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The Internet protocol (IP) was created as a connectionless network layer protocol that takes no attempt to distinguish between various application types. Hence, the integration of a wide range of telecommunication services over the Internet is the main reason behind the need for the provision of quality of service (QoS) guarantees to end users. In such multiservice networks, resources are managed based on service level agreements (SLA), acknowledging different types of traffic in terms of bandwidth requirements, delay and other QoS parameters. An SLA is the documented result of a negotiation between a customer and a service provider that defines service characteristics, responsibilities and priorities of every party. An SLA may include statements about tariffing and billing, service delivery, and compensations. This paper provides a short overview of some aspects of quality of service, and identifies main issues and problems of defining and managing an SLA, based on its current standardization stage. Keywords

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Absslracr-This paper assesses the idueaee of different link cost metries on the overall performance of muting algorithms, which are suitable for realizing traffic engineering in IP networks by means of MPLS (Multipmtocol Label Switching). The performance evaluation is conducted by mesm of extensive network simulations for a partially meshed network and three distributed muting algorithms, while the average end-to-end delay, total network throughput, and the total packet dmp pmbabilily are taken as performance measures. It is shown that the link cast metric selection affects the performance of the considered muting algorithms in terms of the typical traffic engineering goals.