A Distributed Source Control for Multimedia ATM Networks

Abstract

The effects of multimedia data such as voice, audio, video, still-image, text, and graphics on high speed networks need to be identified for the purpose of developing efficient multimedia network designs and implementations. In this thesis, we identify a model for the most demanding multimedia type: motion video. Then, we define a network protocol for handling the bursty nature of the multimedia type. The protocol is placed at the source and is defined as an adaptive distributed source control (DSC) to adjust to the particulars of the given video call's virtual channel. The internal network protocol is also defined to work closely with the source nodes. In a computer simulation, the performance of adaptive DSC protocol in a multimedia ATM network is contrasted with non-adaptive DSC protocol performance. By adding video data types, a decrease in the network protocol performance is shown while lowering DSC setting improves performance. On the basis of these results, an overall adaptive DSC protocol strategy is shown to be the best approach in implementing the DSC protocol, especially when the statistics of the source are not known prior to transmission.