Service Level Agreement Optimization via Reverse Engineering the QoE/QoS Relations

Abstract

Abstract Along with the growth of the Internet comes a competitive environment among Internet service providers. In this regard, quality of service (QoS) and customer's quality of experience (QoE) is introduced as the two main criteria of satisfaction for network users/regulators. In this paper, we have evaluated these two criteria for one of the largest Internet service communication networks in Iran. By providing a predictive model, we propose solutions to improve the quality of the communication network. Because the quality of experience can only be achieved through direct contact with users - a time-consuming and costly process - the use of a predictive model can be very helpful. Our model predicts the quality of experience from the quality-of-service parameters with an accuracy of about ninety percent. Next, we reverse-engineer the relationship between the quality of experience and quality of service to develop a service level agreement (SLA) contract. The relationship between quality of experience and quality of service is then compiled into a set of if-then rules. In this regard, using a decision tree classifier, we were able to set the quality-of-service parameter thresholds for the gold, silver, and bronze SLAs.