We study virtual time CSMA protocols for hard real time communication systems, i , e.

, systems where messages have explicit deadlines. In this class of CSMA prot ocols, each node maintains two clocks; a real time clock and a virtual time cloc k. Whenever a node finds the channel to be idle, it resets its virtual clock. Th e virtual clock then runs at a higher rate than the real clock. A node transmits a waiting message when the time on the virtual clock is equal to some parameter of the message. Using different message parameters in conjunction with the virt ual clock, different transmission policies can be implemented. In particular, us e of message arrival time, message length, message laxity, and message deadline implements FCFS, Minimum-Length-First, Minimum-Laxity-First, and Minimum-Deadlin e-First transmission policies, respectively.