Oscillation Compensating Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP

Streaming multimedia over the Internet is omnipresent but still in its infancy, specifically when it comes to the adaptation based on bandwidth/throughput measurements, clients competing for limited/shared bandwidth, and the presence of a caching infrastructure. In this paper we present a buffer-based adaptation logic in combination with a toolset of client metrics to compensate for erroneous adaptation decisions. These erroneous adaptation decisions are due to insufficient network information available at the client and issues introduced when multiple clients compete for limited/shared bandwidth and/or when caches are deployed. Our metrics enable the detection of oscillations on the client - in contrast to server-based approaches - and provide an effective compensation mechanism. We evaluate the proposed adaptation logic, which incorporates the oscillation detection and compensation method, and compare it against a throughput-based adaptation logic for scenarios comprising competing clients with and without caching enabled. In anticipation of the results, we show how the presented metrics detect oscillation periods and how such undesirable situations can be compensated while increasing the effective media throughput of the clients.