Multirate multicast service provisioning II: a tâtonnement process for rate allocation

In multirate multicast different users in the same multicast group can receive services at different rates depending on their own requirements and the congestion level of the network. In this two-part paper we present a general framework for addressing the optimal rate control problem in multirate multicast where the objective is the maximization of a social welfare function expressed by the sum of the users' utility functions. In Part II we present a market based mechanism and an adjustment process that have the following features. They satisfy the informational constraints imposed by the nature of multirate multicast; and when they are combined with the results of Part I they result in an optimal solution of the corresponding centralized multirate multicast problem. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]