Fair Queuing in Active and Programmable Networks

Abstract

At present the Internet is being transformed to a sophisticated system where network researchers are exploring new ways to dynamically program network switches, routers to accelerate network innovation. This trend introduces the concept of Active and programmable networks. The goal is to simplify the deployment of network services, leading to networks that explicitly support the process of service creation and deployment. To use such technology safely and efficiently, individual nodes must provide mechanisms to enforce resource lim- its to the contending flows. In active and programmable networks, the packet scheduling schemes should consider multiple resources such as CPU and memory in addition to bandwidth to achieve overall fairness. Maintaining fairness of one resource allocation does not ensure the fair allocation of other resources automatically. The dynamic nature of network load, and the unpredictability of processing times of active packets pose another significant challenge in providing fairness guarantees between contending flows. This chapter presents a fair resource allocation mechanism for a programmable/active node.KeywordsFair Resource AllocationSchedulingProgrammable NetworksActive Networks