Dynamic management for end-to-end IP QoS: from requirements to offers

The recent propositions made for supporting QoS in IP networks contain several interesting mechanisms that act on a packet or a set of packets basis. As mastery of the end-to-end QoS requires considering each individual host-to-host service, it is of interest to study how these mechanisms can be efficiently assembled and complemented to meet the end-to-end goal without having to overhead each of the participating nodes. In this paper, we analyze the expression of end-to-end requirements and propose a QoS dynamic management architecture based on DiffServ domains interconnecting units. The proposition relies on a discussion of a set of generic QoS-enabling components that we arrange according to both the time scales axis and the execution planes axis. This reveals the relevant areas to focus on to ensure end-to-end QoS and maintain its conformity to requirements.