Wavelength Selection in OBS Networks Using Traffic Engineering and Priority-Based Concepts

A fundamental assumption underlying most studies of optical burst switched (OBS) networks is that full wavelength conversion is available throughout the network. In practice, however, economic and technical considerations are likely to dictate a more limited and sparse deployment of wavelength converters in the optical network. Therefore, we expect wavelength assignment policies to be an important component of OBS networks. In this paper, we explain why wavelength selection schemes developed for wavelength routed (circuit-switched) networks are not appropriate for OBS. We then develop a suite of adaptive and nonadaptive policies for OBS switches. We also apply traffic engineering techniques to reduce wavelength contention through traffic isolation. Our performance study indicates that, in the absence of full conversion capabilities, intelligent choices in assigning wavelengths to bursts at the source can have a profound effect on the burst drop probability in an OBS network.     

光突发交换试验网的可行性分析

文章对光突发交换网络的产生背景、光突发交换网络模型及技术实现的可行性,以及进一步发展光突发交换网络需要关注的核心技术予以分析,最后对建设中国下一代高速光因特网提出一些建议与思考。     

Rate-controlled optical burst switching for both congestion avoidance and service differentiation

Optical Burst Switching (OBS) has recently been proposed as a candidate architecture for the next generation optical Internet. Several challenging issues remain to be solved to pave the way for the OBS vision. Contention arises in OBS networks when two or more bursts are destined for the same wavelength, and a wide variety of reactive contention resolution mechanisms have been proposed in the literature. One challenging issue in OBS is proactively controlling the traffic flowing through the OBS network so that the network does not stay in a persistent state of contention, which we call the congestion avoidance problem. Another challenging issue is the need for service differentiation, which is common today in electronically switched networks via the use of advanced buffer management and scheduling mechanisms. However, such mechanisms cannot be used in OBS networks due to the limited use, or total absence, of buffering. One of the popular existing approaches to service differentiation in OBS networks is the use of larger offset times for high-priority bursts which, however, increases the delays and may adversely affect application-level performance. In this paper, we propose a feedback-based rate control protocol for the control plane of the OBS network to both address the congestion avoidance and service differentiation issues. Using this protocol, the incoming traffic is dynamically shaped at the edge of the OBS network in order to avoid potential congestion in the burst-switched core. Moreover, the traffic shaping policies for the low and high priority traffic classes are different, and it is possible using the proposed protocol to isolate high-priority and low-priority traffic almost perfectly over time scales on the order of a few round-trip times. Simulation results are reported to validate the congestion avoidance and service differentiation capabilities of the proposed architecture.     

Fair Bandwidth Allocation in Optical Burst Switching Networks

Optical burst switching (OBS) is a promising switching technology for next-generation Internet backbone networks. One of the design challenges is how to provide fair bandwidth allocation in OBS networks; the schemes proposed for general store-and-forward IP switching networks can not be used because of the non-buffering and un-fully utilized bandwidth characteristics of OBS networks. We propose a rate fairness preemption (RFP) scheme to achieve approximately weighted max-min fair bandwidth allocation in OBS networks. We present an analysis of the burst loss probability in RFP-based OBS networks. The analysis and simulation results show that the RFP scheme provides fair bandwidth allocation in OBS networks.      

Comparative Account of Bandwidth Efficiency in Optical Burst Switching and Optical Circuit Switching Networks

The performance of Optical Burst Switched (OBS) networks is compared to that of Optical Circuit Switched (OCS) networks in terms of bandwidth efficiency. Two traffic flow models are employed to investigate the effects of traffic grooming, packetization, buffering and burst assembly on bandwidth efficiency and utilization. Traffic is represented by fluid-flow continuous bit streams in the first model and by packet-based discrete flows in the second model. It is shown that the parameters of traffic characteristics and burst assembly have significant impact on the relative bandwidth savings of OBS. The bandwidth efficiency of OBS compared to OCS should not be taken for granted and has to be examined carefully on a case by case basis.     

