IP traffic characterization: an overview
Achille Pattavina, Massimo Tornatore · 2002
Abstract: The capacity of backbone networks keeps increasing to cope with the increasing user traffic demands. The key user of such huge transport capacity is the IP protocol, which is nowadays seen as the universal network protocol for any type of user application. A more flexible exploitation of backbone network bandwidth in presence of IP traffic requires to simplify network protocol architecture so as to carry IP flows directly in the optical domain. Designing such network environment needs, as key requirement, the statistical modeling of IP traffic. This paper provides an overview of the different proposals concerning the description of IP traffic. Statistical properties derived by actual traffic measurements are discussed and compared in order to provide the traffic modeling necessary for future investigations on IP-over-WDM networks. Key-Words:- IP, TCP, traffic modeling, statistical characterization, heavy-tailed distributions. 1