Internet Engineering Task Force                 Gagan L. Choudhury
   Internet Draft                                  Vera D. Sapozhnikova
   Expires in October, 2002                        AT&T
   draft-ietf-ospf-scalability-01.txt
                                                   Anurag S. Maunder
                                                   Sanera Systems

                                                   Vishwas Manral
                                                   Netplane Systems

                                                   April, 2002


    Explicit Marking and Prioritized Treatment of Specific IGP Packets
      for Faster IGP Convergence and Improved Network Scalability and
                                 Stability


Status of this Memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance
   with all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.

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   Distribution of this memo is unlimited.


Abstract

   In this draft we propose the following mechanisms in order to allow
   fast IGP convergence and at the same time maintain scalability and
   stability of a network:

   (1) Explicitly mark Hello packets, to differentiate them from other
       IGP packets, so that efficient implementations can detect and
       process the Hello packets in a priority fashion.


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   (2) In the absence of special marking, or in addition to it, use
       other mechanisms in order not to miss Hello packets. One example
       is to treat any packet received over a link as a surrogate for
       a Hello packet for the purpose of keeping the link alive.

   (3) The same type of explicit marking and prioritized treatment may
       be beneficial to other IGP packets as well.  Some examples
       include (a) LSA acknowledgment packet, (b) Database description
       (DBD) packet from a slave that is used as an acknowledgement,
       and (c) LSAs carrying intra-area topology change information.

   It is possible that some implementations are already using one or
   more of the above mechanisms in order not to miss the processing of
   critical packets during periods of congestion.  However, we suggest
   the above mechanisms to be included as part of the standard so that
   all implementations can benefit from them.


Table of Contents

   1. Motivation......................................................2
   2. Simulation Study................................................5
   3. Analytic Model for Delay Experienced by a Hello Packet
      During an Initial LSA Storm.....................................7
   4. Need for Special Marking and Prioritized Treatment of
      Specific IGP Packets...........................................12
   5. Summary........................................................13
   6. Acknowledgments................................................14
   7. References.....................................................14
   8. Authors' Addresses.............................................15


1. Motivation

   The motivation of this draft is to address the following two key
   objectives of any data network: (a) Fast restoration under failure
   conditions, and (b) Improved network scalability and stability.
   Using analytic and simulation models we show that in general the two
   objectives are in conflict, i.e., improvement in one usually results
   in the degradation of the other.  However, special marking and
   prioritized processing of certain key messages can allow us to
   achieve both objectives.

   The first item we address is fast restoration. The theoretical limit
   for link-state routing protocols to re-route is in link propagation
   time scales, i.e., in tens of milliseconds.  However, as pointed


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   out in [Ref1], in practice it may take from seconds to tens of
   seconds to detect the link failure and disseminate this information
   to the network followed by the convergence on the new set of paths.
   This is an inordinately long period of transient time for mission
   critical traffic destined to the non-reachable nodes of the network.

   One component of the long re-route time is the link failure detection
   time of between 20 and 30 seconds through typically three missed
   Hello packets with the typical hello interval of 10 seconds (between
   30 and 40 seconds if missed hello threshold is 4). This component
   would be much shorter in the presence of link level detection,
   but as pointed out in [Ref1] it does not work in some cases.
   For example, a device driver may detect the link level failure but
   fail to notify it to the IGP level.  Also, if a router fails behind
   a switch in a switched environment then even though the switch gets
   the link level notification it cannot communicate that to other
   routers. Therefore for faster reliable detection at the IGP level,
   one has to reduce the hello interval.  [Ref1] suggests that
   this be reduced to below a second, perhaps even to tens of
   milliseconds.  A second component of the long re-route time is
   delayed SPF (shortest-path-first) computation.  The typical delay
   value is between 1 and 5 seconds but in order to have sub-second
   rerouting it needs to be reduced significantly.

   The second item we address is the ability of a network to withstand
   the simultaneous or near-simultaneous update of a large number of
   link-state-advertisement messages, or LSAs.  We call this event, an
   LSA storm.  An LSA storm may be initiated due to many reasons.  Here
   are some examples:

   (a) one or more link failures due to fiber cuts,

   (b) one or more node failures for some reason, e.g., software
       crash or some type of disaster in an office complex hosting
       many nodes,

   (c) requirement of taking down and later bringing back many
       nodes during a software/hardware upgrade,

   (d) near-synchronization of the once-in-30-minutes refresh instants
       of some types of LSAs,

   (e) refresh of all LSAs in the system during a change in software
       version.

