Efficient multicast routing with delay constraints

To support real-time multimedia applications in BISDN networks, QoS guaranteed multicast routing is essential. Traditional multicast routing algorithms used for solving the Steiner tree problem cannot be used in this scenario, because QoS constraints on links are not considered. In this paper, we present two efficient source-based multicast routing algorithms in directed networks. The objective of the routing algorithms is to minimize the multicast tree cost while maintaining a bound on delay. Simulation results show that these two heuristics can greatly improve the multicast tree cost measure in comparison with the shortest path routing schemes. Their performance is close to that of the known CSTc algorithm proposed by Kompell et al. in Reference 1, but requiring a much shorter computation time. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.