Petri Net model for the representation of wired LAN
and a special measuring model to determine the
network response time. The drawback of this scheme
is that the results are obtained by simulation and does
not provide accurate results. Also, the model
excludes WLAN.

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HETEROGENEOUS ENTERPRISE
NETWORK MODEL

The Enterprise Network Model consists of

various components of the network which involves
wired network and wireless network.

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token avail. The places Port*In and Port*Out are

contacted ones.

3.1 Model of Switch

A model for a static switching table is
constructed. A separate input and output buffers of
frames for each port and common buffer of the
switched frames are considered. The model of switch
is presented in Figure 1. The swi represents records
of switching table. It maps each known MAC
address to the number of port. The swf describes the
switched frames, waiting for output buffer allocation.
The field portnum stores the number of the target
port. The places Port*In and Port*Out represent the
input and output buffers of the ports correspondingly.

3.2 Model of Access Point

The model of Access Point (AP) is same as that
of switch except that the delay involved in it varies.
It is represented in Figure 2.
[dst=target]
Port*
In

[target,port]

f(src,dst,nf)
In*

@+272

seg

APta*

Api

avail
(src,dst,nf,port)

[dst=target]
[target,port]

f(src,dst,nf)
Port*
In

In*

SwTa
*
Port*
Out

f(src,dst,nf)
(src,dst,nf,1)

@+1

seg
avail

Bu*

Out*

swi

(src,dst,nf,port)

seg

@+272

Apf

avail

Figure 2. Model of Access Point

Port*
Out

f(src,dst,nf)

Bu*

Out*

3.3 Model of Workstation

(src,dst,nf,1)

seg

@+1

swf

avail

Figure 1. Model of Switch

Each token represents the record of the switching
table, for example(1,1)++1(2,1)++1(3,2)++1(4,2).
For instance, token 1(4,2) means that the host with
MAC address 4 is attached to port 2. The fusion
place Buffer is represented with Bu* (Bu1, Bu2, Bu3)
and it corresponds to the switched frames buffer. The
fusion place SwitchTable is represented with SwTa*
(SwTa1, SwTa2, SwTa3). It allows the convenient
modeling of switches with an arbitrary number of
ports avoiding numerous cross lines.
The transitions In* model the processing of input
frames. The frame is extracted from the input buffer
only in cases where the switching table contains a
record with an address that equals to the destination
address of the frame (dst =target). During the frame
displacement the target port number (port) is stored
in the buffer. The transitions Out* model the
displacement of switched frames to the output ports
buffers. The fixed time delays (@+1) are assigned to
the operations of the switching and the writing of the
frame to the output buffer. When a frame is extracted
from the input buffer by transition In*, it is replaced
with the label avail. The label avail indicates that the
channel is free and available for transmission. Before
the transition Out* sends a frame into a port, it
analyses if the channel is available by checking the

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To investigate the frames, flow transmitting

through LAN and to estimate the Network Response
Time (NRT) it is necessary to construct the models
of terminal devices attached to the network. For an
accepted degree of elaboration it is consider that
periodically repeated requests of workstations to
servers with random uniformly distributed delays.
[dst=target]
f(src,dst,nf)
LAN
in

Receive

target
Own

@+22

seg

mac

avail
src

dst@+delay()
f(src,dst,1)
LAN
out

seg

avail

Send

@+22

Remote

dst

mac

Figure 3. Model of Workstation

On reply to an accepted request a server sends a
few packets to the address of the requested
workstation. The number of packets sent and the
time delays are uniformly distributed random values.
A model of workstation is represented in Figure 3.
The places LANin and LANout model the input and
output channels of the LAN correspondingly.

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The workstation listens to the network by means

of transition Receive that receives frames with the
destination address, which is equal to the own
address of the workstation (dst=target) saved in the
place Own. The processing of received frames is
represented by the simple absorption of them. The
workstation sends periodic requests to servers by
means of transition Send. The servers addresses are
held in the place Remote. The sending of the frame is
implemented only if the LAN segment is free. It
operates by checking place LANout for a token avail.
The workstation interacts with a few servers holding
their addresses in the place Remote. The workstation
only assigns the value of a unit to it.

