Keynote: In-network adaptation of scalable video (H.264/SVC) content

Scalable Video Coding, in particular H.264/SVC, is regarded as a promising candidate to enable applications to cope with dynamically varying network conditions and with heterogeneous usage environments, mainly diverse end device capabilities and constraints. The MMC Research Group has for some time investigated the adaptation of SVC content directly in the network, i.e., by Media Aware Network Elements (MANEs), and shown the feasibility of SVC in-network adaptation even on off-the-shelf network devices. This talk will present the basic design considerations, mechanisms, prototype realizations, and performance results of H.264/SVC content adaptation on MANEs. Recent work has realized SVC adaptation proxies on inexpensive, Linux-based WiFi home routers and demonstrated that a reasonable number of SD SVC streams can be transmitted and adapted simultaneously. The benefits of in-network adaptation on these home routers will be illustrated by streaming HD SVC content over an IEEE 802.11 wireless network and by timely adaption of the video according to the varying conditions on the wireless link toward a mobile client.