Towards QoE-aware mobile infrastructures QoE-based Resource Management in Mobile Networks

Abstract: With the development of mobile networks, customer needs and behaviourshave changed. Mobile communications means so much more than simplevoice communication; there is now mobile Internet with web surfing, videophone,streaming media, and micro blogging. The objective of network optimizationhas gradually shifted from enhancing network performance to improvequality of experience (QoE). Therefore, assessing and optimizing QoEis the trend for optimizing future mobile networks.Today, users want reliable access for their content, wherever they go inthe network. To deliver the best possible experience to mobile broadbandsubscribers, operators need new ways to assess performance that will enablethem to build and manage their networks in the most efficient way. The newparadigmatic eco system (user-interface-network-content) requires novel anddisruptive end-to-end considerations in order to enable and sustain the nextgeneration of services and user experience. Thus, the extraordinary adoptionof mobile connectivity by end users, and the need for optimized bandwidthmanagement network resource, on the one hand, and the growing interest forgood quality content delivery/consumption, is boosting the creation of newnetwork solutions.We consider that by taking advantage of the capacity to support multimedia platforms and applications of mobile devices (e.g. smartphones, tablets,etc.) is possible to incorporate and provide awareness to the wireless infrastructuresin the context of cross-layer systems to manage the resource allocationaccording to expected QoE levels. In this thesis, we address the questionon how to implement QoE-aware mobile networks and evaluate differentschedulers oriented to take advantage of the proposed architecture. We showthat by providing QoE-awareness to the network infrastructure is possible toimprove user’s QoE and generate impacts in the utilization of the networkresources. With this study, we provide insights into the broader question ofwhether future mobile infrastructures can be deployed considering QoE besidesthe classical QoS considerations.