TECHNICAL
Figure 5: Zip’s Internet Model
Zip’s Internet Model Overview
that an end-to-end mechanism to measure and manage Internet traffic is not achievable? This is the basic tenet of my thinking i.e., “if there is no agreed end to end mechanism for doing so, why do so many commentators describe (and quantify) Internet traffic with such gusto?” Zip’s Internet Model as a series of interconnected queues To answer the question addressed in 5.2 above, I’m suggesting one approach for further consideration and earlier, I made reference to Leonard Kleinrock and his work on Queueing Systems. Whilst most of Kleinrock’s two volumes are way above my intellectual capability, Chapter 5 of Volume 2 is of interest here, perhaps? Using Figure 6 below as one possible approach to modelling the Internet. Here, I’m representing Internet flow measurement by modelling the Internet as a series of interconnected queues. As can been seen, each network has input and output and, at the micro level, a flow (measured in bit/s?) can, at any one point in time, can be measured – a “busy hour” to stretch the circuit switching analogy, perhaps?
In the absence of an agreed standard in the definition and measurement of Internet traffic, can we apply the approach of the circuit switch engineering to the Internet? RFC 9522, as an example, describes a process model (Section 3.) which is worthy of further investigation. In addition RFC 2722, introduces (and I quote): “This document provides a general framework for describing network traffic flows, presents an architecture for traffic flow measurement and reporting, discusses how this relates to an overall network traffic flow architecture and indicates how it can be used within the Internet.”
A diagram always helps?
To assist in my initial analysis, I have redrawn Figure 4 as Figure 5 below.
I’ve done so to illustrate the concept of the Internet as a network of networks, which by observation is not under the control of a single management domain i.e., it could be argued that (currently)
Figure 6: A possible model for determining end to end Internet traffic.
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DECEMBER 2025 Volume 47 No.4
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