Unequal Error Protection Raptor Codes

We design Unequal Error Protection (UEP) Raptor codes with the UEP property provided by the precode part of Raptor codes which is usually a Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) code. Existing UEP Raptor codes apply the UEP property on the Luby transform (LT) code part of Raptor codes. This approach lowers the bit erasure rate (BER) of the more important bits (MIB) of the data decoded by the LT part of the decoder of Raptor code at the expense of degrading the BER performance of Less Important Bits (LIB), and hence the overall BER of the data passed from the LT part to the LDPC part of the decoder is higher compared to the case of using an Equal Error Protection (EEP) LT code. The proposed UEP Raptor code design has the structure of UEP LDPC code and EEP LT code so that it has the advantage of passing data blocks with lower BER from the LT code part to the LDPC code part of the decoder. This advantage is translated into improved performance in terms of required overhead and achieved BER on both the MIB bits and LIB bits of the decoded data compared to UEP Raptor codes applying the UEP property on the LT part. We propose two design schemes. The first combines a partially regular LDPC code which has UEP properties with an EEP LT code, and the second scheme uses two LDPC codes with different code rates in the precode part such that the MIB bits are encoded using the LDPC code with lower rate and the LT part is EEP. Simulations of both designs exhibit improved BER performance on both the MIB bits and LIB bits while consuming smaller overheads. The second design can be used to provide unequal protection for cases where the MIB bits comprise a fraction of more than 0.4 of the source data which is a case where UEP Raptor codes with UEP LT codes perform poorly

Unequal Error Protected JPEG 2000 Broadcast Scheme with Progressive Fountain Codes

This paper proposes a novel scheme, based on progressive fountain codes, for broadcasting JPEG 2000 multimedia. In such a broadcast scheme, progressive resolution levels of images/video have been unequally protected when transmitted using the proposed progressive fountain codes. With progressive fountain codes applied in the broadcast scheme, the resolutions of images (JPEG 2000) or videos (MJPEG 2000) received by different users can be automatically adaptive to their channel qualities, i.e. the users with good channel qualities are possible to receive the high resolution images/vedio while the users with bad channel qualities may receive low resolution images/vedio. Finally, the performance of the proposed scheme is evaluated with the MJPEG 2000 broadcast prototype

Rateless Codes with Progressive Recovery for Layered Multimedia Delivery

This paper proposes a novel approach, based on unequal error protection, to enhance rateless codes with progressive recovery for layered multimedia delivery. With a parallel encoding structure, the proposed Progressive Rateless codes (PRC) assign unequal redundancy to each layer in accordance with their importance. Each output symbol contains information from all layers, and thus the stream layers can be recovered progressively at the expected received ratios of output symbols. Furthermore, the dependency between layers is naturally considered. The performance of the PRC is evaluated and compared with some related UEP approaches. Results show that our PRC approach provides better recovery performance with lower overhead both theoretically and numerically

Decentralised distributed fountain coding: asymptotic analysis and design

A class of generic decentralised distributed fountain coding schemes is introduced and the tools of analysis of the performance of such schemes are presented. It is demonstrated that the developed approach can be used to formulate a robust code design methodology in a number of instances. We show that two non-standard applications of fountain codes, fountain codes for distributed source coding and fountain codes for unequal error protection lie within this decentralised distributed fountain coding framework

Expanding window fountain codes for unequal error protection

A novel approach to provide unequal error protection (UEP) using rateless codes over erasure channels, named Expanding Window Fountain (EWF) codes, is developed and discussed. EWF codes use a windowing technique rather than a weighted (non-uniform) selection of input symbols to achieve UEP property. The windowing approach introduces additional parameters in the UEP rateless code design, making it more general and flexible than the weighted approach. Furthermore, the windowing approach provides better performance of UEP scheme, which is confirmed both theoretically and experimentally. © 2009 IEEE

Expanding window fountain codes for unequal error protection

A novel approach to provide unequal error protection (UEP) using rateless codes over erasure channels, named Expanding Window Fountain (EWF) codes, is developed and discussed. EWF codes use a windowing technique rather than a weighted (non-uniform) selection of input symbols to achieve UEP property. The windowing approach introduces additional parameters in the UEP rateless code design, making it more general and flexible than the weighted approach. Furthermore, the windowing approach provides better performance of UEP scheme, which is confirmed both theoretically and experimentally. © 2009 IEEE

Expanding window fountain codes for unequal error protection

A novel approach to provide unequal error protection (UEP) using rateless codes over erasure channels, named Expanding Window Fountain (EWF) codes, is developed and discussed. EWF codes use a windowing technique rather than a weighted (non-uniform) selection of input symbols to achieve UEP property. The windowing approach introduces additional parameters in the UEP rateless code design, making it more general and flexible than the weighted approach. Furthermore, the windowing approach provides better performance of UEP scheme, which is confirmed both theoretically and experimentally