AIST Releases PSPacer 1.0 as open-source software

AIST Releases Network Traffic Smoothing Software PSPacer 1.0 as Freely
Available, Open Source Software for the Linux Platform

Tokyo, Japan, June. 23, 2005 - (JCN Newswire) - The National Institute of
Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST,), an independent
administrative institution, has released software PSPacer 1.0 for accurate
network bandwidth control and traffic smoothing. PSPacer 1.0 realizes
accurate bandwidth control and smoothing on the ordinary personal computer
(PC) based on the Linux operating system (OS) without requiring special
purpose hardware. The PSPacer 1.0 suppresses bursty traffic, improves the
efficiency of long-distance wide-bandwidth communications through the
internet and contributes to improving the quality of stream delivery.

Key Points

- Precise network bandwidth control and traffic smoothing implemented by
use of software alone without requiring special hardware.
- Packet transmit spacing is uniform ensuring stable communications
- High efficiency long-distance wide-bandwidth communications and high
quality streaming made available.
- Released as freely available, open source software for the Linux
platform.

Background of Development

In the Internet Protocol (IP) communications, bursty traffic often occurs,
sending a greater number of packets in a short interval and temporarily
exceeding the available bandwidth. Under such a situation, buffers for
switches and routers in the network overflow, causing some packets lost
and effective communication performance markedly degraded. In the ordinary
PC and streaming servers, the onset of bursty traffic is unavoidable, to
deteriorate the quality of communications. In order to suppress bursty
traffic, smoothing is needed to ensure equally spaced packet transmission
in compliance with available bandwidth.

History of Development

The GTRC-AIST has noticed the possibility of ensuring efficient
communications by smoothing bursty traffic, and has developed and been
utilizing a smoothing hardware. For the purpose of extending this
technology to versatile use, smoothing software PSPacer has been
developed.

The development work of PSPacer has been partly supported by a grant from
the Ministry of Education, Sports, Culture, Science and Technology (MEXT)
of Japan through the NAREGI (National Research Grid Initiative) Project.

Technological Features

Up to now, the control of packet transmit interval with software has been
made through the timer interruption. The timer interruption provided by
the Linux and other operating systems gives spacing 1 to 10 ms, which is
not small enough for accurate control of transmit interval. On the other
hand, shortening interval of timer interruption increases the processor
burden, providing unfavorable effects to computation and communication
performance of the computer.

The PSPacer 1.0 controls transmission intervals through the transmission
of additional packet (gap packet) between adjacent packets without timer
interruption. The transmit interval can be controlled accurately by
adjusting the number and size of gap packets. As the gap packets are
discarded at the input ports of switches and routers, they do not affect
the network.

Major Functions

With the PSPacer 1.0, it is possible to provide bandwidth control and
smoothing for each of 100 or more connections by use of ordinary PC. In
case of gigabit Ethernet, the transmission bandwidth can be set for a
range from 8 kbps to 930 Mbps for each of IP communication connections,
and the packet transmission interval can be controlled at an accuracy of
time for 1-byte data transmission in accordance with the bandwidth.

The PSPacer 1.0 is installed as a loadable kernel module for the Linux
platform, to be ready for being introduced independent of the device
driver. After the installation of the PSPacer 1.0, all that's required is
to specify (1) the packet allocation rule with IP address and port No.,
(2) the communication interface for bandwidth control and smoothing and
(3) the allocated maximum bandwidth. Applications to use the network are
not required to be changed. The software also supports IPv6.

Major Applications

With the PSPacer 1.0, variations in transmission bandwidth are kept at the
minimum level, and the possibility of buffer overflow is reduced. For this
reason, it is possible to drastically augment the utilization efficiency
of the network physical bandwidth.

The PSPacer 1.0 can be effectively used for the following applications.

Long-distance wide-bandwidth TCP/IP communications: In the TCP/IP, which
is  widely used in the internet communications, the maximum volume of data
to be transmitted is controlled in accordance with roundtrip time. For
this reason, bursty traffic may easily occur in the long-distance network
where the latency is large. With the PSPacer 1.0, it is possible to
utilize 90 % or more of network bandwidth even in the intercontinental
communications with very large latency.
Multiple communications through one-and-same path: When multiple traffics
are carried through one-and-same path in the network as in case of stream
delivery, it may occur that bursty traffics in each of communications are
summed up readily going beyond the available bandwidth. With the PSPacer
1.0, each traffic does not surpass the setup bandwidth making it possible
to utilize the network bandwidth to the maximum extent.

Method of Distribution

The PSPacer 1.0 is distributed as open source software under the terms of
the GNU General Public License (GPL), and can be downloaded from GridMPI
(http://www.gridmpi.org/)

Note: Translation of the AIST press released on June 6, 2005

About AIST
The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (the
new AIST) began operations on April 1, 2001. AIST is a newborn research
organization that comprises 15 research institutes previously under the
former Agency of Industrial Science and Technology (the former AIST) in
the Ministry of International Trade and Industry and the Weights and
Measures Training Institute. The new AIST is Japan's largest public
research organization with many research facilities and around 3,200
employees in all.

Contact

AIST Planning Headquarters
1-3-1,Kasumigaseki Chiyoda-ku,
Tokyo, 100-8921 Japan
Tel +81-3-5501-0830
Fax +81-3-5501-0855

June. 23, 2005, 20:56 (JST)
Source: AIST
AIST
http://www.aist.go.jp/index_en.html
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Sectors: Programming and Development, Networking, Linux & Open Source


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