Efficient scheduling algorithms for mixed services in wireless OFDMA system

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) is an attracting system for combating the frequency selective fading. It’s widely considered as a promising candidate modulation and access scheme for next generation mobile communication systems. However, the explosive growth of multimedia applications raises higher performance requirements for Radio Resource Management (RRM) in OFDMA system. In particular, limited bandwidth and fierce resource competition impose a challenging issue on the design of packet scheduler. In this paper, we propose two scheduling algorithms applicable to mixed services (i.e., real-time and non-real-time services), that is QoS-oriented Dynamic Threshold Control (DTC) algorithm and fairness-oriented Fairness Aware and QoS Aware (FAQA) algorithm. These two algorithms are both composed of two stages, i.e., initial subcarrier allocation and subcarrier reallocation. For the DTC algorithm, in the stage of initial subcarrier allocation, based on the different metrics to weigh QoS between both services, we design a unique scheduling strategy for each type of service. A dynamic threshold is adopted to help users quickly recover from starvation, so that any one user in system can escape from severely degraded QoS. In the stage of subcarrier reallocation, we will reallocate the surplus subcarriers from the buffer-empty users to the buffer-nonempty users so as to increase spectrum efficiency. For FAQA algorithm, in the stage of initial subcarrier allocation, for the purpose of achieving Proportional Fairness (PF) with lower complexity, we deduce a simple scheduling strategy satisfying PF criterion by means of Greedy algorithm. In the stage of subcarrier reallocation, in order to increase the number of users satisfying QoS requirements, we’ll reallocate the surplus subcarriers from the QoS-satisfied users to the QoS-unsatisfied users. Simulation results demonstrate that, on one hand, the DTC algorithm not only guarantees the quality of both services, but also increases the spectrum efficiency; on the other hand, the FAQA algorithm well maintains the fairness among users, and increases the QoS satisfaction degree at the same time.