Efficient and modified round-robin protocols for fiber optic networks

Several packet-switched, multiaccess protocols based on round-robin scheduling have been proposed for fiber-optic networks, e.g. D-Net, Expressnet, and Fasnet. The authors study simple modifications to these round-robin protocols in order to improve the channel capacity for fixed packet length. A representative example modification of D-Net based on generating periodic locomotives is called scheduled D-Net. A further modification, which combines the beneficial properties of unmodified and scheduled D-Net, results in an even more efficient mixed D-Net protocol. The authors outline, approximately model, and analyze scheduled and mixed D-Net protocols, and demonstrate quantitatively how these protocols outperforms unmodified D-Net. For this comparison, the protocols´ delay-throughput characteristics are sued as the performance metric. Simulation results are also included