An Intelligent Fuzzy Logic-Based Content and Channel Aware Downlink Scheduler for Scalable Video over OFDMA Wireless Systems

The recent advancements of wireless technology and applications make downlink scheduling and resource allocations an important research topic. In this paper, we consider the problem of downlink scheduling for multi-user scalable video streaming over orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) channels. The video streams are precoded using a scalable video coding (SVC) scheme. We propose a fuzzy logic-based scheduling algorithm, which prioritises the transmission to different users by considering video content, and channel conditions. Furthermore, a novel analytical model and a new performance metric have been developed for the performance analysis of the proposed scheduling algorithm. The obtained results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms the content-blind/channel aware scheduling algorithms with a gain of as much as 19% in terms of the number of supported users. The proposed algorithm allows for a fairer allocation of resources among users across the entire sector coverage, allowing for the enhancement of video quality at edges of the cell while minimising the degradation of users closer to the base station.