The resource management trade-offs of data communications in ATM based networks

The paper analyses the options available for bandwidth management in ATM-based networks carrying predominantly data traffic, develops a rationale for best-effort approaches and quantifies the trade-off associated with these approaches. Distributed computing, multimedia mail, walk through virtual reality are just a few examples of applications where the current approaches for traffic control (as foreseen by ITU-TSS) are not suitable. Traffic descriptors (other than maybe peak rates) are difficult to determine for the user. Advance reservation for the duration of a call is difficult to understand in an environment where workstations are connected continuously to a network interface and therefore approaches must be imagined which do not rely on such information.