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NorthStar Planner Class of Service Overview

The Class of Service chapter describes how the NorthStar Planner network design software can be used to model Class of Service (CoS). CoS plays a key part in making sure that services can be transported over a connectionless IP network and can meet the customer Service Level Agreement.

CoS can be implemented on each interface of a router. Users define traffic classes based on “match criteria,” such as a particular protocol, access control list, or a specified input interface on which packets arrive. When a packet arrives at a router, it is classified according to the class whose criteria it successfully matches. This packet then constitutes the traffic for that class. At the router, there is a reserved queue for each class, and any traffic belonging to a class is directed to the corresponding queue. Users can also define characteristics of each class’s queue based on bandwidth and queue limit.

If you have an existing set of config files, use getipconf or the Import Data Wizard (via File > Import Data) to parse your config files and create a set of NorthStar Planner input files.

Use this feature if you want to:

  • Check and validate that the current network configuration can handle customer traffic (even before customer implementation).

  • Identify bottlenecks and adjust the network design by performing What-if Studies

The what-if capabilities in NorthStar Planner may have to be used in order to correct the network design. For instance, if too many packets are dropped during the simulation, the following actions can be investigated:

  • Increasing the queue size limit for a given class

  • Decreasing the bandwidth of lower priority traffic classes

  • Locally increasing link bandwidth