Scheduling real-time communication on dual-link networks

The authors develop a general model of reservation-based dual-link networks to support real-time communication. They examine the desirable properties of this network and the difficulties in achieving these properties. They then introduce the concept of coherence and develop a theory of coherent dual-link networks. It is shown that a coherent dual-link network can be analyzed as though it is a centralized system. It is also shown that a coherent dual-link network can be analyzed similarly to an equivalent centralized system in terms of its schedulability for periodic message traffic