Overview
ISO/IEC TR 29181-6:2013 is a Technical Report that defines the problem statement and requirements for media transport in the Future Network (FN). Focused on delivering seamless, high-quality media over heterogeneous networks, the standard details media transport needs, classifies basic and composite media services, and specifies the roles and functionality of Media Aware Network Elements (MANE) - network nodes that are content- and context-aware to optimize media delivery. This report is informative (TR) and intended for network architects, implementers and standards bodies working on next‑generation media transport and content delivery.
Key Topics and Requirements
- Media transport requirements: Detailed descriptions for transporting time-dependent (live, low-latency) and time-independent (static, streamed) media across diverse network environments.
- Service classification: Identification of basic services and media services tailored to user preferences and heterogeneous access networks.
- MANE functionality: Requirements for content-aware processing, context-awareness, decision-making, congestion control, and seamless mobility support to improve QoE (quality of experience).
- Support models: Accommodation of both connection‑oriented and connection‑less transport models.
- Content/container concepts: Use of containers and headers to carry media attributes and network-related metadata for adaptive routing and service selection.
- Technical problems identified:
- Protocol overhead and unnecessary encapsulation
- Limitations of layered coding (LC) and need for alternatives like multiple description coding (MDC)
- Lack of cross-layer information exchange and media-awareness in current stacks
- Need to merge diverse existing solutions for unified media transport
- Quality requirements: Emphasis on QoS (bandwidth, delay, error resilience) and mapping to QoE for media services.
Applications and Who Should Use It
ISO/IEC TR 29181-6 is practical for:
- Network architects and operators designing Future Network and content delivery infrastructures (CDNs, carrier networks).
- CDN and MANE vendors implementing media-aware nodes, congestion control, and adaptive routing.
- Multimedia application developers (video conferencing, VoIP, streaming services) seeking transport-aware designs.
- Standards bodies and researchers aligning work on media transport, cross-layer optimization, and context-aware networking.
Use cases in the report include HD multiparty videoconference, web browsing optimizations, and MANE-based content-aware congestion control and mobility.
Related Standards
Annex B references related activities and standards such as:
- MMT (MPEG Media Transport)
- CDNi (Content Delivery Network Interconnection)
- Research projects: MEDIEVAL, SMART, and ALICANTE
Keywords: ISO/IEC TR 29181-6:2013, media transport, Future Network, Media Aware Network Element, MANE, QoS, QoE, content delivery, layered coding, MDC, CDN, heterogeneous networks.