On the Incremental Reconfiguration of Time-sensitive Networks at Runtime

Abstract

Static configurations in Time-sensitive Networking (TSN) using the Time-aware Shaper allow precise calculations of deterministic, tight bandwidth and latency guarantees for realtime industrial application streams. It is, however, this static configuration which makes introducing flexible changes to a running TSN system at runtime very hard. Scenarios of adaptive TSN networks envision that the network configuration evolves with time in accordance to anticipated changes such as the dynamicity of machine formations and machine reconfigurations. In this paper, we propose a notion of flexibility of scheduler configurations along a network path that facilitates introducing changes to TSN network configurations at runtime. Based on this notion, we develop and analyze algorithms to incrementally reconfigure TSN using the Time-Aware Shaper. These reconfigurations include determining the admissibility of new or changed streams that may possess individual deadlines.