Analysing quality of service performance in packet-switched networks

Starting from the principle of delay constancy requirements of quality of service (QoS) for real-time applications, this paper defines a framework for analysing both the statistical and deterministic end-to-end delay performance in packet switched networks. The framework is based on a novel general queueing model and virtual session server. The paper shows that overall variable packet delay can be decomposed into three separate components; each characterizes and isolates specific factors that constitute the delay components. This separation allows us to derive an expression for the end-to-end delay bound in a packet switched networks of arbitrary topology.