Mechanisms that enforce bounds on packet lifetimes

Abstract

For reliable transport protocol operation the lifetime of packets should not exceed an assumed maximum packet lifetime (MPL). A packet's lifetime is spent in nodes and crossing links. Time spent in nodes and on simple links is easily found. Other links or logical links may lose, duplicate, delay, and reorder data and do not provide transittime information. We present a link-transit-time protocol for bounding the transit time of packets that cross such links.