Survivable Atm Group Communications: Issues and Techniques

This paper presents the survivability issues relevant to ATM group communications and outlines the tradeo s between restoration techniques that can be extended from circuit-switched communications. Current models proposed by the ATM Forum for group communications (VC Mesh and Multicast Server) are compared and restoration techniques for all possible single fault scenarios are examined. It is concluded that di erent restoration techniques are preferable for each proposed model depending on availability and connectivity to backup servers (adjacent or remote), guarantees of single fault tolerance, restoration time tolerance, level of group dynamics, and cost. Further research is needed to quantify the tradeo s between di erent restoration techniques. author for correspondence; additional contact information: telephone (309) 438-