Packet Report Messages for Transport Protocol Reliability
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing data communication protocols rely on separate acknowledgments and negative acknowledgments for packet loss detection and flow control, which can be inefficient and assume specific delivery characteristics of media channels, limiting the ability to tailor reliability and quality of service (QOS) for individual channels.
Innovation Solution
An application-level transport protocol that uses packet report messages to identify received packets and their reception times, allowing for implicit packet loss detection and flow control without separate acknowledgments, enabling tailored reliability and QOS mechanisms, including retransmission and error correction, for media communications.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If separate acknowledgments and negative acknowledgments are used for packet loss detection and flow control, then packet delivery reliability is improved, but protocol complexity and overhead increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple functions (packet acknowledgment, flow control, and statistics collection) into a single packet report message mechanism. Instead of using separate ACK/NACK messages, the receiver generates comprehensive packet reports that contain sequence numbers, reception timestamps, and other metrics, which the sender uses for both reliability control and flow management, thereby reducing protocol complexity while maintaining reliability
Solution Approach 2:
The packet report message serves multiple purposes simultaneously: it acknowledges received packets, provides flow control feedback, enables packet loss detection, and collects network statistics. This multi-functional approach eliminates the need for separate dedicated messages for each function, resolving the contradiction between reliability and complexity
2Measurement precision
If separate acknowledgments are used for flow control, then flow control accuracy is improved, but message overhead and processing burden increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges flow control information with packet acknowledgment information into the same packet report message. The report contains both the acknowledgment data (sequence numbers of received packets) and flow control data (reception timestamps, inter-arrival intervals), eliminating the need for separate flow control messages and reducing overall message overhead while maintaining precision
3Reliability
If protocols make assumptions about delivery characteristics of media channels, then specific QOS requirements are met, but adaptability to different channels is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent enables each communication channel to have its own packet report mechanism with channel-specific parameters and thresholds. The sender can configure different reliability levels, report intervals, and threshold values for different channels based on their specific QOS requirements, while the general packet report framework remains applicable to all channels, achieving both specialization and adaptability
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically adjusts packet report generation and processing based on channel conditions and QOS requirements. Channels can transition between different reliability modes (from best-effort to fully reliable) without changing the underlying protocol structure, allowing adaptability while meeting specific QOS needs through configurable parameters
Data Source
AI summary
In communication between first and second endpoints, packets include respective sequence numbers reflecting a sequential order of transmission. The second endpoint (1) identifies reception times for the packets, and stores the sequence number and reception time of each received packet, and (2) sends packet report messages to the first endpoint, each identifying (i) a respective received packet by its position within the sequential order of transmission of the packets, and (ii) the reception time of the received packet. The first endpoint (1) receives the packet report messages from the second endpoint, and (2) processes the packet report messages to (i) detect missing packets not identified as received in the packet report messages, and initiating re-transmission of the missing packets, and (ii) based on the reception times for the received packets, calculate time-based performance characteristics for the communications link for use in higher-level control of the communications link.