The authors consider some reliability and performance aspects of ATM-based signaling networks. They present ideas on how ATM technology, suitable system concepts, as well as simplified and enhanced protocols could maintain or even improve the reliability level of the existing Common Channel Signaling System No. 7. They also discuss possible scenarios for the interworking of ATM-based signaling networks with existing signaling networks. They also examine the aspect of performance enhancement in terms of reduced delays and increased throughput due to the ATM signaling connections with higher bit rates and protocol simplifications.>

An approximate analytical method is presented for the estimation of the loss probability for single and multichannel calls in TST (time-space-time) switching networks. Two extended methods are described. The assumptions for the basic method are that: all occupation patterns of the two internal highways between a certain start and destination highway for a given number of occupied channels have the same probability, and that the state probabilities of the start and destination highway are given by a multidimensional Erlang distribution. Based on this method, the second approximation considers calls that are switched from start to destination highway. In a third method, the dependency of the states of all input and output highways is taken into account. The basic approximation has shown the best agreement with the simulation results. The other methods take into account additional properties of TST switching networks for single and multichannel connections. In order to keep the state space in a reasonable size, additional assumptions had to be used which impair the results significantly compared to the basic approximation method.>

The authors give a classification of the most common Banyan networks and outline an analysis approach for the rather general class of delta-b networks with multiple buffers. On the basis of this approach, they discuss the effects of the approximation involved and present a refined analysis algorithm for the special case of a single buffered delta-2 network. The results of both algorithms are compared with simulation results to assess their accuracy. The comparison shows clearly that the accuracy of the analysis is mainly determined by the modeling of the dependencies between consecutive clock cycles.>