Figure 2 depicts the main components of a topology as seen by BRITE. In BRITE, a topology is represented by a class Topology. This class contains a Model (1) and a Graph (2) as data members, and among others, a set of exporting methods and function members (3).
The Model class is an abstract base class from which multiple specific generation models are derived. Each specific topology generated by BRITE can use a single instance of one of the available generation models if the generated topology is flat, or more than one instance if the topology is a combined hierarchical topology. (Section 3.2). The Graph data member (2) is a Graph class with the minimal functionality required by the generation models. Should more capabilities from the Graph component be required, this class may be extended or replaced with minimum effects on the remaining code. Finally, the general architecture shows a set of export methods which output BRITE topologies into specific formats.
