David Rand Irvin

A queueing model for local area network bridges

The buffer needed to match the transmission speeds of two different local area networks interconnected by a MAC-layer bridge is modeled as a G/M/1 queue. To account for the problems caused by the arrivals of traffic bursts from the higher-speed network, traffic interarrival times are assumed to follow a hyperexponential probabilty density function. Selecting parameters for the hyperexponential distribution to model realistic traffic conditions is examined. A hypothetical bridge is discussed as an example. Queue length for the G/M/1 system with hyperexponential interarrivals is shown to depend primarily on the persistence of bursts on the higher-speed network.