Interactive multimedia networking

Summary form only given. Applications that require real-time interaction among users are gaining importance and widespread use as computer networks become increasingly powerful and ubiquitous. Many such applications impose stringent requirements on the network; among the applications today widely deployed, videoconferencing is the most demanding. In order for the participants in a videoconference call to interact naturally, the end-to-end delay should be below human perception. We identify the components of the end-to-end delay in various configurations with the objective of understanding how delay can be kept below the desired bound. The most common tools for controlling service quality are presented, and the two major frameworks for their deployment within IP networks, i.e., integrated services (IntServ) and differentiated services (DiffServ), outlined. The tutorial studies the implications of the architecture of packet switches on delay bounds. It also analyzes the end-to-end delay components of a videoconferencing system step-by-step, considering two video encoding schemes. Various queuing and scheduling algorithms for asynchronous and synchronous packet networks are analyzed and compared