Quality of service in telecommunications. I. Proposition of a QoSframework and its application to B-ISDN

The the quality of service (QoS) concept is becoming an ever more important issue in telecommunication and computer communication. The article focuses on the QoS notion and concept. The definition of QoS in the International Telecommunications Union-Telecommunications Sector (ITU-T) recommendations and the International Standards Organization (ISO) standards is analysed. Little is known about the asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) performance requirements of the broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN) services, especially for multimedia applications. This is because the ATM performance requirements of multimedia applications depend not only on the diverse QoS requirements from application and user, but also on the protocol stacks and scheduling in end systems. Therefore, in order to guarantee QoS to the user, it is necessary to introduce a set of QoS parameters whose properties indicate the nature and requirements of the layered protocol stack. We describe how a proposed QoS framework can be applied to B-ISDN as a specific network. The QoS aspects related to B-ISDN signaling (the control plane) and the QoS aspects related to layer and plane management (the management plane) are described. We also describe how the QoS framework resides in a protocol stack and works together with the B-ISDN network management and signaling     

数据业务端到端QoS参数映射与优化

在移动通信网内采用业务质量(QoS,Quality of Service)机制实现差异化的业务传输是近年的研究热点。端到端QoS包括非接入层用户和业务的识别、不同承载间QoS的一致性传递和接入层QoS的正确执行。这里以EDGE网络中数据业务传送机制为基础,全面研究了3GPP的QoS框架在UMTS网络的GERAN A/Gb模式和UTRAN Iu模式中的QoS映射,给出一个经过优化的端到端QoS参数映射表,并基于该表,在真实的EDGE网络中验证了QoS参数优化的可行性和参数映射的一致性。实验结果表明,根据不同业务的特点采用差异化的传输策略可以提升业务的感知。     

ATM网络中服务质量问题的完整视图

文章提出了一种称做服务质量完整视图的方案,该方案由服务质量参数变换和分配两部分组成,总体思路是把用户的需求逐层映射,转换成ＡＴＭ网络各个层闪的服务质量参数,直到ＡＴＭ网络最底层的性能参数,通过性能参数在网络中的适当分配,从而来保证用户的质量需求。     

Applying ATM/AAL2 as a switching technology in third-generationmobile access networks

In this article we focus on the transport and switching part of third-generation mobile access networks and outline some important aspects of applying ATM in these networks. In particular, we argue that in order for the mobile access network to support low-bit-rate delay-sensitive traffic consisting of short packets, the standardization of a new ATM adaptation layer, AAL2, and associated signaling protocol has been necessary. The AAL2 protocol has been designed to support low-bit-rate delay-sensitive services (typically compressed voice) where other adaptation layers fail to deliver the required QoS and maintain efficient resource utilization at the same time. Furthermore, in order to provide mobility and soft handover support in W-CDMA-based mobile networks such as UMTS or IMT-2000, there is also a strong demand for fast connection establishment and release. Therefore, when designing ATM-based cellular access networks some specific architectural and traffic management issues need to be addressed     

B-ISDN and the OSI protocol reference model

The evolution of public telecommunication networks toward broadband integrated services digital networks (B-ISDNs) is presented. The asynchronous transfer mode (ATM), which supports B-ISDNs, and the B-ISDN protocol reference model are discussed. It is shown that the service offered by the ATM layer in the B-ISDN protocol reference model is equivalent to the service offered by the OSI physical layer. It is also shown that the service offered by the ATM adaptation layer (AAL) type 3/4 is similar to an OSI data link service. The emergence of the metropolitan area network (MAN) standard as an intermediate support for broadband services and the similarities between the DQDB MAC and the AAL type 3/4 in its connectionless mode are discussed     

