802 11 QoS Overview

802.11

Philippe Klein
IEEE Plenary Meeting – Nov 08 Dallas, TX

avb-phkl-802-11-qos-overview-0811-1
Disclaimer

This presentation is not a highly detailed technical

presentation but a crash course aiming to provide
- prior to the joint meeting with the 802.11 WG- a
basic understanding g of the QoS mechanisms
currently defined in the IEEE 802.11-2007
specifications

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 2

Abbreviations & Acronyms
y
ADDTS add traffic stream
AIFS arbitration interframe space
AIFSN arbitration interframe space number
AP access point
APSD automatic power-save delivery
BSS basic service set
CSMA/CA carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance
CW contention window
DELTS delete traffic stream
DIFS distributed (coordination function) interframe space
DLS direct-link setup
EDCA enhanced distributed channel access
EDCAF enhanced distributed channel access function
EIFS extended interframe space
HCCA HCF controlled channel access
HCF hybrid coordination function
MAC medium access control
MPDU MAC protocol data unit
NAV network allocation vector
PIFS point (coordination function) interframe space
PS power save (mode)
QoS quality of service
S-APSD scheduled automatic power-save delivery
SIFS short interframe space
SP service period
STA station
TXOP transmission opportunity
U-APSD unscheduled automatic power-save delivery
WMM WiFi Multimedia

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 3

802 11 MAC Legacy
802.11 L Access
A Protocol
P t l

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 4

802.11 MAC Access Protocol

1. Distributed Coordinated Function (DCF)

Contention access
Based on Carrier Sense Media Access /Collision Avoidance
(PHY Carrier Sense & Network Allocation Vector)
2. Point Coordinated Function (PCF)
Contention Free access:
Access P
A Point
i t (AP) coordinates
di t access ffor AP and
d STA
transmissions
Optional !!!

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 5

DCF Contention Mechanism

DIFS Backoff Time

PIFS

SIFS
Busy Medium Contention Window Next Frame

Slot time

Decrement Backoff as
Deferred Access
long as medium is idle

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 6

Interframe Spacing
p g in 802.11

SIFS Control Frame or next frame fragment may be sent here

PIFS Beacon or New PCF Frame may be sent here

New DCF Frame may be sent here

DIFS

EIFS Frame Error Recovery done here

(allow other frame exchanges to
complete correctly before another
ACK Slot time Slot time transmission is allowed)
time

802 11b
802.11b 802 11
802.11a 802 11
802.11g
SIFS 10 µs 16 µs 10 µs
Slot time 20 µs 9 µs 9 µs
PIFS (= SIFS + 1 x Slot time) 30 µs 28 µs 19 µs
DIFS (= SIFS + 2 x Slot time) 50 µs 34 µs 28 µs

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 7

Random Backoff Time

Backoff Time = Random() * SlotTime

Random() = Pseudo
Pseudo-random
random [0
[0,CW]
CW]

CWmin =< CW <= Cwmax

CW:
● Incremented by 2n-1 on each retransmission
● Reset after successful Txm

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 8

Distributed Coordinated Function

DIFS DIFS DIFS DIFS

FRAME
Station A

Defer
FRAME
Station B

Defer
FRAME
Station C

Defer
FRAME
Station D

Defer
FRAME
Station E

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 9

PCF: Point Coordinator Function

● Poll and response protocol to eliminate the

possibility of contention for the medium
medium.
● A Point Coordinator (PC) - always located in an
Access Point - controls the PCF
● To operate in PCF, stations register to the PC
● PC regularly
g y polls
p the registered
g stations for traffic
while delivering traffic to theses stations.

