High Speed Network Technologies
 

New Packet Admittance Policies for 802.14 MAC Protocol

Authors:
N. Golmie, S. Masson, and D. Su

Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Optical Communications and Networks
January, 1997
Paris, France
Abstract

The main functionality of a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer protocol for a bidirectional Cable TV network using a Hybrid Fiber Coaxial (HFC) technology, is to control the access of the various nodes on to the shared medium. Currently, MAC specifications are being drafted by the IEEE 802. 14 (Cable TV) working group.

The goal of this paper is to examine given the ternary-tree blocking algorithm for resolving collisions, policies enforced by the headend for admitting new traffic on the shared medium. We evaluate different techniques for "unblocking" new backlogged traffic after collisions are resolved. Performance is measured in terms of the mean access delay and the packet collision multiplicity. Simulation results for configurations of interest are also presented.

Abdobe Acrobat File