QoS routing in ad hoc wireless networks

The emergence of nomadic applications have generated much interest in wireless network infrastructures that support real-time communications. We propose a bandwidth routing protocol for quality-of-service (QoS) support in a multihop mobile network. The QoS routing feature is important for a mobile network to interconnect wired networks with QoS support (e.g., ATM, Internet, etc.). The QoS routing protocol can also work in a stand-alone multihop mobile network for real-time applications. This QoS routing protocol contains end-to-end bandwidth calculation and bandwidth allocation. Under such a routing protocol, the source (or the ATM gateway) is informed of the bandwidth and QoS available to any destination in the mobile network. This knowledge enables the establishment of QoS connections within the mobile network and the efficient support of real-time applications. In addition, it enables more efficient call admission control. In the case of ATM interconnection, the bandwidth information can be used to carry out intelligent handoff between ATM gateways and/or to extend the ATM virtual circuit (VC) service to the mobile network with possible renegotiation of QoS parameters at the gateway. We examine the system performance in various QoS traffic flows and mobility environments via simulation. Simulation results suggest distinct performance advantages of our protocol that calculates the bandwidth information. It is particularly useful in call admission control. Furthermore, “standby” routing enhances the performance in the mobile environment. Simulation experiments show this improvement     

ATM网络安全技术

指出了ATM网络存在的安全威胁,讨论了ATM网络的数据加密技术、完整性服务等ATM网络安全技术。在基于将ATM的安全层置于AAL层和ATM层之间的观点上,本论文设计了一个数字签名结构和密钥交换协议,该协议作为呼叫建立过程的一部分,嵌于现存的ATM信今协议中。这些安全技术可透明地加入到B—ISDN的协议参考模型中,无需改变现存的协议标准。     

Real-time multimedia scheduling policies for end-to-end delayjitter and loss guarantees across ATM satellite systems

We propose a simple first-in first-out (FIFO)-based service protocol which is appropriate for a multimedia ATM satellite system. The main area of interest is to provide real-time traffic with upper bounds on the end-to-end delay, jitter, and loss experienced at various service queues within a satellite network. Various service protocols, each based on a common underlying strategy, are developed in light of the requirements and limitations imposed at each of the satellite's subsystems. These subsystems include the uplink (UL) earth station (ES) service queue, on-board processing (OBP) queues, and the downlink (DL) ES service queue feeding into a wireline ATM network or directly to an end-user application. Numerous network simulation results demonstrate the tractability, efficiency, and versatility of the underlying service discipline. Key features of our strategy are its algorithmic and architectural simplicity, its non-ad-hoc scheduling approach, and its unified treatment of all real-time streams at all service queues. In addition, the delay and jitter bounds are uncoupled. In this way, end-to-end jitter can be tightly controlled even if medium access requires long indeterminate waiting durations     

Challenges and opportunities of delivering IP-based residential television services

This article describes the main challenges of implementing an end-to-end architecture for delivery of high-quality, IP-based residential TV services to residential customers. The IP-based approach can be implemented with an IP multicast overlay network with traditional routers or use IP-multicast-aware ATM switching systems. Both approaches use IP multicast to transport MPEG-2 broadcast video and can work on any access architecture, especially on copper-based architectures (xDSL) such as ASDL and VDSL. The main challenges met while implementing the IP-based architecture are competitive positioning relative to traditional CATV architectures, overall architecture, head-end architecture and quality issues, traffic engineering for stringent QoS requirements, IP multicast requirements, and business case considerations. The IP-based approach described leverages Internet technology advancements and capitalizes on the impacts of Internet on interactive entertainment. Video channel manipulation at the head-end is dependent on access bandwidth and affects video quality. Video traffic management to meet stringent QoS requirements is challenging at the IP layer. High-capacity, responsive IP multicasting is essential to achieving high service quality. Cost-effective IP multicasting is a critical component of the business case.     

Analysis of end-to-end QoS for networked virtual reality services in UMTS

Virtual reality services may be considered a good representative of advanced services in the new-generation network. The focus of this article is to address quality of service support for VR services in the context of the UMTS QoS framework specified by the 3G standardization forum, the Third Generation Partnership Project. We propose a classification of VR services based on delivery requirements (real-time or non-real-time) and degree of interactivity that maps to existing UMTS QoS classes and service attributes. The mapping is based on matching VR service requirements to performance parameters and target values defined for UMTS applications. Test cases involving heterogeneous VR applications are defined, using as a reference a general model for VR service design and delivery. Measurements of network parameters serve to determine the end-to-end QoS requirements of the considered applications, which are in turn mapped to proposed VR service classes.     

