Call admission control for capacity-varying networks

Abstract

Many networks, such as Non-Geostationary Orbit Satellite (NGOS) networks and networks providing multi-priority service using advance reservations, have capacities which vary over time for some or all types of calls carried on these networks. For connection-oriented networks, Call Admission Control (CAC) policies which only use current capacity information may lead to excessive and intolerable dropping of admitted calls whenever the network capacity decreases. Thus, novel CAC policies are required for these networks. Three such CAC policies are discussed, two for calls with exponentially distributed call holding times and one for calls whose holding time distributions have Increasing Failure Rate (IFR) functions. The Admission Limit Curve (ALC) is discussed and shown to be a constraint limiting the conditions under which any causal CAC policy may admit calls and still meet call dropping guarantees on an individual call basis. We demonstrate how these CAC policies and ALC represent progressive steps in developing optimal CAC policies for calls with exponentially distributed call holding times, and extend this process to the more general case of calls with IFR call holding times.