A simulation model of correlated traffic sources based on random repetition of random variables

Simulation of a multimedia communication system often needs the generation of large sequences of random numbers, which have certain amplitude distributions and correlation among the values. For example, to design a multimedia system by simulation and evaluate its performance, the information stream generated by a traffic source has to be modeled by correlated random sequences, as the main characteristics of multimedia information streams are related to synchronization, that is, to the presence of relationships between the information units which make up the multimedia stream. This paper presents a method which allows easy and fast generation of correlated random sequences. The correlation among the generated values is obtained by random repetition of random variables, according to probability distributions which are derived from empirical histograms of the amplitude distribution and correlation among the values of the traffic source we intend to model by simulation.