Evaluating Quality-of-Service in Blockchains Using Modelling and Simulation Tools

Abstract

A Blockchain is a distributed, decentralized and ordered list of special data structures called as blocks, where each block is connected to its previous block by a special pointer called as hash pointer, resulting in an append only system which only grows in size with time. In designing and implementing Blockchain driven systems many decisions about configuration parameters need to be made in advance. However investigation and experimentation on real systems is not feasible. Blockchain simulators help in deciding about best configuration parameters for design and development of Blockchain based solutions before actually building the real solution. Quality of service is an important aspect in any distributed system, so is the case with Blockchain driven systems. Security, Auditability, Transparency, and Tamper resistance are key features of Blockchain. In this paper we collected and defined Quality of Service metrics for Blockchains that drive their key characteristics. We also review and evaluate BlockSim and VIBES as Blockchain simulators to study the effect of Blockchain configuration parameters on Blockchain Quality of Service metrics.