   In addition to the LSAs generated as a direct result of link/node
   failures, there may be other indirect LSAs as well.  One example
   in ATM/MPLS networks is LSAs generated at other links as a result



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   of significant change in bandwidth resulting from rerouting of
   virtual circuits that went down during the link/node failure.  The
   LSA storm tends to drive the node CPU utilization to 100% for a
   period of time and the duration of this period increases with the
   size of the storm and the node adjacency, i.e., the number of links
   connected to it. During this period the Hello packets received at
   the node would see high delays and if this delay exceeds the
   Router-Dead Interval (typically 30-40 seconds or three to four hello
   intervals) then the associated link would be declared down.

   In this draft we address only the issue of links
   being declared down due to the delayed processing of Hello messages,
   but in general, depending on the implementation, there may be other
   impacts of a long CPU busy period.  For example, in a reliable node
   architecture with an active and a standby processor, a processor
   switch-over may result during an extended CPU-busy period which may
   mean that all the adjacencies would be lost and need to be re-
   established.  A processor switch-over may also result from a memory-
   exhaust caused by an extended CPU busy period. Both of the above
   events would cause more database synchronization with neighbors and
   network-wide LSA flooding which in turn might cause extended CPU-
   busy periods at other nodes.  This may cause unstable behavior in
   the network for an extended period of time and potentially a
   meltdown in the extreme case.

   Due to world-wide increased traffic
   demand, data networks are ever increasing in size. As the network
   size grows, a bigger LSA storm and a higher adjacency at certain
   nodes would be more likely and so would increase the probability of
   unstable behavior.  One way to address the scalability issue is to
   divide the network hierarchically into different areas so that
   flooding of LSAs remains localized within areas.  However, this
   approach increases the network management and design complexity and
   may result in less optimal routing between areas. Also, unless
   addresses are aggregated, a large number of summary LSAs may need to
   be flooded. Thus it is important to allow the network to grow towards
   as large a size as possible under a single area.

   The undesirable impact of large LSA storms is understood in the
   networking community and it is well known that large scale flooding
   of control messages (either naturally or due to a bug) has been
   responsible for several network events in the past causing a
   meltdown or a near-meltdown.  For some recent examples see
   [Ref2-Ref5].  Recently, proposals have been submitted to reduce
   flooding overhead in case more than one interface goes to the same
   neighbor [Ref6,Ref7].  Also, [Ref8-Ref9] considers a wide range
   of congestion control and failure recovery mechanisms.

   Section 2 uses a simulation model to illustrate the onset of


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   instability in the network as the result of a large LSA storm.
   Section 3 uses a simple, approximate but easy-to-understand analytic
   model to make the point that reducing hello intervals and more
   frequent SPF computation would in fact reduce network scalability
   and stability. Section 4 makes the point that many of the underlying
   causes of network scalability can be avoided if certain IGP messages
   are specially marked and provided prioritized treatment. [Ref10]
   also provides simulation and analytic models to show the onset
   of instability in large networks due to LSA storms and proposes the
   prioritization of Hello and other special packets to improve
   scalability and stability.



2. Simulation Study

   We have developed a network-wide event simulation model to study the
   impact of an LSA storm.  It captures the actual congestion seen at
   various nodes and accounts for propagation delay between nodes,
   retransmissions in case an LSA is not acknowledged, failure of links
   for LSAs delayed beyond the Router-dead interval, and link recovery
   following database synchronization and LSA flooding once the LSA is
   processed. It approximates a real network implementation and uses
   processing times that are roughly in the same order of magnitude as
   measured in the real network (of the order of milliseconds).
   There are two categories of IGP messages processed at each node in
   the simulation. Category 1 messages are triggered by a timer and
   include the Hello refresh, LSA refresh and retransmission packets.
   Category 2 messages are not triggered by a timer and include
   received Hello, received LSA and received acknowledgments. Timer-
   triggered messages are given non-preemptive priority over the other
   type.  As a result, the received Hello packets and the
   received acknowledgment packets may see long queuing delays
   under intense CPU overload.

