VNS Video-Over-IP Guidelines

Quality of Service Quality of Service (QoS) is a set of capabilities used to create differentiated services for network traffic, thereby providing better service for selected network traffic. For example, with QoS, bandwidth can be increased for critical traffic, and limited for non-critical traffic; consistent network response can be achieved, among other things. This allows the use of network connections more efficiently. QoS primarily comes into play when the amount of traffic through an interface is greater than the interface's bandwidth. When the traffic through an interface exceeds the bandwidth, packets form one or more queues from which the device selects the next packet to send. By setting the queuing property on a device or interface, you can control how the queues are serviced, thus determining the priority of the traffic. ITS Data Services offers 1.544 Mbps (T-1), a 3 Mbps, and a 6 Mbps connectivity upgrades with the ability to enable Quality of Service.  Video and voice traffic will have the highest priority assigned since these packets are expected to arrive at their destination near real-time.  The bursty nature of data traffic, and non-real-time packet arrival requirements allow a lower priority to be assigned. To implement QoS, QoS properties and policies are defined on devices or device interfaces. The policies can differentiate traffic based on its source, destination, or type. For example, you can recognize traffic based on the network host, port, protocol, or even IP precedence values in the packets.   ITS will give priority to IP Addresses of the video Ethernet segment.. Upgrades at each site purchasing ITS data service will consist of new site routers that will be configured for QoS and have a built-in firewall.  The management of the ITS provided site routers will be performed by ITS data services.  The QoS network provided by ITS is designed to provide optimum quality of service to all sites.  QoS profiles must be tightly controlled both on the core network and at each customer’s site router.  ITS Data Services will also manage firewall configurations on the ITS provided routers.  For QoS to operate correctly and efficiently, QoS profiles and firewall rules must be designed and put in place at each site.   Correct video call routing is required to ensure that video packets take the proper QoS enabled path through the ITS network.  Router access lists (ACLs) will provide security and proper call routing for video.  Full Help Desk support is provided to sites with an ITS managed router. Configuration of the video segment on your LAN must be controlled and managed for QoS to work.  Adding additional video endpoints will require that the QoS profiles be reconfigured and tested.   The QoS profiles will be set to assign a specific amount of bandwidth to each video endpoint, therefore systems that are added, removed, or moved will have to be recertified and router configurations will have to be reset and verified.  These controls must be in place to maintain the integrity of the QoS network.  For your video conferencing applications to work we cannot stress enough that coordination and consultation with ITS Video Network Services is a must when building your video segment.  We will assess your requirements and design the best solution. If your site purchases Internet connectivity from a private ISP Quality of Service will not be possible.