Novel distributed decoding scheme for efficient resource utilization in network coding

In this paper, we introduce network coding (NC) at intermediate nodes of a linear network where coding is conducted on address correlated packets. In particular, we propose a novel algorithm for decoding network-coded messages that enhances the bandwidth usage and reduces the resource allocation by allowing nodes in the network to perform distributed decoding. We show that, compared to traditional decoding at end nodes, distributed decoding allows reduction not only in the number of transmitted bytes but also in the number of resources needed to perform NC. Our strategy is compared to decoding at end nodes and experiments show a reduction of 64% in the number of transmitted bytes and a reduction of 93% of buffering time when using distributed decoding to exchange 1000 packets between end nodes of a linear network of 8 nodes.