   Table 1 below shows sample results
   of the simulation study when applied to a network with about
   300 nodes and 800 links.  The node-adjacency varies from node
   to node and the maximum node-adjacency is 30.  The Hello
   interval is assumed to be 5 seconds, the minimum interval between
   successive SPF (Shortest-Path-First) calculations is 1 second, and
   the Router-Dead Interval is 15 seconds, i.e., a link is declared
   down if no Hello packet is received for three successive hello
   intervals.   During the study, an LSA storm of size X is created at
   instant of time 100 seconds where storm-size is defined as the
   number of LSAs generated during a storm.  Three cases are considered
   with X = 300, 600 and 900 respectively.  Besides the storm, there
   are also the normal once-in-thirty-minutes LSA refreshes.  At any
   given point of time we define a quantity "dispersion" that is the


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   number of LSU packets already generated in the network but not
   received and processed in at least one node (each LSU packet is
   assumed to carry three LSAs).

   Table 1 plots dispersion as a function of time and thereby
   identifies the impact of LSA storm on network stability.

   ======|==========================================================
         |     Table 1: DISPERSION as a FUNCTION of TIME (in sec)
    LSA  |                     for different LSA Storm Sizes
   STORM |==========================================================
   SIZE  |100s  106s  110s  115s  140s  170s  230s  330s  370s
   ======|==========================================================
    300  | 0     39     3     1     0     1     0     0     0
   ------|----------------------------------------------------------
    600  | 0    133   120   100    12     1     0     0     0
   ------|----------------------------------------------------------
    900  | 0    230   215   196   101   119   224   428   488
   ======|==========================================================

   Before the LSA storm, the dispersion due to normal LSA refreshes
   remains small.  We expect the dispersion to jump to a high value
   right after the storm and then come down to the pre-storm level
   after some period of time (this happens with X=300 and X=600 but not
   with X=900).  In Table 1 with a LSA storm size 300, the "heavy
   dispersion period" lasted about 11 seconds and no link losses were
   observed.  With a LSA storm of size 600, the "heavy dispersion
   period" lasted about 40 seconds.  Some link losses were observed a
   little after 15 seconds within the "heavy dispersion period" but
   eventually all links recovered and the dispersion came down to the
   pre-storm level. With a LSA storm of size 900, the "heavy dispersion
   period" lasted throughout the simulation period (6 minutes).


   The generic observations are as follows:

   (1) If the initial LSA storm size (e.g., X=300) is such that the
       delays experienced by Hello packets are not big enough to cause
       any link failures anywhere in the network, the network remains
       stable and quickly gets back to a period of "low dispersion".
       These types of LSA storms are observed quite frequently in
       operational networks, from which the network easily recovers.

   (2) If the initial LSA storm size (e.g., X=600) is such that the
       delays experienced by a few Hello packets in a few nodes cause
       link failures then some secondary LSA storms are generated.
       However, the secondary storms do not keep growing indefinitely
       and the network remains stable and eventually gets back to a
       period of "low dispersion".  This type of LSA storm was observed


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       in an operational network triggered by a network upgrade, from
       which the network recovered but with some difficulty.

   (3) If the initial LSA storm size (e.g., X=900), is such that the
       delays experienced by many Hello packets in many nodes cause link
       failures then a wave of secondary LSA storms are generated.  The
       network enters an unstable state and the secondary storms are
       sustained indefinitely or for a very long period of time. This
       type of LSA storm was observed in an operational network triggered
       by a network failure [Ref2] from which the network recovered only
       after taking some corrective steps (manual procedures based on
       reducing adjacencies at heavily congested nodes were used to
       reduce LSA flooding and stabilize the network).

   The results show that there is a LSA storm threshold above which the
   network shows unstable behavior.  It was also observed that if Hello
   packets (both received and sent) are given higher priority compared
   to other IGP packets then the LSA storm threshold above which network
   shows unstable behavior is significantly increased. In this draft we
   only look at the failure of links due to missed Hellos, but in
   general there may be many other types of failures once a network
   enters an unstable state.  Examples of failures include memory
   exhaust and shooting down of the node processor due to the
   inability of performing certain critical jobs.


