Transition and Adaptability: The Cornerstone of Resilience in Future Networked Multimedia Systems and Beyond

Let us define transition as the "exchange" between two mechanisms with comparable functionality, but with different algorithms and implementation concepts, which are optimal depending on the respective conditions of the respective context. It is much more that adaptability; it does not cover just the smooth automatic control of e.g., a MAPE loop or a control loop which is in charge to maximize the quality of service of streamed media data while errors occur.

Resilience describes the ability of a system to either absorb large changes (and crises) and recover from them in the short term or to overcome them by acquiring comparable or new basic functionality through overall system adjustments. In doing so, the system's readiness increases continuously and sustainably by learning from past changes of the context (and crises).

Just one extreme example: In the situation of a severe danger due to a nature disaster, a person -located in the affected area of the disaster- transmits to the rescue team an on-the-fly generated 360-degree panoramic point cloud of the situation. He still has sufficient energy supply and for whatever reason the communication facilities are still available. Due to energy shortage, a lot of other traffic and some damages of the infrastructure, multimedia communication must be adjusted continuously to the environment and requirements. In an extreme situation data is send over high latency low bandwidth satellite channels. Media might become a short textual description of the actual surrounding. Assume it happens without any manual interaction of the person sending this data. Multimedia and Communications Mechanisms must be exchanged; media must be "customized". Transitions happen to support the user in e.g., such an extreme stress situation.

In the collaborative research project MAKI as well as our center researching resilient infrastructures of digital cities that can withstand crises and disasters emergenCITY, we address some of these issues. However, in the next years beyond multimedia networks, many multimedia systems, interfaces, applications, etc. will be affected.