Emerging applications targeted for clusters are inherently interactive
and collaborative in nature. These applications demand end-to-end Quality
of Service (QoS) in addition to performance. Achieving predictable
performance and ability to exploit resource adaptivity are also common
requirements of these next generation applications. Providing QoS
mechanisms for clusters to satisfy the demands of next generation
applications is a challenging task.
We have suggested NIC-level rate control mechanism and coordinated
admission control/scheduling mechanism. The rate control mechanism
works by controlling the rate at which packets are injected at the
source NIC into the network. The admission control/scheduling mechanism
maintains global knowledge of cluster traffic patterns. We also
provide an interface so that applications can specify bandwidth
requirements of their flows to the underlying network.