Smoothness properties in congestion control for TCP

We introduce and define "smoothness" as a property of the congestion control mechanisms for TCP. We show that "smooth" congestion control mechanisms can help address some problems of TCP, specifically those related to spurious packets discards. Such discards can cause TCP to halve its window size resulting in large variations in round-trip times. To do this, we introduce the notion of "smoothness" and define it via four characteristics. Using this definition, a new "smooth" congestion control mechanism is then introduced. We illustrate the utility of this congestion control mechanism by examining its behavior and effectiveness in controlling connections subjected to spurious events very common in wireless networks.