Internet Draft     Analysis of Existing QoS Solutions      November 2001


Internet Engineering Task Force                               H. de Meer
INTERNET-DRAFT                             University College London, UK
Expires     May 2002                                            G. Feher
                                         University of Budapest, Hungary
                                                      N. Blefari-Melazzi
                                            University of Perugia, Italy
                                                          G. Karagiannis
                                                              D. Partain
                                                             L. Westberg
                                                                Ericsson
                                                           November 2001

                   Analysis of Existing QoS Solutions
                  draft-demeer-nsis-analysis-00.txt





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Copyright Notice





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   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2001). All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

   This memo gives a brief analysis of existing IP quality of service
   (QoS) solutions and the implied signalling issues. This analysis is
   intended to point out open issues in QoS signalling.  Moreover, this
   analysis is done in order to understand whether the strict QoS
   requirements imposed by future fixed and mobile applications on
   networks are satisfied by the existing IP QoS solutions.  The
   existing IP QoS solutions can be categorized as follows:

    * End-to-end per-flow resource reservation protocol

    * Integrated Services over Differentiated Services

    * Statically assigned trunk reservations based on
      Differentiated Services

    * Dynamic trunk reservations with Aggregated RSVP


1.  Introduction

   QoS support in IP networks can be traced back to the seminal
   Sigcomm92 paper on the "Integrated Service Packet Network" model
   (ISPN) by Clark, Shenker and Zhang [CSZ92]. Roughly, the ISPN model
   is built on four columns:

    * A QoS specification and requirements description, which could
      be seen as a description of a service level agreement that
      must be honored by a given QoS architecture.

    * Mechanisms for admission control or traffic conditioning
      when resources are finite and contention may arise.

    * Scheduling and other mechanisms to be in place at the network
      nodes to enforce preferential forwarding and processing of
      data packets. Network resources must be in place to assure
      the specified QoS.

    * signalling and service interfaces to convey information on
      preferences and expectations (requirements) of data packet
      processing and forwarding from applications to relevant
      control elements of network resources and from there back





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      to the applications.

   Finally, a QoS architecture is needed that integrates all four
   columns into an end-to-end solution. At this point nothing is
   precluded in terms of the interpretation of such an end-to-end
   architecture.  The requirement for an end-to-end QoS solution does
   not necessarily mean that a single resource reservation signalling
   protocol must be applied end-to-end.  In fact, it is most likely that
   the end-to-end QoS management architecture will consist of many
   interoperable and concatenated QoS management architectures rather
   than one global end-to-end QoS infrastructure.

   "Next Steps for the IP QoS Architecture" [RFC2990] for example,
   recognizes that, "both the Integrated Services architecture and the
   Differentiated Services architecture have some critical elements in
   terms of their current definition which appear to be acting as
   deterrents to widespread deployment... There appears to be no single
   comprehensive service environment that possesses both service
   accuracy and scaling properties". This statement sums up the reasons
   behind both the proposal of hybrid architectures composed of IntServ
   and DiffServ regions (with the associated problems related to mapping
   and interworking procedures between different regions) and the
   necessity/opportunity of improving/upgrading the IntServ and DiffServ
   paradigms.

   Well-known interpretations are IntServ, DiffServ and even
   heterogeneous interpretations such as IntServ over DiffServ. Other
   interpretations may still be to come.

   Each column, however, may be realized differently in each
   interpretation. For example, resources may be claimed based on the
   granularity of flows or aggregates. Signalling would similarly
   reflect the right level of granularity and could be implicit or
   explicit.  For example, RSVP [RFC2205], one of most prominent
   signalling protocols has been adopted within the IntServ architecture
   for resource reservations. Admission control could be explicit by or
   implicit by overprovisioning and conditioning, etc.

   In this draft a brief analysis is given of existing IP QoS solutions
   and the implied signalling issues. The analysis is intended to point
   out open QoS signalling issues (column 4). Where needed, we will also
   touch on related admission control or traffic conditioning issues.
   The main goal of this analysis is to understand whether the strict
   QoS requirements imposed on networks by future fixed and mobile
   applications are satisfied by the existing IP QoS solutions. The main





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   existing IP QoS solutions can be categorized as follows:

    * End-to-end per-flow resource reservation protocol:
      uses a per-flow resource reservation signalling protocol
      that is applied in an end-to-end communication path.

