QRON: QoS-aware routing in overlay networks

Abstract

Recently, many overlay applications have emerged in the Internet, such as peer-to-peer file sharing, end host multicasting and content distribution network. Currently, each of these applications requires their proprietary functionality support, such as network topology discovery, routing path selection, fault detection and tolerance, etc. A general unified framework may be a desirable alternative to application-specific overlays. In this paper, we introduce the concept of overlay brokers (OBs). We assume that each autonomous system in the Internet has one or more OBs. These OBs cooperate with each other to form an overlay service network (OSN) and provide overlay service support for overlay applications, such as resource allocation and negotiation, overlay routing topology discovery, and other functionalities. The scope of our effort is the support of quality-of-service (QoS) in overlay networks. In this paper, our primary focus is on the design of QoS-aware routing protocols for overlay networks (QRONs). The goal of QRON is to find a QoS-satisfied overlay path, while trying to balance the overlay traffic among the OBs and the overlay links in the OSN. A subset of OBs, connected by the overlay paths, can form an application specific overlay network for an overlay application. The proposed QRON algorithm adopts a hierarchical methodology that enhances its scalability. Two different types of path selection algorithms are analyzed in our paper. We have simulated the protocols based on the transit-stub topologies produced by GT-ITM. Simulation results have shown that the proposed algorithms perform well in providing QoS-aware overlay routing service.