9.1 INTRODUCTION

Header compression is advantageous on low or medium speed links. Header compression can work to increase interactive response time. In addition, low speed links can benefit. However, echoing of characters may consume as much time as 100 200 ms due to the time needed to send large headers. That time frame is the maximum that users can normally withstand without giving up on the overall computer response time.

It permits small packets to be used for bulk data with sufficient line efficiency. This is crucial when telnet and ftp traffic are combined due to the fact that the heavy ftp data needs to be conveyed in small packets to lessen the waiting time when a packet with interactive (telnet) data is caught behind a heavy or unwieldy ftp data packet.

The main idea of any network design is to always reduce the load as much as possible. When you utilize shorter packet sizes for the ftp traffic, you effectively provide a visionary solution to a shortsighted problem. It will expand the load on the network as it has to work with many small packets. A better solution may be to fragment the big packets locally over the slow link.

It is important to permit the utilization of small packets for delay sensitive low data-rate traffic. In applications such as voice, the time required to fill a packet with data is significant if packets are big. In order to achieve low end-to-end delay short packets are favored. In the absence...