    * Integrated Services over Differentiated Services: a framework
      that provides end-to-end QoS using the IntServ model over
      heterogeneous networks.

    * Statically assigned trunk reservations based on
      Differentiated Services: several individual reservations
      are aggregated into a common reservation trunk that is
      statically configured.

    * Dynamic trunk reservations with Aggregated RSVP: several
      individual reservations are aggregated into a common
      reservation trunk. Additionally, these trunks are dynamically
      configured by using a signalling protocol that manages various
      mechanisms for dynamic creation of an aggregate reservation.


2.  End-to-end per-flow resource reservation protocol

   An end-to-end per-flow resource reservation signalling protocol is
   applied in an end-to-end communication path, and it can be used by an
   application to make known and reserve its QoS requirements to all the
   network nodes in this path.  This type of protocol is typically
   initiated by an application at the beginning of a communication
   session. A communication session is typically identified by the
   combination of the IP destination address, transport layer protocol
   type and the destination port number.  The resources reserved by such
   a protocol for a certain communication session will be used for all
   packets belonging to that particular session.  Therefore, all
   resource reservation signalling packets will include details of the
   session to which they belong.

   The end-to-end per-flow resource reservation signalling protocol most
   widely used today is the Resource Reservation Protocol (RSVP) (see
   [RFC2210], [RFC2205]). The main RSVP messages are the PATH and RESV
   messages.  The PATH message is sent by a source that initiates the
   communication session. It installs states on the nodes along a data
   path.  Furthermore, it describes the capabilities of the source. The
   RESV message is issued by the receiver of the communication session,
   and it follows exactly the path that the RSVP PATH message traveled





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   back to the communication session source. On its way back to the
   source, the RESV message may install QoS states at each hop. These
   states are associated with the specific QoS resource requirements of
   the destination. The RSVP reservation states are temporary states
   (soft states) that have to be updated regularly. This means that PATH
   and RESV messages will have to be retransmitted periodically. If
   these states are not refreshed then they will be removed.  The RSVP
   protocol uses additional messages either to provide information about
   the QoS state or explicitly to delete the QoS states along the
   communication session path. RSVP uses in total seven types of
   messages:

    * PATH and RESV messages

    * RESV Confirm message

    * PATH Error and RESV Error messages

    * PATH Tear and RESV Tear messages

   An overview of the RSVP functionality includes:


    * End-to-end reservation with aggregation of path
      characteristics such as fixed delay.

    * The same type of reservation functionality in all
      routers. Only policy handling separates the edge of the
      domain from other routers.

    * Multicast and unicast reservations with receiver initiated
      reservations. RSVP makes reservations for both unicast and
      many-to-many multicast applications, adapting dynamically
      to changing routes as well as to group membership.

    * Shared reservations for multiple flows.

    * Support for policy handling to handle multi-operator
      situations since more than one operator will be responsible
      for RSVP's operation.

    * Flexible object definitions. RSVP can transport and maintain
      traffic and policy control parameters that are opaque to
      RSVP. Each RSVP message may contain up to fourteen classes of
      attribute objects. Furthermore, each class of RSVP objects





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      may contain multiple types to specify further the format
      of the encapsulated data. Moreover, the signalling load
      generated by RSVP on the routers is directly proportional
      to the flows processed simultaneously by these routers.
      Furthermore, processing of the individual flows in the
      networking infrastructure may impose a significant processing
      burden on the machines, thus hurting throughput. These
      issues make it reasonable to question the scalability and
      performance in a large network that supports a huge number
      of users.

    * Support for uni-directional reservations, but not
      bi-directional.  (In some wireless subnetworks, the initiation
      of the reservations is done on a bi-directional basis.)

