Simulation and analysis of circuit-switched playthrough rings

Abstract

We consider queueing delay versus throughput performance for PLAYTHROUGH rings. The PLAYTHROUGH data link layer protocol is a multiserver distributed control mechanism that allows concurrent message transfer. We present simulation data comparing performance for four queueing disciplines. We also present a simple analysis to predict the throughput value at which the queueing system saturates. We compare analytical and simulation results for both PLAYTHROUGH and token rings and find the average performance of PLAYTHROUGH rings to be superior.