Abstract
We describe the design and the experimental evaluation of a playout delay control mechanism we have developed in order to support unicast, voice-based audio communications over the Internet. The proposed mechanism was designed to dynamically adjust the talkspurt playout delays to the traffic conditions of the underlying network without assuming either the existence of an external mechanism for maintaining an accurate clock synchronization between the sender and the receiver during the audio communication, or a specific distribution of the audio packet transmission delays. Performance figures derived from several experiments are reported that illustrate the adequacy of the proposed mechanism in dynamically adjusting the audio packet playout delay to the network traffic conditions while maintaining a small percentage of packet loss.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
M. Bernardo, R. Gorrieri, and M. Roccetti, “Formal performance modeling and evaluation of an adaptive mechanism for packetized audio over the internet,” Formal Aspects of Computing, to appear.
J. Bolot, H. Crepin, and A. Vega Garcia, “Analysis of audio packet loss on the internet,” in Proc. of Network and Operating System Support for Digital Audio and Video, Durham (NC), 1995, pp. 163–174.
D. Cohen, “Issues in transnet packetized voice communications,” in Proc. of Fifth Data Communication Symposium, Snowbird (UT), 1977, pp. 6.10–6.13.
F. Cristian, “Probabilistic clock synchronization,” Distributed Computing' Vol. 3, pp. 146–158, 1989.
V. Hardman, M.A. Sasse, and I. Kouvelas, “Successful multi-party audio communication over the Internet,” in Communications of the ACM Vol. 41, pp. 74–80, 1998.
ITU-T Recommendation G.729, “Coding of speech at 8-kb/s using coniugate-structure algebraic-code-excited linear-prediction,” 1996.
ITU-T Recommendation G.723.1, “Dual rate speech coder for multimedia communications transmitting at 5.3/6.3-kb/s,” 1996.
V. Jacobson and S. McCanne, vat, ftp://ftp.ee.lbl.gov/conferencing/vat/.
T.J. Kostas, M.S. Borella, I. Sidhu, G.M. Schuster, J. Grabiec, and J. Mahler, “Real-time voice over packetswitched networks,” IEEE Network, Vol. 12, pp. 18–27, 1998.
W.E. Leland, M.S. Taqqu, W. Willinger, and D.V. Wilson, “On the Self-Similar Nature of Ethernet Traffic,” in IEEE/ACM Trans. on Networking Vol. 2, pp. 1–15, 1994.
M. Macedonia and D. Brutzmann, “mbone provides audio and video across the Internet,” in IEEE Computer Magazine, Vol. 21, pp. 30–35, 1994.
D.L. Mills, “Improved algorithms for synchronizing computer network clocks,” in Proc. of ACM SIGCOMM’ 94, London (UK), 1994, pp. 317–327.
S.B. Moon, J. Kurose, and D. Towsley, “Packet audio playout delay adjustment: Performance bounds and algorithms,” in ACM Multimedia Systems Vol. 6, pp. 17–28, 1998.
R. Ramjee, J. Kurose, D. Towsley, and H. Schulzrinne, “Adaptive playout mechanisms for packetized audio applications in wide-area networks,” in Proc. of IEEE INFOCOM'94, Montreal (CA), 1994.
P.V. Rangan, S.S. Kumar, and S. Rajan, “Continuity and synchronization in MPEG,” in IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, Vol. 14, pp. 52–60, 1996.
M. Roccetti, M. Bernardo, and R. Gorrieri, “Packetized audio for industrial applications: A simulation study,” in Proc. of 10th European Simulation Symposium, Nottingham (UK), 1988, pp. 495–500.
M. Roccetti, V. Ghini, G. Pau, P. Salomoni, and M.E. Bonfigli, “Design and experimental evaluation of an Adaptive playout delay control mechanism for packetized audio for use over the Internet,” UBLCS Technical Report n. 98-4, Laboratory for Computer Science, University of Bologna, May 1998.
H. Schulzrinne, “Voice communication across the Internet: A network voice terminal,” Tech. Rep., Dept. of ECE and CS, Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst (MA), 1992.
H. Schulzrinne, S. Casner, R. Frederick, and V. Jacobson, “RTP: A transport protocol for real-time applications,” Request for Comments 1889, IETF, Audio-Video WG, 1995.
A. Vega Garcia, “Mecanismes de controle pour la transmission de l'audio sur l'Internet,” Doctoral Thesis in Computer Science, University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, Ecole Doctoral SPI, 1996.
L. Zhang, “RSVP: A new resource reservation protocol,” in IEEE Network Magazine Vol. 7, pp. 8–18, 1993.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Roccetti, M., Ghini, V., Pau, G. et al. Design and Experimental Evaluation of an Adaptive Playout Delay Control Mechanism for Packetized Audio for Use over the Internet. Multimedia Tools and Applications 14, 23–53 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011303506685
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011303506685