2nd DIGITAfrica Summer School on Digital Sciences and Research Infrastructures

By the end of day 2, participants will be able to adapt the radio network to meet their performance objectives
(e.g., delay, bandwidth) and will be involved in an hackathon aiming to deploy a 5GNR radio network on the campus.

Instructor

Damien Saucez

Researcher at Inria Sophia Antipolis – Méditerranée

Show Biography

Part A : Introduction to 5G - an experimental approach

Duration: 2 days (6 hours / day, excluding lunch)
Format: Hands-on Tutorial (5G + docker + measurements)

Core Learning Outcome

By the end of day 1, participants will be able to deploy a 5G network composed of open-source 5G core and RAN implementations. They will also be able to run traffic workloads on the network from multiple UEs, as well as collect and analyze control-plane and user-plane traffic.

By the end of day 2, participants will be able to adapt the radio network to meet their performance objectives (e.g., delay, bandwidth) and will be involved in an hackathon aiming to deploy a 5GNR radio network on the campus.

https://gitlab.inria.fr/digitafrica/hands-on/senegal2026
Time	Activity	Focus
Day 1
09:30-11:00	Module 1: Foundations – 5G Principles and Architecture	5G architecture, core and RAN interactions
11:00-11:15	Coffee Break
11:15-12:45	Module 2: Reproducibility and Experimental Research	Introduction to reproducibility, setup research environment, run a “hello-world” experiment
12:45-13:45	Lunch Break
13:45-15:15	Module 3: Deploying a 5G Network and Running an Experiment	Configure/deploy 5G core, RAN, analyze signaling traffic
15:15-15:30	Coffee Break
15:30-17:00	Module 4: Traffic Workload on 5G and Analysis	Connect UEs, run workloads, collect/analyze data
Day 2
09:30-11:00	Module 5: Foundations – 5G New Radio Principles	5G NR architecture, radio transmission in 5G
11:00-11:15	Coffee Break
11:15-12:45	Module 6: 5GNR Configuration in OpenAirInterface	Analysis of `gnb.conf` files in OpenAirInterface
12:45-13:45	Lunch Break
13:45-17:00	Module 7: Deploying a 5G network and run an experiment on it.	Collective deployment of a real 5GNR radio network on campus

Required Competencies and Materials

Technical Prerequisites

Linux command line: Intermediate-level knowledge of Linux command line.
Participants should be comfortable with using the Linux command line.
Basic Network Concepts: A rudimentary understanding of how network work
in general will be beneficial, though core concepts will be covered.

Software and Setup

A preconfigured environment will be made available on DigitAfrica.
On their laptop, participants will require a modern browser with Internet access.

Part B: Day 3 &4: Urban Digital Services Hackathon

Building AI-Enabled Educational and Urban Service Platforms on Low-Cost Infrastructure

Theme : Designing Affordable and Sustainable Digital Services for Smart Campuses and Urban Communities

Objectives

Participants will:

Deploy and operate a complete cloud-native infrastructure.
Integrate heterogeneous networking, cloud automation, and AI services.
Develop practical solutions addressing urban and educational challenges.
Demonstrate the feasibility of low-cost sovereign digital infrastructures.

Morning Session

Time	Activity
08:30-09:00	Kick-off and Team Formation
09:00-09:30	Challenge Briefing – Teams select one challenge track

Participants form multidisciplinary teams (4–6 members).

Suggested profiles:

Network Engineer
Cloud Engineer
AI/Data Analyst
Application Developer
Project Coordinator

Challenge Tracks

Track 1: Smart Campus Analytics

Develop a digital platform that:

Collects campus operational data.
Provides AI-based analytics.
Offers dashboards through JupyterHub.

Possible datasets:

Classroom occupancy
Energy consumption
Internet usage statistics

Expected outputs:

Data pipeline
Jupyter notebooks
Grafana dashboard

Track 2: Urban Mobility Observatory

Create a monitoring platform for:

Traffic congestion analysis
Public transport monitoring
Pedestrian flow visualization

Infrastructure requirements:

k3s deployment
JupyterHub notebooks
Monitoring dashboard

Track 4: AI-Powered Digital Education Platform

Build a cloud-native learning platform integrating:

Keycloak authentication
JupyterHub notebooks
Learning analytics

Additional features:

Student activity monitoring
AI-assisted educational insights

Track 5: Community Connectivity and Network Monitoring

Design a solution for:

Community Wi-Fi management
Connectivity monitoring
Network quality assessment

Expected outputs:

Network performance dashboard
Connectivity reports
Service recommendations

Technical Requirements

Each team must deploy:

Infrastructure Layer

k3s cluster
Helm-managed services

Identity Layer

Keycloak authentication

Learning Layer

JupyterHub

Observability Layer

Grafana
Prometheus

Analytics Layer

Python notebooks
AI or data analytics workflow

Development Phase Day 3

09:30 – 13:00	Infrastructure deployment Deliverables: Architecture diagram Operational cluster User authentication
13:00 – 14:00	Lunch Break
14:00 – 16:30	Application and AI development Deliverables: Urban service application AI notebooks Dashboards

Development Phase Day 4

09:30 – 13:00	Infrastructure deployment Deliverables: Architecture diagram Operational cluster User authentication
13:00 – 14:00	Lunch Break
14:00 – 16:30	Application and AI development Deliverables: Urban service application AI notebooks Dashboards
16:30 – 17:30	Final Testing and Demonstration Preparation Teams prepare: 5-minute pitch Technical demonstration Lessons learned