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 10

PCF Operation
p

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 11

Co-existence of PCF and DCF
CFP Repetition Interval CFP Repetition Interval

Contention Free Contention Period Contention Free Contention Period

Period (CFP) (CP) Period (CFP) (CP)

B PCF DCF B PCF DCF

NAV NAV Time

Beacon
Beacon

● CFP/C ratio is programmable in the AP

● Beacon marks the beginning of the Contention Free Period
(CFP)
● CF-End ends the CFP
● NAV prevent outstanding DCF traffic to interfere with CFP
IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 12
Qualityy of Service Limitations
Q

● Both PHY’s DCF and PCF methods do not

differentiate between traffic types or sources and
do not provide QoS
● PCF provides only iso-synchronous
iso synchronous services
● worse latency access only is deterministic
● access latencyy is function of the number of registered
g
stations, the CF traffic and the CFP/CP ratio

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 13

Medium Access Control
Q lit off S
Quality Service
i
Enhancements

(previously 802.11e amendment ,

now partt off 802.11-2007)
802 11 2007)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 14

Major
j Enhancements in 802.11e

● Basic Elements for QoS

Traffic Differentiation
Concept of Transmission Opportunity (TXOP)

● New Contention Channel Access

Enhanced Distributed Channel Access (EDCA)

● New Contention Free Channel Access

HCF Controlled Channel Access (HCCA)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 15

Major
j Enhancements in 802.11e

● Automatic Power-Save Delivery (APSD)

● New
N mechanisms
h i ffor higher
hi h ththroughput
h t
Block Acknowledgement (Block Ack)
Direct Link Setup (DLS)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 16

Enhanced Distributed Channel Access (EDCA)
( )

● Same Contention Based that EDC but…

1 8 priority
1. i i levels
l l per station
i (id
(identical
i l to IEEE
802.1D priority tags) mapped to 4 access
categories (AC)
2. Different Arbitration InterFrame Space
(AIFS) per access categories
3. TxOP Burst Limits

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 17

EDCA Frame Priorities

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 18

EDCA Implementation
p Model
802.1D tagged MSDU

Mapping to Access Category

Voice Video Best Back-

Data Data Efforts ground
Txm AC VO
AC_VO AC VI
AC_VI AC BE
AC_BE AC BK
AC_BK
queues

Resolve AIFSN, AIFSN, AIFSN, AIFSN,

internal CWmin, CWmin, CWmin, CWmin,
CWmax CWmax CWmax CWmax
collision

Txm attempt

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 19

Traffic Prioritization & Collision Resolution

● Depends
epe ds o
on 2 ttiming
g pa
parameters
a ete s tthat
at vary
a y for
o eac
each AC:
C
1. AIFSN (Arbitrary Inter-Frame Space Number)
2. CW (Contention Window)
(and TxOP Limit for AC_VI and AC_VO)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 20

Arbitration InterFrame Space
p

AIFS (AC i-1)

CW
AIFS (AC i)
DIFS

CW
PIFS

SIFS
Busy Medium Contention Window Next Frame

Deferred Access

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 21

EDCA + Admission Control
Admitted
AP
flows
Rejected
Video stream

AC2 (video)
AC3 (Voice)

AC2 (video)
AC2 (video)
AC1
STA1 STA3

STA2

● Capability Negotiation of Admission Control per Access Category

(AC) occurs during association:
● STA sends an Add Traffic Stream (ADDTS) request with Txm
Specifications (TSPEC) prior to sending packet on a particular
AC.
● TSPEC can be for upstream, downstream, or bibi-directional
directional traffic.
● AP has proprietary algorithm to accept/deny ADDTS request.

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 22

802.11 TSPEC Element

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 23

802.11 TSPEC Main Parameters

User Priority 0 (lowest) to 7 (highest)

Maximum MSDU size maximum size of the packets (octets)

Maximum Burst Size maximum size of the data burst that can be transmitted at the
peak data rate (octets)
Minimum PHY rate physical bit rate assumed by the scheduler for transmit time
and admission control calculations (b/s)
Peak data Rate maximum bit rate allowed for transfer of the packets

M
Mean d
data
t rate
t average bit rate
t for
f transfer
t f off the
th packets
k t (b/
(b/s))

Delay bound maximum delay allowed to transport a packet across the

wireless interface (including queuing delay, in ms)
Nominal MSDU size nominal size of the packets (octets)

Maximum Service interval required by TS in this TSPEC between the start of two
Interval successive TXOPs

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 24

 EDCA Limitations

● Still no guaranty of service provided but..

