A multiplexing method in consideration of cell delay variation

In ATM networks, generally, cell delay variation occurs between users and network nodes. This cell delay variation may cause cell clumping in a cell stream sent normally from users, so that some cells may exceed the peak rate. These cells are discarded as the cell violating the peak rate by usage parameter control on the network node. As a result, a considerable quantity of cells will be lost. To avoid this problem, the method that extends the narrowed cell interval to the peak interval by a spacer (or a shaper) has been proposed. However, this method has a drawback that cell delays increase because of extending the cell interval by force. The authors propose a multiplexing method to make up the drawback. They show that this method can suppress the cell delay variation which may cause cell clumping exceeding the peak rate. As a result, they show that the quantity of cell delays can be reduced because the spacer decreases in frequency in use.<>