3. Analytic Model for Delay experienced by a Hello Packet During an
Initial LSA Storm

   From the simulation results of the previous section it is clear that
   it is important to identify the delay experienced by a Hello packet
   during an initial LSA storm and compare that against the maximum
   allowed delay so as not to declare the link down.  We develop a
   simple and approximate analytic model for this purpose and use it to
   study the impact of Hello and SPF intervals on network stability.
   As explained in Section 2, for every link interface, a node has to
   send and receive a Hello packet once every hello interval. Sending
   of a Hello packet is triggered by a timer.  We assume that higher
   priority is given to timer-triggered jobs and therefore no
   significant delay is experienced in the sending of Hello packets.
   However, a received Hello packet cannot be easily distinguished from
   other IGP packets and therefore we assume that it is served in
   a first-come-first-served fashion.  Let's assume:

   S = Size of LSA storm, i.e., the number of LSAs in it.  Also, it is
   assumed that each LSA is carried in one LSU packet.
   L = Link adjacency of the node under consideration.

   t1 = Time to send or receive one IGP packet over an interface (the


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   same time is assumed for Hello, LSA, duplicate LSA and LSA
   acknowledgment even though in general there may be some
   differences.  However, this would be a good approximation if
   majority of the time were in the act of receiving or sending and a
   relatively small part for packet-type-specific work.)  In the
   numerical examples we assume t1 = 1 ms.

   t2 = Time to do one SPF calculation. For large networks, this time
   is usually in hundreds of ms and in the numerical examples we assume
   t2 = 200 ms.

   Hi = Hello interval (the gap between successive Hello messages on
   the same link).

   Si = Minimum interval between successive SPF calculations.

   ro = Rate at which non-IGP work comes to the node (e.g., forwarding
   of data packets).  For the numerical examples we assume ro = 0.2.

   T = Total work brought in to the node during the LSA storm.  For
   each LSA update generated elsewhere, the node will receive one new
   LSA packet over one interface, send an acknowledgment packet over
   that interface, and send copies of the LSA packet over the remaining
   L-1 interfaces. Also, assuming that the implicit acknowledgment
   mechanism is in use, the node will subsequently receive either an
   acknowledgment or a duplicate LSA over the remaining L-1
   interfaces.  So over each interface one packet is sent and one is
   received.  It can be seen that the same would be true for self-
   generated LSAs (see Table 1 for an example).   So the total work per
   LSA update is 2*L*t1.  Since there are S LSAs in the storm, we get

   T = 2*S*L*t1      (1)

   In Equation (1) we ignore retransmissions of LSAs in case
   acknowledgments are not received or processed within 5 seconds.
   From the simulation study we see that this is a reasonable
   assumption since usually only a few retransmissions result during
   the processing of the initial LSA storm (usually retransmissions
   happen at a higher rate during the secondary storms).

   T2 = Time period over which the work comes. Due to differences in
   propagation times and congestion at other nodes, it is possible for
   the work arrival time to be spread out over a long interval.
   However, since we are primarily interested in a few nodes that are
   bottlenecks or near-bottlenecks, it is reasonable to assume that
   most of the work comes in one chunk.  We verified this to be usually
   true using simulations.  One part of T2 will be of the order of link
   propagation delay and we assume that there is a second part which is
   proportional to T. Therefore we get,


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   T2 = A + B*T    (2)

   Where A and B are constants.  For the numerical examples we assume
   A = 10 ms and B = 0.1.

   D = Maximum delay experienced by a Hello packet during the LSA
   storm.  We assume first-come-first-served service and hence the
   delay seen by the Hello packet would be the total outstanding work
   at the node at the arrival instant plus its own processing time.  We
   assume that the outstanding work steadily increases over the
   interval T2 and so the maximum delay is seen by a Hello packet that
   comes near the end of this interval.  We write down an approximate
   expression for D and then explain the various terms on the right
   hand side:

   D = T - T2 + max(1,2*T2/Hi)*t1 + max(1,T2/Si)*t2 + ro*T2     (3)

   The first term is the total work brought in due to the LSA storm.
   The second term is the work the node was able to finish since we are
   assuming that it was continuously busy during the period T2.  The
   third term is the total work due to the sending and receiving of
   Hello packets during the period T2.  Note that it is assumed that at
   least one Hello packet is processed, i.e., itself.  The fourth term
   is due to SPF processing during the period T2 and we assume that at
   least one SPF processing is done.  The last term is the total non-
   IGP work coming to the node over the interval T2.

