Generation of Realistic Social Network Datasets for Testing of Analysis and Simulation Tools

摘要

Testing large-scale dynamic network simulation packages, such as NetWatch, requires a large quantity of test data to be available for each of the experiments. The test data includes initial topologies of agents' social networks and specification of knowledge networks for each of the agents to fit an empirically derived distribution of knowledge. Testing the software on machine-generated data, as opposed to empirical data only, allows the user to conduct repeatable tests that stress certain aspects of the software and help in debugging and optimization of software performance.