An Algorithm for Designing Upper-Delay Bounded Switched Local Area Networks

Abstract

The designs of switched Local Area Networks (switched LANs) in practice are usually based on heuristics and experience; in fact, in many cases, no network design is carried out, but only network installation (network cabling and nodes/equipment placements). This may have been as a result of the absence of generally known methods for designing such networks. Also, there is the need for deterministic guarantees on delays when designing switched LANs, as it has been generally agreed that these delays are useful engineering quantities. This is because, if the maximum delay between two nodes of a network is unknown, it is impossible to provide a deterministic guarantee of worst case response times of packets flows in the network. This paper reports the development of an algorithm for designing upper-delay bounded switched LANs.