Resource managers for QoS in CORBA

Abstract

Multimedia applications require support for quality of service (QoS). The need for reusable and maintainable code also means that these kinds of applications are developed in a distributed object system. To address the support of QoS in middleware, we propose a lightweight model to manage QoS constraints in this kind of environment. This model is based on two types of objects: micro-QoS managers (/spl mu/QoS-Mngrs) and resource managers (R-Mngrs). A /spl mu/QoS-Mngr is associated with an application, and it handles the QoS contract, the QoS mapping and the QoS monitoring. Each R-Mngr is responsible for QoS management for a specific resource, including admission control, real-time scheduling and monitoring. The /spl mu/QoS-Mngrs and the R-Mngrs co-operate, using the middleware, to ensure end-to-end QoS management. This paper focuses on the R-Mngrs and it gives an overview of our implementation on a CORBA platform in the context of a video-on-demand (VOD) application.