Ad Hoc Computing Framework

This is an open-source, event-driven, asynchronous component model developed in Python. This library can be used to design and implement component-based ad hoc and distributed computing models and algorithms. The project is on GitHub.

Communication engineers are specialised in digital communications and networking technologies, whereas computer engineers or application developers are mostly specialised in software engineering with no or minimal background in the communication domain. With the introduction of virtualisation and softwarization, networks have become programmable that requires knowledge from both telecommunication and computer engineering domains. We have to fill the gap between these two domains to address the challenges of future networks. The main objective of the AHC project is to develop a distributed computing and learning environment on wireless networks employing software-defined radios. There are many simulators, emulators, and test-beds for researching networks or event-driven concurrent programming tools of distributed algorithms. However, there is a need for a tool that helps researchers integrate distributed algorithms considering the specifics of wireless networks. The tool has to incorporate wireless channel characteristics, packet collisions, contention-based channel access, forward- and backward-error correction, topology management, multi-hopping, or end-to-end reliable data transport and many other issues related to wireless communication and networking.

The goal of the AHC project is to develop an open-source education and research software framework that facilitates the development of distributed algorithms on wireless networks considering the impairments of wireless channels. The framework will be used as a learning and prompt-prototyping tool.

The Ad-hoc Computing Framework is funded by the AMPR and is developed by the WINS Lab of METU. WINS lab strives to conduct research in the field of computer networks, wireless networks, mobile systems and security thereof. We aim at building efficient and dependable solutions for the networks of the future and focus on the design and experimentation of systems and protocols. We support education both at undergraduate and graduate levels. WINS Lab and ARLEON are both founded by Prof. Ertan Onur.