Meta-Level Architectures for Component-Based Mobile Computing

We present an approach to mobile-aware application development that integrates mobile-awareness into existing distributed component designs. Our proposed mobile components encapsulate a context of distributed components that collaborate to fulfill a set of published application functions. The approach is based on a set of meta-level architectures for mobility. First, we present a reflective layered-adaptation model derived from a proposed set of dynamic adaptation architectures. Then, we present a set of mobility-enhanced component services and corresponding object-oriented architectures for their realization. The approach is demonstrated with the development of a video delivery component. We show how mobile awareness can be integrated into an existing component-based design based on our proposed mobility-enhanced CORBA-based services.     

VLSI Implementation of H.264 Video Decoder for Mobile Multimedia Application

In this letter, we present a design of a single chip video decoder called advanced mobile video ASIC (A‐MoVa) for mobile multimedia applications. This chip uses a mixed hardware/software architecture to improve both its performance and its flexibility. We designed the chip using a partition between the hardware and software blocks, and developed the architecture of an H.264 decoder based on the system‐on‐a‐chip (SoC) platform. This chip contains 290,000 logic gates, 670,000 memory gates, and its size is 7.5 mm×7.5 mm (using 0.25 micron 4‐layers metal CMOS technology).     

Routing protocol development for quality of service optimization of video‐on‐demand system over mobile ad hoc networks

A video‐on‐demand (VoD) application system over mobile ad hoc networks typically requires particular quality of service (QoS) parameters to be achieved. In this paper, we have proposed a novel QoS‐based routing protocol called as mobile VoD protocol. This protocol has been developed for improving the QoS of the mobile VoD system (normal Mobi_VoD approach). The protocol uses customer caching scheme for storing the first fragment of the entire video in the mobile customers and thereafter broadcast them when the new mobile customers missed the portion of the already transmitted first fragment for reducing the service delay of the customer, consequently optimizing QoS parameters. Various scenarios have been studied, and the efficacy of simulation results proves that the proposed system architecture in which the mobile customers use an ad hoc network caching scheme (mobile VoD protocol) is more efficient and performs better than the existing system (ad hoc on‐demand distance vector protocol) when compared in terms of QoS parameters such as the end‐to‐end delay, energy consumption, packet delivery ratio, throughput, and overhead.     

MaGMA: mobility and group management architecture for real‐time collaborative applications

We introduce MaGMA, a mobility and group management architecture, enabling real‐time collaborative group applications such as push‐to‐talk (PTT) for mobile users. MaGMA provides, for the first time, a comprehensive and scalable solution for group management, seamless mobility, and quality‐of‐service (QoS). MaGMA is a distributed IP‐based architecture consisting of an overlay server network deployed as part of the service infrastructure. MaGMA's architecture consists of a collection of mobile group managers (MGMs), which manage group membership and may also implement a multicast overlay for data delivery. The architecture is very flexible, and can co‐exist with current as well as emerging wireless network technologies. We see such services as essential components in beyond‐3G (B3G) networks. We propose two group management approaches in the context of MaGMA. We devise protocols for both approaches, evaluate both solutions using simulations, and validate the results through mathematical analysis. Finally, we present a proof‐of‐concept prototype implementation. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Pipelined Scheduling of Functional HW/SW Modules for Platform‐Based SoC Design

We developed a pipelined scheduling technique of functional hardware and software modules for platform‐based system‐on‐a‐chip (SoC) designs. It is based on a modified list scheduling algorithm. We used the pipelined scheduling technique for a performance analysis of an MPEG4 video encoder application. Then, we applied it for architecture exploration to achieve a better performance. In our experiments, the modified SoC platform with 6 pipelines for the 32‐bit dual layer architecture shows a 118% improvement in performance compared to the given basic SoC platform with 4 pipelines for the 16‐bit single‐layer architecture.     

