System Support for Integrated Desktop Video Conferencing

Desktop computers are increasingly used as communication devices. Advances in digital media are making the integration of video into desktop computers practical, both technically and economically. At the convergence of these technologies is computer-integrated interactive video conferencing. This paper discusses the requirements of integrated desktop video conferencing on a networked set of multimedia-capable workstations. Among those requirements are the following: Media-intensive parts of applications should be distributed; a multimedia software platform should provide support for this. Audio and video conferencing require network transparent location and reference of people, media devices, and conferences. The name and remote access reference for a conference must be exportable to client applications. All group support applications that provide remote access require security services. True in any network application, this is more important with live communication streams, such as audio and video. Low latency of an audio connection is more important than synchronization of audio with other timecritical communication, such as video conferencing and user gestures in shared interactive applications. To efficiently support multiperson conferences, multicast networking protocols are essential. A research prototype multimedia platform was evaluated, based on these requirements. This paper presents the lessons learned about system requirements for video conferencing that are not obviously required for single-user multimedia. It also discusses the motivation and requirements for extending the platform to support shared applications not previously considered to have constraints related to time.