TCP rate implicit control (TRIC)

Current congestion control mechanisms in today's Internet rely on end-to-end TCP congestion avoidance algorithms that back off sources when congestion occurs, detected by packet loss or explicit congestion notification signals. But one of the major setbacks of such mechanisms is making sure that all sources respond correctly in applying congestion avoidance measures during periods of high congestion; non-compliant sources can aggravate the network congestion state and yield to unfairness, worsening the state of the network. In this paper, we propose a network-centric solution for congestion control-called TRIC (TCP rate implicit control), that shapes the behavior of TCP from the edge of the network, using TCP's window manipulation and ACK pacing, based on backward explicit congestion notification in ACK packets going back to the source, generated by routers experiencing incipient congestion in the forward path. We also present simulation results that show how TRIC helps improve the throughput of TCP.