● Probabilistic
P b bili ti priority
i it mechanism
h i only
l tto allocate
ll t
bandwidth based on traffic categories

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 25

HCF Controlled Channel Access (HCCA)
( )

● HCF = Hybrid Coordination Function

● Hybrid
H b id C
Coordinator
di t (HC) operates
t att QQoS-AP
S AP
● Controls the iteration of Contention Free Period
(CFP) and Contention Period (CP)
● Schedule Transmit Opportunities for contention free
accesses

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas 26

HCF Controlled Channel Access (HCCA)
( )

● Similar to PCF
● Same polling mechanism to assign Transmission
Opportunity (TXOP) to QoS-STA
● but
● Polling can be issued in both CFP and CP (in
Controlled Access Periods)
● HC Polling is scheduled according to Transmit
specifications (TSPECs)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 27

PCF vs HCF Comparison
p

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 28

802.11e Media Access Summaryy

CAP Controlled Access Period CP Contention Period TBTT Target Beacon Transmission Time
CFP Contention Free Period EDCF Enhanced Distributed Coord. Function TXO Transmission Opportunity
CF-Poll
CF Poll Contention Free – Poll QAP QoS Access Point
CF-End Contention Free – End QSTA Qos Station

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 29

802.11e
802 11e
Automatic Power-Save Delivery

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 30

Automatic Power-Save Deliveryy ((APSD))

● Enhancing Power Saving mode in QoS Basic

Service Set
● QoS-AP automatically delivers downlink frames,
which belong to some specified Access Category
Category,
to Power-Saving stations
● Two types of delivery mechanism
● Unscheduled APSD (U-APSD)
● Scheduled APSD (S-APSD)
(S APSD)

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 31

Unscheduled APSD (U-APSD)
( )

1 P
1. Power-saving
i Q QoS-STA
S STA wakes
k up and d sendd a “t
“trigger”data
i ”d t
frame belonging to “trigger-enabled” AC to QoS-AP
2. After receiving “trigger”
trigger frame, a Service Period (SP) is
started
3. QoS-AP send frames belonging to “delivery-enabled” AC
to QoS-STA
Q SS
IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 32
Scheduled APSD (S-APSD)
( )
Voice Voice

Ack
Ack
Q-AP

Poll
Poll

B
B
Packet Packet

Voice Voice

Ack
Ack
Q-STA Packet Packet

Voice Frame Voice Frame

20 mS

Service Service
Start Time Start Time

1. QoS-STA negotiates a APSD Schedule with QoS-AP

2. QoS-AP start transmitting the frames of the specified
T ffi Stream
Traffic St att Service
S i St Startt Ti
Time and
d the
th ffollowing
ll i
periods
3 QoS
3. QoS-STA
STA must wake up at Service Start Time and the
following periods to receive frames
IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 33
802.11e
802 11e
Throughput Enhancements

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 34

Block ACK
● Improves channel efficiency by aggregating several
acknowledgments into one frame.
● 2 types of Block Ack mechanisms:
● immediate and delayed

Immediate ACK Delayed ACK

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 35

Direct Link Protocol

● Ability to exchange data directly between two

stations in the network
network, without traversing the AP
AP.

QoS AP

QoS STA1 QoS STA2

5: DLS Data

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 36

WMM ((Wi-Fi Multimedia™))

● Certification program initiated by the Wi-Fi

Alliance (www.wi-fi.org)
(www wi fi org)

● Specification document:
Wi-Fi Alliance Technical Committee Quality of Service
(QoS) Task Group, WMM (including WMM™ Power
Save) Specification Version 1.1
● Subset of IEEE 802.11e : EDCA & U-APSD only

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 37

Thank you

IEEE 802.1 Plenary Meeting , Nov 08 Dallas TX 38