Delivery Of Multimedia Services Research Articles

A feature selection for video quality of experience modeling: A systematic literature review

AbstractQuality of Experience (QoE) multidimensional concept is the key for successful delivery of multimedia services. Higher user requirements for new experiences such as augmented reality, virtual reality, and future 6G services set higher requirements for QoE. A more complex QoE space requires the use of data mining methods in order to process the data for better QoE prediction. The increased dimensionality of the QoE space becomes a limiting factor for achieving the desired QoE prediction accuracy. Existing studies considering the QoE multidimensional concept with approaches that overcome the challenge of increased QoE space dimensionality are of great importance for future research. Accordingly, this article aims to review the applications of Feature Selection (FS) methods in video QoE modeling. It provides a comprehensive overview of the existing studies with the categorization and review of applied FS methods with reference to the data collection and data modeling steps. The analysis included 71 studies which provides overview of the FS methods applications in video QoE modeling depending on the input Influence Factor (IF) dimension sizes, type of IFs, QoE prediction methods used and QoE evaluation type. Our review revealed the advantages of using FS methods in video QoE modeling, frequency of application of FS methods with potential of applying more FS methods in a series or a parallel, gives an overview of the achieved dimensionality reduction degree for different methods, and provides insights in opportunities for researchers for applying FS methods on complex multidimensional QoE space.This article is categorized under: Technologies > Data Preprocessing Algorithmic Development > Multimedia

SDN and NFV for QoE-driven multimedia services delivery: The road towards 6G and beyond networks

The concept for developing the future mobile communication systems has been explored in recent years with a vision towards 5G and 6G systems. Meeting performance targets such as higher data rate transmission, lower end-to-end latency, higher capacity, lower cost, and satisfied Quality of Experience (QoE) for delivered services is the key for the success of 5G and 6G networks. Within these performance targets and associated enabling technologies, QoE and the overall management of multimedia services is the one which has been less well addressed for 5G in the past. This paper provides a comprehensive and ground-breaking discussion regarding QoE management in the context of future softwarized 5G/6G networks. We introduce a generalized QoE provisioning ecosystem for emerging multimedia streaming services in softwarized 5G/6G and beyond networks. We explore potential network softwarization and communication technologies that will enable the end-user’s QoE in 5G/6G. We further provide promising use case scenarios regarding (a) QoE-driven management of multimedia services over multi-access cloud/edge softwarized and virtualized 5G networks, (b) QoE monitoring for large traffic variations in business, residential and public areas in 5G networks, along with a Machine Learning (ML)-based softwarized controller for QoE provisioning over 5G/6G networks. We build on the achievements of 5G networks to provide the roadmap towards the development of 6G and beyond networks in terms of requirements, use case scenarios and service classes. We also present potential technologies that will be dominant through 2025–2030 in shaping the vision of 6G and beyond networks including (a) self-driving 3D network architecture, (b) network management, automation and orchestration, and (c) pervasive artificial intelligence. Moreover, we provide challenges and research directions in 6G and beyond wireless communication systems. The paper provides the first roadmap towards the management, orchestration and monitoring of multimedia 3D services in 6G and beyond networks. The comprehensive goal of this paper is to encourage researchers from the industry and academia to work together towards the realization of softwarized 6G and beyond networks while tackling the critical research challenges regarding the management of emerging 3D multimedia services and applications. The comments made by the authors in this paper are expectations on 6G, and the standardization of 6G where these aspects will be decided in 6G networks and beyond, will be started soon by different standardization bodies and fora.

Design of dynamic resource allocation scheme for real-time traffic in the LTE network

The 5G wireless technology is recently standardized for meeting intense demand. The Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology provides an easy, time-saving, and low-cost method for deploying a 4G/5G network infrastructure. To support multimedia service and higher bandwidth data delivery, an LTE MAC layer has Quality of Service (QoS) support with several QoS class indicator (QCI) levels. Based on LTE current QCI priority and QoS requirements in UEs, the original Max-Rate scheduler, Proportionally Fair (PF) and Modified Largest Weighted Delay First (M-LWDF) algorithms could not achieve their goal owing to the UE’s dynamic physical capacity with a different Channel Quality Indicator (CQI) at run time. For better QoS service than LTE networks, per UE’s CQI state for each resource block (RB) must be considered simultaneously in LTE MAC layer resource allocation with cross-layer support. As downlink real estimated capacity is dynamic owing to a UE’s periodic CQI reporting, the CQI state in LTE scheduling must be considered. This study proposes a smart and flexible scheme for Enhanced Utilization Resource Allocation (EURA) including three novel mechanisms that can dynamically fit UEs’ CQI states. The simulation results in this study demonstrate that the proposed EURA scheme outperforms the contrast schemes (Max-Rate, EXP/PF and M-LWDF), can save more rare radio capacity, and improve the utilization of radio resource assignment.

