Qos General Overview - Alcatel-Lucent OmniSwitch 9900 Series Network Configuration Manual

Configuring QoS

QoS General Overview

Quality of Service (QoS) refers to transmission quality and available service that is measured and
sometimes guaranteed in advance for a particular type of traffic in a network. QoS lends itself to circuit-
switched networks like ATM, which bundle traffic into cells of the same length and transmit the traffic
over predefined virtual paths. In contrast, IP and other packet-switched networks operate on the concept of
shared resources and best effort routing, using bandwidth as needed and reassembling packets at their
destinations. Applying QoS to packet-switched networks requires different mechanisms than those used in
circuit-switched networks.
QoS is often defined as a way to manage bandwidth. Another way to handle different types of flows and
increased bandwidth requirements is to add more bandwidth. But bandwidth can be expensive, particularly
at the WAN connection. If LAN links that connect to the WAN are not given more bandwidth, bottlenecks
can still occur. Also, adding enough bandwidth to compensate for peak load periods mean that at times
some bandwidth is unused. In addition, adding bandwidth does not guarantee any kind of control over
network resources.
Using QoS, a network administrator can gain more control over networks where different types of traffic
(or flows) are in use or where network congestion is high. Preferential treatment can be given to individual
flows as required. Voice over IP (VoIP) traffic or mission-critical data can be marked as priority traffic
and/or given more bandwidth on the link. QoS can also prevent large flows, such as a video stream, from
consuming all the bandwidth on a link. Using QoS, a network administrator can decide which traffic needs
preferential treatment and which traffic can be adequately served with best effort.
QoS is implemented on the switch through the use of user-defined policies, port-based QoS configuration,
and integration with virtual output queuing to manage egress congestion. The following simplified
illustration shows an example of how video traffic can receive priority over email traffic.
video feed
email server
QoS sits in the ingress and egress software path. IP calls QoS to validate packets destined for the switch.
IP also calls QoS to validate and/or prioritize packets originating from the switch.
The general order of events with respect to the OmniSwitch implementation of QoS are as follows:
1
Classification—Packets are classified and marked according to policies and traffic behavior. This is
accomplished on the ingress using technologies such as 802.1p, IP precedence and Diffserv Code Point
(DSCP). See "Classification" on page 26-5
2
Congestion Management—Classified packets are prioritized and placed into queues based on Class of
Service (CoS) markings to ensure preferential treatment to high priority traffic. See
Management" on page
OmniSwitch AOS Release 8 Network Configuration Guide
OmniSwitch
Prioritization
Policy
Best Effort
Sample QoS Setup
for more information.
26-9.
The Internet
December 2017
QoS General Overview
"Congestion
page 26-3