A critical look at power law modelling of the Internet

This paper takes a critical look at the usefulness of power law models of the Internet. The twin focuses of the paper are Internet traffic and topology generation. The aim of the paper is twofold. Firstly it summarises the state of the art in power law modelling particularly giving attention to existing open research questions. Secondly it provides insight into the failings of such models and where progress needs to be made for power law research to feed through to actual improvements in network performance.Comment: To appear Computer Communication

Dynamic bandwidth allocation in ATM networks

Includes bibliographical references.This thesis investigates bandwidth allocation methodologies to transport new emerging bursty traffic types in ATM networks. However, existing ATM traffic management solutions are not readily able to handle the inevitable problem of congestion as result of the bursty traffic from the new emerging services. This research basically addresses bandwidth allocation issues for bursty traffic by proposing and exploring the concept of dynamic bandwidth allocation and comparing it to the traditional static bandwidth allocation schemes

Performance modelling of wormhole-routed hypercubes with bursty traffice and finite buffers

An open queueing network model (QNM) is proposed for wormhole-routed hypercubes with finite buffers and deterministic routing subject to a compound Poisson arrival process (CPP) with geometrically distributed batches or, equivalently, a generalised exponential (GE) interarrival time distribution. The GE/G/1/K queue and appropriate GE-type flow formulae are adopted, as cost-effective building blocks, in a queue-by-queue decomposition of the entire network. Consequently, analytic expressions for the channel holding time, buffering delay, contention blocking and mean message latency are determined. The validity of the analytic approximations is demonstrated against results obtained through simulation experiments. Moreover, it is shown that the wormholerouted hypercubes suffer progressive performance degradation with increasing traffic variability (burstiness)

A Slotted Ring Test Bed for the Study of ATM Network Congestion Management

This thesis addresses issues raised by the proposed Broadband Integrated Services Digital Network which will provide a flexible combination of integrated services traffic through its cell-based Asynchronbus Transport Mode (ATM). The introduction of a cell-based, connection-oriented, transport mode brings with it new technical challenges for network management. The routing of cells, their service at switching centres, and problems of cell congestion not encountered in the existing network, are some of the key issues. The thesis describes the development of a hardware slotted ring testbed for the investigation of congestion management in an ATM network. The testbed is designed to incorporate a modified form of the ORWELL protocol to control media access. The media access protocol is analysed to give a model for maximum throughput and reset interval under various traffic distributions. The results from the models are compared with measurements carried out on the testbed, where cell arrival statistics are also varied. It is shown that the maximum throughput of the testbed is dependent on both traffic distribution and cell arrival statistics. The testbed is used for investigations in a heterogeneous traffic environment where two classes of traffic with different cell arrival statistics and quality of service requirements are defined. The effect of prioritisation, media access protocol, traffic intensity, and traffic source statistics were investigated by determining an Admissible Load Region (ALR) for a network station. Conclusions drawn from this work suggest that there are many problems associated with the reliable definition of an ALR because of the number of variable parameters which could shift the ALR boundary. A suggested direction for further work is to explore bandwidth reservation and the concept of equivalent capacity of a connection, and how this can be linked to source control parameters

A simulation model for video traffic performance via ATM over TCP/IP

Although TCP has emerged as the standard in data communication, the introduction of ATM technology has raised numerous problems regarding the effectiveness of using TCP over A TM networks, especially when video traffic performance is considered. This paper presents a simulation model for transmission performance of video traffic via ATM over TCP/IP. The interactivity between TCP/IP and ATM, generation of MPEG traffic and evaluation of traffic performance are implemented in the model. The design and implementation details of the model are carefully described. The experiments conducted using the model and experimental results are briefly introduced, revealing the capability of our model in simulating network events and in evaluating potential solutions to performance issues.<br /

Resource management for multimedia traffic over ATM broadband satellite networks

PhDAbstract not availabl

Fragmentiranost europskog zračnog prostora: Procjena zasnovana na troškovnoj učinkovitosti

