An optimized resource allocation algorithm for scalable video delivery over wireless multicast links

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate resource allocation of video multicast over resource-constrained wireless networks. The video multicast is a best-effort service which suffers from limited transmission energy and channel access time. To cater for multi-resolution video demands of heterogeneous mobile clients, we consider scalable video coding (SVC) which offers spatial, temporal and fidelity scalabilities. We formulate multicast strategy that maximizes video quality under transmission energy and channel access constraints. We show that the problem is a joint optimization of mode selection and transmission power allocation. It is a mixed-integer programming problem which is in general NP-hard. To solve the optimization problem, we first reduce the problem into a binary integer programming problem. By exploiting inter-layer dependency of SVC packets, we propose a novel solution based on the dynamic programming approach. Experiment results demonstrate that the proposed method archives notable improvement of average video quality over a conventional method.