Application and evaluation of distributed WAN optimization technique in heterogeneous networks

WAN optimization becomes a well-known technique to improve transmission rate in file transfer applications and interactive applications served in international cloud services. WAN optimization technique can improve transmission speed by using high performance protocols instead of TCP between both ends of wide area network, which has a large round trip time and a high packet loss rate. There are some kinds of high performance protocols, and their effectiveness in improving communication are different from each other based on the characteristics of the networks and applications. When WAN optimization technique is only used at both ends of a heterogeneous network containing networks such as wireless networks, international leased lines, etc. (e.g., access from a mobile device to a foreign cloud data center), improvement in communication is limited because only one high performance protocol is being applied. Therefore, we propose “distributed WAN optimization technique” that dynamically changes high performance protocols and sections to adapt those protocols based on network characteristics and applications.