Model of Workstation

Model of Workstation

P1 In
P1 In
P1 Out

P1 Out
Model of Switch

Model of Access

3.4 Device Delay Calculation

The experimental setup with wired (two
desktops with a switch) and wireless network (two
laptops with an access point) is considered. A file is
transferred from one node to another via twisted pair
cable to determine the overall transfer time, T1. The
same file is transferred between the same pair of
nodes via switch. Then, the transfer time is noted as
T2. Again the same file is transferred between the
same pair of nodes via switch and AP. The transfer
time is taken as T3. The Switch delay is calculated
by the difference between T2 and T1. The AP delay
is determined by the difference between T3 and T2.
3.5 Parameters of Model
Obtained

and

Delay Values

Model of Workstation

Model of Workstation

Figure 4. Colored Petri Net for the Experimental

Set-up
4

THROUGHPUT ANALYSIS

The TCP throughput over IEEE 802.11 WLANs

for the experimental set-up shown in Figure 5 is
estimated. Various network configurations, starting
with the case of one STAtion (STA) and Active
Window (AWND) > 1 are considered and then
finally generalized to the case of multiple STAs.

The unit of Model Time Unit (MTU) equals 1

millisecond. The parameters, real value obtained
after experimentation and model value obtained as
shown in Table 1. Using these values CPN model
obtained as shown in Figure 4. The port in and port
out are mentioned as P1 In and P1 Out as shown in
Figure 4. Similarly, the workstations connected
through AP will be connected using ports for input
and output of packets.
Table 1 Parameters of Model

Parameters

Real

Model

value

value

(ms)
LAN switch read frame delay

0.035

LAN switch write frame delay

0.035

Access point read frame delay

9.548

272

Access point write frame delay

9.548

272

Workstation delay

0.771

22

Figure 5. Experimental Set-up and IP Connected

4.1 Single Station

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The assumption AWND > 1 means that

collisions between TCP data packets and TCP
Acknowledge (ACK) packets are possible. It also

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means that the TCP sender, after transmitting a data

packet, does not always need to wait for a TCP ACK
before sending another packet, since it may already
have another packet in queue. To simplify the
analysis, the key assumption that the transmit buffer
at the TCP sender is never empty. In this approach
the analysis of throughput is by focusing on the
average time tcycle between successfully transmitted
packets by the TCP sending node.
The second key assumption is that the system
achieves an equilibrium state where the average rate
of successfully transmitted packets from the TCP
sending node equals the average rate of successfully
transmitted TCP ACKs from the TCP receiving node.
In other words, the average time between
successfully transmitted packets by the TCP
receiving node is also given by tcycle.
The throughput is given by,
S = l data/t cycle Mbps
Where,
t cycle = t data + t ack + t bc

(1)

tdata=tphy +((lmac+ltcpip+ldata)/rdata)+
tsifs+tphy+(lack/rctrl)+tdifs

(3)

The tack is given by

tack=tphy+((lmac+ltcpip)/rdata)+
tsifs+tphy+(lack/rctrl)+tdifs

(4)

In a t cycle period, the TCP sending node successfully

transmits one packet, freezes its back-off counter
when the TCP receiving node successfully transmits
one packet, and increases its back-off stage
whenever there is a collision. In this case it is
assumed that, each transmitted packet has a constant
and independent collision probability p. With this
assumption, the quantity tbc can be written as
m-1

tbc = (1-p)A0+p(1-p)A1+..p
(1-p)A

m-1

(5)

A model for the case of n > 2 active STAs is

developed. In this case, either all TCP data packets
(in
the
downstream
case)
or
all
TCP
acknowledgement packets (in the upstream case)
flow through the AP transmit buffer. Therefore, it is
reasonable to assume that the AP transmit buffer
never empties. It is denoted by tcycle the average time
between packets successfully transmitted by the AP,
and assumed that an equilibrium state is reached
such that the combined effect of the n active STAs is
to yield a sequence of successfully transmitted TCP
packets (either data packets or ACK packets) with
average spacing that is also equal to tcycle.
The throughput is given by,
S = l data / t cycle Mbps

(8)

Where
tcycle=tdata+tack+tbc +

(9)

Ak = k tcoll+ tslot ((2jWmin-1)/2)

lim j=0 to k

The assumption that at each transmission attempt

of a given AP packet, there is a probability p of
colliding with STA packets, resulting in an average
back-off window, . This assumption on the average
packet spacing for the STA population as a whole
implies that each individual STA produces a
sequence of successfully transmitted packets with an
average spacing ntcycle. Given this assumption, it is
natural to assume that each STA has an average
effective back-off time of n.
The probability q that in any given slot is
determined and a packet from the tagged STA has a
collision with a packet from at least one other STA
but not with a packet from the AP. The probability of
a collision with a packet from at least one other STA
is 1-(1-1/(n))n-1, and the probability of a collision
with an AP packet is 1/. Therefore, the Eq. 10 is
obtained,
q = ( 1- ( 1- ( 1/n ) ) n-1)(1-(1/))

