Analysis of source policy in rate-controlled ATM networks

Broadband packet networks based on asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) are enabling the integration of traffic with a wide range of characteristics within a single communication network. This paper provides an analysis of the source policy behavior in the rate-based congestion control framework being developed by the ATM Forum and derives approximate analytical closed-form expressions to describe the rate-increase process. These approximations are used to analyze the impact of the source algorithm on the TCP slow-start process operating over a rate-controlled ATM network where rate allocation is performed explicitly in the switches. The results show that the increase in TCP congestion window ramp-up time is noticeable when the round-trip delay is small. The results are verified by simulation