Distributed Rate Control for Video Streaming over Wireless Networks with Intersession Network Coding

In this paper, we study the problem of rate control over wireless networks with intersession network coding. We formulate the general problem as a utility maximization problem, show that it has a distributed solution and demonstrate convergence through numerical simulations. Rate control for video streaming fits naturally within this framework. However, the time-varying nature of video content implies time-varying utilities and affects the underlying network coding opportunities. A key observation is that by delaying some scenes and by optimizing the rate allocation over longer time intervals, we can create more network coding opportunities and thus achieve higher total utility. We develop distributed rate allocation schemes that exploit this observation and demonstrate the benefit through numerical simulations.