Measuring, Modeling and Integrating Time-Varying Video Quality in End-to-End Multimedia Service Delivery: A Review and Open Challenges

The multimedia delivery chain consists of multiple stages such as content preparation, content delivery via Over-The-Top delivery network and Internet Service Providers network.Within the multimedia service chain, each stage influences the Quality of Experience (QoE) of the end user. The objective of this work is to provide a comprehensive literature survey with future research challenges and opportunities in the field of time-varying video quality in multimedia service delivery. The contribution of this work is two fold: 1) Survey – we provide a review of state-of-the-art works for video quality models to quantify multiple artifacts into a single QoE metric, pooling strategies for global quality measurements, and Continuous Time-Varying Quality (CTVQ) models; 2) Future Challenges and Directions – we investigate ten major research challenges and future directions based on the state-of-the-art for QoE modelling, QoE-aware encoding/decoding and QoE monitoring/management of multimedia streaming in next-generation networks.

QoEMultiSDN: Management of Multimedia Services using MPTCP/SR in Softwarized and Virtualized Networks

5G networks are set to empower new user experiences for multimedia streaming services by offering high data rates and low latency. The rapid growth of multimedia services, such as video streaming services over future softwarized 5G networks, poses great challenges for both service providers and network operators regarding service provisioning with high Quality of Experience (QoE). Network evolution towards Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) provides new opportunities to develop innovative ways to address the challenges. In this paper, we present a novel QoE-aware management scheme based on SDN/NFV by utilizing Multi-Path-TCP/Segment-Routing (MPTCP/SR) techniques and exploring information from both the network and client. The new scheme, entitled QoEMultiSDN, provides an optimized end-to-end QoE for multimedia service delivery. QoEMultiSDN employs two novel strategies to achieve this: (a) QoE-based multisource routing and QoE optimization, and (b) multipath protection and dynamic link-failure-free mechanisms. We implemented the proposed scheme over SDN through Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) experiments using Mininet, POX and OpenDaylight controllers, and compared its performance with MPTCP and regular TCP. Experimental results indicate that the QoEMultiSDN outperforms others in terms of system throughput, failure recovery time and the QoE of the end-user.

Artificial Intelligence Aided Joint Bit Rate Selection and Radio Resource Allocation for Adaptive Video Streaming over F-RANs

Recently, fog-computing-based radio access networks (F-RANs) have been conceptualized to provide high quality of experience (QoE) for adaptive bit rate (ABR) streaming, where additional computing capacity is supplemented on fog nodes to facilitate complicated cross-layer optimization (i.e., joint bit rate selection and radio resource allocation). However, finding an optimal global solution with acceptable complexity is still infeasible by the conventional optimization methods. In this work, we propose an artificial intelligence (AI) aided joint bit rate selection and radio resource allocation scheme referred to as iABR, which provides a new vision for handling the over-complicated optimization in F-RANs. Based on multi-agent hierarchy deep reinforcement learning, the proposed iABR can dynamically allocate radio resource and select bit rate in a multiuser scenario, by perceiving the network environment and clients' player information. Moreover, long short-term memory (LSTM) is employed by the iABR algorithm, which enables accurate prediction of the change of channel quality by learning the history of the wireless channel. Hence, iABR is able to adjust the action policy in advance to accommodate the future channel quality for avoiding bit rate fluctuation. According to the experimental results, the iABR exhibits higher QoE in terms of high average bit rate, low rebuffering ratio, and average bit rate variance. Last but not least, the QoE performance of all the clients are fairly guaranteed by the iABR algorithm, enhancing the practicality of AI-driven F-RANs for multimedia service delivery.

A Profitable and Energy-Efficient Cooperative Fog Solution for IoT Services

Fog-to-fog communication has been introduced to deliver services to clients with minimal reliance on the cloud through resource and capability sharing of cooperative fogs. Current solutions assume full cooperation among the fogs to deliver simple and composite services. Realistically, each fog might belong to a different network operator or service provider and thus will not participate in any form of collaboration unless self-monetary profit is incurred. In this paper, we introduce a fog collaboration approach for simple and complex multimedia service delivery to cloud subscribers while achieving shared profit gains for the cooperating fogs. The proposed work dynamically creates short-term service-level agreements (SLAs) offered to cloud subscribers for service delivery while maximizing user satisfaction and fog profit gains. The solution provides a learning mechanism that relies on online and offline simulation results to build guaranteed workflows for new service requests. The configuration parameters of the short-term SLAs are obtained using a modified tabu-based search mechanism that uses previous solutions when selecting new optimal choices. Performance evaluation results demonstrate significant gains in terms of service delivery success rate, service quality, reduced power consumption for fog and cloud datacenters, and increased fog profits.

