@node Distributed
@chapter Distributed Simulation with MPI
@anchor{chap:Distributed}

@menu
* Current Implementation Details::
* Running Distributed Simulations::
* Tracing During Distributed Simulations::
@end menu

Parallel and distributed discrete event simulation allows the execution of a 
single simulation program on multiple processors. By splitting up the 
simulation into logical processes, LPs, each LP can be executed by a different 
processor. This simulation methodology enables very large-scale simulations by 
leveraging increased processing power and memory availability. In order to 
ensure proper execution of a distributed simulation, message passing between 
LPs is required. To support distributed simulation in ns-3, the standard 
Message Passing Interface (MPI) is used, along with a new distributed simulator 
class. Currently, dividing a simulation for distributed purposes in ns-3 can 
only occur across point-to-point links.

@node Current Implementation Details
@section Current Implementation Details
During the course of a distributed simulation, many packets must cross 
simulator boundaries. In other words, a packet that originated on one LP 
is destined for a different LP, and in order to make this transition, a message 
containing the packet contents must be sent to the remote LP.  Upon receiving 
this message, the remote LP can rebuild the packet and proceed as normal. The 
process of sending an receiving messages between LPs is handled easily by the 
new MPI interface in ns-3.

Along with simple message passing between LPs, a distributed simulator is used 
on each LP to determine which events to process. It is important to process 
events in time-stamped order to ensure proper simulation execution. If a 
LP receives a message containing an event from the past, clearly this is an 
issue, since this event could change other events which have already been 
executed. To address this problem, a conservative synchronization algorithm with 
lookahead is used in ns-3. For more information on different synchronization 
approaches and parallel and distributed simulation in general, please refer to
"Parallel and Distributed Simulation Systems" by Richard Fujimoto.

@subsection Remote point-to-point links
As described in the introduction, dividing a simulation for distributed purposes 
in ns-3 currently can only occur across point-to-point links; therefore, the idea 
of remote point-to-point links is very important for distributed simulation in ns-3.
When a point-to-point link is installed, connecting two nodes, the point-to-point 
helper checks the system id, or rank, of both nodes.  The rank should be assigned 
during node creation for distributed simulation and is intended to signify on which 
LP a node belongs.  If the two nodes are on the same rank, a regular point-to-point 
link is created. If, however, the two nodes are on different ranks, then these nodes 
are intended for different LPs, and a remote point-to-point link is used. If a packet 
is to be sent across a remote point-to-point link, MPI is used to send the message to 
the remote LP.

@subsection Distributing the topology
Currently, the full topology is created on each rank, regardless of the individual node 
system ids.  Only the applications are specific to a rank.  For example, consider 
node 1 on LP 1 and node 2 on LP 2, with a traffic generator on node 1. Both node 
1 and node 2 will be created on both LP1 and LP2; however, the traffic generator 
will only be installed on LP1.  While this is not optimal for memory efficiency, it 
does simplify routing, since all current routing implementations in ns-3 will work 
with distributed simulation.

@node Running Distributed Simulations
@section Running Distributed Simulations

@subsection Prerequisites
Ensure that MPI is installed, as well as mpic++. In Ubuntu repositories, 
these are openmpi-bin, openmpi-common, openmpi-doc, libopenmpi-dev. In 
Fedora, these are openmpi and openmpi-devel.

Note: 
There is a conflict on some Fedora systems between libotf and openmpi. A 
possible "quick-fix" is to yum remove libotf before installing openmpi. 
This will remove conflict, but it will also remove emacs. Alternatively, 
these steps could be followed to resolve the conflict:

@verbatim
1) Rename the tiny otfdump which emacs says it needs:

     mv /usr/bin/otfdump /usr/bin/otfdump.emacs-version

2) Manually resolve openmpi dependencies:

     sudo yum install libgfortran libtorque numactl

3) Download rpm packages: 

     openmpi-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm
     openmpi-devel-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm
     openmpi-libs-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm
     openmpi-vt-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm

     from

     http://mirrors.kernel.org/fedora/releases/11/Everything/i386/os/Packages/

4) Force the packages in:

     sudo rpm -ivh --force openmpi-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm
     openmpi-libs-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm openmpi-devel-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm
     openmpi-vt-1.3.1-1.fc11.i586.rpm

@end verbatim

Also, it may be necessary to add the openmpi bin directory to PATH in order to 
execute mpic++ and mpirun from the command line.  Alternatively, the full path 
to these executables can be used.  Finally, if openmpi complains about the 
inability to open shared libraries, such as libmpi_cxx.so.0, it may be 
necessary to add the openmpi lib directory to LD_LIBRARY_PATH.

