IMPROVED PHANTOM FLOW CONTROL METHOD AND APPARATUS

摘要

A flow control method and apparatus for controlling flow through an output link in a communication network modifies a Phantom flow control method by calculating a maximum allowable cell rate as a function of a number of active flows through the output link. To accomplish this, the method and apparatus calculates alpha smoothing parameters as a function of a number of virtual channels flowing through the output link. The method and apparatus improves the stability of the Phantom flow control method, and also enables it to be used with less costly network switches, such as shared memory switches. The flow control method and apparatus prevents a portion of the total bandwidth of the output link from being used when the maximum allowable cell rate through that output link is calculated.