JRFC 30 - Network Sim Vis Tool

### This is cross posted from: https://github.com/jbenet/ipfs/issues/39 Let's use this as discussion

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(( I posted this on some email lists, but figure the people watching this repo may be able to help ))

We're making a (javascript - d3) visualizer of protocol traces to observe, debug, learn, ... admire... networks. Our main use case is for IPFS (ipfs.io, github.com/jbenet/ipfs) and Filecoin (filecoin.io). Has anybody here seen something like this? Rough scheme:
- protocols output traces following a specific format detailing nodes + events
- protocols can optionally specify viz layouts (e.g. DHT address ring vis, or force graph (based on latency))
- d3 program consumes traces (could be live streams) in json and runs the simulation
- simulation playback controls (play/pause/ffwd/rwind/speed)

Also, we are not experts on d3, so if you're interested in creating a general enough trace visualizer tool applicable to lots of other protocols, I'm open to paying people to do it. (Will be open source MIT licensed).

Thanks,
Juan

@juanbenet
github.com/jbenet