FRR for latency reduction and QoS provisioning in OBS networks

We propose a forward resource reservation (FRR) scheme to reduce the data burst delay at edge nodes in optical burst switching (OBS) systems. We also explore algorithms to implement the various intrinsic features of the FRR scheme. Linear predictive filter (LPF)-based methods are investigated and demonstrated to be effective for dynamic burst-length prediction. An aggressive resource reservation algorithm is proposed to deliver a significant performance improvement with controllable bandwidth cost. By reserving resources in an aggressive manner, an FRR system can reduce both the signaling retransmission probability and the bandwidth wastage as compared with a system without the aggressive reservation. An FRR-based QoS strategy is also proposed to achieve burst delay differentiation for different classes of traffic. Theoretical analysis and simulation results verify the feasibility of the proposed algorithms and show that our FRR scheme yields a significant delay reduction for time-critical traffic without incurring a deleterious bandwidth overhead.