   Dmax = Maximum allowed value of D, i.e., if D exceeds this value
   then the associated link would be declared down. In the numerical
   examples below we assume

   Dmax = 3*Hi     (4)

   If we assume that the previous Hello packet was minimally delayed
   then exceeding Dmax really means four missed hellos since the Hello
   packet under study itself came after a period Hi.  In the numerical
   examples below, both D and Dmax change with choice of system
   parameters and we are mainly interested in identifying if D exceeds
   Dmax.  For this purpose we define the following ratio variable

   Delay Ratio = D/Dmax      (5)

   and identify if Delay Ratio exceeds 1.

   In Tables 2-4 we plot the Delay Ratio as a function of LSA Storm
   size with node adjacencies 10, 20 and 50 respectively.  All
   parameters except for the ones noted explicitly on the Tables are as
   stated earlier.  Table 2 assumes Hello packets every 10 seconds and
   SPF calculation every 5 seconds, which are typical default values


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   today.  With a node adjacency of 10, the Delay Ratio is below 1 even
   with an LSA storm of size 900.  However, with a node adjacency of
   20, the Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm of size 800 and with
   a node adjacency of 50, the Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm
   of size 325.

   ==========|========================================================
             | Table 2: Ratio of Hello Packet Delay to Maximum Allowed
             | Hello Packet Delay as a function of LSA Storm Size (LSS)
             | (Hello Every 10 Seconds, SPF Every 5 Seconds,
             |  Dmax = 30 seconds)
     NODE    |========================================================
   Adjacency |  LSS=100    LSS=300    LSS=500    LSS=700    LSS=900
   ==========|========================================================
     10      |   0.0677     0.1904     0.3131     0.4358     0.5584
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     20      |   0.1291     0.3744     0.6198     0.8651     1.1104
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     50      |   0.3131     0.9264     1.5398     2.1558     2.7718
   ==========|========================================================


   In a large network it is not unusual to have LSA storms of size
   several hundreds since the LSA database size may be several
   thousands. This is particularly true if there are many Autonomous-
   System-External (ASE) LSAs and there are special LSAs for carrying
   information about available bandwidth at links as is common in ATM
   networks and might be used in MPLS-based networks as well.  Table 3
   decreases the hello interval to 2 seconds and SPF calculation is
   done once a second.  LSA storm thresholds are significantly reduced.
   Specifically, with a node adjacency of 10, the Delay Ratio exceeds 1
   at around a storm of size 310; with a node adjacency of 20, the
   Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm of size 160; and with a node
   adjacency of 50, the Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm of size
   only 65.
















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   ==========|=======================================================
             |Table 3: Ratio of Hello Packet Delay to Maximum Allowed
             |Hello Packet Delay as a function of LSA Storm Size (LSS)
             |  (Hello Every 2 Seconds, SPF Every 1 Second,
             |   Dmax = 6 seconds)
   NODE      |========================================================
   ADJACENCY |   LSS=30    LSS=90    LSS=150    LSS=210    LSS=270
   ==========|========================================================
     10      |   0.124     0.308      0.492      0.676      0.86
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     20      |   0.216     0.584      0.952      1.32       1.691
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     50      |   0.492     1.412      2.349      3.289      4.229
   ==========|========================================================

   Table 4 decreases the hello interval even further to 300 ms and SPF
   calculation is done once every 500 ms. LSA storm thresholds are
   really small now.  Specifically, with a node adjacency of 10, the
   Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm of size 40, with a node
   adjacency of 20, the Delay Ratio exceeds 1 at around a storm of size
   20, and with a node adjacency of 50, the Delay Ratio is already over
   1 even with a storm of size 10.

   ==========|========================================================
             | Table 4: Ratio of Hello Packet Delay to Maximum Allowed
             | Hello Packet Delay as a function of LSA Storm Size (LSS)
             | (Hello Every 300 ms, SPF Every 500 ms, Dmax = 900 ms)
   NODE      |========================================================
   ADJACENCY |    LSS=10      LSS=30      LSS=50    LSS=70    LSS=90
   ==========|========================================================
     10      |     0.419       0.828      1.237      1.646     2.055
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     20      |     0.623       1.441      2.259      3.078     3.896
   ----------|--------------------------------------------------------
     50      |     1.237       3.282      5.333      7.467     9.602
   ==========|========================================================


