TRANSPORT-SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE SERVICES FOR HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMMUNICATIONS-SYSTEMS

Providing end-to-end gigabit communication support for high-bandwidth multimedia applications requires transport systems that transfer data efficiently via network protocols such as TCP, TP4, XTP, and ST-II. Th is paper describes and classifies transport system services that integ rate operating system resources such as CPU's, virtual memory, and I/O devices together with network protocols to support distributed multi- media applications running on local and wide area networks. A taxonomy is presented that compares and evaluates four commercial and experime ntal transport systems in terms of their protocol processing support. The systems covered in this paper include System V UNIX STREAMS, the B SD UNIX networking subsystem, the x-kernel, and the Choices Conduit sy stem. This paper is intended to navigate the researchers and developer s through the transport system design space by describing alternative approaches for key transport system services.