Accelerating Mobile Video: A 64-Bit SIMD Architecture for Handheld Applications

Providing quality mobile video applications in hand-held mobile devices requires increased computational capability. Using Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) techniques to expose and accelerate the data parallelism inherent in video processing increases performance in handheld and wireless systems. The paper introduces a new 64-bit SIMD coprocessor of the Intel® XScale® microarchitecture which is optimized for low-power handheld applications. The architecture blends the SIMD media processing style with the capabilities of the XScale microarchitecture. This paper provides an overview of the architecture, its instruction set, programming model, the pipeline organization and functional units. The paper also describes how key features of architecture improve the performance of video applications as compared to a scalar implementation. The performance and power improvements based upon measured results are analyzed to show how the opportunities of power savings by reducing the frequency and voltage can be realized.Nigel C. Paver has 13 years experience with the ARM architecture, and in the Intel PCA Components group in Austin, Texas, he is responsible for the architecture and implementation of multimedia coprocessors for the Intel XScale micro-architecture. He is also involved in product architecture and definition of Intel PCA processors. Before Intel, Nigel was one of the lead designers of the early AMULET asynchronous ARM microprocessors at the University of Manchester. He was also vice president in a startup company which used asynchronous design techniques to produce a low-power asynchronous DSP core. Nigel holds a Master of Science degree and Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Manchester and a Bachelor of Science degree in electronics from UMIST.Moinul Khan is a multimedia product architect at Intel Corporation PCA Components group. He is responsible PCA graphics and security architecture. His research interests are virtual prototyping, signal processing algorithms and architecture and communications networking. Before joining Intel he was a technology specialist and founding member of a startup at ATDC, Georgia. He worked on his doctoral research at Georgia Center for Advanced Telecommunications Technology at Georgia Institute of Technology. He received his B.Tech form Indian Insti-ture of Technology and MSEE from Georgia Tech. He also worked as a research member for Canadian Institute for Telecommunications Research and Bell Communications Laboratories.Bradley C. Aldrich joined Intel in 1997 where he is currently an architect within the PCA Components Group. His current work includes the development of coprocessor instruction support in addition to image capture and display technologies for XScale based application processors. He was previously a member of the Intel/Analog Devices joint development architecture team responsible for video enhancements for the Micro Signal Architecture. Prior to that he was a video system architect in Intel’s Digital Imaging and Video Division working on CMOS sensors, still cameras, and tethered PC based video peripherals. He has also worked as a device engineer for Motorola and as a test engineer for Tektronix. He received a BSEE in 1988 and MSEE in 1994 from the University of Texas at San Antonio.Christopher D. Emmons received a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Austin in 2003. He joined Intel in 2001 and is currently a multimedia architect responsible for algorithm development and performance optimization for handheld products within the PCA Components Group. Prior to this he worked as an applications engineer providing performance and power analysis in support of product marketing groups. His research interests include video compression, operating system design, and dynamic resource management.     

A 64 mW High Picture Quality H.264/MPEG-4 Video Codec IP for HD Mobile Applications in 90 nm CMOS

We have developed an H.264/MPEG-4 dual video codec IP for mobile applications such as digital still cameras (DSCs), digital video cameras (DVCs), and mobile phones. The codec is capable of encoding and decoding HD-sized moving pictures (1280 pixels by 720 lines at 30 fps) in real-time at an operating frequency of 144 MHz, and SD-sized pictures at 54 MHz. We have implemented our original architecture based on a macroblock-level pipeline method and encoding algorithms suitable for the architecture in the codec, which enable low power of 64 mW for HD encoding with high picture quality equivalent to that of the H.264 reference encoder “JM (Joint Model)”.      

Downlink media streaming with wireless fountain coding in wireline‐cum‐WiFi networks

This paper addresses the problem of streaming packetized media data in a combined wireline/802.11 network. Since the wireless channel is normally the bottleneck for media streaming in such a network, we propose that wireless fountain coding (WFC) be used over the wireless downlink in order to efficiently utilize the wireless bandwidth and exploit the broadcast nature of the channel. Forward error correction (FEC) is also used to combat errors at the application‐layer. We analytically obtain the moment generating function (MGF) for the wireless link‐layer delay incurred by WFC. With the MGF, the expected value of this wireless link‐layer delay is found and used by the access point (AP), who has no knowledge of the buffer contents of wireless receivers, to make a coding‐based decision. We then derive the end‐to‐end packet loss/late probability based on the MGF. We develop an integrated ns‐3/EvalVid simulator to evaluate our proposed system and compare it with the traditional 802.11e scheme which is without WFC capability but equipped with application‐ and link‐layer retransmission mechanisms. Through extensive simulations of video streaming, we show that streaming with WFC is able to support more concurrent video flows compared to the traditional scheme. When the deadlines imposed on video packets are relatively stringent, streaming with WFC also shows superior performance in terms of packet loss/late probability, video distortion, and video frame delay, over the traditional scheme. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

IPTV Systems, Standards and Architectures: Part II - Heterogeneous Networks and Terminal-Aware QoS/QoE-Guaranteed Mobile IPTV Service

We describe two main technical challenges in terms of the network and application levels for mobile IPTV service. To support a multimedia- streaming application service over a mobile network environment, we present the IP/MPLS-based NGN architecture with fixed and mobile convergence and its challenge, which is basically to support QoS for mobile IPTV ser vice. To meet the challenges for application source levels, we focus on the relationship of user terminals and video streaming sources to support user-perceived QoE, based on high- quality service between heterogeneous terminals. The techniques to meet these challenges depend on the characteristics of media processing and terminal capabilities, such as LCD panel size, resolution, video coding, and so on, in the heterogeneous network environment. To have a relationship between the two different levels, the significant factors mentioned previously are required to deliver the bandwidth coupled with a user profile to provide QoS/QoE in assured seamless mobile IPTV service on client devices.     

