Method of risk-sensitive rate correction for dynamic heterogeneous networks

A dynamic heterogeneous network for transmitting media over satellite networks and terrestrial networks, said system comprising:

• at least one source for transmitting a media signal;
• at least one destination for receiving a media signal;
• a link intermediate said at least one source and said at least one destination, and being in direct communication with said at least one source and said at least one destination, whereby a media signal transmitted from said source is transmitted through said link towards said destination, and
• a non-transitory computer readable medium operably associated with said link and configured to autonomously allocate a respective buffer size to each of said media signals to be transmitted to said source according to a closed loop allocation algorithm having predetermined rate allocation performance specifications and which
• a) first determines an actual demand rate for each media signal, a logical queue and a buffer size,
• b) then determines a difference between said actual demand rate and an actual service rate, a buffer size and an associated buffer setpoint,
• c) determines a signal bottleneck for an epoch based upon at least one penalty for a high jitter or a high variability of a source rate from a plurality of predetermined sources,
• d) reconfigures a rate allocation allowance adapted to reduce said bottleneck for at least one said media signal,
• e) uses a stochastic control paradigm to reduce performance variations in said rate allocation allowance and
• f) transitions to an adaptive Reno window allocation scheme for controlling a plurality of outstanding data packets.

A method of transmitting media using a dynamic heterogeneous network, said method comprising the steps of:

• providing at least one source for transmitting a media signal;
• providing at least one desination for receiving a media signal;
• providing a link intermediate said at least one source and said at least one destination, and being in direct communication with said at least one source and said at least one destination, whereby a media signal transmitted from said source is transmitted through said link towards said destination;
• determining an actual demand rate for each media signal, a logical queue and a buffer size;
• determining a difference between said actual demand rate and an actual service rate, a buffer size and an associated buffer setpoint;
• determining a rate allocation allowance for at least one said media signal;
• and
• using a stochastic control paradigm to reduce performance variations in said rate allocation allowance to autonomously allocate a said respective buffer size to each of said media signals to be transmitted to said source according to a closed loop allocation algorithm;
• and
• using a Minimal Cost Variance paradigm predetermined rate allocation performance specification to minimize a variation around said buffer setpoint.