Book chapter in "Internetworking and Computing over Satellite Networks" (Yongguang Zhang ed.), Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003
Abstract: The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is an integral part of many popular Internet applications, including email, file transfer, and web browsing. Historically, the performance of TCP over satellite channels has been suboptimal due to a variety of protocol algorithm and configuration issues. In this chapter, we describe the challenges that the satellite environment poses to TCP performance. We then summarize a number of standard TCP options that, when applied to a connection, can improve performance. Finally, we survey additional proposals for further improvements that are still considered to be in the research phase.