Evaluation of multicast error recovery using convolutional codes

Packet losses due to congested traffic conditions in the Internet leads to the investigation of the reliable delivery of data to multicast receivers. In this paper, we examine the technique based on FEC, using (n, k, m) convolutional codes to recover lost packets. We show that when the redundant packets are generated by convolutional codes, a receiver can tolerate a certain amount of packet loss and still be able to obtain all data without requiring retransmission. We evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach to perform the recovery of lost packets for multicast transmission taking into account two different parameters: the number of packets needed to be sent to guarantee the reception of data, and the number of transmissions. Finally, we compare the proposed approach with the scheme when parity packets are based on Reed-Solomon codes. We demonstrate that the use of parity generated by convolutional coding is more efficient at reducing bandwidth requirements and the number of transmissions from the source.