    * Re-scheduling of signaling message in every router. The
      re-scheduling of session refresh messages (aggregated and non
      aggregated ones) depend on the router's own refresh period
      timer. This means, for example, that when a session refresh
      message arrives at a router at the beginning of a refresh
      period it might have to be re-scheduled for re-sending to
      the next hop at the end of the refresh period.

    * Signalling initiation of RSVP error indication messages:
      Any time that an erroneous situation occurs a router
      initiates an RSVP error message.

   In case of wireless networks, when a mobile host moves or the
   connection moves from one base station to another, it could force the
   communication path to change its (source/destination) IP address.
   The change of IP address will require that RSVP establish a new RSVP
   session through the new path that interconnects the two end points
   involved in the RSVP session and release the RSVP session on the old
   path.  During this time, the end-to-end data path connection is
   incomplete (i.e., QoS disruption), and it will negatively affect the
   user performance.

   RSVP includes much more functionality and complexity than is required
   in some IP networks. The QoS problem in such networks is
   significantly simpler to solve (see [WQOSREQ]).  The tradeoff between
   performance and functionality is one of the key issues in such
   networks, and the majority of the functionality in RSVP is not
   required.  This is true for five reasons:







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    * Most of the QoS sensitive applications do not use the
      multicast capabilities of RSVP. Supporting only unicast and
      one-to-many multicast reservations is a reasonable tradeoff,
      since they are considerably simpler than many-to-many
      multicast reservations.  Note that even for the one-to-many
      multicast reservations capability, it should be ensured that
      this type of reservation will not outweigh the requirement
      for simplicity and scalability.

      Without the many-to-many reservation support, protocols
      do not necessarily have to be receiver-oriented. In
      this case, there is no need for the PATH messages.
      This reduces the number of states in the routers.
      Furthermore, no reverse direction (backward) routing is
      required. Such protocols perform one pass only during the
      setup instead of the two passes and therefore speed up the
      reservation initiation. Additionally, the initiation of
      bi-directional reservations in combination with many-to-many
      reservations is very complex.

    * Edge-to-edge with one operator does not require policy
      handling in the interior routers.

    * Path characteristics and flexible traffic parameters and
      QoS definitions could be solved by network dimensioning
      and edge functionality.

    * The huge number of per-microflow states in intermediate
      routers might cause severe scalability problems.

    * Initiation or re-scheduling of signalling messages might load
      intermediate interior routers severely. There are different
      reservation protocol approaches, where it is sufficient
      that edge routers and/or signalling end-points initiate
      or re-schedule all the signaling messages. In this case,
      the intermediate interior routers only forward the messages
      and use a dedicated field of the message to signal to other
      routers. This approach lightens the load on the intermediate
      interior routers.


3.  Integrated Services over Differentiated Services

   The IntServ over DiffServ architecture addresses the problem of
   providing end-to-end QoS using the IntServ model over heterogeneous





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   networks. In this scenario, DiffServ is one of these networks
   providing edge-to-edge QoS.

   The IntServ over DiffServ architecture allows at least two different
   possible deployment strategies. The first is based on statically
   allocated resources in the DiffServ domain.  In this strategy, the
   Diffserv domain is statically provisioned (see Section 4).
   Furthermore, with this strategy the devices in the Diffserv network
   region are not RSVP (or any other dynamic signalling) aware. However,
   it is considered that each edge node in the customer network consists
   of two parts. One part of a node is a standard Intserv that
   interfaces to the customer's network region and the other part of the
   same node interfaces to the Diffserv network region. All edge nodes
   in the customer network maintain a table that indicates the capacity
   provisioned per SLS (Service Level Specification) at each Diffserv
   service level. This table is used to make admission control decisions
   on Intserv flows that cross the Diffserv region.

   A disadvantage of this approach is that the edge nodes in the
   customer network will not be aware of the traffic load in the nodes
   located within the Diffserv domain.  Therefore, a congestion
   situation on a communication path within the Diffserv domain cannot
   be detected by any of these edge nodes. Congestion within a DiffServ
   domain may arise due to difficulties in static provisioning
   [RFC2990]. Repeated steps of aggregations/disaggregations of traffic
   aggregates or other stochastic disturbances may adversely affect the
   QoS. In contrast to the IntServ architecture, no mathematical proof
   of a reliable QoS delivery by DiffServ architectures has yet been
   provided. An immediate conclusion is to take such possibilities into
   account from the outset.