An investigation on adaptive HTTP media streaming Quality-of-Experience (QoE) and agility using cloud media services

ABSTRACT Web services is software entity allows machine to machine communication, operates as standalone unit and interoperability over network using standard web technologies such as Hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) and eXtensible markup language (XML). With the rapid growth of cloud platform, infrastructure and emergence of multiple Digital transformation technologies, more and more conventional applications are transformed into web-based services. Service-based approach creates tremendous impact on multimedia content storage, retrieval, delivery and communication. With cloud infrastructure and service, get economically viable, real time, high resolution multimedia content on-the-go anywhere and everywhere using adaptive http streaming approach. This paper presents convergence of adaptive http streaming from conventional infrastructure to cloud enabled model and presents the advancement and architecture of adaptive http streaming delivery as a web-based service delivery approach. The detailed performance evaluation of conventional and cloud enabled service-based approaches were presented, and the metrics were compared from real-time experiment. By analyzing performance indices and characteristics, cloud enabled multimedia service delivery approach poses advantages, gives promising result and better user experience compare to the conventional adaptive HTTP streaming approach.

Modular and deep QoE/QoS mapping for multimedia services over satellite networks

SummarySatellite networks are promising alternatives to deal with the increasing traffic volume and provide universal access for end users. Quality of experience (QoE) as an aggregate of user perception and network quality will be a critical success factor for multimedia service delivery over satellite networks. Quality of experience prediction based on quality of service (QoS) has received much attention recently, but it has been little investigated in satellite networks. In this paper, on the basis of the modular neural network and deep belief networks (DBNs), we design a QoE/QoS mapping method for multimedia services over satellite networks to translate QoS parameters into user QoE. The task of QoE/QoS mapping for multimedia services is decomposed into several different subtasks by using traffic classification. Heterogeneous DBNs are used to learn the mapping relationships between QoE and QoS for different types of services (ie, subtask) simultaneously. An integrative approach based on relative distance is exploited to select subneural network(s) to predict resulting QoE collaboratively. To determine the weight parameters of the QoE/QoS correlation model, the dataset composed of QoS parameters and subjective opinion scores is built on the basis of satellite network simulator and subjective test. Finally, the effectiveness of our QoE/QoS mapping method is validated, and the relationship between adoption rating and opinion scores is analyzed.

Experimental performance analysis of multipath TCP path characteristics in streaming UHD HEVC-dash over wireless networks

The multiple interfaces in modern devices today have given great promise in enhancing multimedia service delivery over wireless networks. However, the IP coupled nature of the TCP/IP protocol inhibits the simultaneous use of these interfaces. Multipath TCP (MPTCP), a protocol undergoing IETF standardization has been developed to simultaneously use multiple interfaces for service delivery over the Internet. In this paper, we studied the effect of MPTCP paths characteristics in streaming Ultra High Definition, High Efficiency Video Codec (UHD HEVC-DASH) while connected to multiple wireless access points. The findings though specific instead of general, reveal that under balanced and unbalanced network paths, MPTCP offers good Quality of Experience (QoE) compared to SPTCP. However, with variability in latency, and packet loss between paths, MPTCP underperforms compared to SPTCP in terms of video buffering in the unbalanced network case, and high packet retransmission rate in either balanced or unbalanced network paths.

Intelligent Video Surveillance Platform for Wireless Multimedia Sensor Networks

Wireless multimedia sensor networks (WMSNs) are increasingly being deployed for surveillance and monitoring applications. WMSNs applications produce large amount of data, which require high transmission rates. An efficient and seamless delivery of multimedia services in WMSNs is still a challenging task. This article proposes an intelligent video surveillance platform (IVSP) for wireless multimedia sensor networks. IVSP presents the design of a networked system for joint rate control and error control of video over resource-constrained embedded devices. First, a combination of two different congestion indicators is introduced to differentiate between congestion levels and handle them accordingly. Second, a feedback-based rate controller is developed to maximize received video quality, in which sensor nodes can adaptively adjust their sending rates. Finally, a different retransmission mechanism for different packets is proposed. Lost packets can be stored temporarily and resend when free channel is available to avoid congestion. The core component of IVSP is an open source hardware platform, which is based on Raspberry Pi sensor nodes. IVSP is extensively evaluated on 7 Raspberry Pi sensor nodes. We present the results of 7-node real-world deployment of IVSP in a video surveillance application and show that it works well in long-term deployments.

