A Comparative Study of Multicast Protocols Top, Bottom, or In the Middle
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AComparativeStudyofMulticastProtocols:
Top,Bottom,orIntheMiddle?
LiLao1,Jun-HongCui2,MarioGerla1,DarioMaggiorini3
1ComputerScienceDepartment,UniversityofCalifornia,LosAngeles,CA90095
2ComputerScience&EngineeringDepartment,UniversityofConnecticut,Storrs,CT06029
3ComputerScienceDepartment,UniversityofMilano,viaComelico39,Milano,Italy
Abstract—Multicastsolutionshavebeenevolvingfrom“bottom”to“top”,i.e.,fromIPlayer(calledIPmulti-cast)toapplicationlayer(referredtoasapplicationlayermulticast).Recently,therearesomenewproposals(namedasoverlaymulticast)usingcertain“infrastructure”(com-posedofproxies)inthemiddle.AlthoughitiswellacceptedthatapplicationlayermulticastandoverlaymulticastareeasiertodeploywhilesacrificingbandwidthefficiencycomparedwithIPmulticast,littleresearchhasbeendonetosystematicallyevaluateandcomparetheirperformance.Inthispaper,weconductacomparativestudyofdifferenttypesofmulticastroutingprotocols.Wefirstpresentaqualitativecomparisonofthreetypesofprotocols,andthenweprovideaquantitativestudyoffourrepresentativeprotocols,namely,PIM-SSM,NARADA,NICE,andPOMbyextensivesimulations.Ourstudieswillhelptoanswersomeofthemostimportantquestions,suchaswhichwaytogo:top,bottom,orinthemiddle?
I.INTRODUCTION
Recently,moreandmoregroupcommunicationap-
plications(e.g.,video-conferencing,online-gaming,and
long-distanceeducation)haveemergedwiththeincreas-
ingpopularityoftheInternet.Tosupportsuchmulti-
userapplications,multicastisconsideredasaveryeffi-
cientmechanismsinceitusessomedeliverystructures
(e.g.,treesormeshes)toforwarddatafromsendersto
receivers,aimingtoreduceduplicatepackets.Initially,
multicastisimplementedattheIPlayer(i.e.,IPmulticast
[13]),inwhichatreedeliverystructurecomposedof
networkroutersisusuallyemployed,withdatapackets
onlyreplicatedatbranchingnodes([26],[24],[14]).
However,duetomanytechnicalandmarketingreasons,
suchasthelackofascalableinter-domainmulticast
routingprotocol,therequirementofglobaldeployment
ofmulticast-capableIProutersandthelackofpractical
pricingmodels,itisstillfarfrombeingwidelydeployed
[2],[15].
ToresolvethedeploymentissuesofIPmulticast,ap-
plicationlayermulticast([11],[17],[4],[27],[20],[23],
[29],[34],[7])andoverlaymulticast([9],[19],[10],
[31],[30],[5])havebeenproposed.Inbothapproaches,
certainnodesformavirtualnetwork,andmulticast
deliverystructuresareconstructedontopofthisvirtual
network.Datapacketsarereplicatedatparticipating
nodesanddeliveredthroughtunnels.However,thereare
significantdifferencesbetweenthesetwoapproaches.
Theformerapproachreliesonlyonendhoststhatare
partofamulticastgroup,whereasthelatteroneusesstrategicallydeployedoverlayproxynodes(sometimes
referredtoasservicenodes)besidesendhostsinorder
tofacilitatethemanagementofgroupmembershipand
multicastdeliverystructures.Comparatively,thesetwo
approachesaremucheasiertodeploythanIPmulticast.
Ontheotherhand,however,theysacrificetheefficiency
ofmulticast,sincesomedatapacketsmightbetransmit-
tedoverthesamephysicallinkmultipletimes.
Eventhoughitiswellacceptedthatapplicationlayer
multicastandoverlaymulticasttradebandwidtheffi-
ciencyforeasierdeployment,littleresearchhasbeen
donetosystematicallyevaluateandcomparetheirperfor-
mance.Answersformanyimportantquestionsarestill
open.Forexample,howmuchworsedotheupperlayer
alternativesolutionsperformcomparedtoIPmulticast?
Cantheyserveasalong-termsubstitutetoIPmulticast,
oronlyasatemporarysolutiontocircumventthediffi-
cultiesofdeployingIPmulticast?Whatarethetrade-offs
ofusingextraoverlayproxiesvs.relyingsolelyonend
hosts?Inotherwords,whichupperlayerarchitecture
shouldwechooseinwhichscenario?
Inthispaper,westrivetoanswerthesequestions.We
comparetheirperformancewithrespecttoavarietyof
metricsthroughextensivesimulationstudies.Wealso
evaluatetheimpactofoverlaystructure(suchasthe
numberofproxies)onoverlaymulticastperformance.
Ourgoalistoprovideguidelinesforresearchersand
developerstoadoptappropriateschemesunderdifferent
conditions.Toourbestknowledge,thisisthefirstwork
onverticallycomparingmulticastprotocolsimplemented
onthreedifferentlayersoftheprotocolstack.
Theremainingpaperisorganizedasfollows.InSec-
tionII,wegiveanoverviewonthethreemulticast
architecturesandprovideaqualitativecomparison.We
describeourexperimentalmethodologiesinSectionIII.
ThenwepresentthesimulationresultsinSectionIV.
Finally,webrieflyreviewrelatedworkinSectionVand
concludeourworkinSectionVI.
II.MULTICASTROUTINGPROTOCOLOVERVIEW
Inthissection,weprovideabriefoverviewonthe
multicastroutingprotocolsandgiveaqualitativecom-
parison.Fig.1givesahighlevelillustrationofthethree
multicastarchitectures,namely,IPmulticast,application
layermulticast,andoverlaymulticast.