Linear programming models for traffic engineering in 100% survivable networks under combined IS-IS/OSPF and MPLS-TE

This paper concerns the problem of minimizing the maximum link utilization of IP telecommunication networks under the joint use of traditional IGP routing protocols, such as IS-IS and OSPF, and the more sophisticated MPLS-TE technology. It is shown that the problem of choosing the optimal routing, both under working conditions and under single link failure scenarios, can be cast as a linear program of reasonable size. The proposed model is validated by a computational experimentation performed on synthetic and real networks: the obtained results show that the new approach considerably reduces the maximum link utilization of the network with respect to simply optimizing the IGP weights, at the cost of adding a limited number of label switched paths (LSPs). Optimizing the set of IGP weights within the overall approach further improves performances. The computational time needed to solve the models matches well with real-time requirements, and makes it possible to consider network design problems.