Dynamic resource allocation for multimedia services delivery in cellular/infostation integrated HSR networks

With the rapid development of high-speed railway HSR system, the resource allocation problem in HSR wireless network becomes one of the key issues to improve the efficiency of resource utilisation. In this paper, we investigate the downlink resource allocation problem for multimedia services delivery in HSR multiple-input multiple-output MIMO-orthogonal frequency division multiplexing OFDM system with a cellular/infostation integrated network architecture. Taking the train trajectory and network stability into account, we formulate the problem as a stochastic network optimisation programming, which aims at maximising the overall system utility while keeping the system stable under the total transmission power constraint. To address the NP-hard mixed integer programming, the original problem is firstly transformed into a queue stability problem, and then decomposed into two separate subproblems by the drift-plus-penalty DPP approach. Finally, based on the stochastic optimisation technique, a dynamic resource allocation algorithm is proposed and its efficiency is illustrated by theoretical analysis and numerical simulations.

Dynamic resource allocation for multimedia services delivery in cellular/infostation integrated HSR networks

With the rapid development of high-speed railway (HSR) system, the resource allocation problem in HSR wireless network becomes one of the key issues to improve the efficiency of resource utilisation. In this paper, we investigate the downlink resource allocation problem for multimedia services delivery in HSR multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)-orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) system with a cellular/infostation integrated network architecture. Taking the train trajectory and network stability into account, we formulate the problem as a stochastic network optimisation programming, which aims at maximising the overall system utility while keeping the system stable under the total transmission power constraint. To address the NP-hard mixed integer programming, the original problem is firstly transformed into a queue stability problem, and then decomposed into two separate subproblems by the drift-plus-penalty (DPP) approach. Finally, based on the stochastic optimisation technique, a dynamic resource allocation algorithm is proposed and its efficiency is illustrated by theoretical analysis and numerical simulations.

Guest Editorial: Pervasive Multimedia Computing—Systems Applications and Services

The advent of techniques in pervasive computing has affected human life that freely uses Internet environment, and advances in ubiquitous networks, telecommunications, and information technology, along with the proliferation of multimedia smart devices—such as laptops, iPods, personal digital assistants (PDA), and cellular telephones—have stimulated the development of intelligent pervasive multimedia applications. These key technologies are creating a multimedia revolution that will have significant impact across a wide spectrum to consumer, business, healthcare, and governmental domains. Yet, many challenges remain, especially when it comes to efficiently indexing, mining, querying, searching, and retrieving multimedia data. This special issue attempts to offer an open discussion in the realm of pervasive multimedia computing, including efficient delivery and distribution of multimedia content, applications, and services over the wired and wireless networks as well as multimedia QoS support for such networks. This issue also interests in looking at service architectures, protocols, and standards for multimedia communications along with the related security issues, such as secure multimedia information sharing. Finally, this issue expects to explore works on novel applications Multimed Tools Appl (2016) 75:14015–14017 DOI 10.1007/s11042-016-3826-z

Delivery of ATSC 3.0 Services With MPEG Media Transport Standard Considering Redistribution in MPEG-2 TS Format

MPEG-2 transport stream (TS), standardized by the ISO/IEC as part of the well-known MPEG-2 standards family, is the most widely deployed standard for multimedia services in traditional broadcast industry, such as ATSC and DVB-T. MPEG standards have been designed to specify essential features for multimedia broadcast applications, such as the structure of multimedia content composed of multiple audio-visual streams and temporal relationships among those streams. One of the new MPEG standards that was recently developed and published, namely MPEG media transport (MMT), has catered for the emerging convergence of digital broadcasting and the Internet. MMT inherits major advantageous features of MPEG-2 TS and adds advanced and innovative features to support broadcast services in the new converged environment. IP-based broadcast standards, e.g., ATSC 3.0, has gained significant attention by the broadcast industries as IP-based broadcast provides more flexible and enriched multimedia broadcast services to users. The ATSC 3.0 has adopted MMT as its one of media delivery technology to strengthen hybrid delivery of multimedia services which could be consumed on multiple devices simultaneously. This paper discusses the use of MMT in ATSC 3.0 service delivery. Important features of MMT will be described together with their restrictions and extensions that are needed to enable efficient delivery of ATSC 3.0 services.

