Power Management of Packet Switches via Differentiated Delay Targets

In this paper, we explore two novel scheduling algorithms which allow for both differentiated quality-of-service (QOS) and power conservation in input-queued packet switches. At their core is the idea of a backlog target which represents the delay sensitivity of each input/output port combination. The first algorithm, target-based projective cone scheduling (T- PCS), incorporates these targets into the well-studied projective cone scheduling algorithm, a generalized form of maximum weight matching (MWM). The second algorithm, average backlog scheduling(ABS), uses a ´memory window´ to push average backlogs towards their targets. We explain the intuition behind each of these and then show, through simulation, that both exhibit high performance in terms of managing power and QOS, while simultaneously addressing these two key concerns in switches.