The paper studies the Quality of Service (QoS) concept in Broadband ISDN (B-ISDN). The QoS parameters in the ATM layer and the AAL (ATM Adaptation Layer) are defined. The main goal of this paper is to present the translation of QoS parameters between layers. We concentrate on the translation from the AAL to the ATM layer because the AAL must be designed to be service dependent and specific. The QoS parameters at the ATM layer resulting from the translation will be the performance requirements on a connection basis for the ATM network. Finally, we discuss the impacts of QoS parameter translation on guaranteeing QoS in the ATM network.
1: IntroductionAs telecommunication and computer communication evolve into high bandwidth and low delay communication, applications which were previously restricted to specialised networks can be integrated into a broadband network. The B-ISDN will be based on the Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM). ATM is a very flexible transfer mode which does not impose a fixed rate of transmission to the sources of information, therefore being adequate to support any type of service, either at a constant or variable bit rate. This ensures that ATM can be used not only for existing services but also for new services and applications [1] [2].A major problem, however, in the B-ISDN is how to guarantee the QoS to each service, especially given the wide range of services that the B-ISDN will be supporting and the higher degree of ATM resource sharing as compared to the conventional synchronous transfer mode (STM). To provide QoS guarantees requires at the one end the knowledge of QoS requirements, and at the other end the construction of an ATM core network that can guarantee this QoS :1) First problem is that little is known about the ATM performance requirements of future B-ISDN services, especially multi-media applications. Even the requirements of foreseeable B-ISDN services (i.e., N-ISDN services) have not been thoroughly analysed in terms of ATM network performance parameters; only ?This work was partially supported by the EEC research project
M * c E (QOSMIC).Also a member of the research staff at KOREA TELECOM. some (not exact) definitions [3][4] are known. This is because the performance requirements depend not only on the diverse QoS requirements from user, but also on the layer processing and workload in host systems. So, in order to guarantee1 QoS to the user, it is necessary to introduce a set of DOS Dara meters whose properties indicate the nature and the requirements in layered protocol stack. These QoS parameters are defmed for each layer such that each layer can guarantee the demanded QoS to its next-higher layer and demands a possibly different QoS from its next-lower layer [5]. So, it is important to translate2 user requirements into ATM layer QoS parameters. We call this mechanism 00s parameter mnslation.We concentrate on the translation from the AAL to the ATM layer, as the AAL is designed to be service dependent and specific. The ATM layer QoS parameters are basically the end-to-e...