   Accordingly, further improvements could be achieved by providing
   congestion signalling from within such a DiffServ domain to the
   border between the two administrative domains in question.  As is the
   case with TCP control, it is anticipated that (some) "subscribers" to
   such a disturbed service would back off and thus improve the traffic
   load situation within the domain.  Appropriate signalling mechanisms
   would be needed that reflect violation of a specified QoS level. If
   subscribers do back off the original QoS level would be resumed.
   Feedback information and signalling is needed in the next generation
   of a DiffServ architecture that delivers its specified classes of
   service by a combination of resource provisioning and cooperation
   with the subscribers. This would be similar to native TCP/IP
   environments, but with integrated DiffServ characteristics.  While
   resource provisioning is static and does cover the most common and





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   regular case of QoS support, feedback signalling and adaptation or
   dynamic conditioning would deal with the (hopefully) rare event of
   insufficient provisioning. Note that the original service
   specification would explicitly entail the possibility of a reduction
   in the advertised DiffServ bandwidth and the expectation of
   subscribers to back off according the to needs of reestablishing a
   DiffServ QoS class. More details of this concept is given in [DO01].

   The second possible strategy is based on dynamically allocated
   resources in the DiffServ domain. According to [RFC2998], this can be
   done using RSVP-aware DiffServ routers.  However, this approach has
   most of the drawbacks described in Section 2, and per-microflow state
   information is kept in the intermediate routers. Furthermore, dynamic
   provisioning may be too slow to respond quickly enough to congestion
   events.

   Alternatively, resources in the DiffServ domain can be dynamically
   allocated using Aggregated RSVP. This will be discussed in Section 5.

   Other approaches related to the bandwidth broker concept are still
   very immature and will not be discussed here.


4.  Statically-assigned trunk reservations based on Differentiated
Services

   A significant problem in deploying an end-to-end per-flow resource
   reservation signalling scheme is its scalability. This can be solved
   by aggregating (trunking) several individual reservations into a
   common reservation trunk.  The reservation trunks can either be
   statically or dynamically configured.  When the reservation trunks
   are statically configured, no signalling protocol is required for
   performing the reservation of network resources but is likely to be a
   difficult management problem.  However, due to the different mobility
   requirements (such as handover) and QoS requirements (such as
   bandwidth) that the multi-bitrate applications impose on a network
   that supports mobile users, it will be difficult to configure the
   trunked reservations statically and at the same time utilize the
   network efficiently.

   In particular, and focusing on DiffServ [RFC2475], an important open
   point is that such an architecture lacks a standardized admission
   control scheme, and does not intrinsically solve the problem of
   controlling congestion in the Internet. As previously explained in
   Section 3, the edge nodes in the customer network will not be aware





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   of the traffic load in the nodes located within the Diffserv domain.
   Therefore, a congestion situation on a communication path within the
   Diffserv domain cannot be detected by any of these edge nodes.
   Congestion within a DiffServ domain may arise due to difficulties in
   static provisioning [RFC2990].  Upon overload in a given service
   class, all flows in that class suffer a potentially harsh degradation
   of service. "A Framework for Integrated Services Operation over
   Diffserv Networks" [RFC2998] recognizes this problem and points out
   that "further refinement of the QoS architecture is required to
   integrate DiffServ network services into an end-to-end service
   delivery model with the associated task of resource reservation". It
   is thus suggested [RFC2990] to define an "admission control function
   which can determine whether to admit a service differentiated flow
   along the nominated network path".

   In the following we expand on this issue, in the framework of the
   typical hybrid reference network shown in Figure 1, which includes a
   DiffServ region in the middle of a larger network supporting IntServ
   end-to-end. Notice that some of the following considerations also
   apply to an all DiffServ network. In Figure 1, the source host Tx,
   the destination host Rx, the Edge Routers (ER) and the Border Routers
   (BR) execute the functions listed in [RFC2998]. In particular, we
   assume that both sending and receiving hosts use RSVP to communicate
   the quantitative QoS requirements of QoS-aware applications running
   on the hosts. Obviously, admission control in the IntServ subnetworks
   is signalled using RSVP.

