A Resource Reservation Protocol Supporting QoS-aware Multicast Trees for Next Generation Networks

It is expected that next generation of networks will handle new types of services which are destined to large audiences and have different QoS requirements. From the transport point of view, multicast is the most suitable technology for the required group communication services, since it avoids packets duplication and saves network resources. However, QoS-aware multicast content deliver raises several problems, such as the control of QoS trees in environments with asymmetric routing. This paper presents Multi-service Resource Allocation (MIRA), a multicast-aware resource reservation protocol for class-based networks that consider routing asymmetries. MIRA controls the resources of network classes associated to multicast sessions considering the QoS characteristics of the latter and network conditions of the available classes in the source-to-receivers path. A detailed description of the functionalities of MIRA and a conceptual analysis against RSVP and RMD-QoSM are presented. Finally, the session setup time, and the signalling and state overheard in comparison with RSVP are analyzed based on simulations.