Resilience Analysis of Packet-Switched Communication Networks

Abstract

In the presence of local network outages, restoration and protection switching mechanisms redirect the traffic over alternative paths to mitigate the effect of failures. However, some failure combinations still lead to loss of ingress-egress connectivity within a network or to severe congestion due to rerouted traffic. Congestion may also be caused by unexpected traffic shifts due to changed user behavior or due to changes of interdomain routing. This paper presents a framework for the analysis of ingress-egress unavailability and link congestion due to: 1) failures; 2) changes of user behavior; and 3) changed interdomain routing. It proposes algorithms to find the most probable combinations of 1)-3) according to some models, and to evaluate the connectivity and the relative link load of the network under these conditions. We have implemented this concept in a software tool and its visualization of the results leads to a comprehensive view of the network's resilience. It helps to anticipate potential ingress-egress disconnection and congestion before failures and overload occur or before planned modifications (new infrastructure, new routing, new customers) take effect. Thus, it detects weak points in a network, predicts the effectiveness of potential upgrades, and thereby supports careful bandwidth overprovisioning.