            ________         ______________         ________
           /        \       /              \       /        \
          /          \     /                \     /          \
   |---| |        |---|   |---|          |---|   |---|        | |---|
   |Tx |-|        |ER1|---|BR1|          |BR2|---|ER2|        |-|Rx |
   |---| |        |-- |   |---|          |---|   |---|        | |---|
          \          /     \                /     \          /
           \________/       \______________/       \________/

        IntServ region       DiffServ region     IntServ region

            Figure 1: Sample Network Configuration

   Requests for IntServ services must be mapped onto the underlying
   capabilities of the DiffServ network region. Aspects of such mapping
   include [RFC2998]:

    1. selecting an appropriate PHB, or a set of PHBs, for the





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       requested service

    2. performing appropriate policing (perhaps including
       shaping or remarking) at the edges of the DiffServ region

    3. exporting IntServ parameters from the DiffServ region
       (e.g., for the updating of ADSPECs)

    4. performing admission control on the IntServ requests
       that takes into account the resource availability in the
       DiffServ region.


   In principle, the availability of DiffServ per-hop behaviors along
   with mechanisms to statically or dynamically limit the absolute level
   of traffic within a traffic class allows the DiffServ network cloud
   to act as a network element within the Integrated Services framework.
   In other words, an appropriately designed, configured and managed
   DiffServ network cloud can act as one component of an overall end-to-
   end QoS controlled data path using the Integrated Services framework,
   and therefore support the delivery of IntServ QoS services [WROCHA].
   To this end, point 4 above, i.e., the admission control function is
   key.

   In fact, QoS aware services require that the amount of arriving
   traffic be limited by suitable admission control. Two issues are of
   interest [WROCHA]:

    * the method used by the DiffServ cloud to determine whether
      sufficient resources are available

    * the method used by the overall network to query the DiffServ
      cloud about this availability

   Within the cloud, the admission control "mechanism" is closely
   related to resource provisioning. If some form of static resource
   provisioning is used, the admission control function can be performed
   by any network component that is aware of this allocation, such as a
   properly configured boundary router. If resource allocation within
   the network cloud is dynamic (e.g., a dynamic "bandwidth broker" or
   signalling protocol) then this protocol can also perform the
   admission control function by refusing to admit new traffic when it
   determines that it cannot allocate appropriate new resources.

   The key to providing absolute, quantitative QoS services within a





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   DiffServ network is to ensure that at each hop in the network the
   resources allocated to the PHBs used for these services are
   sufficient to handle the arriving traffic. This can be done through a
   variety of mechanisms ranging from static provisioning to dynamic
   per-hop signalling within the cloud. Two situations are possible:


    * With per-cloud provisioning, sufficient resources are
      made available in the network so that traffic arriving at
      an ingress point can flow to "any" egress point without
      violating the PHB resource allocation requirements. In this
      case, admission control and traffic management decisions
      need not be based on destination information.

    * With per-path provisioning, resources are made available
      in the network to ensure that the PHB resource allocation
      requirements will not be violated if traffic arriving
      at an ingress point flows to one (in the unicast case)
      specific egress point. This requires that admission control
      and resource provisioning mechanisms take into account the
      egress point of traffic entering the network, but results
      in more efficient resource utilization.

   The per-cloud vs per-path decision is independent of decisions about
   static vs. dynamic provisioning. It is often assumed that dynamic
   provisioning is necessarily per-path, while static provisioning is
   more likely to be per-cloud. In reality, all four options may be
   useful in different circumstances.

   In any case, there need to be entities that are able to allow or
   refuse service requests, possibly on the basis of resource
   utilization. In other words, we also need an admission control
   function acting on the DiffServ cloud. We can proceed along two
   different routes:

    * Define an admission control function that is also able
      to operate WITHIN the DiffServ cloud. This could solve our
      problem even in the case of isolated or all DiffServ networks
      (that is, not part of an end-to-end RSVP loop).

