BACS: Split channel based overlay multicast for multimedia streaming

Abstract

Multipath multicast has focused on how to deal with band-width instability and unfairness in forwarding overhead. Creating multiple disjoint trees is good for applied applications requiring aggregated throughput, such as content distribution. However, the path heterogeneity of different trees may cause data asynchrony in the receiver's view, making it difficult to use in real time applications. In this paper, we propose a new delivery structure named cluster tree that utilizes bandwidth efficiently and lessens asynchrous sub-stream arrival. Cluster is composed of the interconnection of nodes within a latency boundary to each other, and the parent-child relationship between clusters forms a tree. Members of a cluster exchange disjoint sub-streams with peers in the same cluster and adapt to network dynamics cooperatively. This rate control mechanism can adapt to bandwidth fluctuation. The simulation result shows that cluster tree increases effective packets and reduces average source-to-leaf latency. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.