Heuristic algorithms for packing of multiple-group multicasting

Multicast communication is an efficient routing method for multimedia data distribution, since it can save network bandwidth during the communication session. Thus, the multicast routing problems have received much attention from many researchers. In this paper, we consider a multicast routing problem with multiple multicast sessions under a capacity limited constraint. This problem is formulated as a tree packing problem. We propose two heuristic algorithms, Steiner-tree-based heuristic (STH) algorithm and cut-set-based heuristic (CSH) algorithm, for solving this problem. The simulation results show that the STH algorithm can find a better approximate solution in a shorter computation time compared to CSH. In addition, if the available bandwidth for the service is just enough, the STH and CSH algorithms may fail to find a solution even if the solution exists. The simulation results also indicate that CSH has a higher probability than STH to find a solution. Thus, it is suggested that one can apply the STH algorithm first to solve the tree packing problem. In case STH fails, CSH algorithm will be used instead.