Low Cost Quality of Service Multicast Routing in High Speed Networks

Many of the services envisaged for high speed networks, such as B-ISDN/ATM, will support real-time applications with large numbers of users. Examples of these types of application range from those used by closed groups, such as private video meetings or conferences, where all participants must be known to the sender, to applications used by open groups, such as video lectures, where partcipants need not be known by the sender. These types of application will require high volumes of network resources in addition to the real-time delay constraints on data delivery. For these reasons, several multicast routing heuristics have been proposed to support both interactive and distribution multimedia services, in high speed networks. The objective of such heuristics is to minimise the multicast tree cost while maintaining a real-time bound on delay. Previous evaluation work has compared the relative average performance of some of these heuristics and concludes that they are generally efficient, although some perform better for small multicast groups and others perform better for larger groups. Firstly, we present a detailed analysis and evaluation of some of these heuristics which illustrates that in some situations their average performance is reversed; a heuristic that in general produces efficient solutions for small multicasts may sometimes produce a more efficient solution for a particular large multicast, in a specific network. Also, in a limited number of cases using Dijkstra's algorithm produces the best result. We conclude that the efficiency of a heuristic solution depends on the topology of both the network and the multicast, and that it is difficult to predict. Because of this unpredictability we propose the integration of two heuristics with Dijkstra's shortest path tree algorithm to produce a hybrid that consistently generates efficient multicast solutions for all possible multicast groups in any network. These heuristics are based on Dijkstra's algorithm which maintains acceptable time complexity for the hybrid, and they rarely produce inefficient solutions for the same network/multicast. The resulting performance attained is generally good and in the rare worst cases is that of the shortest path tree. The performance of our hybrid is supported by our evaluation results. Secondly, we examine the stability of multicast trees where multicast group membership is dynamic. We conclude that, in general, the more efficient the solution of a heuristic is, the less stable the multicast tree will be as multicast group membership changes. For this reason, while the hybrid solution we propose might be suitable for use with closed user group multicasts, which are likely to be stable, we need a different approach for open user group multicasting, where group membership may be highly volatile. We propose an extension to an existing heuristic that ensures multicast tree stability where multicast group membership is dynamic. Although this extension decreases the efficiency of the heuristics solutions, its performance is significantly better than that of the worst case, a shortest path tree. Finally, we consider how we might apply the hybrid and the extended heuristic in current and future multicast routing protocols for the Internet and for ATM Networks.

A Distributed Routing Algorithm for Internet-wide Geocast

Geocast is the concept of sending data packets to nodes in a specified geographical area instead of nodes with a specific address. To route geocast messages to their destination we need a geographic routing algorithm that can route packets efficiently to the devices inside the destination area. Our goal is to design an algorithm that can deliver shortest path tree like forwarding while relying purely on distributed data without central knowledge. In this paper, we present two algorithms for geographic routing. One based purely on distance vector data, and one more complicated algorithm based on path data. In our evaluation, we show that our purely distance vector based algorithm can come close to shortest path tree performance when a small number of routers are present in the destination area. We also show that our path based algorithm can come close to the performance of a shortest path tree in almost all geocast situations

Analysis of Performance of Dynamic Multicast Routing Algorithms

In this paper, three new dynamic multicast routing algorithms based on the greedy tree technique are proposed; Source Optimised Tree, Topology Based Tree and Minimum Diameter Tree. A simulation analysis is presented showing various performance aspects of the algorithms, in which a comparison is made with the greedy and core based tree techniques. The effects of the tree source location on dynamic membership change are also examined. The simulations demonstrate that the Source Optimised Tree algorithm achieves a significant improvement in terms of delay and link usage when compared to the Core Based Tree, and greedy algorithm

Roaming Real-Time Applications - Mobility Services in IPv6 Networks

Emerging mobility standards within the next generation Internet Protocol, IPv6, promise to continuously operate devices roaming between IP networks. Associated with the paradigm of ubiquitous computing and communication, network technology is on the spot to deliver voice and videoconferencing as a standard internet solution. However, current roaming procedures are too slow, to remain seamless for real-time applications. Multicast mobility still waits for a convincing design. This paper investigates the temporal behaviour of mobile IPv6 with dedicated focus on topological impacts. Extending the hierarchical mobile IPv6 approach we suggest protocol improvements for a continuous handover, which may serve bidirectional multicast communication, as well. Along this line a multicast mobility concept is introduced as a service for clients and sources, as they are of dedicated importance in multipoint conferencing applications. The mechanisms introduced do not rely on assumptions of any specific multicast routing protocol in use.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figure

Minimum power multicasting with delay bound constraints in Ad Hoc wireless networks

In this paper, we design a new heuristic for an important extension of the minimum power multicasting problem in ad hoc wireless networks. Assuming that each transmission takes a fixed amount of time, we impose constraints on the number of hops allowed to reach the destination nodes in the multicasting application. This setting would be applicable in time critical or real time applications, and the relative importance of the nodes may be indicated by these delay bounds. We design a filtered beam search procedure for solving this problem. The performance of our algorithm is demonstrated on numerous test cases by benchmarking it against an optimal algorithm in small problem instances, and against a modified version of the well-known Broadcast Incremental Power (BIP) algorithm 20 for relatively large problems