Traffic Forecasting & Network

Planning
Lec 05

Kamran Nadeem
kamran.case@yahoo.com
 Trunking
• A means for providing access to users a channel from the available pool
on demand

• With this a technique a small number of channels can accommodate a

large number of random users

• Telephone companies use trunking theory to calculate the number of

channels/circuits required for a population
– Limited servers
– Large population
 Terminologies
• Traffic intensity is measured in Erlangs
– 1 Erlang = Traffic in a channel when it is completely occupied
– 0.5 Erlang = Channel is busy 30 minutes in a one hour period

• Set-Up time: Time to allocate a channel to a user

• Blocked Call: Call which cannot be completed at the time of request due
to congestion in the network

• Lost Call: Same as blocked

• Holding Time (H): Duration of a typical call

• Load: Traffic intensity across the whole system

• Request rate (λ): Average number of call requests in a unit time

 Quality of Service (1)
• A network cannot be dimensioned for the worst case peaks. Then,
occasionally the requested service is not available or the quality of the
service is reduced

• The dimensioning has to made according to the stated (statistical) criteria

for the quality of service
– grade of service (GoS): quality at the call level (e.g. telephone network)
– quality of service (QoS): quality during a connection or session (e.g. ATM
network)

• In a telephone network a call that cannot be immediately carried

– may be blocked: loss system
– may have to wait (ringing tone): waiting system

• The GoS requirement

– loss system: P (call is blocked) < x %
– waiting system: P (waiting time > z seconds) < x %
 Quality of Service (2)
• Loss system
– Call blocking may occur during the busy hour
– Probabilistic, which depends on the traffic intensity during the busy hour and
the dimensioning of the network as described by Erlang's formula (so called
B formula)
– Blocking probabilities in different parts of the network can summed to
approximately estimate the end-to-end blocking

• Waiting system
– If connecting the call is not immediately possible, the call may be put in a
waiting state
– A small waiting time does not matter, a user may not notice it at all
– Long waiting times are unacceptable for the users
– One sets an upper limit to the waiting time, after which the call is blocked
– the behavior of a waiting system is described by so called Erlang's C formula

• There may be reattempts after unsuccessful calls

 Quality of Service (3)
• It is not reasonable to dimension the network for a very small blocking
probability, since the call may be unsuccessful due to other reasons with
a much higher probability
– User is busy
– User is unavailable
– Wrong number

• The system is designed around a 1% blocking probability rate

 Quality of Service (4)
• In networks other than the POTS, QoS may have different parameters
instead of or in addition to blocking probability

• Internet traffic or ATM networks have

– Packets or cell delays
– Jitter
– Lost packets
– Erroneous packets
– Throughput
 Erlang’s B Formula (1)
• Assumptions
– A loss system: a blocked call is cleared (no reattempts)
– There are n trunks; any free trunk can be used
– The arrivals constitute a Poisson process
• The arrivals occur at average rate λ, otherwise, the arrivals are completely random
• This is good model when the calls originate from a large population of independent
users

• Traffic intensity is A = λH
 Erlang’s B Formula (2)
• The probability of blocked call is given by

• Relates the system (n), the traffic (A) and quality of service (E)
 Erlang’s B Formula (3)
• Example capacity table using Erlang’s B system
Grade of Service (1)
 Grade of Service (2)
• In a blocked call cleared system, the required GOS is 0.5%. How many
users are there in the system with 5 channels if each user generates 0.1
Erlangs of traffic?

• You can refer to chart or use the formula

• A = ~1.13
• U = A/Au = ~11
Grade of Service (3)
Grade of Service (4)
Grade of Service (5)
 Time & Call Blocking
• Time Blocking
– Fraction of time when all resources are occupied
• Call Blocking
– Fraction of all calls that are blocked

• Why do we take them as being equal?

The End