For 0<=k<=m

(10)

The total number of retransmissions per packet

from the tagged STA is then given by q=(1-q), and
the total occupancy of the channel due to collisions
between STA packets is given by,

(6)

Case 2: For k>m

Ak = k tcoll+ tslot ((2jWmin-1)/2)
+ (k-m) (2mWmin-1)/2)
lim j=0 to m (7)

= tsta q /(1-q)

Where, tcoll is the time duration of the collided

packet plus the MAC acknowledgement timeout. The

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4.2 Multiple Stations

(2)

The tdata is given by

Case 1:

MAC acknowledgement timeout parameter defines

the time that must elapse before the sending MAC
layer deems that a collision has occurred.

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(11)

In case of upstream flows, the packet is a TCP

ACK packet,
tsta =tack

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In case of downstream flows, the packet is a

TCP data packet,
tsta=tdata

Collision probability Vs Throughput for n=2

60
55
50

45

4.3 Throughput Calculation

Throughput

40

Using the delay values calculated in the Section

3.5 and the parameters in the Table 2, throughput is
calculated.

35

Throughput

30

25
20
15
10
5

Table 2 802.11g MAC and Physical Parameters

0
0

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

0.45

0.5

0.55

0.6

0.65

0.7

0.75

0.8

0.85

0.9

collision probability

S.No

Parameters

Value

rdata

54Mbps

rctrl

1Mbps

lack

112 bits

lmac

224 bits

l tcpip

320 bits

tphy

192 s

tslot

20 s

tsifs

10 s

tdifs

50 s

10

Wmin

16

11

Wmax

1024

12

13

Figure 7. Collision Probability versus Throughput

for Two Station
5 CONCLUSION
The CPN model has been developed for various
components of the experimental set-up and
experimentation is conducted to measure the delay
caused by the switch, the AP and the workstations.
Throughput for WLAN decreases as the probability
of collision increases. When the number of stations
connected within the network increases, throughput
decreases for a certain level. Once it reached a
saturation level, throughput remains constant even
when the number of stations goes on increasing in
the network.
6

4.4 Graphical Output

The Collision Probability versus the Throughput
for single station and multiple stations are shown in
Figure 6 and Figure 7 respectively.
collision probability Vs Throughput for n=1
60
55
50
45

T h ro u g h p u t

40
35
30
Throughput
25
20
15
10
5
0
0

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

0.45

0.5

0.55

0.6

0.65

0.7

0.75

0.8

0.85

0.9

collision Probability

Figure 6. Collision Probability versus Throughput

for Single Station

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REFERENCES

[1] M. Beaudouin-Lafon, W.E. Mackay, M. Jensen:

CPN Tools: A Tool for Editing and Simulating
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[2] Daniele Miorandi, Arzad A. Kherani, and Eitan
Altman: A queueing model for HTTP traffic over
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effect of feedback traffic in IEEE 802.11b
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(2003).
[4] D.P. Heyman, T.V. Lakshman, and A.L.
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Ubiquitous Computing and Communication Journal

IEEE Journal on Select Areas in Communication,

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H.
Abdul Rauf received the Bachelors Degree in
Electrical and Electronics Engineering in 1987. He
completed his Masters degree in Business
Administration (M.B.A) Degree in the year 1996 and
his masters degree in Computer Science and
Engineering in the year 1999.He is currently a PhD
candidate in the faculty of Information and
Communication Engineering, Anna University of
Chennai. His research interests includes mobile
computing, Computer Networks, Network Security,
Advanced Networks and Performance Evaluation of
Computer
Networks.
He
is currently
the
Dean (CSE/IT), V.L.B. Janakiammal College of
Engineering & Technology, Coimbatore, India
Dr. Ebenezer Jeyakumar is currently the Principal of
Government College of Engineering, Salem, India.
Being an eminent professor of Anna University,
there are many students doing their research under
his guidance in various fields. Some of main areas
of research are Networking, mobile computing, high
voltage engineering and other related areas.

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