    * Export suitable characteristics of the Diffserv cloud toward
      the IntServ part so that admission control can be performed
      by the latter (that is, by RSVP).

   In considering the second of these possibilities, in order to do this





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   to provide Guaranteed Service, it would be necessary to export the
   "error terms", referred to as C and D in the specification, which
   would allow the customer to calculate the bandwidth to request from
   the network in order to achieve a particular queuing delay target.

   The difficulty in characterizing the parameters C and D is that,
   unlike the IntServ model, where the C and D terms are a local
   property of the router, in the case of DiffServ these terms depend
   not only on the topology of the cloud, but also on the internal
   traffic characteristics of potentially all traffic in the cloud
   handled with the PHB chosen to support the Guaranteed Service.

   Hence, the existence of upper bounds on delay through the cloud
   implies centralized knowledge about the topology of the cloud and
   traffic characterization.

   These considerations imply that determination of the bound on the
   delay through the DiffServ cloud should be performed off-line,
   perhaps as part of a traffic management algorithm, based on the
   knowledge of the topology, traffic patterns, shaping policies, and
   other relevant parameters of the cloud [WROCHA].

   However, this turns out to be a rather difficult task.  Barring new
   results on delay bounds, the amount of traffic requiring end-to-end
   Guaranteed service across the DiffServ cloud should be rather small,
   potentially leading to severe inefficiencies.

   Additionally, to provide a strict delay bound, the utilization factor
   of the bandwidth allocated to this traffic has to be
   deterministically bounded on all links in the network.  This can be
   either ensured by signalled admission control (such as using dynamic
   resource reservation, e.g., [RMD]) or by a static provisioning
   mechanism.  It should be noted that if provisioning is used, then to
   ensure deterministic load/service rate ratio on all links, the
   network should be strongly overprovisioned to account for possible
   inaccuracy of traffic matrix estimates [WROCHA].

   In conclusion, providing QoS aware service over a DiffServ cloud
   without admission control functions able to operate within the cloud
   itself potentially leads to severe inefficiencies. In fact, the
   "worst case" provisioning model targeting a particular utilization
   bound results in substantially more overprovisioning than the "point-
   to-point" provisioning using an estimated traffic matrix, which in
   turn is potentially more inefficient than explicit point-to point
   bandwidth allocation using signalled admission control.





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   This brings us to option 1 above, the definition of an admission
   control function within the DiffServ region.

   To this end, we cannot use explicit per flow signalling, for obvious
   reasons (this would lead to a stateful architecture). Similarly, we
   do not want to modify the basic router operation by introducing
   packet marking schemes or forcing routers to parse and interpret
   higher layer information. What we would like to do is to implicitly
   convey the status of inner DiffServ routers to the edges of the cloud
   (or to the end points, when the DiffServ net is an isolated one), by
   means of scalable, DiffServ compliant procedures, so that suitable
   devices can make appropriate admission control decisions without
   violating the DiffServ paradigm. A possible way to do this has been
   proposed in [RMD] and [BiaBle].


5.  Dynamic trunk reservations with Aggregated RSVP

   The reservation trunks can be dynamically configured by using a
   signalling protocol that manages various mechanisms for dynamic
   creation of an aggregate reservation, classification of the traffic
   to which the aggregate reservation applies, determination of the
   bandwidth needed to achieve the requirement, and recovery of the
   bandwidth when the sub-reservations are no longer required.

   The first router that handles the aggregated reservations could be
   called an Aggregator, while the last router in the transit domain
   that handles the reservations could be called a Deaggregator.

   The Aggregator and Deaggregator functionality is located in the edge
   nodes. In particular, an Aggregator is located in an ingress edge
   node, while a Deaggregator is located in an egress edge node,
   relative to the traffic source.

