Quality of Service for Multimedia and Control System Applications in Mobile Ad-hoc Network

A Mobile Ad-Hoc Network (MANET) is a collection of randomly distributed infrastructure-less mobile nodes that form a wireless network. These Mobile nodes have the capability to act as a host or relay. As a host, the mobile nodes can be the source and/or destination of traffic, and when acting as a relay, they can be an intermediate node that forwards the traffic to its destination. Some of the challenges of a MANET include the dynamic network topology, device discovery, power constraints, wireless channel conditions and limited network resources. These challenges degrade the network performance and thus affect the network stability and robustness. Therefore, it is difficult for a MANET to attain the Quality of Service (QoS) of a wired network. This thesis aims to address the problem of the limited wireless network resources by proposing two adaptive scheduling algorithms that can adapt in real-time to the changes in the network. To achieve the aim; this thesis first analyses the behaviour of various application profiles in a queue. It models Voice, Email, and Internet Browsing traffic (by specifying packet sizes, and inter-arrival rates based on various distributions) separately and then simultaneously in a common network for uncongested and congested conditions, after which scheduling is applied in order to improve the overall network performance. The Voice traffic profile is then added to the UDP/IP protocol stack and the network performance is compared to a simple node without the UDP/IP protocol stack. A realistic wireless propagation model for the simulation is developed from a point-to-point open-field outdoor experiment. This thesis proposes two adaptive priority fuzzy based scheduler for a MANET, the priority of packets in the queue are determined based on the real-time available network resources. The methodology for transmitting a live-feed video stream over OPNET to validate the scheduler is also presented. An interface between the simulation and hardware is created to send real-time video traffic through the simulation network. This thesis concludes by showing that the performance of a MANET network can be improved by applying an adaptive scheduler

Moe the Monkey: A Fun Way to Educate Children

This paper presents the development and usability testing of Evoke, an interactive avatar that can see, hear and respond to children in pitch-altered voice in real-time. The system uses Moe, a stylised monkey, as an interaction point between the teacher and children. Children remained fully engaged, responded more openly, and friendlier to the avatar (Moe), which was controlled by their teacher in a separate room. The user testing showed that the children listened to the character and were eager to ask questions, they grabbed and retained information given by Moe