@subsection Building and Running Examples
If you already built ns-3 without MPI enabled, you must re-build:
@verbatim
./waf distclean
@end verbatim

Configure ns-3 with the --enable-mpi option:
@verbatim
./waf -d debug configure --enable-mpi
@end verbatim

Ensure that MPI is enabled by checking the optional features shown from the 
output of configure.

Next, build ns-3:
@verbatim
./waf
@end verbatim

After building ns-3 with mpi enabled, the example programs are now ready to 
run with mpirun.  Here are a few examples (from the root ns-3 directory):

@verbatim
mpirun -np 2 ./waf --run simple-distributed
mpirun -np 4 -machinefile mpihosts ./waf --run 'nms-udp-nix --LAN=2 --CN=4 --nix=1 --tracing=0'
@end verbatim
            
The np switch is the number of logical processors to use. The 
machinefile switch is which machines to use.  In order to use machinefile, 
the target file must exist (in this case mpihosts). This can simply contain 
something like:

@verbatim
localhost
localhost
localhost
...
@end verbatim

Or if you have a cluster of machines, you can name them.

** NOTE: Some users have experienced issues using mpirun and waf together. 
An alternative way to run distributed examples is shown below:

@verbatim
./waf shell
cd build/debug
mpirun -np 2 examples/mpi/simple-distributed
@end verbatim

@subsection Creating custom topologies
The example programs in examples/mpi give a good idea of how to create 
different topologies for distributed simulation. The main points are 
assigning system ids to individual nodes, creating point-to-point 
links where the simulation should be divided, and installing
applications only on the LP associated with the target node.

Assigning system ids to nodes is simple and can be handled two different 
ways. First, a NodeContainer can be used to create the nodes and assign 
system ids:

@verbatim 
NodeContainer nodes;
nodes.Create (5, 1); // Creates 5 nodes with system id 1.
@end verbatim

Alternatively, nodes can be created individually, assigned system ids, and 
added to a NodeContainer. This is useful if a NodeContainer holds nodes with 
different system ids:

@verbatim
NodeContainer nodes;
Ptr<Node> node1 = CreateObject<Node> (0); // Create node1 with system id 0
Ptr<Node> node2 = CreateObject<Node> (1); // Create node2 with system id 1
nodes.Add (node1);
nodes.Add (node2);
@end verbatim

Next, where the simulation is divided is determined by the placement of 
point-to-point links.  If a point-to-point link is created between two 
nodes with different system ids, a remote point-to-point link is created, 
as described in @ref{Current Implementation Details}.

Finally, installing applications only on the LP associated with the target 
node is very important. For example, if a traffic generator is to be placed 
on node 0, which is on LP0, only LP0 should install this application. 
This is easily accomplished by first checking the simulator system id, and 
ensuring that it matches the system id of the target node before installing 
the application.

@node Tracing During Distributed Simulations
@section Tracing During Distributed Simulations
Depending on the system id (rank) of the simulator, the information traced 
will be different, since traffic originating on one simulator is not seen 
by another simulator until it reaches nodes specific to that simulator.  The 
easiest way to keep track of different traces is to just name the trace files 
or pcaps differently, based on the system id of the simulator.  For example, 
something like this should work well, assuming all of these local variables 
were previously defined:

@verbatim
if (MpiInterface::GetSystemId () == 0)
  {
    pointToPoint.EnablePcapAll ("distributed-rank0");
    phy.EnablePcap ("distributed-rank0", apDevices.Get (0));
    csma.EnablePcap ("distributed-rank0", csmaDevices.Get (0), true);
  }
else if (MpiInterface::GetSystemId () == 1)
  {
    pointToPoint.EnablePcapAll ("distributed-rank1");
    phy.EnablePcap ("distributed-rank1", apDevices.Get (0));
    csma.EnablePcap ("distributed-rank1", csmaDevices.Get (0), true);
  }
@end verbatim
