QoS provisioning for multimedia services on all- IP based hybrid networks

The objective of this paper is to identify a dynamic QoS architecture for multimedia services applicable to all type of QoS scenarios in integrated IP-based terrestrial/satellite networks. The main contribution of this work focuses on the capability of the dynamic QoS architecture to provide QoS also to QoS unaware applications and to easily interconnect DiffServ and IntServ based terrestrial networks with DVB-RCS satellite networks implementing DiffServ features. The proposed dynamic QoS architecture presents two cross-layer mechanisms: the first one between application and network layers in order to provide guaranteed QoS for multimedia applications and a second one between IP and MAC layers in order to maximise the efficiency of satellite resources utilization. Two different configurations have been proposed for the dynamic QoS architecture. The first option implements both cross-layer mechanisms allowing dynamic resource reservation at Layer 2 and 3. The second option presents only the first interface and performs dynamic QoS at IP layer. Both options are compared from a functional point of view and comparative assessment of their performance and complexity is provided. We have implemented and tested at ESA laboratory the second option of the dynamic QoS architecture in order to validate the presented architecture.