On Measurement-Based Transport Method for Message Delay Minimization Over Wide-Area Networks

Data transport methods with end-to-end performance guarantees are required by the next generation distributed computing applications. Transport methods based on default best-effort IP networks are not capable of providing such guarantees due to complex traffic distributions in wide-area networks and highly dynamic network conditions. In this paper, we present a measurement-based transport method using source routing strategy to minimize message delays via multiple quickest paths. This method is based on a linear approximation using effective bandwidth, and is computationally efficient and also analytically tractable under fairly general conditions. This method is implemented using application-level daemons and tested at Internet nodes. The results illustrate its superior performances over the default TCP/IP method.