Congestion Control

1. Congestion Control Computer Networks John Kristoff

2. Where are we? John Kristoff

3. Recall • Data Link Layer • Link level specific transmission • Network Layer • End-to-End host addressing and routing • Transport Layer • End-to-End application multiplexing and message flow-control • The expert: Sally Floyd http://www.aciri.org/floyd/ John Kristoff

4. Note Flow control is a subset of congestion control. The former attempts to properly match the rate of the sender with that of the network and receiver. The later deals with the sustained overload of intermediate network elements such as internetwork routers. John Kristoff

5. Congestion Collapse • As the network load increases, packet drops and thus packet retransmissions increase • Fragments dropped are especially annoying, the remaining fragments get sent, but cannot be used • As retransmissions increase, less actual work gets done John Kristoff

6. Some Congestion Fixes • When congestion increases, slow down! • Additive Increase, Multiplicative Decrease is used in TCP • Setup reservations or service classes • Packets failing to adhere to their class or reservation are simply discarded or put onto a low priority queue/link • Discover end-to-end MTU if fragments are getting dropped John Kristoff

7. Fairness • Equal share bandwidth to end stations • Fair share based on application • Fair share based on timeliness of data • Fair share based on value of data • Fair share based on price paid • ...and so on John Kristoff

8. Active Congestion Control Mechanisms • Eligible discard • Queue management • Network Signaling and Notification • End station avoidance • Class of service signaling • Quality of service reservations John Kristoff

9. Eligible Discard • Frames, cells or packets are marked according to a drop priority • Source or edge intermediate device may mark based on some policy • watermark/threshold reached • data type • source • destination • cost • Usually implemented at data link or network layer John Kristoff

10. Eligible Discard Illustrated John Kristoff

11. Queue Management • First in, first dropped (FIFO) • Tail drop (LIFO) • Leaky bucket • Token bucket • Random early detection (RED) • Weighted Fair Queueing • Usually implemented in intermediate devices such as routers and switches John Kristoff

12. First In, First Out Illustrated • Queue pointers need to be updated • Sender learns of drop sooner John Kristoff

13. Last In, First Out Illustrated • Simple - no queue pointers to update • Source cannot react as quick John Kristoff

14. Leaky Bucket Illustrated • From Tanenbaum Figure 5-24, graphic will print to a Postscript printer John Kristoff

15. Token Bucket Illustrated • From Tanenbaum Figure 5-26, graphic will print to a Postscript printer John Kristoff

16. RED Illustrated • Probability marking applied to each packet based on queue length, packet being dropped John Kristoff

17. Weighted Fair Queueing John Kristoff

18. Network Signaling and Notification • Also called choke packets • In Frame Relay • Forward Explicit Congestion Notification (FECN) • Backward Explicit Congestion Notification (BECN) • Bit in frame set • Experimental Internet mechanism • Explicit Congestion Notification (ECN) • Bits set in packets to hosts John Kristoff

19. End Station Avoidance • Also called end-to-end control • TCP • Slow start • Congestion avoidance • Fast Retransmit • Fast Recovery John Kristoff

20. Class of Service Signaling • Packets marked to a particular traffic class • IEEE 802.1p • Differentiated Services (DiffServ) • Re-defines IP Type of Service (ToS) bit fields • Asynchronous Transfer Mode John Kristoff

21. Quality of Service Reservations • Resource ReSerVation Protocol • Reserve resources in routers • Requires stateful path • Asynchronous Transfer Protocol (ATM) John Kristoff