Seamless QoS adaptation control for embedded multimedia communications

• Published in: IEEE transactions on consumer electronics Vol. 52; no. 1; pp. 91 - 99
• Main Authors: Hsu-Yang Kung, Jing-Shiuan Hua, Yi-Fang Chang, Ching-Yu Lin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.02.2006; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Communication system control; Communication system traffic control; Control systems; Embedded system; Handheld computers; Mobile communication; MPEG 4 Standard; Multimedia communication; Multimedia systems; Streaming media
• ISSN: 0098-3063; 1558-4127
• DOI: 10.1109/TCE.2006.1605053

Pervasive applications that retrieve multimedia information using handheld devices are increasingly popular with the rapid progress of mobile communications. However, handheld devices have very limited computing resources, so cannot easily store large volumes of multimedia data severely restricting the operation quality of pervasive applications. This study proposes the Resource Refinement Adaptation Control (R 2 AC) for embedded multimedia communications. The fundamental control procedure of R 2 AC fits media within the limited computational capability and memory of embedded systems, based on the MPEG-4 object priority. R2AC monitors the mobile network traffic and the computing resources of the client, including the CPU workload and the memory usage. When insufficient resources are available, R 2 AC mechanism adapts the quality of the media to fit the available network bandwidth, and the client releases some unnecessary system processes to increase the memory and CPU resources available for applications. To achieve seamless steady multimedia streaming, a quality-based differentiated transmission control mechanism is proposed to balance the workload of the embedded system.