A Survey on Network Calculus Tools for Network Infrastructure in Real-Time Systems

Boyang Zhou,Liang Cheng,Siraphob Limprapaipong,Isaac Howenstine

doi:10.1109/access.2020.3043600

Boyang Zhou, Liang Cheng + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.1109/access.2020.3043600

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Abstract

Network Calculus is an established analytical framework which can provide deterministic estimates of latency and buffer requirements for feed-forward packet-switched communication networks. Researchers find it useful in analyzing network performance in real-time systems. As there are several Network Calculus tools and software packages for estimating network performance, it is important to select suitable Network Calculus tools for network analysis problems. This article introduces twelve established tools for Network Calculus analysis and compares their advantages and disadvantages in terms of their applicability for various systems and analysis needs. We also provide recommendations for users to select the suitable tools for research. Five public tools, namely DiscoDNC, RTC Toolbox, Deborah, CyNC, and nc-tandem-tight, are chosen to analyze end-to-end delay in a series of tandem networks for their performance demonstration. Simulations of the same tandem networks are implemented to compare with the analytical results achieved by the Network Calculus tools. To our best knowledge, this is the first comprehensive study that compares existing tools of Network Calculus analysis for real-time system network infrastructure. Our aim is to provide quick guidance to research communities for selecting suitable tools to analyze delay performance of networks.

Highlights

Network Calculus is a set of theories and analytical methods to deterministically estimate the upper bound of the and endto-end delay for data flows and minimum buffer size for switches in communication networks, which is widely used by researchers working on real-time systems such as realtime cyber-physical systems (CPS) [1]
NETWORK CALCULUS Network Calculus analyses require certain information and assumptions, which include: 1) The topology of the network; 2) The properties of each data flow; a) The flow paths are assumed to be static during the analysis; b) The network induced by all the flow paths must be feed-forward; 3) The properties of each switch in the network
CASE STUDIES OF TANDEM NETWORK ANALYSIS we show the analytical results of the worstcase delay in tandem networks using RTC Toolbox, DiscoDNC, nc-tandem-tight, Deborah, and CyNC

Summary

Introduction

Network Calculus is a set of theories and analytical methods to deterministically estimate the upper bound of the and endto-end delay for data flows and minimum buffer size for switches in communication networks, which is widely used by researchers working on real-time systems such as realtime cyber-physical systems (CPS) [1]. Network Calculus provides a framework for modeling the critical aspects of the network to estimate bounds of the worst-case delay and backlog of the network. These aspects include the applications serviced by the network and their unique communication requirements, the capability of the network devices in the network, the topology of the network substrate, the data flow paths, and the scheduling algorithms.

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