   The aggregation region consists of a set of aggregation-capable
   network nodes.  The Aggregator can use a policy that can be based on
   local configuration and local QoS management architectures to
   identify and mark the packets passing into the aggregated region.
   For example, the Aggregator may be the base station that aggregates a
   set of incoming calls and creates an aggregate reservation across the
   edge-to-edge domain up to the Deaggregator.  In this situation the
   call signalling is used to establish the end-to-end resource
   reservations. Based on policy, the Aggregator and Deaggregator will
   decide when the Aggregated states will be refreshed or updated.






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   One example of a protocol that can be used to accomplish QoS dynamic
   provisioning via trunk reservations is the RSVP Aggregation
   signalling protocol specified in [RFC3175].

   With regards to aggregated RSVP, even if the reservation is based on
   aggregated traffic, the number of re-negotiations of the allocated
   resources due to mobility (handover) does not decrease and each re-
   negotiation of resources has the same performance requirements as the
   per-flow reservation procedure.

   Note that the aggregated RSVP solution may use a policy to maintain
   the amount of bandwidth required on a given aggregate reservation by
   taking account of the sum of the underlying end-to-end reservations,
   while endeavoring to change it infrequently. However, such solutions
   (policies) are very useful assuming that the cost of the
   overprovisioned bandwidth is not significant, since this implies the
   need for a certain "slop factor" in bandwidth needs. In certain
   networks, where overprovisioning is not practical due to high costs
   of transmission links, a more dynamic QoS provisioning solution is
   needed.

   Furthermore, the aggregated RSVP scheme is receiver initiated and
   cannot support bi-directional reservations.

   In the aggregated RSVP scheme the resource reservation states stored
   in all the RSVP-aware edge and interior nodes represent aggregated
   RSVP sessions or trunks of RSVP sessions. Therefore, the number of
   the resource reservation states in the aggregated RSVP scheme
   compared to the (per-flow) RSVP scheme is decreased.  However, in a
   Diffserv-based domain the number of the aggregated RSVP sessions
   depends on:

    * The number of Aggregators/Deaggregators: this depends on the
      number of the edge nodes used. For example, in an IP-based
      wireless network, the number of the edge nodes can depend on
      the the number of based stations and controlling gateways. In
      cellular networks, the number of controlling gateways is
      high, and the number of base stations is in the range of
      thousands (see [PaKa01]).

    * The network topology used: when the communication is
      performed in a meshed way (that is, all-to-all), it
      will imply that many communication paths will have to be
      maintained by the network simultaneously.






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    * The number of Diffserv Code Points (DSCPs) used:  more than
      one traffic class will be supported within a network.

   Therefore, the number of the aggregated RSVP reservation states
   within such a network will be significant.


6.  Conclusions

   This draft gives a brief analysis of existing IP QoS solutions and
   accompanying signalling issues.

   This analysis is done in order to understand whether the strict QoS
   requirements imposed by future fixed and mobile applications on
   networks are satisfied by the existing IP QoS solutions.  This
   analysis points out pending and open QoS signalling issues in the
   existing QoS solutions. Given these results, we believe that
   appropriate standardization should take place to create the necessary
   protocols for QoS signalling.


7.  References

   [BiaBle]    G. Bianchi, N. Blefari_Melazzi, "A Migration Path
               to provide End-to-End QoS over Stateless
               Networks by Means of a Probing-driven Admission
               Control", Internet Draft, work in progress,
               draft-bianchi-blefari-end-to-end-QoS-xx.txt, 2001.

   [CSZ92]     Clark, D.D., Shenker, S., Zhang, L, "Supporting
               Real-Time Applications in an Integrated Services
               Packet Network: Architecture and Mechanism",
               Proc. ACM SIGCOMM'92, August 1992.

   [DO01]      De Meer, H., O'Hanlon, P, ''Segmented Adaptation
               of Traffic Aggregates'', 9th Int'l Workshop on
               Quality of Service, IWQoS'01, Karlsruhe, 2001.

   [PaKa01]    Partain, D., Karagiannis, G., Wallentin, P.,
               Westberg, L., "Resource Reservation Issues
               in Cellular Radio Access Networks",
               Internet Draft, work in progress,
               draft-westberg-rmd-cellular-issues-xx.txt, 2001.

