Unequal error protection for wireless ATM applications

Variable rate error protection will be required to support the broad range of quality of service (QoS) requirements for multimedia services and other applications that are likely to be encountered in future asynchronous transfer mode (ATM)-based wireless networking systems. Performance results are presented for several forward error correction (FEC) coding schemes that can provide unequal error protection (UEP) for messages on the wireless access segment of an ATM-based wireless networking system. UEP is based on punctured (or shortened) convolution, Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem (BCH), and Reed-Solomon (RS) coding. A rate-compatibility restriction is imposed on the encoder to allow for the use of a single encoder for each type of code, even when the code rates are changed. The example air interface packet (AIP) formats used in this study are the types that are envisaged for various flavors of wireless ATM. It is shown that UEP at the wireless physical layer is a feasible strategy to provide variable rate error protection for the types of services and applications that are likely to be encountered in future ATM-based wireless networking systems.