Contents

Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1
Active queue management and Droptail queues ......................................................... 1
AQM components ..................................................................................................... 1
AQM classification ................................................................................................... 2
Classification by mechanism ................................................................................. 2
Congestion indicator .......................................................................................... 2
Control function ................................................................................................ 2
Parameter tuning................................................................................................ 2
Feedback signal ................................................................................................. 3
Classification by context........................................................................................ 3
Wired networks ................................................................................................. 3
Wireless networks ............................................................................................. 3
Classification by performance ............................................................................... 3
Approaches to AQM ................................................................................................. 3
Heuristic design ..................................................................................................... 4
Control-theoretic Design ....................................................................................... 4
Deterministic ......................................................................................................... 4
AQM in wired networks ............................................................................................ 4
RED ...................................................................................................................... 4
Stabilized RED ...................................................................................................... 5
Adaptive RED ....................................................................................................... 5
DREAM ................................................................................................................ 5
Fuzzy control RED ................................................................................................ 5
AQM in wireless networks ........................................................................................ 5
Channel-Aware AQM............................................................................................ 5
Rate-based exponential AQM ................................................................................ 6
Adaptive QoS and Wireless Bandwidth ................................................................. 6
CLAMP................................................................................................................. 6
Slope Based Discard .............................................................................................. 6
AQM in the internet .................................................................................................. 6

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Introduction
Active Queue management (AQM) was first introduced to IP networks to control the
flow of the network, it was used to assist end-system protocols to control network
congestions. [1]

AQM could be classified due to many factors: mechanisms, context of use and
performance criteria, here we use the context of use factor so we can compare
between AQM in wired and wireless networks.

First formal version of AQM was RED (Random Early Detection), many successive
algorithms were enhanced versions of RED. RED prevents congestion by dropping
packet due to average queue length.

Active queue management and Droptail queues

AQM controls the flow of the network and assists endpoints in congestion control to
prevent congestions.

Active queue management is one of queue management algorithms, which control

when the router should drop packets and which packets to drop. In this context we
have to mention Droptail queues. Droptail queues first introduced as FIFO droptail
queue, they are simple and could be easily implemented in routers but these queues
limit the performance of endpoints congestion control schemes [2]. Droptail queues
do not drop packets until they are full, the endpoint won't be able to detect congestion
until full congestion occurred. On the contrary AQM helps end-system protocol in
congestions control either by explicit notification to the sender or by packet dropping
which provoke the congestion control mechanisms in the sender resulting in lowing
sending rate.

AQM components
AQM schemes contain three main component: congestion indicator, congestion
control function and the control function.

 Congestion indicator: it is a factor that measures the congestion amount of the

network, this could be the length of the queue as the length of the queue is
large the probability of packets dropped is high and vice-versa.
 Control function: it defines the function that controls the probability of
dropped packets due to the congestion indicator.
 Feedback mechanism: as previously noted, congestion could be detected by
either dropping packet or explicit congestion notifications (ECN).

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AQM classification
AQM could be classified in different ways, they can be compared due to their
mechanisms of operation such the type of their congestion indicator, how their
parameters are tuned, their control function and the nature of their feedback signal to
the source algorithms.

AQM schemes can also be classified according to their context of use whether it is
used in best-effort networks or networks with differentiated services, wired networks
or wireless networks. Another comparison method could be the performance of the
AQM according to specified criteria (e.g., fairness, packet loss, throughput, delay,
delay variation).

Classification by mechanism
AQM could be categorized in terms to the mechanism used in each of its components.

Congestion indicator
There are many types of congestion indicators whether it’s queue-based, rate-based,
hybrid, load-based or packet loss based.

 Queue-based: Queue based congestion indicators could be stimulated due to

enqueue events only or both enqueue and dequeue events.
 Rate-based: congestion indicators could divided into two main types whether
it is based on the arrival rate or congestion window size.
 Packet-loss based: the congestion indicator is based on either the number of
packets dropped or the number of buffer overflow events.

Control function
AQM are classified due to how the control function is designed whether heuristic,
control-theoretic or optimization.

 Control-theoretic: there are two main methods of control-theoretic schemes

whether it is TCP-centric or non TCP-centric. Each model could be
approached by classical control modern control or fuzzy control.
 Optimization: control function could be designed based on deterministic
model, stochastic or based on neural networks.

Parameter tuning
AQM could be classified due to the way their parameters are tuned whether it is
manually, adaptive or mixture of both.

 Static parameters: parameters are manually tuned for better performance.

 Adaptive parameters: Parameters are dynamically changed due to either
network load, bandwidth distance product (BDP), round trip time (RTT) or
link capacity.
 Mixture: some parameters are fixed others are changed dynamically.

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Feedback signal
AQM algorithms may uses different types of feedback signal either implicit or
explicit.

 Implicit feedback signals: the algorithm drop packets and the endpoint could
be notified that the packet is dropped due to implicit signaling such as three
acknowledgements in TCP.
 Explicit feedback signals: the algorithm send explicit congestion notification
marking to the endpoint.

Classification by context
AQM schemes are divided by context of use either are used in best effort network or
used in networks with differentiated services. The mentioned networks are used either
in wired or wireless networks.

Wired networks
AQM in wired networks are categorized whether they are used for TCP-based traffic,
UDP or both.

Wireless networks
AQM in infrastructural wireless networks are either implemented for air interface
(uplink or downlink) or at the core. For ad hoc networks they are categorized in way
to the wired networks.

Classification by performance
AQM schemes could be classified due to performance criteria which could be
categorized to steady-state behavior (fairness, delay or delay jitter), transient behavior
(responsiveness, queue stability or robustness) or complexity (memory or processing
time).

