Subject: RFC 2481 on ECN to IP

From: RFC Editor <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 15 Jan 1999 12:45:16 -0800

A new Request for Comments is now available in online RFC libraries.

        RFC 2481:

        Title:      A Proposal to add Explicit Congestion Notification
		    (ECN) to IP
	Author(s):  K. Ramakrishnan, S. Floyd
	Status:     Experimental
	Date:       January 1999
        Mailbox:    [email-masked], [email-masked]
	Pages:      25
        Characters: 64559
        Updates/Obsoletes/See Also: None 
        I-D Tag:    draft-kksjf-ecn-03.txt

        URL:        ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2481.txt

This note describes a proposed addition of ECN (Explicit Congestion
Notification) to IP.  TCP is currently the dominant transport
protocol used in the Internet. We begin by describing TCP's use of
packet drops as an indication of congestion.  Next we argue that with
the addition of active queue management (e.g., RED) to the Internet
infrastructure, where routers detect congestion before the queue
overflows, routers are no longer limited to packet drops as an
indication of congestion.  Routers could instead set a Congestion
Experienced (CE) bit in the packet header of packets from ECN-capable
transport protocols.  We describe when the CE bit would be set in the
routers, and describe what modifications would be needed to TCP to
make it ECN-capable.  Modifications to other transport protocols
(e.g., unreliable unicast or multicast, reliable multicast, other
reliable unicast transport protocols) could be considered as those
protocols are developed and advance through the standards process.
 
This memo defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community.
It does not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Discussion and 
suggestions for improvement are requested.  Distribution of this memo 
is unlimited.

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Joyce K. Reynolds and Alegre Ramos
USC/Information Sciences Institute

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