IP over Avian Carriers with Quality of Service

Status of this Memo

This memo defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet
community. It does not specify an Internet standard of any kind.
Discussion and suggestions for improvement are requested.
Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

Copyright (C) The Internet Society (1999). All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

This memo amends RFC 1149, "A Standard for the Transmission of IP
Datagrams on Avian Carriers", with Quality of Service information.
This is an experimental, not recommended standard.

Overview and Rational

The following quality of service levels are available: Concorde,
First, Business, and Coach. Concorde class offers expedited data
delivery. One major benefit to using Avian Carriers is that this is
the only networking technology that earns frequent flyer miles, plus
the Concorde and First classes of service earn 50% bonus miles per
packet. Ostriches are an alternate carrier that have much greater
bulk transfer capability but provide slower delivery, and require the
use of bridges between domains.

The service level is indicated on a per-carrier basis by bar-code
markings on the wing. One implementation strategy is for a bar-code
reader to scan each carrier as it enters the router and then enqueue
it in the proper queue, gated to prevent exit until the proper time.
The carriers may sleep while enqueued.

For secure networks, carriers may have classes Prime or Choice.
Prime carriers are self-keying when using public key encryption.
Some distributors have been known to falsely classify Choice carriers
as Prime.

Packets MAY be marked for deletion using RED paint while enqueued.
Weighted fair queueing (WFQ) MAY be implemented using scales, as
shown:

__
_____/-----\ / o\
>--
+-----+ \ / /______/
| 10g | /|:||/
+-----+ /____/|
| 10g | |
+-----+ .. X
===============================
^
|
=========

Carriers in the queue too long may leave log entries, as shown on the
scale.

The following is a plot of traffic shaping, from coop-erative host
sites.


Alt | Plot of Traffic Shaping showing carriers in flight
|
2k | ....................
| . .
| . .
1k | . .
| +---+ +---+
| | A | | B |
| +---+ +---+
|_____________________________________________


Avian carriers normally bypass bridges and tunnels but will seek out
worm hole tunnels. When carrying web traffic, the carriers may
digest the spiders, leaving behind a more compact representation.
The carriers may be confused by mirrors.

Round-robin queueing is not recommended. Robins make for well-tuned
networks but do not support the necessary auto-homing feature.

A BOF was held at the last IETF but only Avian Carriers were allowed
entry, so we don't know the results other than we're sure they think
MPLS is great. Our attempts at attaching labels to the carriers have
been met with resistance.