A mobile service platform using proxy technology

This paper proposes iMobile, a proxy‐based platform for developing mobile services for various mobile devices and wireless access technologies. iMobile acts as a message gateway that allows mobile devices to relay messages to each other through various protocols on different access networks. It allows mobile devices to access internet services, corporate databases and to control various network devices. iMobile implements three key abstractions: dev‐let, info‐let and app‐let. An info‐let provides abstract view of information space. An app‐let implements service or application logic by processing information from various info‐lets. A dev‐let receives and sends messages through any particular protocols for mobile devices. The let engine supports user and device profiles for personalization and transcoding, and invokes proper app‐lets and info‐lets to answer requests from a dev‐let. The iMobile modular architecture allows developers to write device drivers, information access methods and application logic independently from each other. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Performance Analysis for MPEG‐4 Video Codec Based on On‐Chip Network

In this paper, we present a performance analysis for an MPEG‐4 video codec based on the on‐chip network communication architecture. The existing on‐chip buses of system‐on‐a‐chip (SoC) have some limitation on data traffic bandwidth since a large number of silicon IPs share the bus. An on‐chip network is introduced to solve the problem of on‐chip buses, in which the concept of a computer network is applied to the communication architecture of SoC. We compared the performance of the MPEG‐4 video codec based on the on‐chip network and Advanced Micro‐controller Bus Architecture (AMBA) on‐chip bus. Experimental results show that the performance of the MPEG‐4 video codec based on the on‐chip network is improved over 50% compared to the design based on a multi‐layer AMBA bus.     

基于边缘计算的高效视频内容分发关键技术与挑战

近年来移动互联网、工业互联网的快速发展,引发媒体计算与服务的一个新的趋势:以视频为代表的多媒体数据的产生、处理和分发越来越多地趋向网络边缘。复杂应用环境下,用户行为、系统资源的不确定性成为网络视频服务面临的重大挑战。如何引入人工智能与机器学习的方法,利用网络边缘的计算、存储和网络资源实现视频内容分发随需而动,从而支撑更低延迟、更高带宽需求的网络视频服务,逐渐成为新的研究和应用热点。该综述分析了基于边缘计算的视频分发所面临的挑战,提出了通过边缘计算的网络、存储和计算能力来进行视频内容分发的框架,并在此框架下给出了边缘缓存及替换、边缘内容预取、边缘内容收集和边缘计算迁移等视频分发的优化策略设计。     

Proxy-assisted techniques for delivering continuous multimedia streams

We present a proxy-assisted video delivery architecture that can simultaneously reduce the resources requirements at the central server and the service latency experienced by clients (i.e., end users). Under the proposed video delivery architecture, we develop and analyze two novel proxy-assisted video streaming techniques for on-demand delivery of video objects to a large number of clients. By taking advantage of the resources available at the proxy servers, these techniques not only significantly reduce the central server and network resource requirements, but are also capable of providing near-instantaneous service to a large number of clients. We optimize the performance of our video streaming architecture by carefully selecting video delivery techniques for videos of various popularity and intelligently allocating resources between proxy servers and the central server. Through empirical studies, we demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed proxy-assisted video streaming techniques.     

Efficient handoff based on link quality prediction for video streaming in urban transport systems

The continuously increasing interest in developing efficient vehicle‐roadside communication networks to provide on‐board connectivity has recently brought to the definition of several solutions based on different wireless technologies. Among them, wireless local area network‐based solutions emerged as an attracting alternative to guarantee high‐quality connectivity enabling services, like video streaming, that require stringent quality of service guarantees. In this work, we propose a handoff procedure based on a forecasting model of the link quality for mobile routers operating in vehicle‐roadside wireless local area network‐based networks. First, a preliminary set of experiments is performed in a realistic environment to study the behavior of the wireless channel when mobility in urban environment is considered. Then, considering the hands‐on experience gained from the initial set of experiments, a novel handoff procedure is designed, which exploits a forecasting technique to predict link channel quality. The proposed procedure is then exploited in a cross‐layer manner to proactively reduce the number of transmitted layers during handoff in the case of real‐time video traffic based on H.264/SVC encoding. The proposal is assessed by means of simulation and compared with existing solutions. Results demonstrate that our proposal guarantees performance comparable with other algorithms. The advantage of predicting the handoff point is demonstrated by means of simulations employing a realistic video streaming traffic model, showing how the quality of experience perceived by end‐users can be improved through the adaptation of the traffic load. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