   Based on the simulation observations we understand that if Delay
   Ratio is less than 1 for all Hello packets then the system is stable
   and if it exceeds 1 at many nodes then the system tends to enter an
   unstable region.  Therefore, the LSA storm threshold at which the
   Delay Ratio exceeds 1 may also roughly be considered as the network
   stability threshold.  Tables 2-4 show that the stability threshold
   rapidly decreases as the hello interval and SPF computation interval
   decreases.  One reason for this is the increased CPU work due to
   more frequent hello and SPF computations, but the dominant reason is
   that Dmax itself decreases and so a smaller CPU busy interval is


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   needed to exceed it.  Specifically, Dmax is 30 seconds in Table 2, 6
   Seconds in Table 3 and only 900 ms in Table 4. It is clear from the
   above examples that in order to maintain network stability as the
   hello interval decreases, it is necessary to provide faster
   prioritized treatment to received Hello packets which can of course
   be only done if those packets can be distinguished from other IGP
   packets.


4. Need for Special Marking and Prioritized Treatment of Specific IGP
packets

   The analytic and simulation models show that a major cause for
   unstable behavior in networks is received Hello packets at a node
   getting queued behind other work brought in to the node during an
   LSA storm and missing the deadline of typically three or four hello
   intervals.  Clearly, if the Hello packet can be specially marked to
   distinguish it from other IGP packets then they can be
   given prioritized treatment and they would not miss the deadline
   even during a large LSA storm.  However, the key is that the
   detection mechanism should be significantly faster than the complete
   processing of an IGP packet and it should be possible to do
   detection and separate queueing at the line rate.

   Usually a special Diffserv codepoint is used to differentiate all
   IGP packets from other packets.  We propose a separate Diffserv
   codepoint for Hello packets that allows them to be queued separately
   from other IGP packets and given prioritized treatment.

   We also suggest the use of additional mechanisms in order not to miss
   Hello packets during periods of congestion and thereby avoid
   declaring links to be down.  One such mechanism is to treat any
   packet received over a link as an implicit Hello packet for the
   purpose of keeping the link alive.  Under this mechanism a link will
   be declared down only if no packets are received over the link for a
   duration of the Router Dead interval. So, during a period of
   congestion, if Hello packets are queued behind LSAs or some other
   packets but at least one such packet is received over the link no
   slower than once every Router Dead interval, the link will stay up.

   Besides the Hello packets there may be other IGP packets that could
   also benefit from special marking and prioritized treatment. We give
   some examples below but clearly others are possible.

   (1) One example is the LSA acknowledgment packet.  This packet
       disables retransmission and if a large queueing delay to this
       packet expires the retransmission timer (typical default value
       is 5 seconds) then a needless retransmission will happen causing
       extra traffic load. A special marking and prioritization of the
       LSA acknowledgment packet would eliminate many needless


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       retransmissions. During the database exchange process between
       neighbours following a link coming up, Database Description
       packets are exchanged and the successful receipt of such a
       packet is acknowledged by sending a properly sequenced Database
       Description packet back to the sender.  Since these packets are
       used as acknowledgments, it makes sense to properly mark and
       prioritize them as well.

   (2) Another example is an LSA carrying a change information. It is
       preferable to transmit this information faster than other LSAs
       in the network that are just once-in-30-minutes refreshes.

       Among "change" LSAs we can distinguish further and give
       preferential treatment to only those "change" LSAs that carry
       intra-area topology change information as opposed to other
       "change" LSAs that are summary LSAs or Opaque LSAs.  We can also
       distinguish between "change" LSAs carrying "bad" information
       (node/link failure) versus those carrying "good" information
       (node/link coming up) and give higher priority to LSAs carrying
       "bad" information. There may be multiple levels of priority
       depending on the relative importance of the various IGP packets.

       The explicit identification can also be used for preferentially
       triggering the SPF calculation. We can normally have a longer gap
       between successive SPF calculations, but revert to a shorter gap
       after receiving an LSA that carries a area-topology-change
       information. This will speed up restoration time following a
       failure but would not unduly increase the SPF processing overhead.


5. Summary

   In this draft we point out that if a large LSA storm is generated as
   a result of some type of failure/recovery of nodes/links or
   synchronization among refreshes then the Hello packets received at a
   node may see large queueing delays and miss the deadline of
   typically three or four hello intervals.  This causes the associated
   link to be declared down, starts a secondary storm and is
   potentially the beginning of unstable behavior in the network.  This
   is already a concern in today's network but would be a bigger
   concern if the hello interval and the minimum interval between SPF
   calculations are substantially reduced (below or perhaps well below
   a second) in order to allow faster rerouting.  To avoid the above,
   we propose the following:

   (1) Explicitly mark Hello packets to differentiate them from other
       IGP packets so that efficient implementations can detect and act
       upon these packets in a priority fashion. This may be done by



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   Internet Draft          Explicit Marking              October, 2002


       using a special Diffserv codepoint for Hello packets (separate
       from that used for other IGP packets).

