Synchronization of multimedia data for a multimedia news-on-demand application

We present a complete software control architecture for synchronizing multiple data streams generated from distributed media-storing database servers without the use of a global clock. Independent network connections are set up to remote workstations for multimedia presentations. Based on the document scenario and traffic predictions, stream delivery scheduling is performed in a centralized manner. Certain compensation mechanisms at the receiver are also necessary due to the presence of random network delays. A stream synchronization protocol (SSP) allows for synchronization recovery, ensuring a high quality multimedia display at the receiver. SSP uses synchronization quality of service parameters to guarantee the simultaneous delivery of the different types of data streams. In the proposed architecture, a priority-based synchronization control mechanism for MPEG-2 coded data streams is also provided. A performance modeling of the SSP is presented using the DSPN models. Relevant results such as the effect of the SSP, the number of synchronization errors, etc., are obtained