Lessons Learned while Trying to Reproduce the OpenRF Experiment

International audienceEvaluating and comparing performance of wireless systems, like for any other scientific area, requires the ability to reproduce experimental results. In this paper, we describe the specific issues that we encountered when focusing on reproducing the experiments described in a paper related to wireless systems. We selected the OpenRF paper published in SIGCOMM 2013, a very interesting research work allowing to perform beamforming on commodity WiFi devices. We illustrate how reproducibility is strongly dependent on the used hardware, and why an extensive knowledge of the used hardware and its design is necessary. On the basis of this experience, we propose some recommendations and lessons for the design of reproducible wireless experiments