Double feedback streaming agent for real-time delivery of media over 3G wireless networks

Abstract

Abstract-A network agent located at the junction of wired and wireless networks can provide additional feedback information to streaming media servers to supplement feedbacks from clients. Specifically, it has been shown that feedbacks from the network agent have lower latency, and they can be used in conjunction with client feedbacks to effect proper congestion control. In this work, we propose the double-feedback streaming agent (DFSA) which further allows the detection of discrepancies in the transmission constraints of the wired and wireless networks. By working together with the streaming server and client, DFSA reduces overall packet losses by exploiting the excess capacity of the path with more capacity. We show how DFSA can be used to support three modes of operation tailored for different delay requirements of streaming applications. Simulation results under high wireless latency show significant improvement of media quality using DFSA over non-agent-based and earlier agent-based streaming systems.

Structured Network Coding and Cooperative Wireless Ad-Hoc Peer-to-Peer Repair for WWAN Video Broadcast

“…First, previously developed feedback-based loss recovery schemes like [2] for point-to-point unicast streaming become infeasible in the broadcast scenario due to either the lack of a feedback channel, or the well-known NAK implosion problem [3] even if such feedback channel is available. Second, because broadcast systems are often optimized for the average channel [4] to maximize utility for the average user, packet losses are inevitable for the temporarily-worse-than-average users due to the unpredictable and time-varying nature of wireless channels, resulting in deteriorated video quality.…”

“…Due to the aforementioned NAK implosion problem [3], many video streaming strategies over MBMS [4] have forgone feedback-based error recovery schemes like [2] and opted instead for forward error correction (FEC) schemes like Raptor codes [4]. While FEC can certainly help some MBMS receivers recover some packets, receivers experiencing transient channel failures due to fading, shadowing, and interference still suffer great losses.…”

MobiStream: Error-Resilient Video Streaming in Wireless WANs Using Virtual Channels

“…Related other works have investigated improving video streaming over wireless links in other ways. For example, Cheung et al in [7] present a double feedback streaming agent for improving video streaming over UMTS WWAN links while Zheng et al in [10] use a UPD-based transport protocol for efficient media streaming in wireless networks.…”

Low-Latency Error Control of H.264 Using SP-Frames and Streaming Agent Over Wireless Networks

“…1, to perform functions such as stream caching and relaying to improve streaming reliability and scalability. For wireless streaming, we have shown in our earlier work [3] that one such intermediary, the Streaming Agent (SA), located at the junction of wired network and a wireless link, can effectively exploit any excess bandwidth in either sub-path to reduce loss rate. See Fig.2 for an illustration.…”

“…Works on network intermediaries [2], including our earlier work on Streaming Agent [3], focus on demonstrating the benefits of such entities using media agnostic channel coding or retransmission schemes. In contrast, our current work focus on a specific usage of such intermediaries in a fashion that is tightly coupled with the characteristics of SP-frames.…”