An efficient medium access control protocol for high-speed networks

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a new medium access control (MAC) layer protocol, called Optical Reservation Multiple Ac cess (ORMA), which is suitable for data traffic on a folded bus high-speed MANs and LANs. Its main feature is an opticallCser vation technique, to allow stations to reserve transmission slots, which is attractive for use in high-speed networks. Unlike tradi tional protocols where reservation is mostly done using software, ORMA performs its reservation function using simple and effi cient optical hardware circuits. A complete description of the ORMA protocol is given. Then, ORMA is shown to achieve high throughput and small transmission delays while preserving the fairness of the whole network.