QoE aware real-time multimedia streaming in software-defined networks

Abstract

The exponential increase in bandwidth-sensitive multimedia traffic on the net has given rise to new challenges and services. There is a need to have quality management measures to serve the high needs of efficient transmission and delivery in time-constrained environments over IP networks. Quality of Experience (QoE) is one of the major techniques introduced to achieve the goals of application efficiency and user satisfaction from an end-user perspective. By utilizing crowdsourcing techniques, QoE becomes more cost-efficient and easier to measure. In this paper, I propose a framework that takes real time QoE feedback and forward it to SD-WAN controllers in order to enhance streaming routes based on real-time user quality perceptions. We analyze how QoE can be affected by different streaming protocols and which streaming protocols perform better when dynamic quality changes are introduced. Real-time feedback is compared to predefined dynamic changes to identify if participants able to capture all degradation events or whether not all degradations event combinations are noticeable to the participants. This QoE timestamped feedback will be fed to a SD-WAN controller, in-order to allow end users interaction and the possibility to point out issues in the current service path and to enable the network controllers to take corrective action by rerouting the streamed traffic. Our aim is to demonstrate that real-time QoE feedback can enhance cloud-based services and can adjust services quality based on real-time active participants’ interaction.