TY - GEN
T1 - On the cross-layer impact of TCP ACK thinning on IEEE 802.11 wireless MAC dynamics
AU - Kim, Hyogon
AU - Lee, Heejo
AU - Shin, Sangmin
AU - Kang, Inhye
PY - 2006
Y1 - 2006
N2 - ACK thinning refers to the technique to discard or reduce TCP acknowledgements (ACKs) for the purpose of diverting scarce bandwidth to TCP data traffic. Delayed ACK and ACK filtering fall into the category. It has been shown that under some circumstances the technique is effective to boost the TCP throughput on wireless links, in particular the IEEE 802.11 wireless LAN (WLAN). In this paper, however, we show that ACK thinning backfires under congestion due to its cross-layer impact on the 802.11 MAC dynamics. With the ACK filtering example, we demonstrate the phenomenon and analyze the cause. Based on the analysis, we show how the IEEE 802.11 contention window size control solves the problem. Although only the ACK filtering and Delayed ACK are considered in this paper, any other techniques to save on TCP ACK bandwidth usage share the same fundamental issues.
AB - ACK thinning refers to the technique to discard or reduce TCP acknowledgements (ACKs) for the purpose of diverting scarce bandwidth to TCP data traffic. Delayed ACK and ACK filtering fall into the category. It has been shown that under some circumstances the technique is effective to boost the TCP throughput on wireless links, in particular the IEEE 802.11 wireless LAN (WLAN). In this paper, however, we show that ACK thinning backfires under congestion due to its cross-layer impact on the 802.11 MAC dynamics. With the ACK filtering example, we demonstrate the phenomenon and analyze the cause. Based on the analysis, we show how the IEEE 802.11 contention window size control solves the problem. Although only the ACK filtering and Delayed ACK are considered in this paper, any other techniques to save on TCP ACK bandwidth usage share the same fundamental issues.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=34548831656&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/VTCF.2006.463
DO - 10.1109/VTCF.2006.463
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:34548831656
SN - 1424400635
SN - 9781424400638
T3 - IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference
SP - 2241
EP - 2246
BT - 2006 IEEE 64th Vehicular Technology Conference, VTC-2006 Fall
T2 - 2006 IEEE 64th Vehicular Technology Conference, VTC-2006 Fall
Y2 - 25 September 2006 through 28 September 2006
ER -