PlanetLab is a research testbed that supports 428 experiments on 276 sites, with 583 nodes in 30 countries. It has lowered the barrier to distributed experimentation in network measurement, peer-to-peer networks, content distribution

Andy Bavier

Larry Peterson

Neil Spring

Vivek Pai

PlanetLab is a continuously-evolving global network research testbed that is simultaneously used by hundreds of researchers for diverse tasks, ranging from shortterm self-contained experiments among PlanetLab nodes to continuously-running Web-accessible services with tens of thousands of non-PlanetLab users. While PlanetLab cannot provide a perfectly-customized environment for every experiment, it has been changing over time, and the base of knowledge of how to best utilize it has also been growing. As a result, many of the early observations researchers made about PlanetLab would change if rechecked today. In this paper, we discuss these issues and explain whether they remain, have been addressed via PlanetLab’s evolution, or can be avoided by the use of best practices. Where possible, we provide quantitative evidence showing the realities of PlanetLab and possible research avenues to further broaden the opportunities for using PlanetLab in network research. 

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Using PlanetLab for network research: myths, realities, and best practices

http://www.cs.umd.edu/~nspring/papers/osr.pdf

Using PlanetLab for network research: Myths, realities, and best practices

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