A proposal for an asymmetric best-effort service

Abstract

We propose asymmetric best-effort, a novel service to provide a "throughput versus delay jitter" differentiated service for IP packets. With this service, every best effort packet is marked as either green or blue. Green packets, typically sent by real-time applications such as interactive audio, receive more losses during bouts of congestion than blue ones. In return, they receive less delay jitter. Both green and blue services are best-effort. The incentive to choose one or other is based on the nature of one's traffic and on traffic conditions. If applications are TCP-friendly, those sending blue packets will receive more throughput but also more delay jitter, than they would if they sent green packets for a given network state and path.