Worst-case performance of a buffer with independent shaped arrival processes

In both asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) standards and evolving Internet guidelines, deterministic shaping has two principle objectives: (1) to facilitate the allocation of a suitable amount of resources (buffer memory, bandwidth) to a connection to achieve its required quality of service and (2) to easily police traffic and assure "fair" access to a shared resource. We take an ATM context and use fluid modeling, which is appropriate because ATM uses small fixed-length (53-byte) packets called cells. A buffer in a network access node with independent and identically distributed shaped arrival processes is considered. A worst-case performance bound is derived that relies only on the traffic shaping parameters.