A new delay‐constrained algorithm for multicast routing tree construction

New multimedia applications provide guaranteed end-to-end quality of service (QoS) and have stringent constraints on delay, delay-jitter, bandwidth, cost, etc. The main task of QoS routing is to find a route in the network, with sufficient resources to satisfy the constraints. Most multicast routing algorithms are not fast enough for large-scale networks and where the source node uses global cost information to construct a multicast tree. We propose a fast and simple heuristic algorithm (EPDT) for delay-constrained routing problem for multicast tree construction. This algorithm uses a greedy strategy based on shortest-path and minimal spanning trees. It combines the minimum cost and the minimum radius objectives by combining respectively optimal Prim's and Dijkstra's algorithms. It biases routes through destinations. Besides, it uses cost information only from neighbouring nodes as it proceeds, which makes it more practical, from an implementation point of view. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.