Performance analysis of the Rainbow WDM optical network prototype

Abstract

Rainbow is a prototype optical metropolitan area network (MAN) developed at IBM. It employs wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) on a fiber-optic passive-star network topology, with each station equipped with a laser, which is fixed tuned to its own unique wavelength, and a Fabry-Perot filter, which is tunable across all wavelengths. The paper presents a model and analysis of the protocol used in the Rainbow prototype using the equilibrium point analysis (EPA) technique. The authors examine the system's throughput and how it is affected by various system parameters such as message arrival rate, message length, and timeout duration. They show that, for a given arrival rate, there is a timeout duration that will yield the optimal throughput. The analytical results are verified by simulation.