适应多媒体业务的ATM适配层AAL2

介绍了ＩＴＵ Ｔ建议Ｉ．３６３．２中定义的新型ＡＴＭ适配层ＡＡＬ２,包括协议的细节及ＡＡＬ２的应用实例。与其他ＡＡＬ协议相比,ＡＡＬ２的优点在于更强的业务适应能力和高效的频带利用率,因此是传输多媒体业务的较佳ＡＴＭ适配类型。     

Designing a practical ATM LAN

The adaptor cards and driver software for workstations and local asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) switches and switch control software used in an ATM local area network (LAN) system are discussed. It is shown that the ATM hardware and software components together provide services that are essential for ATM to be considered a realistic alternative to current shared-media LANs. These services include: completely transparent support for the TCP/IP protocol suite, an application programming interface for full access to the underlying ATM capabilities, support for AAL5, AAL3/4, and the null AAL, both connection-oriented and connectionless service, dynamic connection establishment or switched virtual circuits, resource reservation of guaranteed bandwidth and quality of service, full-bandwidth multicast and broadcast, virtual path and channel routing among multiple switches, automatic configuration and failure recovery, dynamic address assignment and internetwork address resolution, and network management via the simple network management protocol (SNMP)     

A new ATM adaptation layer for TCP/IP over wireless ATM networks

This paper describes the design and performance of a new ATM adaptation layer protocol (AAL‐T) for improving TCP performance over wireless ATM networks. The wireless links are characterized by higher error rates and burstier error patterns in comparison with the fiber links for which ATM was introduced in the beginning. Since the low performance of TCP over wireless ATM networks is mainly due to the fact that TCP always responds to all packet losses by congestion control, the key idea in the design is to push the error control portion of TCP to the AAL layer so that TCP is only responsible for congestion control. The AAL‐T is based on a novel and reliable ARQ mechanism to support quality‐critical TCP traffic over wireless ATM networks. The proposed AAL protocol has been validated using the OPNET tool with the simulated wireless ATM network. The simulation results show that the AAL‐T provides higher throughput for TCP over wireless ATM networks compared to the existing approach of TCP with AAL 5. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

QoS guarantees for multimedia services on a TDMA-based satellitenetwork

This article describes a proposed network architecture for both the ground and space segments of a satellite network supporting multimedia services with quality of service (QoS) guarantees. The space segment proposal is geared toward a TDMA-based satellite network comprising many nongeostationary satellites, while the ground segment proposal does not put any restriction an the satellite network. The ground segment proposal is based on the new ATM adaptation layer 2 (AAL2) which we consider to have a major role to play in offering an efficient way to provide multimedia services over ATM networks. Indeed, it allows easy encapsulation of the complete set of media component sessions which forms a multimedia transaction into a single ATM virtual channel connection. An additional advantage of AAL2 is that it can run over any arbitrary slotted access system independent of the ATM format (i.e., without transporting the ATM cell headers). This is important for efficient interfacing of the ground and space segments. The space segment proposal aims at providing a robust, easily managed and controlled architecture to guarantee QoS by using a combination of connectionless and connection-oriented techniques. This is achieved by: defining a fixed logical network architecture (i.e., independent of the motion of the satellites); limiting the functionality of the switches in the sky; and using adequate addressing and routing procedures     

Parallel transport: a new transport layer paradigm for enabling Internet quality of service

The transport layer in the network protocol stack serves as a liaison between the application and the underlying network. Any quality of service provided by the network thus has to be effectively translated by the transport layer protocol in order to be enjoyed by the applications. In this article, we argue for a fundamental rethinking of the transport layer design to facilitate such QoS delivery. We identify the key requirement for a QoS enabling transport layer protocol as the ability to effectively handle multiplicity in terms of user differentiation levels, network resources, and service models. However, TCP, the transport layer protocol predominantly used in the Internet, is unable to support such multiplicity due to its single-state design. We extend TCP to a parallel transport layer protocol called parallel TCP (pTCP) that can tackle the different dimensions of multiplicity, and hence enable varying classes of QoS to applications. We discuss the applicability of pTCP in three specific domains with different levels of network support for QoS, and present simulation results substantiating our arguments.     

