A Cost-efficient Credit-Based Shaper Deployment Framework for Time-Sensitive Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a cost-efficient strategy for deploying Credit-Based Shapers in legacy Ethernet networks to meet time-sensitive traffic requirements, significantly reducing device deployment costs while ensuring performance guarantees.

Contribution

It presents a selective CBS deployment framework using Network Calculus and heuristics, optimizing placement and configuration to reduce costs and improve schedulability.

Findings

Up to 70% reduction in TSN device requirements.

Improved schedulability for medium-priority traffic.

Reduced blocking delays for high-priority traffic.

Abstract

Time-sensitive networks are designed to meet stringent Quality of Service (QoS) requirements for mixed-criticality traffic with diverse performance demands. Ensuring deterministic guarantees for such traffic while reducing deployment costs remains a significant challenge. This paper proposes a cost-efficient partial deployment strategy for Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) devices within legacy Ethernet network. At the core of our approach is the Credit-Based Shaper (CBS), a key TSN scheduling mechanism. Unlike cost-prohibitive full CBS deployment, our approach selectively integrates CBS where it is most needed to enhance performance while reducing costs. Combining Network Calculus for schedulability verification and a heuristic optimization method for CBS configuration and placement, our proposal minimizes deployment costs while improving schedulability for medium-priority traffic and mitigating blocking delays for high-priority traffic. The feasibility and benefits of our approach are validated on a realistic automotive TSN use case with up to 70% of reduction in TSN devices requirements compared to a full deployment.