satellite transmission systems is its susceptibility to burst errors. This characteristic is created by the variations in satellite link attenuation and the use of convolutional coding to compensate for channel noise. ATM systems are also suited for handling random errors in lieu of burst errors. Multiple burst errors in an ATM over satellite system may therefore cause many ATM cells to be discarded during transmission. In order to alleviate this problem, an efficient error checking and/or error correcting mechanism should be in place when implementing this type of system.Implementing an automatic repeat request (ARQ) technique at the link layer of the protocol stack can help to reduce the high error ratio levels created by burst errors. There are three common versions of ARQ used in this situation; stop-and-wait, Go-back-N, and selective-repeat. Most existing ATM over satellite networks use of the Go-back-N scheme. Stop-and-wait is simple but not effective in the satellite environment due to the long propagation delay. Selective-repeat has the benefits of good throughput and error performance but suffers from the disadvantages of sender and receiver complexity and the potential for out-of-order packet reception. Traffic ManagementTraffic and congestion control are very important issues facing the designers of ATM over satellite networks who wish to maintain a high level of Quality of Service (QOS). The long propagation delays of satellite systems coupled with their limited bandwidths (as opposed to the bandwidths of optical fiber links typical of ATM land-based systems) make the efficient implementation of these control functions imperative. Poor overall system performance caused by the neglect of proper traffic and congestion control mechanisms can serve to make the ATM over satellite network unusable.Three common traffic control techniques used with land-based ATM systems are traffic shaping, connection admission control ...
