Network-quality determining method and apparatus for use therewith

• US 7,773,523 B2
• Filed: 08/25/2005
• Issued: 08/10/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 08/26/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Original Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Inventors: Yamasaki, Yasuhiro
• Primary Examiner(s): Yao; Kwang B
• Assistant Examiner(s): BOKHARI, SYED M
• Application Number:
  US11/210,727
• Publication Number:
  US 20060045017A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,811 Days
• Field of Search: 370/349, 370/394, 370/474, 370/252, 370/235, 370/230, 370/332, 370/412, 370/328, 370/395.42, 370/236, 455/466, 714/751, 709/223, 709/227
• US Class Current: 370/236
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/18 Automatic repetition systems, e.g. Van Duuren systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/24 Testing correct operation
• 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 43/0829 Packet loss
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0864 Round trip delays
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0888 Throughput

Abstract

A data receiving portion receives data from a network. A filtering portion classifies the data received at the data receiving portion by flow. A condition monitoring portion monitors, for each flow, ACK-number information and SN-number information of the received data. A quality-determining portion determines whether or not a packet loss has occurred and the position of occurrences of packet losses, on the basis of information from the condition monitoring portion.

Claims

1. A method for determining the quality of a network by an apparatus connected to said network, said method comprising:

receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining whether data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding whether or not a receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission; and

making a comparison between transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to previous reception;

wherein, determining whether data loss has occurred further comprises determining that no data loss has occurred;

when a result of said comparison shows that value of the transmission-sequence-number information of the data which has been received up to the previous reception is greater than a value of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data, and

when the receiving terminal is not at the re-transmission requiring state.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein deciding whether or not a receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state comprises:

deciding that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when data with the same reception-acknowledgment information is received predetermined times or more or when data indicating the reception-acknowledgement information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein determining whether data loss has occurred further comprises creating a history of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and detecting a data loss or the position of the occurrence of data loss.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein determining whether data loss has occurred further comprises:

determining that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal when the value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of the transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to the previous reception and also data with said transmission-sequence-number information has been received in the past, and

determining that a data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus when said receiving terminal has not received data with said transmission-sequence-number information in the past.

5. The method according to claim 1, further comprising calculating goodput based on an increase in ACK number per unit time of received data indicating reception-acknowledgement information.

6. A method for determining the quality of a network by an apparatus connected to said network, said method comprising:

receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining whether a data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding whether or not a receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission;

making a comparison between transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to previous reception;

wherein determining whether a data loss has occurred further comprises determining that a data loss has occurred;

when a result of said comparison shows that value of the transmission-sequence- number information of the data which has been received up to the previous reception is greater than a value of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data, and

when the receiving terminal is at the re-transmission requiring state.

7. The method according to claim 6, wherein deciding whether or not a receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state comprises:

deciding that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when data with the same reception-acknowledgment information is received predetermined times or more or when data indicating the reception-acknowledgement information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time.

8. The method according to claim 6, wherein determining whether a data loss has occurred further comprises creating a history of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and detecting a data loss or the position of the occurrence of data loss.

9. The method according to claim 8, wherein determining whether a data loss has occurred further comprises:

determining that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal when the value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of the transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to the previous reception and also data with said transmission-sequence-number information has been received in the past, and

determining that a data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus when said receiving terminal has not received data with said transmission- sequence-number information in the past.

10. A method for determining the quality of a network by an apparatus connected to said network, said method comprising:

receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network, including transmission-sequence-number information; and

deciding whether the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state comprising deciding that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when data with the same reception-acknowledgement information is received predetermined times or more or when data indicating the reception-acknowledgement information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time; and

determining the quality of said network on basis of at least two of;

said transmission-sequence-number information indicating one or more data-transmission sequence numbers included in said received data,

the reception-acknowledgment information indicating information about data which has been received by said terminal, and

whether the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state.

11. A method for determining the quality of a network by an apparatus connected to said network, said method comprising:

receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining whether a data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding whether or not the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission, and

creating a history of a transmission-sequence-number information of said received data,

wherein determining whether a data loss has occurred comprises determining that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal;

when value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to previous reception and

when data with said transmission-sequence-number information exists in said history, and

wherein determining whether a data loss has occurred comprises determining that a data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus;

when data with said transmission-sequence-number information does not exist in said history.

12. An apparatus for determining the quality of a network comprising:

receiving means for receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining means for determining whether a data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding means for deciding whether or not the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission, and

comparison means for comparing a value of transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to a previous reception, wherein

the determining means determines that no data loss has occurred;

when the value of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data is not greater than that of transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to previous reception, and

when the receiving terminal is not at the re-transmission requiring state.

13. The apparatus according to claim 12, wherein said deciding means decides that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when data with the same reception-acknowledgment information is received predetermined times or more by said receiving means or when data indicating the reception-acknowledgment information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time by said receiving means.

14. The apparatus according to claim 12, wherein

said determining means creates a history of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and detects a data loss or the position of the occurrence of data loss.

15. The apparatus according to claim 14, wherein

said determining means determines that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal:

when the value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of the transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to the previous reception and

data with said transmission-sequence-number information has been received in the past, and

said determining means determines that a data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus;

when said receiving means has not received data with said transmission-sequence-number information in the past.

16. An apparatus for determining the quality of a network comprising:

receiving means for receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining means for determining whether a data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding means for deciding whether or not the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission, and

comparison means for comparing a value of transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to a previous reception;

wherein the determining means determines that a data loss has occurred when;

the value of transmission-sequence-number information of said received data is not greater that of transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been received up to previous reception, and

when the receiving terminal is at the re-transmission requiring state.

17. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein said deciding means decides that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when:

data with the same reception-acknowledgment information is received predetermined times or more by said receiving means or

when data indicating the reception-acknowledgment information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time by said receiving means.

18. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein

said determining means creates a history of the transmission-sequence-number information of said received data and detects a data loss or the position of the occurrence of data loss.

19. The apparatus according to claim 18, wherein

said determining means determines that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal when:

the value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of the transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to the previous reception, and

data with said transmission-sequence-number information has been received in the past, and

said determining means determines that a data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus when;

said receiving means has not received data with said transmission-sequence- number information in the past.

20. An apparatus for determining quality of a network comprising:

receiving means for receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network, including transmission-sequence-number information; and

deciding means for deciding whether the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state comprising deciding that the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state when data with the same reception-acknowledgement information is received predetermined times or more by said receiving means or when data indicating the reception-acknowledgement information which corresponds to the transmission-sequence-number information is not received within a certain time by said receiving means; and

determining means for determining the quality of said network on basis of at least two of;

said transmission-sequence-number information indicating one or more data transmission sequence numbers included in said received data,

the reception-acknowledgment information indicating information about data which has been received by said terminal, and

whether the receiving terminal is at said re-transmission requiring state.

21. An apparatus for determining the quality of a network comprising:

receiving means for receiving data being communicated between terminals which belong to said network; and

determining means for determining whether a data loss has occurred, comprising;

deciding means for deciding whether or not the receiving terminal is at a re-transmission requiring state where it is requiring data retransmission; and

means for creating a history of a transmission-sequence-number information of said received data, and

said determining means determines that a data loss has occurred between a measuring apparatus and the receiving terminal when;

value of said transmission-sequence-number information is not greater than that of transmission-sequence-number information of data which has been determined up to previous reception, and

when data with said transmission-sequence-number information exists in said history, and

said determining means determines that the data loss has occurred between the transmission terminal and the measuring apparatus;

when data with said transmission-sequence-number information does not exist in said history.