The end-to-end available bandwidth (avail-bw) of a network path is of major importance
in congestion control, streaming applications, and overlay networks. I will describe an
end-to-end avail-bw measurement methodology, called Self-Loading Periodic Streams (SLoPS).
The basic idea in SLoPS is that the one-way packet delays of a periodic stream show
an increasing trend when the stream's rate is higher than the avail-bw. We implemented
SLoPS in a tool called pathload. Pathload measurements show that the avail-bw becomes
significantly more variable and less predictable in heavily utilized paths. The same
is true for paths with lower capacity, probably due to a lower degree of statistical
multiplexing.
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