Title
An Optimal Flow Assignment Framework for Heterogeneous Network Access
Abstract
We consider a scenario where devices with multiple networking capabilities access networks with heterogeneous characteristics. In such a setting, we address the problem of efficient utilization of multiple access networks (wireless and/or wireline) by devices via optimal assignment of traffic flows with given utilities to different networks. We develop and analyze a device middleware functionality that monitors network characteristics and employs a Markov Decision Process (MDP) based control scheme that in conjunction with stochastic characterization of the available bit rate and delay of the networks generates an optimal policy for allocation of flows to different networks. The optimal policy maximizes, under available bit rate and delay constraints on the access networks, a discounted reward which is a function of the flow utilities. The flow assignment policy is periodically updated and is consulted by the flows to dynamically perform network selection during their lifetimes. We perform measurement tests to collect traces of available bit rate and delay characteristics on Ethernet and WLAN networks on a work day in a corporate work environment. We implement our flow assignment framework in ns-2 and simulate the system performance for a set of elastic video-like flows using the collected traces. We demonstrate that the MDP based flow assignment policy leads to significant enhancement in the QoS provisioning (lower packet delays and packet loss rates) for the flows, as compared to policies which do not perform dynamic flow assignment but statically allocate flows to different networks using heuristics like average available bit rate on the networks.
Year
DOI
Venue
2007
10.1109/WOWMOM.2007.4351715
2007 IEEE International Symposium on a World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks
Keywords
Field
DocType
process control,traffic flow,access network,testing,middleware,markov decision process,heterogeneous network,stochastic processes,optimal control,system performance
Wireless,Optimal control,Computer science,Network packet,Markov decision process,Computer network,Packet loss,Ethernet,Heterogeneous network,Access network,Distributed computing
Conference
ISBN
Citations 
PageRank 
978-1-4244-0992-1
17
1.44
References 
Authors
14
4
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Jatinder Pal Singh1464.66
Tansu Alpcan21383114.46
Piyush Agrawal321115.13
Varun Sharma446221.91