NETWORK MANAGEMENT AND CONTROL ISSUES IN MULTIMEDIA WIRELESS NETWORKS

There is considerable ferment worldwide in the area of wireless cellular communications. First-generation, analog voice wireless networks have sprung up worldwide; second-generation digital voice/data networks are under development; and some networks have been deployed or are undergoing trials. Third-generation networks designed ultimately to carry multimedia traffic - whether voice, video, images, files, or data, or combinations of these - are under intensive study by the Commission of European Communities as well as the International Telecommunications Union (ITU-R) [1]. Research in the area of wireless communications, as reported in papers at conferences or in wireless journals, has tended to focus either on physical layer issues such as CDMA versus TDMA and multiaccess protocols for the wireless environment, or on higher layer control issues such as call handoff, hierarchical cell design, and dynamic allocation of channels among cells for the voice-call environment. Relatively little has been reported on control issues arising when the wireless networks must carry multimedia traffic, or interface with much higher-speed wired networks designed to carry such traffic. © 1995 IEEE