   (2) In the absence of special marking or in addition to it, other
       mechanisms should be used in order not to miss Hello packets.
       One example is to treat any packet received over a link as a
       surrogate for a Hello packet for the purpose of keeping the link
       alive.

   (3) The same type of explicit marking and prioritized treatment
       would also help other IGP packets and should be considered.  Some
       examples include LSA acknowledgment packets, Database Description
       packets from the slave during database exchange and LSAs carrying
       intra-area topology change information. LSAs carrying bad news
       (node/link failures) may also be given priority over LSAs
       carrying good news (node/link coming back up).

   It is possible that some implementations are already using one or
   more of the above mechanisms in order not to miss the processing of
   critical packets during periods of congestion.  However, we suggest
   the above mechanisms to be included as part of the standard so that
   all implementations can benefit from them.


6. Acknowledgments

   The authors would like to acknowledge several people for their
   helpful comments.  In AT&T we recognize Tushar Amin, Jerry Ash,
   Margaret Chiosi, Elie Francis, Jeff Han, Tom Helstern, Shih-Yue Hou,
   S. Kandaswamy, Beth Munson, Aswatnarayan Raghuram, Moshe Segal, John
   Tinacci, Mike Wardlow and Pat Wirth.  In Lucent Technologies we
   recognize Nabil Biter and Roshan Rao.


7. References

   [Ref1] C. Alaettinoglu, V. Jacobson and H. Yu, "Towards Milli-second
   IGP Convergence," Work in Progress.

   [Ref2] Pappalardo, D., "AT&T, customers grapple with ATM net outage,"
   Network World, February 26, 2001.

   [Ref3] "AT&T announces cause of frame-relay network outage," AT&T
   Press Release, April 22, 1998.

   [Ref4] Cholewka, K., "MCI Outage Has Domino Effect," Inter@ctive
   Week, August 20, 1999.




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   [Ref5] Jander, M., "In Qwest Outage, ATM Takes Some Heat," Light
   Reading, April 6, 2001.

   [Ref6] A. Zinin and M. Shand, "Flooding Optimizations in Link-State
   Routing Protocols," Work in Progress.

   [Ref7] J. Moy, "Flooding over Parallel Point-to-Point Links," Work in
   progress.
   [Ref8] J. Ash, G. Choudhury, J. Han, V. Sapozhnikova, M. Sherif, M.
   Noorchashm, S. Mcallister, A. Maunder, V. Manral, "Proposed
   Mechanisms for Congestion Control / Failure Recovery in OSPF & ISIS
   Networks" Work in Progress.

   [Ref9] J. Ash, G. Choudhury, V. Sapozhnikova, M. Sherif, A. Maunder,
   V. Manral, "Congestion Avoidance & Control for OSPF Networks",
   Work in Progress.

   [Ref10] G. Choudhury, A. Maunder and V. Sapozhnikova, "Faster
   Link-State IGP Convergence and Improved Network Scalability and
   Stability," Presentation at LCN 2001, Tampa, Florida, November
   14-16, 2001.


8 Authors' Addresses

   Gagan L. Choudhury
   AT&T
   Room D5-3C21
   200 Laurel Avenue
   Middletown, NJ, 07748
   USA
   Phone: (732)420-3721
   email: gchoudhury@att.com


   Vera D. Sapozhnikova
   AT&T
   Room C5-2C29
   200 Laurel Avenue
   Middletown, NJ, 07748
   USA
   Phone: (732)420-2653
   email: sapozhnikova@att.com








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   Anurag S. Maunder
   Sanera Systems
   370 San Aleso Ave.
   Second Floor
   Sunnyvale, CA 94085
   Phone: (408)734-6123
   email: amaunder@sanera.net

   Vishwas Manral
   NetPlane
   189, Prashasan Nagar,
   Road Number 72
   Jubilee Hills, Hyderabad
   India
   email: Vishwasm@netplane.com




































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