End-to-end QoS specification issues in the converged all-IP wired and wireless environment

The emerging next-generation networking environment presents an IP-based core interconnecting many wireless radio access networks, providing ubiquitous access to end users through a vast variety of wireless devices. Although the IP protocol is the common denominator, the new environment brings together many different interconnecting domains, each following different QoS models, complicating the overall end-to-end QoS process. This article discusses the need to standardize an end-to-end QoS protocol. It does not, however, focus on the signaling mechanism, since there is currently a relevant ongoing activity in IETF. Instead, it concentrates on the formulation of the QoS information describing the QoS requirements of the session to be established. It presents the generic service specification framework that not only enables the QoS requirements of a specific session to be captured (like a generic QoS template), but also the QoS classes of each IP domain can be described according to it. Through the systematic specification of a domain's QoS classes, an intelligent automatic mapping algorithm can be applied during an end-to-end QoS request, in order to select the most appropriate service class in each domain, as well as to extract the required traffic-related parameters to perform traffic control operations, such as admission control, policing, and scheduling.     

Translation of specification units between IP and ATM quality of service declarations

An integral part of any network quality of service (QoS) system are its QoS declarations. QoS declarations consist of service classes, parameters, and specification units. QoS declarations are a component of the QoS architecture, as such they are a source of heterogeneity stemming from the fact that different QoS systems may be based on different QoS architectures and thus use different QoS declarations. A particular problem in that domain is the translation of specification units for QoS systems that are based on different forwarding technologies with respect to variable vs fixed packet sizes, i.e. packet vs cell switching. This is a problem that can be dealt with generically such that its solution can be applied to several situations of technically heterogeneous QoS systems like an RSVP/IntServ—or DiffServ—over an ATM‐based system. While straightforward translations have been proposed, we investigate how more efficient translations can be achieved by using a slight but effective modification of existing AAL framing schemes as well as making use of statistical knowledge about packet size distributions. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Internet integrated service over ATM: a solution for shortcut QoSvirtual channels

In principle, the interaction of the resource reservation protocol (RSVP) and ATM should allow the IP level to benefit from some features of the ATM layer. The most interesting one is the native support of end-to-end quality of service provided by ATM. On the other hand, there are issues that must be clarified to define correct interworking: for example, the possible overlapping between the mechanisms used in the IP and ATM levels to support QoS, or the needed IP/ATM address resolution mechanism. This article proposes a solution to exploit ATM shortcut VCs supporting QoS in the Internet integrated services model. A straightforward enrichment to the RSVP protocol is defined, which only impacts the devices (hosts and routers) involved in the shortcut procedure. A mechanism for IP/ATM address resolution is provided, avoiding the use of other mechanisms such as NHRP. Special care has been taken to maintain compatibility with “traditional” RSVP hosts and routers     

A differentiated optical services model for WDM networks

This article addresses the issues of scalable end-to-end QoS in metropolitan DWDM networks serving as transit networks for IP access networks. DWDM offering a few wavelengths has been deployed in the past in backbone networks to upgrade point-to-point transmission where sharing is based on coarse granularity. This type of DWDM backbone network, offering a few light-paths, provides no support for QoS services traversing the network. As DWDM networks with larger numbers of wavelengths penetrate the data-centric metro environment, specific IP service requirements such as priority restoration, scalability, dynamic provisioning of capacity and routes, and support for coarse-grain QoS capabilities will have to be addressed in the optical domain in order to achieve end-to-end QoS over a DWDM network. We propose a QoS service model in the optical domain called differentiated optical services (DoS) based on a set of optical parameters that captures the quality and reliability of the optical lightpath