A perceived quality-aware cross layer monitoring framework for real-time media content adaptation

The media content provision in a variety of quality and price levels, through the concept of the perceived quality of service (PQoS) is considered as the most dominant among the various future visions of multimedia networking. The concept of the PQoS-driven service provision, based on multimedia content adaptation across heterogeneous networks, will become in the near future a key-issue among service providers (SPs). This paper presents, describes and proposes a novel cross layer monitoring architecture, driven by a prototype mapping between network QoS (NQoS) and PQoS parameters, aiming at providing perceived performance verification with respect to the QoS guarantees specified in contractual agreements between providers and end-users. Towards this, the proposed framework takes sophisticated actions for real time media content adaption with aim the optimization of the finally delivered perceptual quality and the maximization of the user experience. The validity of the proposed model is tested by a real test-bed, demonstrating satisfactory accuracy of the network measurements and the overall feasibility of the proposed monitoring solution.