Scalable Hybrid Speech Codec for Voice over Internet Protocol Applications

With the advent of various web-based applications and the fourth generation (4G) access technology, there has been an exponential growth in the demand of multimedia service delivery along with speech signals in a voice over internet protocol (VoIP) setup. Need is felt to fine-tune the conventional speech codecs deployed to cater to the modern environment. This fine-tuning can be achieved by further compressing the speech signal and to utilize the available bandwidth to deliver other services. This paper presents a scalable -hybrid model of speech codec using ITU-T G.729 and db10 wavelet. The codec addresses the problem of compression of speech signal in VoIP setup. The performance comparison of the codec with the standard codec has been performed by statistical analysis of subjective, objective and quantifiable parameters of quality desirable from the codec deployed in VoIP platforms.

Multi-Service Group Key Management for High Speed Wireless Mobile Multicast Networks

Recently there is a high demand from the Internet Service Providers to transmit multimedia services over high speed wireless networks. These networks are characterized by high mobility receivers which perform frequent handoffs across homogenous and heterogeneous access networks while maintaining seamless connectivity to the multimedia services. In order to ensure secure delivery of multimedia services to legitimate group members, the conventional cluster based group key management (GKM) schemes for securing group communication over wireless mobile multicast networks have been proposed. However, they lack efficiency in rekeying the group key in the presence of high mobility users which concurrently subscribe to multiple multicast services that co-exist in the same network. This paper proposes an efficient multi-service group key management scheme (SMGKM) suitable for high mobility users which perform frequent handoffs while participating seamlessly in multiple multicast services. The users are expected to drop subscriptions after multiple cluster visits hence inducing huge key management overhead due to rekeying the previously visited cluster keys. The already proposed multi-service SMGKM system with completely decentralised authentication and key management functions is adopted to meet the demands for high mobility environment with the same level of security. Through comparisons with existing GKM schemes and simulations, SMGKM shows resource economy in terms of reduced communication and less storage overheads in a high speed environment with multiple visits.

Method of calculation of parameters of wireless access channel for mobile terminals in millimeter wavelength band

It is proposed a number of new technical solutions to implement the delivery of multimedia signals 4G services with data transfer rate for each subscriber 6–12 Mb/s, which move at a speed of 300–350 km/h with a total capacity of the network over a thousand subscribers. The block diagram (architecture) of transfer network in the millimeter wavelength band is developed. We derived balance equation for the network radio energy, which is the basis of the method for calculating the radio channel parameters. Examples of calculation of radio wireless access parameters to mobile terminals in the millimeter range are presented.

A Unified Broadcast Layer for Horizon 2020 Delivery of Multimedia Services

It is expected that, in the coming years, the video data traffic carried by mobile networks will increase drastically. Among the different ways of facing this “mobile data tsunami,” the cooperation of several complementary access technologies offers promising prospects. In the context of such a cooperative approach, this paper proposes the definition of a unified broadcast layer, close to the 3GPP LTE technology, and therefore liable to be easily integrated in mobile devices and infrastructure equipment. The general technical requirements for the design of such a common physical layer are detailed and a practical example based on the 3GPP LTE/E-MBMS and DVB-T2 standards is described. The verification of the proposed approach is performed through simulation results and validation tests carried out on a hardware platform.

ENHANCEMENT OF QOS IN LTE DOWNLINK SYSTEMS USING FREQUENCY DIVERSITY SELECTIVITY SCHEDULING

LTE is a broadband wireless access network offers rich suite of multimedia applications and developed by Third generation partnership project is designed to support ubiquitous delivery of multimedia services. For this reason, numerous research groups are annoying to utilize its concert. Scheduling and resource allocations are the vital components of wireless data schemes. The CSI (channel state information) makes possible to acclimatize transmissions to channel conditions, which is essential for achieving reliable communication with high data rates in systems. To assist resource allocation, classification algorithm is used to identify mobility users. According to the taxonomy, Frequency diversity and selectivity scheduling algorithm is proposed to synchronies low mobility user for multi user diversity and high mobility user for frequency diversity. Continuous rate adaptation is used to make best use of the channel spectral efficiency given a limited number of time-frequency resource blocks. The capacity allocation allocates the total capacity among each of the base stations in an amount that corresponds to the predictable traffic load at each base station. It is verified by simulation that throughput and capacity is increased for the proposed algorithm.