Due to the ANSPs’ (Air Navigation Service Providers’) unit rates variability in different European airspace areas, the AUs (Airspace Users) pay different financial amounts for the same ANS (Air Navigation Service) provision. The AUs’ interest is to achieve the lowest possible operational costs, so it is often the case that the aircraft, if there is an alternative, fly on longer but economically more acceptable routes through cheaper charging zones. Over the time, the application of such practice has led to the creation of different business interests – that is a critical issue hindering further air transport development in Europe. This paper investigates the research question of whether and if so, how the European airspace is fragmented in terms of cost-efficiency features. By the application of the spatial autocorrelation methodology, i.e. by associating every ANSP’s unit rate value with its spatial position within the European ATM (Air Traffic Management) system, the research question has been answered. Research findings indicate that the European airspace is fragmented from a cost-efficiency aspect and divided into several different homogeneous areas. Such areas are characterized by a certain similarity level of adjacent unit rates, whereas one charging zone represents a hotspot in terms of its dissimilarity to adjacent spatial units.Zbog varijabilnosti jediničnih cijena Pružatelja usluga u zračnoj plovidbi na različitim područjima europskog zračnog prostora, korisnici zračnog prostora za istu uslugu u zračnoj plovidbi plaćaju različite financijske iznose. Interes korisnika zračnog prostora je ostvariti što niže operativne troškove, pa je čest slučaj da zrakoplov, ukoliko postoji alternativa, leti dužim, ali ekonomski prihvatljivijim rutama kroz jeftinije naplatne zone. Tijekom vremena, primjena takve prakse dovela je do stvaranja različitih poslovnih interesa - što predstavlja kritični problem koji ometa daljnji razvoj zračnog prometa u Europi. Ovaj rad se bavi proučavanjem istraživačkog pitanja je li i ukoliko jest, kako je europski zračni prostor fragmentiran s aspekta troškovne učinkovitosti. Primjenom metodologije prostorne autokorelacije, tj. povezivanjem jediničnih cijena Pružatelja usluga u zračnoj plovidbi s njegovim prostornim položajem u okviru europskog sustava upravljanja zračnim prometom, dobiva se odgovor na postavljeno istraživačko pitanje. Rezultati istraživanja ukazuju da je europski zračni prostor fragmentiran s aspekta troškovne učinkovitosti i da je podijeljen u nekoliko različitih homogenih područja. Pri tom, takva područja karakterizirana su određenom razinom sličnosti susjednih jediničnih cijena, dok jedna naplatna zona predstavlja žarišno područje u smislu svoje neusklađenosti sa susjednim prostornim jedinicama

Simplified methods for next generation IP access networks planning

The scope of this paper is to derive a set of simple formulas providing a traffic aggregation in important points of an Internet access networks. The paper shows that the resources associated to the access network depend on user type-, technology and service parameter. Existing calculation methodologies applies on individual approximations whereas this proposal exposes the combined application of these individual and wellknown approximations providing a scheme of generic dimensioning formulas. The dimensioning formulas for a generic applications are derived for the three main levels: connection, session and burst level, and the traffic aggregation is considered through three different and combined variables describing users, accesses and services forming a cube with three axes. The adaptation of corresponding parameters following the different axes allows the calculation of complete access network traffic scenarios, grouped by the so called CASUAL concept: Cube of Accesses / Services / Users. A set of CASUAL based tools allows an estimation of the aggregated traffic in different access points as multiplexers, IP point of presence or edge routers

Some aspects of traffic control and performance evaluation of ATM networks

The emerging high-speed Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networks are expected to integrate through statistical multiplexing large numbers of traffic sources having a broad range of statistical characteristics and different Quality of Service (QOS) requirements. To achieve high utilisation of network resources while maintaining the QOS, efficient traffic management strategies have to be developed. This thesis considers the problem of traffic control for ATM networks. The thesis studies the application of neural networks to various ATM traffic control issues such as feedback congestion control, traffic characterization, bandwidth estimation, and Call Admission Control (CAC). A novel adaptive congestion control approach based on a neural network that uses reinforcement learning is developed. It is shown that the neural controller is very effective in providing general QOS control. A Finite Impulse Response (FIR) neural network is proposed to adaptively predict the traffic arrival process by learning the relationship between the past and future traffic variations. On the basis of this prediction, a feedback flow control scheme at input access nodes of the network is presented. Simulation results demonstrate significant performance improvement over conventional control mechanisms. In addition, an accurate yet computationally efficient approach to effective bandwidth estimation for multiplexed connections is investigated. In this method, a feed forward neural network is employed to model the nonlinear relationship between the effective bandwidth and the traffic situations and a QOS measure. Applications of this approach to admission control, bandwidth allocation and dynamic routing are also discussed. A detailed investigation has indicated that CAC schemes based on effective bandwidth approximation can be very conservative and prevent optimal use of network resources. A modified effective bandwidth CAC approach is therefore proposed to overcome the drawback of conventional methods. Considering statistical multiplexing between traffic sources, we directly calculate the effective bandwidth of the aggregate traffic which is modelled by a two-state Markov modulated Poisson process via matching four important statistics. We use the theory of large deviations to provide a unified description of effective bandwidths for various traffic sources and the associated ATM multiplexer queueing performance approximations, illustrating their strengths and limitations. In addition, a more accurate estimation method for ATM QOS parameters based on the Bahadur-Rao theorem is proposed, which is a refinement of the original effective bandwidth approximation and can lead to higher link utilisation

ASIdE: Using Autocorrelation-Based Size Estimation for Scheduling Bursty Workloads.

Temporal dependence in workloads creates peak congestion that can make service unavailable and reduce system performance. To improve system performability under conditions of temporal dependence, a server should quickly process bursts of requests that may need large service demands. In this paper, we propose and evaluateASIdE, an Autocorrelation-based SIze Estimation, that selectively delays requests which contribute to the workload temporal dependence. ASIdE implicitly approximates the shortest job first (SJF) scheduling policy but without any prior knowledge of job service times. Extensive experiments show that (1) ASIdE achieves good service time estimates from the temporal dependence structure of the workload to implicitly approximate the behavior of SJF; and (2) ASIdE successfully counteracts peak congestion in the workload and improves system performability under a wide variety of settings. Specifically, we show that system capacity under ASIdE is largely increased compared to the first-come first-served (FCFS) scheduling policy and is highly-competitive with SJF. © 2012 IEEE