Distributed Scheduling via Pricing in a Communication Network

Abstract

This paper addresses the issue of pricing-based distributed resource allocation via scheduling in a communication network. Introducing the temporal aspect in the resource allocation problem presents new challenges e.g. in accounting for the durations and deadlines of the resource requests. Dynamic real-time pricing concepts are discussed for the decentralized sharing of network resources. A numerical example illustrates the benefit of congestion based pricing in a dynamic communication network. The quality of service that results from decentralized resource allocation is studied from the point of view of a power-controlled wireless network. The model is based on a dynamic noncooperative game and is related to recent work on centrally optimal (Pareto-optimal) distributed dynamic resource allocation.