Approaches to AQM
There are different approaches to AQM design based on the design of control function
there are two ways to design control function heuristic or theoretic, each has its pros
and cons.

 Heuristic design: in this approach control function is designed based on

heuristic considerations, this approach has some drawbacks that has
parameters to be tuned manually according to the network.
 Theoretic design: control function is designed to achieve a stable and fast
response system [3]. Theoretic design are either control-theoretic or
deterministic.

Here we will note the advantages and disadvantages of each approach.

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Heuristic design
Advantages:

 Easy to implement: heuristic design has the property that is simple to design
for specific context.

Disadvantages:

 Intuitiveness: heuristic design is oriented to specific context and system

parameters are manually tuned which makes it difficult for network
adaptation.

Control-theoretic Design
Advantages:

 Ease of justification: In control-theoretic the control function is easily justified

to adapt network stabilization.
 Transient analysis: the system could be optimized for fast response.

Disadvantages:

 TCP oriented: Most kinds of this scheme are modeled to work with TCP
which makes difficult to adapt with other end-system protocols.
 Limited TCP modeling: Modeled TCP are limited and they need to linearize
non-linear systems.

Deterministic
Advantages:

 No TCP model assumed: AQM developed depending on this approach can

work with TCP and other end-system protocols.

Disadvantages:

 Difficulty in controlling queue length.

 Arbitrary parameter tuning.

AQM in wired networks

It was believed that AQM should work properly for both wired and wireless networks
but using the air-interface showed that some considerations should be taken.

RED
First AQM scheme was RED that was used to replace droptail queues, it is a queue
based algorithm and designed heuristically. RED’s objectives were detection of
congestion, preserving fairness among users and minimizing queuing delay. [1]

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RED had many problems, one of its main problems was parameters tuning which was
difficult and uncertain. [4]

RED has modified versions of it based on control-theoretic or heuristic design here

we will state some variants of RED and the offered solutions for RED shortcomings.

Stabilized RED
SRED is a modified version of RED that put some changes to the congestion indicator
component. SRED uses instantaneous queue length to overcome exponentially
weighted moving average queue length which could drop packets unnecessarily.

Adaptive RED
ARED is one of RED variants that uses different control function. ARED makes the
parameters adaptively changed due to network condition. It also specify single
reference queue-length which minimize the oscillation size around the equilibrium
level.

DREAM
DREAM uses better feedback signal component that could realize the uniformity of
packet drops by improving the spacing between packet drops.

Fuzzy control RED

FCRED use the benefits of fuzzy control to design the control function of RED, it is
suitable for non-linear and time varying system.

FCRED is robust to non TCP traffic, it has small queue-length jitter and could achieve
faster convergence to queue-length target. [5]

AQM in wireless networks

AQM in wireless should consider that channel capacity is not fixed but time-varying,
and there is packet loss due to channel fading. AQM in wireless should take into
consideration different types of wireless networks whether the network infrastructure-
type or infrastructure-less.

In infrastructure-types AQM could be implemented either in downlink, uplink or the

core.

Channel-Aware AQM
CA-AQM takes into account rate-diversity that occurs when different users uses the
same wireless channel but they adjust their rates due to their perception of channel
conditions.

CA-AQM is developed using a utility-based optimization framework that takes into

account wireless networks’ characteristics. [1]

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Rate-based exponential AQM
REAQM were introduced to adapt TCP with wireless networks, it uses two
congestion metrics instead of one, queue length an input rate mismatch.

REAQM use explicit congestion notification which helps to distinguish between

packets dropped due to congestion and those dropped due to channel loss.

Adaptive QoS and Wireless Bandwidth

Adaptive-QWB consider the time-varying wireless link bandwidth by finding best
queue length that minimizes variation in end-to-end delay and ensures that the end-to
end delay remains below a maximum.

Control function used in this algorithm is developed using PID algorithm.

CLAMP
CLAMP algorithm adjust TCP receiver’s advertised window limit for flow control. It
is oriented for competing TCP flows per end-user.

CLAMP is dedicated to wireless LAN and assumes star topology. It is implemented

both in the mobile and AP.

Slope Based Discard

SBD is used at the Radio Network Controller in 3G mobile system, and takes into
account that radio link control stores data from upper layers until full
acknowledgment. Dropping decision is made by comparing the actual rate with
critical rate computed due to the buffer occupancy and the reaction time.

AQM in the internet

As we have seen AQM could be implemented in wired and wireless networks. In the
case of wired networks AQM is implemented on the router in way to assist end-
system protocols in congestion detection and avoidance.

In the wireless context AQM could be implemented to downlink, uplink or core

network.

Figure 1 shows AQM possible implementation to infrastructure type network.

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 Figure 1: Location of AQM in infrastructure-type wireless access network.

As illustrated in AQM could be implemented whether in the air interface or core

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References

[1] R. Adam, IEEE COMMUNICATIONS SURVEYS & TUTORIALS, vol. NO. 3,

2013.

[2] X. G. B. Z. a. J. Y. C. Long, "The Yellow active queue management algorithm,"

Computer Networks, vol. 47, no. 4, 2005.

[3] L. H. a. A. Kshemkalyani, "Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on

Computer Communications and Networks," Chicago, USA, 2004.

[4] V. M. D. T. a. W. G. C. Hollot, "Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Joint

Conference of the IEEE Computerand Communications Society," Anchorage, AK,
USA, 2001.

[5] M. Z. a. M. P. Jinsheng Sun, "Stabilizing RED using a Fuzzy Controller," in ICC,

2007.