Overview of Network Resource Management
In Oracle Solaris, quality of service (QoS) is obtained more easily and dynamically bymanaging network resources. Network resource management is comparable to creating dedicated lanesfor traffic. When you combine different resources to provide to the specific types of networkpackets, those resources form a network lane for those packets. Resources can be assigneddifferently for each network lane. For example, you can allocate more resources to a lane wherenetwork traffic is the heaviest. By configuring network lanes where resources are distributedaccording to the actual need, you increase the system's efficiency in processing network packets.For more information about network lanes, see Overview of Monitoring Network Traffic Statistics of Datalinks and Flows.
The following network resources are used to increase the system's efficiency in processingpackets:
Bandwidth – You can limit the bandwidth of thedatalink according to the actual need of the networking processes supported by the datalink.
Priority – You can prioritize the order inwhich the packets are processed. The latency is reduced for the packets with higher priority becausethey are processed ahead of the other packets.
NIC rings – If a NIC supports ring allocation,its transmit and receive rings can be dedicated for use by datalinks. For more information, seeManaging NIC Rings.
CPU pools – Pools of CPUs are created andassociated with specific zones. These pools can be further assigned to datalinks to manage thenetwork processes of their associated zones. For more information, see Managing Pools and CPUs.
CPUs – On a system with multiple CPUs, you candedicate a given number of CPUs for specific network processing. For more information, see Managing Pools and CPUs.
Network resources on a system can be managed by using either datalink properties orflows.
