An efficient network architecture with guaranteed QoS and very high availability for real-time on-line learning

Abstract

Connection oriented networks such as MPLS can better meet the QoS guarantees required by the emerging e-learning applications that are mostly real-time in nature. These connection oriented networks are more prone to network failures and they can be classified into link/path failures and degraded failures. Virtual path hopping (VPH) concept discussed here eliminates all degraded type failures due to control plane failures. Dynamic virtual path allocation (DVPA) algorithm proposed here can achieve very fast recovery from link/path failures while keeping the utilization efficiency of network resources high. This recovery time consists of two main parts; time taken to detect failures and time taken to activate the backup path (BP). DVPA algorithm virtually makes the time taken to activate the BP 'zero' for premium traffic (PT). The Active BP (ABP) will be always used by best effort traffic (BET) when there aren't any failures. Simulation results obtained were impressive. Implementing DVPA algorithm in conjunction with VPH concept in connection oriented networks can achieve the QoS and very high availability requirements of the future e-learning over the Internet.