Protocols that tend to reduce the traffic volume over time are
used to prevent positive feedback in network traffic. Examples include:
protocols that inherently produce less output than input,
protocols designed to detect loops and eliminate them, and
protocols that guarantee that the acknowledgment process produces a bounded number of packets.
Complexity: The complexity of
analyzing a protocol for being over-damped is closely related to live-lock and
deadlock analysis which is probably NP-complete for most current protocols.
Nevertheless, protocol analysis is a well-studied field and it is feasible
to assure that protocols are over-damped.