Dynamic Buffer Size Control for Network Latency Management
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Solution Overview
Problem
Network nodes experience unacceptable latency due to buffering issues caused by mismatches between ingress and egress interface speeds, leading to congestion spillover and increased latency for packets intended for different stations, which is complicated and resource-intensive to address with separate buffers.
Innovation Solution
A method and apparatus that dynamically adjust the size of a transmission buffer based on observed latency and egress rate, allowing the buffer to grow when latency is acceptable and reducing its size when latency exceeds a threshold to mitigate latency issues, with a closed-loop technique monitoring egress rate and latency to control the buffer size.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If data is buffered to resolve ingress-egress speed mismatch, then throughput is improved, but latency increases
Solution Approach 1:
The buffer size is made dynamic rather than static. The system continuously monitors latency metrics and adjusts the buffer size accordingly - increasing it when latency is acceptable to improve throughput, and decreasing it when latency exceeds thresholds to maintain quality of service. This dynamic adjustment resolves the contradiction by allowing the buffer to adapt to changing network conditions.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the parameter of buffer size based on latency observations. By monitoring latency metrics and adjusting the buffer size parameter dynamically, the system optimizes the trade-off between throughput (which benefits from larger buffers) and latency (which suffers with larger buffers).
2Reliability
If buffer size is increased to handle bursty traffic, then congestion is reduced, but latency spillover to other stations increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements feedback control by monitoring latency metrics and using this information to adjust buffer size. When latency spillover is detected (indicating the buffer is too large and affecting other stations), the feedback loop triggers a reduction in buffer size. This feedback mechanism resolves the contradiction by continuously balancing congestion handling capability against latency spillover to other stations.
3Loss of time
If separate buffers are configured for separate destinations, then latency spillover is eliminated, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention makes a single buffer serve multiple destinations dynamically by adjusting its size based on latency observations, rather than requiring separate dedicated buffers for each destination. This universal buffer approach eliminates latency spillover through dynamic size adjustment while avoiding the complexity of multiple separate buffer configurations.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of static separate buffers for each destination, the system uses a single dynamic buffer that adjusts its size based on latency metrics. This dynamic approach achieves the latency spillover elimination benefit of separate buffers without the complexity of configuring and managing multiple destination-specific buffers.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods associated with controlling buffer size based on latency are described. In one embodiment, a method includes determining a transmission latency for a data item exiting a transmission buffer and selectively manipulating a size of the transmission buffer based on the transmission latency for the data item.