LT-TCP: End-to-End Framework to Improve TCP Performance over Networks with Lossy Channels

As wireless channels are becoming common, the performance of TCP over networks with such links is important. TCP performance suffers substantially when packet error rates increase beyond a value of about 1% - 5%. This paper proposes an end-end mechanism to improve TCP performance over networks comprising lossy wireless link. The scheme separates the congestion indications from the wireless packet erasures by exploiting ECN. To overcome packet erasures we use a dynamic and adaptive Forward Error Correction (FEC) scheme that includes adaptation of the Maximum Segment Size for TCP. Redundancy is added in the form of proactive FEC which tunes itself to the measured error rate. The residual packet errors are handled by an enhanced retransmission scheme using reactive FEC repair packets to complement proactive FEC and SACK retransmission. Dynamically changing the MSS tailors the number of segments in the window for optimal performance. The scheme is built on top of TCP-SACK and depends on S...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2005
• Where: IWQOS
• Authors: Omesh Tickoo, Vijaynarayanan Subramanian, Shivkumar Kalyanaraman, K. K. Ramakrishnan
• Keywords: Communications, IWQOS 2005, Packet Erasures, Packet Errors, Tcp Performance