Mininet: an instant virtual network on your computer

In this chapter, we provide a detailed introduction of the Mininet network emulator. Beginning with background motivation for network emulation, we provide a high-level overview of the Mininet emulator and contrast it to other popular software-based emulation approaches. We follow this discussion with a description of the common workflow for employing Mininet, including several code examples that highlight the salient commands needed to interface with the emulator. We comprehensively explain the in-depth features that enable the functionalities of Mininet to describe its underlying mechanisms for lightweight network simulation. We conclude with an example showcasing the different features discussed throughout this chapter.