Introduction

What is Quality:
Current definition for quality by the International Standards Organization :
Degree to which a set of inherent characteristics fulfils requirement

Quality of Service in Telecommunications

Quality of service management is an essential function in the provision and maintenance of a telecommunication service Features of QoS in telecommunication
Measured and expressed on an end-to-end basis Service specific Different priority for different user sectors Level of performance may be different among users within the same user sectors Quality requirements are dynamic

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Network Performance Engineering

Quality/network performance relationship

Network Performance Engineering

QoS criteria in telecommunication
billing errors waiting lists for provision of service wrong number time to repair poor transmission fault incidence failure of call completion dial tone/post-dialing delay

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Network Performance Engineering

Principal performance parameters

Network Performance Engineering

Performance impairments
Transmission performance
the ability to transport information between source and destination without distortion or under loss and is mainly influenced by the performance of transmission systems

Call processing performance

this relates to the ability of a network to accept and interpret routing information from the customer and establish a connection to the required destination within prescribed response time

Availability performance
the proportion of time for which satisfactory service is given

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Transmission Plan
a set of network design guidelines recommended by ITU-T to ensure that end-to-end transmission is stable and acceptable to users including
overall signal strength at various point in the connections control of signal loss and electrical stability of the connection limits on acceptable signal propagation time limit on acceptable noise disturbance control of sidetone and echo limits on acceptable signal distortion, crosstalk and interference

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Transmission Loss
is the ratio of the input power to output power expressed in dB it comprises of
the loss in translating sound into electrical input -- the Send Loudness Rating (SLR) the loss across the network the loss incurred at receiver -- the Receive Loudness Rating (RLR)

The overall loss between the customers -- Overall Loudness Rating (OLR)
OLR=SLR+Network Loss+RLR

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

Transmission Network

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Stability
Why there is Stability loss
insufficient loss around the 4-wire loop could result in positive feedback and the circuit oscillating in an uncontrolled manner if the balance of the hybrid transformer that converts the 2-wire to 4wire is distributed, it will cause a low loss between the 4-wire connections

Definition of Stability Loss

the lowest loss between equi-relative points at a 4-wire interface, from the receive to send port, measured at any single frequency in the band 0-4000Hz

Derivation of overall reference equivalent

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EE5302 Network Design and Management

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Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Echo
echoes are caused by reflection of the speakers voice back from the distance receiving end due to an imperfect line balance at the hybrid that causes part of the signal energy transmitted in one direction to return in the other echo loss: the loss between equi-relative level points at a 4 wire interface, from the receive to send ports measured as a weighted quantity in frequency band 300-3400Hz the mean value of echo loss presented by national network is not less than (15+n), where n is the number of circuits in the national chain echo control devices should be incorporated for the one-way delay of echo path exceeds 25ms

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Delay
Propagation defined as the time taken by a signal applied at the input of an equipment to reach the output of that equipment Excessive delay not only incurs the risk of echo but also impairs communication ITU-T recommends that, maximum one-way delay should not exceed 400ms for an international connection The one-way delay for connections originating and terminating in the UK is 23 ms Connections that are routed within the UK network to, or from, an international gateway should not exceed a one-way delay of 12 ms

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Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

EE5302 Network Design and Management

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Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Error
defined as a single bit inconsistency between transmitted and received signals

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Jitter
defined as short-term variation of the significant instants of a digital signal from their ideal positions in time

Slip
occur at each switching unit in IDN at a rate proportional to the frequency difference between the incoming bit stream and exchange clock and will cause error degradation to services two types of slip
uncontrolled slip
lead to loss

Wander
defined as the non-cumulative variations of the significant instants of digital signal from their ideal position in time due and cause variations in propagation times

Sidetone
defined as the proportion of the talkers speech that is fed back into his/her ear and is measured in terms of a Sidetone Masking Rating(STMR) ITU-T recommends values of STMR of at least 12dB

frame slip

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Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Noise
Impulse noise Psophometrically weighted noise Single frequency noise

Performance Parameter For Transmission Network

Group delay distortion
Defined as the envelope delay measured at the output at a given frequency, compared with the minimum measured envelope delay at any frequency in a specified frequency band

Quantisation distortion (quantisation noise)

induced by the converting of an analogue signal into a PCM digital signal

Cross talk
Defined as the presence of unwanted signal coupled from a source other than the connection under consideration Far end crosstalk (FEXT): the crosstalk is transmitted over the disturbed channel in the same direction as its own signal Near end crosstalk (NEXT): the crosstalk is transmitted in the opposite direction to its own signal

Loss distortion with frequency

defined as the logarithmic ratio of output voltage at a reference frequency divided by its value at any frequency in a specified band, with the input signal level constant

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Call Processing Performance

Those affecting the call processing phase are
delay to dial tone removal of dial tone connection establishment delay connection establishment failure due to network congestion connection establishment failure due to no tone misrouting of calls incorrect network tones or announcement premature release of established connection delay to connection release connection release failure

Availability
Network Congestion
a network is of dimension to meet the peak demand, with a small proportion of calls rejected due to insufficient equipment. This congestion is represented by Grade of Service () = traffic lost/traffic offered= probability of congestion

Availability
describe how much of the time a system or network will be available and operating, measured as the ratio of uptime to total time, as percentage the overall unavailability is influenced by the reliability of equipment, which is measured by Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF), Mean Time to Repair/Replace/Restore (MTTR), Mean Time to Failure (MTTF), and Mean Down Time (MDT)

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Classes of Service
ITU-T proposes grouping IP telecommunications transactions into 6 unique classes defined according to the desired performance QoS objective
Class 0: Real time, highly interactive applications, sensitive to jitter.
mean delay upper bound is 100ms delay variance is less than 50 ms packet loss is less than 10-3 application example: Voice, Video Teleconference

Classes of Service
Class 2: Highly interactive transaction data
mean delay upper bound is 100ms delay variance is unspecified packet loss ration is less than 10-3 application example including signaling

Class 3: Interactive transaction data

mean delay upper bound is 400ms delay variance is unspecified loss ratio is less than 10-3 application example including signaling

Class 1: Real time, interactive applications, sensitive to jitter.

mean delay upper bound is 400 ms delay variance is less than 50 ms loss ratio is less than 10-3 application: VoIP, Video Teleconference

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EE5302 Network Design and Management

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Classes of Service
Class 4: Low loss only application
mean delay upper bound is 1 s delay variance is unspecified loss ratio is less than 10-3 application example including short transactions, bulk data, video streaming

Practical Steps for Measuring QoS

Task1: Specify the Service for which QoS needs to be measured
the real-time services as voice and video the non-real-time as email, web browsing, streaming

Task2: Define end users transaction

measure the QoS parameters

Class 5: Unspecified application with unspecified mean delay, delay variance and loss ratio
application example including traditional applications of default IP network

Task3: Define QoS parameters

define the accessibility, continuity and fulfillment parameters impacting the quality of the specified transaction

Task4: Decide on measurement approach

active measurement passive measurement

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Dr. W Yao, Brunel University

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Practical Steps for Measuring QoS

Task5: Sampling plan and data collection
involves many activities including the desired confidence level and accuracy and validity of the collected data

Task6: Trend analysis Task7: Set thresholds

set the threshold against which the QoS parameters need to be controlled

Task8: Detect, diagnose and resolve

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