TESTING SHAPED TCP TRAFFIC

• US 20120263058A1
• Filed: 04/13/2012
• Published: 10/18/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/15/2011
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Viavi Solutions, Inc. (Lumentum Holdings Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Viavi Solutions, Inc. (Lumentum Holdings Inc.)
• Inventors: CONSTANTINE, Barry
• Application Number:
  US13/446,964
• Publication Number:
  US 20120263058A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/252
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0888 Throughput
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/50 Testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/55 Testing of service level quality, e.g. simulating service usage

Abstract

A testing system for a TCP network that provides an innovative and bounded test approach to a network configuration that otherwise would require live user traffic and subjective means to determine if the traffic was being shaped or policed. The parameters of a network segment are determined, and then a plurality of connections are used to properly stress network buffers and the traffic shaping function. A throughput chart can then be generated to determine if the network segment has been properly shaped.

Claims

1. A method of testing whether a network segment is properly traffic shaped comprising:

providing first and second testing devices at opposite ends of the network segment;

determining bandwidth capacity of the network segment;

determining round trip time between first and second testing devices;

determining bandwidth delay product from bandwidth capacity and round trip time;

determining number of connections to provide a cumulative TCP window greater than the bandwidth delay product;

transmitting data over the number of connections at the cumulative TCP window from the first testing device to the second testing device; and

generating a throughput chart for the connections to determine if the network segment is properly traffic shaped.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of determining bandwidth capacity includes transmitting stateless IP traffic between the first and second testing devices

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the stateless IP traffic comprises user datagram protocol (UDP) packets.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of determining bandwidth capacity includes gradually increasing traffic launched into network segment from the first testing device to the second testing device until a maximum capacity is reached, which is the maximum capacity before packet loss occurs at the second testing device.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the steps of determining bandwidth capacity and determining round trip time are repeated a plurality of times to verify the accuracy.

6. The method according to claim 1, further comprising transmitting data over the number of connections at the cumulative TCP window from the second testing device to the first testing device.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of determining number of connections includes multiplying the bandwidth delay product by a scaling factor.

8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the scaling factor is from 1.5 to 2.0.

9. The method according to claim 7, further comprising determining the scaling factor by experimentation.

10. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart to determine if the network segment is properly traffic shaped includes determining if a connection network utilization for each connection varies by less than 10% of an ideal shared bandwidth.

11. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart to determine if the network segment is properly traffic shaped includes determining if a connection network utilization for each connection varies by less than 15% of an ideal shared bandwidth.

12. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart to determine if the network segment is properly traffic shaped includes determining if a connection network utilization for each connection varies by less than 10% of an ideal equally-shared bandwidth.

13. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart to determine if the network segment is properly traffic shaped includes determining if a connection network utilization for each connection varies by less than 15% of an ideal equally-shared bandwidth.

14. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart for the connections is conducted in real-time.

15. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of generating a throughput chart for the connections is conducted post analysis.

16. A computer program, which when executed by a processor, is configured to perform the method according to claim 1.