Computing path blocking probability and delay in optical networks with retrial

Hybrid optical architectures combining path and packet switching can be good candidates for future optical networks because they exploit the best of both worlds. However, the optimization of some parameters of the hybrid switch by some metrics is vital to maximize the benefit of the hybrid architecture. Blocking rate and reservation delay are two of the most important performance metrics in the path switching layer of the hybrid architecture. In this paper, we propose an analytical method with an improved backward blocking analysis to compute both blocking rates and reservation delays in path switching optical WDM networks with destination-initiated reservation allowing retrial of failed reservation attempts. On a mesh topology, we show that the results of our analytical method and simulations were close to each other, while the analytical method was several orders of magnitude faster than the simulation, which may allow much faster performance analysis, design, and optimization of hybrid networks.