Glossary
A
Application Programming Interface
An interface in software, which allows a third party to interact with the software programmatically.
API is analogous to a user interface: Whereas a UI offers software-human interaction, an API offers software-software interaction.
C
Comma-Separated Values
Originally CSV was only about values that were separated by commas, but nowadays the separation mark can also be something else like a semicolon.
Qosium, for example, uses tabs as separation marks in its CSV-formatted results files.
D
Downlink / Received Direction
Refers to a network path direction where traffic is flowing from a remote point towards the observer.
Deep Packet Inspection
A method of processing packets, where the packet content is studied further than just the outermost transport layer.
DPI does not necessarily imply that the actual payload of the packet is inspected.
G
Global Navigation Satellite System
A general term under which all the different global satellite navigation systems (e.g., GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BDS) fall.
General Package
Qosium General Package contains the basic Qosium components required for measurements and monitoring.
Generic QoS Measure Algorithm
A parameter based QoS mapping algorithm allowing to map a single quality indicator from several parameters. When tuned with real user tests, GQoSM allows also QoE estimations.
GQoSM, however, is meant for evaluating the influence of the network to the quality – not for estimating the absolute quality (e.g., including the defects of codecs, etc.). For more information, see our article on Quality of Experience.
GPRS Tunnelling Protocol
A group of IP-based communications protocols used to carry data within GSM, UMTS, LTE and 5G NR radio networks.
Graphical User Interface
User interface which features graphical elements, such as windows, buttons, dialogs, images, and controls.
I
Internet Protocol
The standard protocol in computer networks for addressing and transferring packets.
L
Local Area Network
A closed network or a segment of network comprising a single address space.
M
Mean Opinion Score
The most widely used measure for QoE.
Multiprotocol Label Switching
A routing technique in telecommunications networks that forwards data based on short path labels rather than long network addresses.
Maximum Transmission Unit
This determines the largest packet size that can be communicated in a single network-layer transaction.
N
Network Address Translation
A technique for remapping an IP address space
Network Interface Card
A piece of hardware which offers a device a networking interface.
5G Non-Standalone
A mobile network technology providing a pathway for 5G New Radio workloads to connect to a 4G/LTE core.
Network Time Protocol
A very common protocol for synchronizing the clocks of devices across a network.
O
Operating System
A software which manages the resources of a device and provides a confined space for users for managing the device and for running software.
Example operating systems: Windows, Ubuntu, Android, MacOS.
P
Packet Loss Timer
Qosium determines packet losses by waiting each packet a predefined amount of time. Packet loss timer defines this duration.
If this value is set too small, packets exceeding this duration in the traversal of the measurement path will be incorrectly considered lost. A large value yields more precise results, but causes a lag to the reporting of lost packets, since Qosium needs to wait for this duration for packets before reporting them as lost.
Loss timer should be always at least 2 × control packet interval. The latter parameter is typically set automatically according to the averaging interval, but it can be also changed manually. In order to have short packet loss timer value, set the control packet interval as well.
Power over Ethernet
A way to power up network devices by passing electric power along with data on twisted-pair Ethernet cabling.
Pulse per second
A square-like electrical signal that is used in accurate clock synchronization
Promiscuous Mode
A mode in network interfaces, which allows packet sniffers to process packets even if they are not designated to said network interface.
This mode is essential in Qosium, since it’s fairly common to measure network traffic by placing Probes somewhere in-path or off-path via port mirroring instead of end-points.
Some network interfaces do not support promiscuous mode, so try turning it off if starting measurement results in an error, or no packets are captured.
For more information, see the Wikipedia article on Promiscuous mode.
Pseudo-Subjective Quality Assessment
A neural network based model for estimating QoE.
For more information, see our article on Quality of Experience.
Precision Time Protocol
A protocol for synchronizing the clocks of devices across a network. The reached synchronization accuracy is typically considerably better than with NTP.
Q
QoS Measurement Control Protocol
Kaitotek's proprietary protocol for controlling measurements and gathering measurement results.
QMCP is a protocol made by Kaitotek to optimize QoS measurement control communications. TCP is used in the transport layer (currently), but QMCP controls its sessions. All Qosium products use QMCP.
Quality of Experience
Indicates the overall performance of a network application, and how user's experience is affected by the network conditions.
For more information, see our article on Quality of Experience.
Quality of Service
Indicates the overall performance of the connection/network and its ability to serve applications.
For more information, see our article on Quality of Service.
R
Representational State Transfer
A software architectural style that was created to guide the design and development of the architecture for the World Wide Web.
Robust QMCP Mode
A feature which allows Qosium products to re-connect each other and carry on the measurement, even if connectivity is momentarily lost.
If robust QMCP mode is not enabled, the measurement is stopped if the connection between Qosium products is lost. It is recommended to keep this feature always on unless there’s a good reason to disable it.
Real-time Transport Protocol
A transport protocol for applications with real-time constraints, such as video streams, VoIP, and remote control.
Round-Trip Time
In packet data communications, RTT is the time it takes a packet to be sent from one network point to another and back.
In practical measurement solutions, like Ping, RTT includes the one-way delays of the directional network paths plus the processing delay of the solution. The processing delay is typically considered small or insignificant compared to the delay caused by the network paths. Sometimes RTT is called Round-Trip Delay, RTD.
S
Sent Information Not Found
This is a special statistic, meaning that a packet was received but was not indicated sent on the other end.
In a way, this is negative packet loss, which, of course, is an absurd concept as such. Therefore, the continuous appearance of SINF values is often an indication of incorrect parameterization of the measurement. For example, if the packet filter is set too loose, traffic can arrive at the measurement point from other sources than those seen by the peer measurement point. This statistic can also grow occasionally if the QMCP connection between the Probes has too low QoS to stay synchronized with the measurement’s pace. SINF can, however, also occur naturally if the measured traffic content is somehow changed (consider, e.g., video transcoding) between the network path of the measurement points. In that case, the sending side measurement point sees its packets as lost, while the receiving side sees SINF.
Service-Level Agreement
A commitment between a service provider and a client
Defines, for example, the QoS level the service provider agrees to provide for the client.
Structured Query Language
A language used in programming and designed for managing and processing data held in a relational database management system.
T
Transport Control Protocol
A robust connection-oriented transport protocol for transferring non-realtime data reliably.
U
User Datagram Protocol
A simple, fast, and connectionless transport protocol.
User Interface
User Interface is the segment of the software that provides a way for human-software interaction.
Uplink / Sent Direction
Refers to a network path direction where traffic is flowing away from the observer towards a remote point.
Coordinated Universal Time
UTC is the primary time standard by which the world regulates clocks and time.
V
Virtual LAN
A LAN seqment which has no physical hardware, but instead is carried over network.
Voice over IP
Refers to technologies which enable a delivery of voice communication over IP network.
Virtual Private Network
A technique to provide a secure tunnel over a public network.
W
Wireless LAN
A LAN segment which operates wirelessly.
X
Extended Reality
Extended reality is an umbrella term being used to refer at least to terms such as augmented reality, virtual reality, and mixed reality.