Some Observations on Fairness of Bandwidth Sharing

This paper reviews the engineering solutions and economic models for fair allocation of network bandwidth to elastic flows. By using examples, it gives insight to Proportional Fairness, and how it compares to the fairness achieved by TCP. The second topic is a discussion of fair bandwidth allocation between multicast and unicast flows. By separating the discussion into economic and engineering viewpoints, this paper discusses ideal solutions and suggests practical approaches to achieving reasonable fairness. email address: [email protected] © 1999 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved. The SML Technical Report Series is published by Sun Microsystems Laboratories, of Sun Microsystems, Inc. Printed in U.S.A. Unlimited copying without fee is permitted provided that the copies are not made nor distributed for direct commercial advantage, and credit to the source is given. Otherwise, no part of this work covered by copyright herein may be reproduced in any form or by any means graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or storage in an information retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. TRADEMARKS Sun, Sun Microsystems, Java, and the Sun logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. For information regarding the SML Technical Report Series, contact Jeanie Treichel, Editor-in-Chief . Some Observations on Fairness of Bandwidth Sharing Dah Ming Chiu Sun Microsystems Laboratories Burlington, Massachusetts