Seamless, Reliable, Video Multicast in Wireless Ad Hoc Networks : Multiple Multicast Tree Construction Based Multiple Description Coding

Video multicasting over Wireless Ad hoc Networks (WAHNs) is bandwidth-efficient compared to multiple unicast sessions. However, video multicasting poses great challenges over WAHNs. One main challenge of video multicasting in WAHNs for heterogeneous destinations is the assignment of Video Descriptions (VDs) and the construction of multicast tree. However, the assignment of VDs and the construction of multicast tree can greatly affect user satisfaction (i.e., affect the quality of the received video). In this book, we introduce novel approaches to improve the user satisfaction for a set of heterogeneous multicast destinations. The main idea of our approaches is to employ the independent-description property of Multiple Description Coding (MDC) along with multiple multicast trees. However, many questions are raised: How multiple multicast trees should be constructed? How VDs should be assigned? Is it better to construct multiple multicast trees first and then assign the VDs? Or is it better to assign the VDs first and we then construct multiple multicast trees? Should we perform that in a distributed manner or in a centralized manner?