   [RFC2205]   Braden, R., Zhang, L., Berson, S., Herzog, A.,





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               Jamin, S., "Resource ReSerVation Protocol (RSVP)
               -- Version 1 Functional Specification", IETF RFC
               2205, 1997.

   [RFC2210]   Wroclawski, J., "The use of RSVP with IETF
               integrated Services", IETF RFC 2210, 1997.

   [WQOSREQ]   Westberg, L., Karagiannis, G., Partain, D., "QoS
               Signalling Requirements for Wireless
               Networks", Internet Draft, work in progress,
               draft-westberg-nsis-wireless-requirements-xx.txt,
               2001.

   [RFC2475]   Blake, S., Black, D., Carlson, M., Davies, E., Wang,
               Z., Weiss, W., "An Architecture for Differentiated
               Services", IETF RFC 2475, December 1998.

   [RFC2990]   G. Huston, "Next Steps for the IP QoS Architecture",
               RFC2990, November 2000.

   [RFC2998]   Bernet, Y., Yavatkar, R., Ford, P., Baker, F.,
               Zhang, L., Speer, M., Braden, R., Davie, B.,
               Wroclawski, J. and Felstaine, E., "A Framework
               for Integrated Services Operation Over DiffServ
               Networks", RFC 2998, November 2000.

   [RFC3175]   Baker, F., Iturralde, C. Le Faucher, F., Davie, B.,
               "Aggregation of RSVP for IPv4 and IPv6
               Reservations", IETF RFC 3175, 2001.

   [RMD]       Westberg, L., Jacobsson, M., Partain, D.,
               Karagiannis, G., Oosthoek, S., Rexhepi, V., Szabo,
               R., Wallentin, P., "Resource Management in Diffserv
               Framework", Internet draft, work in progress,
               draft-westberg-rmd-framework-xx.txt, 2001.

   [WROCHA]    Wroclawski,J., Charny, A.,: "Integrated Service
               Mappings for Differentiated Services
               Networks", Internet Draft, work in progress,
               draft-ietf-issll-ds-map-01.txt, 2001.










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8.  Acknowledgments

   Thanks to Vlora Rexhepi, Istvan Cselenyi, Pontus Wallentin, Geert
   Heijenk and Giussepe Bianchi for reviewing this draft and providing
   useful input.


9.  Editors' Addresses

   Hermann De Meer
   Department of Electronic & Electrical Engineering
   University College London
   Torrington Place
   London WC1E 7JE
   Great Britain
   EMail: H.DeMeer@ee.ucl.ac.uk

   Gabor Feher
   Budapest University of Technology and Economics
   Department of Telecommunications and Telematics
   Magyar tudosok korutja 2.; H-1117 Budapest; Hungary
   Phone: +36 1 463 2187
   EMail: feher@ttt-atm.ttt.bme.hu

   Nicola Blefari-Melazzi
   DIEI, University of Perugia
   Via G. Duranti 93, 06125 Perugia, ITALY
   Tel: +39 075 585 3630
   EMail: blefari@diei.unipg.it

   Georgios Karagiannis
   Ericsson EuroLab Netherlands B.V.
   Institutenweg 25
   P.O.Box 645
   7500 AP Enschede
   The Netherlands
   EMail: Georgios.Karagiannis@eln.ericsson.se

   David Partain
   Ericsson Radio Systems AB
   P.O. Box 1248
   SE-581 12  Linkoping
   Sweden
   EMail: David.Partain@ericsson.com






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   Lars Westberg
   Ericsson Research
   Torshamnsgatan 23
   SE-164 80 Stockholm
   Sweden
   EMail: Lars.Westberg@era.ericsson.se


Table of Contents



1 Introduction ....................................................    2
2 End-to-end per-flow resource reservation protocol ...............    4
3 Integrated Services over Differentiated Services ................    7
4 Statically-assigned trunk reservations based on Differentiated
     Services .....................................................    9
5 Dynamic trunk reservations with Aggregated RSVP .................   14
6 Conclusions .....................................................   16
7 References ......................................................   16
8 Acknowledgments .................................................   18
9 Editors' Addresses ..............................................   18




























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