MODIFYING QUALITY OF SERVICE TREATMENT FOR DATA FLOWS

• US 20180191622A1
• Filed: 06/30/2016
• Published: 07/05/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 06/30/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: British Telecommunications PLC (BT Group PLC)
• Original Assignee: British Telecommunications PLC (BT Group PLC)
• Granted Patent: US 11,616,728 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5006 Creating or negotiating SLA contracts, guarantees or penalties
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5009 Determining service level performance parameters or violations of service level contracts, e.g. violations of agreed response time or mean time between failures [MTBF]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5022 by giving priorities, e.g. assigning classes of service
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/24 Traffic characterised by specific attributes, e.g. priority or QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2425 for supporting services specification, e.g. SLA
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2458 Modification of priorities while in transit
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/76 using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation requested by the user or requested by the network in response to changing network conditions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/805 QOS or priority aware
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/83 based on usage prediction

Abstract

Modifying quality of service treatment for data flows A method of transmitting a data flow via a network is disclosed where the network supports transmission of data in accordance with a plurality of Quality of Service, QoS, models. Prior to transmission of the data flow, a client system configures a first class of service for the data flow based on a first QoS model, and a first portion of the data flow is transmitted through the network in accordance with the first class of service. In response to detecting a renegotiation condition, the network communicates with the client system to configure a second class of service for the data flow based on a second QoS model, and a subsequent portion of the data flow is transmitted through the network using the second class of service.

Claims

1. A method of transmitting a data flow via a network, the network supporting transmission of data in accordance with a plurality of Quality of Service, QoS, models, the method comprising:

prior to transmission of the data flow, communicating with a client system associated with the data flow to configure a first class of service for the data flow based on a first QoS model;

transmitting a first portion of the data flow through the network in accordance with the first class of service;

detecting a renegotiation condition; and

in response to detecting the renegotiation condition;

communicating with the client system to configure a second class of service for the data flow based on a second QoS model; and

transmitting a subsequent portion of the data flow through the network in accordance with the second class of service.

2. A method according to claim 1, wherein communicating to configure a second class of service comprises:

transmitting a renegotiation notification to the client;

receiving a response from the client, the response indicating the second QoS model for the data flow.

3. A method according to claim 1, comprising transmitting information specifying one or more alternative QoS models for the data flow, the second QoS model preferably selected from, or based on at least one of, the alternative QoS models.

4. A method according to claim 3, wherein information specifying one or more alternative QoS models is included in the renegotiation notification or sent in response to a query from the client system.

5. A method according to claim 1, comprising determining one or more performance characteristics of the data flow, wherein the renegotiation condition is detected in dependence on the performance characteristics.

6. A method according to claim 5, wherein determining performance characteristics of the data flow comprises one or both of:

measuring one or more past performance characteristics of the data flow; and

forecasting one or more future performance characteristics for the data flow.

7. A method according to claim 8, comprising selecting one or more reference data flows;

and wherein determining reference performance characteristics comprises determining characteristics representative of performance of the reference data flows.

8. A method according to claim 1, wherein the renegotiation condition relates to a change in an available set of QoS models supported by the network, the change preferably having occurred after configuration of the first class of service.

9. A method according to claim 8, comprising:

determining a requested QoS vector, wherein the requested QoS vector comprises a set of QoS metrics based on QoS requirements specified by the client system when configuring the first class of service;

determining a delivered QoS vector, wherein the delivered QoS vector comprises a set of QoS metrics based on the first QoS model and/or a based on a measured or forecast performance of the data flow;

determining a plurality of available QoS vectors for a set of available QoS models;

computing a first difference measure between the requested QoS vector and the delivered QoS vector;

computing respective second difference measures between the requested QoS vector and each of the available QoS vectors;

identifying one or more available QoS models in the set of available QoS models having QoS vectors closer to the requested QoS vector than the delivered QoS vector in accordance with the computed difference measures; and

in response to identifying one or more available QoS models, detecting the renegotiation condition and/or offering one or more of the identified available QoS models to the client for the data flow.

13. A method according to claim 1, comprising tagging traffic of the data flow with a class of service identifier corresponding to the first and/or second configured class of service.

14. A computer readable medium comprising software code adapted, when executed on a data processing apparatus, to perform a method as set out in claim 1.

15. A system or apparatus having means, preferably in the form of at least one processor and associated memory, for performing a method as set out in claim 1.

10. A method of configuring a class of service applied to a data flow transmitted from a client system via a network, the network supporting transmission of data in accordance with a plurality of Quality of Service, QoS, models, the method comprising, at the client system:

prior to transmission of the data flow, communicating with a QoS negotiation module associated with the network to configure a first class of service for the data flow based on a first QoS model;

initiating transmission of the data flow to the network based on the first class of service;

detecting a renegotiation condition; and

in response to detecting the renegotiation condition;

communicating with the QoS negotiation module to configure a second class of service for the data flow based on a second QoS model; and

continuing transmission of the data flow to the network based on the second class of service.

11. A method according to claim 10, wherein detecting the renegotiation condition comprises:

determining one or more current performance requirements for the data flow;

determining one or more performance characteristics of the data flow; and

detecting the renegotiation condition if the determined performance characteristics differ from the current performance requirements, preferably by more than a threshold difference.

12. A method according to claim 10, wherein performance is compared or assessed:

with respect to at least one and preferably each of a set of performance features; and

/or

by numerical comparison of one or more QoS metrics or distance computation between respective QoS feature vectors.