A View from the Other Side
Sohaib Ahmad, Abdul Lateef Haamid, Zafar Ayyub Qazi, Zhenyu Zhou, Theophilus Benson, Ihsan Ayyub Qazi · 2016
Mobile devices are becoming increasingly dominant in the developing world. However, there is little insight into the characteristics of devices being used in such regions. Using a dataset of ~0.5 million subscribers from one of the largest cellular operators in Pakistan, we analyze the characteristics of cell phones based on different features (e.g., CPU, memory, and cellular interface). We identify potential device-level bottlenecks for Internet access and analyze the security implications of the phones being used. To aid the analysis of cell phones, we propose abstractions (e.g., connectivity, capacity, and device security) and cluster phones based on these abstractions. Our analysis reveals interesting insights for improving mobile web performance.