Dropping Policy with Burst Retransmission to Improve the Throughput of TCP Over Optical Burst-switched Networks

A major concern in optical burst-switched (OBS) networks is contention, which occurs when more than one bursts contend for the same data channel at the same time. Due to the bufferless nature of OBS networks, these contentions randomly occur at any degree of congestion in the network. When contention occurs at any core node, the core node drops bursts according to its dropping policy. Burst loss in OBS networks significantly degrades the throughput of TCP sources in the local access networks because current TCP congestion control mechanisms perform a slow start phase mainly due to contention rather than heavy congestion. However, there has not been much study about the impact of burst loss on the performance of TCP over OBS networks. To improve TCP throughput over OBS networks, we first introduce a dropping policy with burst retransmission that retransmits the bursts dropped due to contention, at the ingress node. Then, we extend the dropping policy with burst retransmission to drop a burst that has experienced fewer retransmissions in the event of contention at a core node in order to reduce the number of events that a TCP source enters the slow start phase due to contention. In addition, we propose to limit the number of retransmissions of each burst to prevent severe congestion. For the performance evaluation of the proposed schemes, we provide an analytic throughput model of TCP over OBS networks. Through simulations as well as analytic modeling, it is shown that the proposed dropping policy with burst retransmission can improve TCP throughput over OBS networks compared with an existing dropping policy without burst retransmission.     

A two-moment performance analysis of optical burst switched networks with shared fibre delay lines in a feedback configuration

Fibre delay lines (FDLs) can substantially reduce the burst loss in Optical Burst Switching (OBS) networks and share-per-node FDL configurations can provide a more cost-efficient solution compared to architectures where delay lines are shared per port. Nevertheless, mathematical performance analysis of this configuration is more difficult due to traffic correlations arising from the shared resource. In this paper, an approximate two-moment traffic model is developed for quantifying end-to-end burst blocking probability in networks of OBS switches with share-per-node FDLs. The two-moment approach can improve model accuracy over more usual Poisson network analysis methods and additionally allows the characteristics of offered load to be taken into account. The accuracy of the proposed method is shown to be favourable, when compared to discrete-event simulations of an OBS network.     

Traffic statistics and performance evaluation in optical burst switched networks

Optical burst switching (OBS) is a promising switching technology to exploit the potential benefits of optical communication and, at the same time, support statistical multiplexing of data traffic at a fine granularity. To quantify its benefits, the paper describes several typical burst assembly algorithms and studies their impact on the assembled burst traffic characteristics as well as the performance of TCP traffic. Also described is a proactive burst scheduling algorithm, called burst overlap reduction algorithm (BORA), which schedules locally assembled bursts in such a way as to reduce burst contention at downstream nodes in OBS networks. Furthermore, to provide analytical insights into performance evaluation of OBS networks, a burst loss model at an OBS node and its extension to different reservation protocols are presented.     

光突发交换网络新型偏射路由方案研究

光突发交换(OBS)被认为是下一代光网络中的有效核心交换技术之一,设计OBS网络的最初目的之一是减小突发包丢失率.解决突发竞争的方法主要包括光缓存、波长变换、偏射路由和突发分段.提出一种改进偏射路由方案,并建立了数学模型,对改进方案的性能进行了仿真分析,结果表明改进方案能更好的提高网络整体性能.     

QoS aware routing and wavelength allocation in optical burst switching networks using differential evolution optimization

The issue of burst losses imposes a constraint on the development of Optical Burst Switching (OBS) networks. Heavy burst losses strongly affect the Quality of Service (QoS) intended by end users. This article presents a QoS aware Routing and Wavelength Allocation (RWA) technique for burst switching in OBS networks. The RWA problem is modeled as a bi-objective Integer Linear Programming (ILP) problem, where objective functions are based on minimizing the number of wavelengths used and the number of hops traversed to fulfill the burst transmission requests for a given set of node pairs. The ILP model is solved using a novel approach based on a Differential Evolution (DE) algorithm. Analytical results show that the DE algorithm provides a better performance compared to shortest path routing, which is a widely accepted routing strategy for OBS networks.     

