Transmitting time‐critical data over heterogeneous subnetworks using standardized protocols

Current communication networks consist of subnetworks of different types. Therefore a common network protocol has to be used for the transmission of data in such a heterogeneous network. Since some time the requirement of mobility in communication networks is showing up. For that reason wireless networks are playing an increasing role as subnetworks. On the other hand there is the need for multiplexed transmission of time-critical and non time-critical (normal) data within a heterogeneous network. In this paper we discuss the problem of multiplexed transmission of time-critical and of non time-critical data over a wireless type subnetwork using a common standardized network protocol. Many of the available wireless subnetworks are of low or medium transmission speed and guarantee a fixed transmission bandwidth at the access point. We describe a mechanism to transmit time-critical data in such a type of subnetwork using a connectionless transport and a connectionless network protocol. The concurrent transmission of non time-critical data using a connection oriented transport and the same connectionless network protocol is assumed to be of lower priority; it is scheduled in a way to fill the remaining capacity, which has not been reserved for the transmission of time-critical data. In our discussion we concentrate on the standardized ISO/OSI protocools CLNP as connectionless network protocol, CLTP as connectionless transport protocol and TP4 as connection oriented transport protocol. We propose a header compression protocol and a fragmentation protocol for use on low bandwidth subnetworks. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.