access icon free Internet traffic modelling: from superposition to scaling

© The Institution of Engineering and Technology
Received 06/10/2013, Accepted 31/01/2014, Revised 31/01/2014, Published 25/03/2014

Internet traffic at various tiers of service providers is essentially a superposition or active mixture of traffic from various sources. Statistical properties of this superposition and a resulting phenomenon of scaling are important for network performance (queuing), traffic engineering (routing) and network dimensioning (bandwidth provisioning). In this article, the authors study the process of superposition and scaling jointly in a non-asymptotic framework so as to better understand the point process nature of cumulative input traffic process arriving at telecommunication devices (e.g., switches, routers). The authors further assess the scaling dynamics of the structural components (packets, flows and sessions) of the cumulative input process and their relation with superposition of point processes. Classical and new results are discussed with their applicability in access and core networks. The authors propose that renewal theory-based approximate point process models, that is, Pareto renewal process superposition and Weibull renewal process superposition can model the similar second-order scaling, as observed in traffic data of access and backbone core networks, respectively.

Inspec keywords: Internet; Weibull distribution; queueing theory; telecommunication network routing; statistical analysis; telecommunication traffic; Pareto distribution

Other keywords: cumulative input process; point process; network dimensioning; scaling dynamics; network performance; nonasymptotic framework; structural components; scaling phenomenon; service provider tiers; switch device; Pareto renewal process superposition; bandwidth provisioning; traffic data; packet component; active traffic mixture; telecommunication network routing; statistical properties; session component; Internet traffic modelling; renewal theory-based approximate point process models; queuing; traffic engineering; telecommunication devices; Weibull renewal process superposition; flow component; traffic superposition; second-order scaling; router device; point process superposition; cumulative input traffic process

Subjects: Queueing theory; Computer communications; Communication network design, planning and routing; Queueing theory; Other computer networks

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