TCP over optical burst-switched networks with controlled burst retransmission

For optical burst-switched (OBS) networks in which TCP is implemented at a higher layer, the loss of bursts can lead to serious degradation of TCP performance. Due to the bufferless nature of OBS, random burst losses may occur, even at low traffic loads. Consequently, these random burst losses may be mistakenly interpreted by the TCP layer as congestion in the network. The TCP sender will then trigger congestion control mechanisms, thereby reducing TCP throughput unnecessarily. In this paper, we introduce a controlled retransmission scheme in which the bursts lost due to contention in the OBS network are retransmitted at the OBS layer. The OBS retransmission scheme can reduce the burst loss probability in the OBS core network. Also, the OBS retransmission scheme can reduce the probability that the TCP layer falsely detects congestion, thereby improving the TCP throughput. We develop an analytical model for evaluating the burst loss probability in an OBS network that uses a retransmission scheme, and we also analyze TCP throughput when the OBS layer implements burst retransmission. We develop a simulation model to validate the analytical results. Simulation and analytical results show that an OBS layer with controlled burst retransmission provides up to two to three orders of magnitude improvement in TCP throughput over an OBS layer without burst retransmission. This significant improvement is primarily because the TCP layer triggers fewer time-outs when the OBS retransmission scheme is used.     

OBS网络基于光缓存的多优先级业务冲突研究

光突发交换(OBS)网络是下一代IP over WDM光网络的典型代表.丈章时配置有光缓存的OBS网络核心节点中发生的多优先级业务冲突问题进行了性能分析,给出了不同优先级数据包的丢失率和平均等待时延,研究结果可以为OBS网络的实用化提供理论参考.     

A novel transfer mode to reduce burst loss rate for optical burst switching networks

A crucial issue in optical burst switching (OBS) networks is burst loss caused by resource contention. As a result, many methods are currently being proposed to reduce burst loss rate. These methods can be summed up into two categories: burst scheduling algorithms and contention resolutions. Both categories of methods can reduce burst loss rate to a certain degree. However, to make OBS to become a viable solution, the burst loss rate needs to be further reduced. Furthermore, almost all methods ignore the fact that an unfortunately scheduled, locally generated single-hop burst could block a number of future incoming transit bursts, though the burst just travels to its next downstream node. This phenomenon becomes more evident when links are heavily loaded in mesh OBS networks. To eliminate contention caused by single-hop traffic completely, this paper proposes a novel transfer mode called packet calking by differentiating between single-hop traffic from multihop traffic for OBS networks. An analysis model is developed to evaluate the performance of packet calking. Theoretical results are validated through extensive simulations in both ring and mesh networks. These results show that packet calking outperforms the transfer mode without packet calking in terms of burst loss rate and link utilization.     

Absolute QoS differentiation in optical burst-switched networks

A number of schemes have been proposed for providing quality-of-service (QoS) differentiation in optical burst-switched (OBS) networks. Most existing schemes are based on a relative QoS model in which the service requirements for a given class of traffic are defined relative to the service requirements of another class of traffic. In this paper, we propose an absolute QoS model in OBS networks which ensures that the loss probability of the guaranteed traffic does not exceed a certain value. We describe two mechanisms for providing loss guarantees at OBS core nodes: an early dropping mechanism, which probabilistically drops the nonguaranteed traffic, and a wavelength grouping mechanism, which provisions necessary wavelengths for the guaranteed traffic. It is shown that integrating these two mechanisms outperforms the stand-alone schemes in providing loss guarantees, as well as reducing the loss experienced by the nonguaranteed traffic. We also discuss admission control and resource provisioning for OBS networks, and propose a path clustering technique to further improve the network-wide loss performance. We develop analytical loss models for the proposed schemes and verify the results by simulation.     

