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A low-latency scheduling approach for high-definition video streaming in a heterogeneous wireless network with multihomed clients

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Abstract

We consider the problem of high-definition (HD) video transmission in a heterogeneous wireless network from a video server to a multihomed client. On the one hand, a single wireless network is limited in the transmission performance (e.g., available bandwidth and link delay); On the other hand, the HD video streaming is characterized by the high transmission rate and large-size video frames. Thus, the end-to-end video frame delay becomes a severely challenging problem which is critical for the real-time video applications. In this paper, we propose a novel scheduling approach named sub-frame-level (SFL), which deliberately splits the large-size video frames into sub-frames and dispatches each of them onto a different wireless network to the multihomed client. This approach is able to improve the frame-level delay for enhancing video quality. We formulate the optimization problem of video streaming allocation for minimizing the end-to-end delay based on the network calculus and derive its solution with the water filling algorithm. We evaluate the performance of the proposed SFL through the Exata emulations using real-time H.264 video streaming. Emulation results show that SFL outperforms the existing frame-level scheduling approaches in improving the frame-level delay as well as in enhancing video quality in terms of peak signal-to-noise ratio.

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Notes

  1. In this paper, we focus on the constant bit rate (CBR) video streaming since it is used in most video applications [22]. Please note that CBR does not always indicate a fixed rate. For the CBR video streaming, the bit rate is constant at large time scales. But at medium or fine-grain time scales, an on–off pattern or back-to-back packet trains are often seen. It is observed in a recent measurement study [23] that most CBR-coded videos are not long-range dependent (LRD).

  2. In this subsection, we consider the case of \(\mu _{i}>\lambda _{i}\) for the derivation while the solution for the case of \(\mu _{i}\le \lambda _{i}\) can be obtained by following the same steps and replacing the notation \(\mu _{i}-\lambda _{i}\) with \(\mu _{i}\).

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Acknowledgments

The research reported in this paper is partly supported by the MultiplAtform Game Innovation Centre (MAGIC), funded by the Singapore National Research Foundation under its IDM Futures Funding Initiative and administered by the Interactive & Digital Media Programme Office, Media Development Authority; National Grand Fundamental Research (973 Program) of China under Grant Nos. 2011CB302506, 2012CB315802; National Key Technology Research and Development Program of China “Research on the mobile community cultural service aggregation supporting technology” (2012BAH94F02); Novel Mobile Service Control Network Architecture and Key Technologies (2010ZX03004-001-01); National High-tech \(\hbox {R} \& \hbox {D}\) Program of China (863 Program) under Grant No. 2013AA102301; and National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. 61171102, 61132001). The authors would like to express their sincere gratitude for the anonymous reviewers’ helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Networking and Switching Technology, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing, 100876, People’s Republic of China

    Jiyan Wu, Xiuquan Qiao, Yamei Xia & Junliang Chen

  2. Singapore University of Technology and Design, 20 Dover Drive, Singapore, 138682, Singapore

    Jiyan Wu & Chau Yuen

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  1. Jiyan Wu
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  2. Xiuquan Qiao
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Correspondence to Jiyan Wu.

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Communicated by C. Sreenan.

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Wu, J., Qiao, X., Xia, Y. et al. A low-latency scheduling approach for high-definition video streaming in a heterogeneous wireless network with multihomed clients. Multimedia Systems 21, 411–425 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00530-014-0388-7

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