A control theoretical analysis of a window-based flow control mechanism for TCP connections with different propagation delays

Abstract

A feedback-based congestion control mechanism is essential to realize an efficient best-effort service in high-speed networks. A window-based flow control mechanism called TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), which is a sort of feedback-based congestion control mechanism, has been widely used in the current Internet. Recently proposed TCP Vegas is another version of TCP mechanism, and can achieve better performance than the current TCP Reno. In our previous works, we have analyzed stability of a window-based flow control mechanism based on TCP Vegas in both homogeneous and heterogeneous networks. In this paper, using our analytic results, we investigate how the dynamics of the window-based flow control mechanism is affected by the difference in propagation delays of TCP connections. We also investigate the effect of various system parameters on transient performance of the window- based flow control mechanism