一种基于H.264的智能手机监控系统设计与实现

文章介绍了基于H．264编解码压缩标准的视频系统在智能手机上的实现与应用。提出了一种基于手机视频的远程监控系统的设计与实现方法，介绍了该系统的体系结构和基本原理；并分别针对局域网络和无线网络进、行测试，得出系统实施的实验结果。     

Adaptive video protection in large scale peer‐to‐peer video streaming over mobile wireless mesh networks

Because video streaming over mobile handheld devices has been of great interest, the necessity of introducing new methods with low implementation cost and scalable infrastructures is a strong demand of the service. In particular, these requirements are present in popular wireless networks such as wireless mesh networks (WMN). Peer‐to‐peer (P2P) networks promise an efficient scalable network infrastructure for video streaming over wired and wireless networks. Limited resources of the peers in P2P networks and high error rate in wireless channels make it more challenging to run P2P streaming applications over WMNs. Therefore, it is necessary to design efficient and improved error protection methods in P2P video streaming applications over WMNs. In this paper, we propose a new adaptive unequal video protection method specially intended for large scale P2P video streaming over mobile WMNs. Using this method, different frames have different priorities in receivers along the recovery process. Moreover, we precisely and completely evaluate different aspects related to frame protection in these networks using five important performance metrics including video distortion, late arrival distortion, end‐to‐end delay, overhead and initial start‐up delay. The results obtained from a precise simulation in OMNeT++ show that the proposed adaptive method significantly outperforms other solutions by providing better video quality on mobile wireless nodes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Supporting the WWW in Wireless Communications Through Mobile Agents

Mobile computing is considered of major importance to the computing industry for the forthcoming years due to the progress in wireless mobile communications. We present a proxy-based architecture that manages to accelerate Web browsing in wireless Customer Premises Networks (CPN). We discuss how such an architecture is implemented using the IBM Aglets framework for mobile agents. The suggested architecture relies heavily on proxy caches – maintained in base stations – which are relocated to follow a roaming user in other control areas (clusters of cells). The cache management scheme involves relocation of full caches to the most-likely-to-be visited control areas, but also fractions of the cache to less-likely-to-be-visited neighbours. A movement prediction algorithm, based on a learning automaton, is used to determine the future location of the terminal. The discussed architecture components have been implemented as Aglets to allow for the efficient introduction of the service in a CPN infrastructure.     

On the effects of traffic mixtures in direct broadcast satellite networks

In this paper we present a multi‐criterion control simulation in a realistically complex environment of a satellite network, involving non‐symmetric up and downlinks. Direct broadcast satellite (DBS) networks carrying heterogeneous traffic is characterized with challenges, such as high traffic burstiness, wireless channel dynamics, and large, but limited capacity. On the other hand, there are system characteristics that can be leveraged to address these challenges such as in centralized topology, different levels in quality of service (QoS) and priorities, availability of side information about channel conditions, flexibility in delivery of delay insensitive traffic, etc. We have developed an adaptive resource allocation and management (ARAM) system that takes the advantage of such characteristics to maximize the utilization of the available capacity on the forward DBS link, while maintaining QoS in the presence of channel effects and congestion in the network. Since variable‐bit‐rate (VBR) video traffic is given priority over available‐bit‐rate (ABR) data traffic in the ARAM concept, in this paper we investigate the impact of the fraction of VBR load in overall load. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Localized energy efficient routing in mobile ad hoc networks

We consider the problem of localized energy aware routing in mobile ad hoc networks. In localized routing algorithms, each node forwards a message based on the position of itself, its neighbors and the destination. The objective of energy aware routing algorithms is to minimize the total power for routing a message from source to destination or to maximize the total number of routing tasks that a node can perform before its battery power depletes. In this paper we propose new localized energy aware routing algorithms called OLEAR. The algorithms have very high packet delivery rate with low packet forwarding and battery power consumption. In addition, they ensure good energy distribution among the nodes. Finally, packets reach the destination using smaller number of hops. All these properties make our algorithm suitable for routing in any energy constrained environment. We compare the performance of our algorithms with other existing energy and non‐energy aware localized algorithms. Simulation experiments show that our algorithms present comparable energy consumption and distribution to other energy aware algorithms and better packet delivery rate. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.