A framework of prioritized burst segmentation supporting controlled retransmission in OBS networks

In optical burst switching (OBS) networks, burst contentions in OBS core nodes may cause data loss. To reduce data loss, retransmission scheme has been applied. However, uncontrolled retransmission may increase network load significantly and data loss probability defeating the retransmission purpose. In addition, in a priority traffic existing OBS network, OBS nodes may apply different retransmission mechanisms to priorities bursts for quality-of-service (QoS) support. This study has developed a controlled retransmission scheme for prioritized burst segmentation to support QoS in OBS networks. Unlike previous works in the literature, we have set a different value to retransmission probability at each contention and propose a retransmission analytical model for burst segmentation contention resolution scheme. In addition, we have applied the proposed retransmission scheme to the prioritized burst segmentation for QoS support. We have taken into account the load at each link due to both fresh and retransmitted traffic, and have calculated the path blocking probability and byte loss probability (ByLP) for high-priority and low-priority burst to evaluate network performance. An extensive simulation has been proposed to validate our analytical model.     

Planning OBS networks with QoS constraints

The design of OBS networks that guarantee QoS provisioning for different classes of traffic is a major topic under current research. In this work we formulate a unified framework for studying QoS in OBS networks with a GMPLS-based control plane. We use this framework in order to investigate two problems. First, the configuration of the parameters of an aggregation strategy so that a given Forwarding Equivalency Class observes its corresponding QoS requirements. Second, we address the problem of planning a whole OBS network given a series of QoS constraints for each one of the Forwarding Equivalency Classes in the network. The presented QoS framework constitutes a valuable tool for studying QoS-related issues in OBS networks.     

Fast blocking probability evaluation of end-to-end optical burst switching networks with non-uniform ON–OFF input traffic model

A novel, accurate, numerically stable and fast mathematical method for network-wide blocking probability evaluation of end-to-end optical burst switching (OBS) networks with heterogeneous link capacity under non-uniform traffic is proposed. Unlike most of previous works, which have used the Poisson model for the burst traffic, this paper considers a non-uniform ON–OFF model being a more realistic choice for OBS networks. Compared with simulation, the method was proved to be very accurate and much faster (up to four orders of magnitude faster than simulation in the studied cases). These features make the proposed method very useful for network analysis, especially for large size networks where simulation time can be prohibitively high.     

Multi-layer loss recovery in TCP over optical burst-switched networks

It is well-known that the bufferless nature of optical burst-switching (OBS) networks cause random burst loss even at low traffic loads. When TCP is used over OBS, these random losses make the TCP sender decrease its congestion window even though the network may not be congested. This results in significant TCP throughput degradation. In this paper, we propose a multi-layer loss-recovery approach with automatic retransmission request (ARQ) and Snoop for OBS networks given that TCP is used at the transport layer. We evaluate the performance of Snoop and ARQ at the lower layer over a hybrid IP-OBS network. Based on the simulation results, the proposed multi-layer hybrid ARQ + Snoop approach outperforms all other approaches even at high loss probability. We developed an analytical model for end-to-end TCP throughput and verified the model with simulation results.     

OBS环网竞争解决办法的分析和比较

在光突发交换(OBS)基本概念的基础上,针对OBS网络,特别是OBS环网突发包竞争引起的突发包丢包等问题,介绍和比较了OBS网络中常用的突发包竞争解决办法.重点分析了几种适用于OBS环网的常用突发包竞争解决办法对网络吞吐量等主要性能的影响,指出了采用这几种竞争解决办法的网络的性能优劣,归纳总结了它们的优缺点.     

A survey of differentiated QoS schemes in optical burst switched networks

Optical Burst Switching (OBS) has proved to be an efficient paradigm for supporting IP-over-WDM networks. The growth of a variety of applications which transmit voice, data, video and multimedia, has necessitated the need to provide Quality of Service over OBS networks. We present a survey of various existing schemes that provide differentiated service. We classify these schemes based on the stage at which service differentiation is performed, namely assembly time, reservation, scheduling, and contention resolution and compare the advantages and disadvantages of each scheme. We then present a model of how differentiated QoS can be provided in terms of various grades of protection mechanisms.