New Routing and Preemption Algorithms for Circuit-Switched Mixed-Media Networks

Abstract

New routing and preemption algorithms were developed for circuit-switched networks such as the Defense Switched Network that include both broadcast satellite and point-to-point transmission media. Three classes of routing procedures were evaluated: (1) mixed-media routing with fixed routing tables and call processing rules that included crankback and remote earth-station querying, (2) adaptive mixed-media routing which adapted routing tables after network damage, and (3) precedence flooding which routed high-precedence calls using flooding techniques. A new preemption technique called guided preemption was also evaluated. When guided preemption is used, lower precedence calls to preempt are selected after examining the paths of all calls previously routed through a switch. Call paths are added to the call-setup-success common-channel-signalling (CCS) packet at the call destination and then read in and stored within each switch in the call path as this message travels back to the call source. Tools developed to evaluate algorithms included a steady-state network analysis program, a call-by-call simulator, and the EISN testbed network described in a companion paper by H.M. Heggestad. Analytic results with the simulator and the steady-state analysis program indicated that the new routing algorithms provided reduced point-to-point blocking probabilities after damage without adding extra trunking. Best performance was obtained with adaptive mixed-media routing and precedence flooding techniques. Guided preemption preempted fewer low-precedence calls than blind preemption as used in AUTOVON to complete the same number of high-precedence calls.