# I. Introduction

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Disclaimer: This tutorial was originally developed by Marc Greis. Currently the tutorial is maintained and being expanded by the VINT group.

Please note: if there is any problem with the example scripts provided below, please refer to the test suites (~ns/tcl/test/test-suite-greis.tcl and test-suite-WLtutorial.tcl) for and lastest updates and let us know, thanks.

Since you have found this page, I assume that you already know what ns is and where you can get it from. If not, I suggest you either go to the web page for the VINT project or the web page for ns (version 2). Note: In these pages I describe ns version 2. Version 1 is different, though there is a backwards compatibility library in version 2.

The purpose of these pages is to make it easier for new ns users to use ns and nam, to create their own simulation scenarios for these tools and to eventually add new functionality to ns. I have found the existing documentation to be rather useful for users who already know the basic features of ns, while it can be a bit tedious for new users to extract the necessary information from the manuals and the example scripts. In this tutorial I will lead you through some simple examples, introducing more and more new features as we go along. The ultimate goal is that after a short time you are able to efficiently use ns and to find any further information you might need in the existing documentation. For this purpose I will also try to tell you where I found the information in this tutorial myself, so you not only learn how to use ns, but also how to use its documentation.

The web is probably the best medium for a tutorial like this, because it's not only possible to add pictures (or even animations) for the examples, but you can also directly download the examples if you don't have the time for typing them in yourself (though I would suggest doing that at least for the first few examples). I chose a frame-oriented design for these pages, since it makes them easier to navigate. If you find that the left frame with the contents takes up too much room or if you just don't like frames, you can switch to a frameless version.

Please understand that I can not give you a full reference manual for ns here, or a full Tcl/C++ tutorial, and that in a simple tutorial like this I can not help you with special problems like installation problems. There are better sources for that which I am going to list in Section II.

If you have any suggestions, find any bugs or problems, have any comments and also if you have any new (well-documented) examples that could be added here, please send email to ns-users mailing list.

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