Performance Evaluation of the XMSF Overlay Multicast Prototype

Growing demand for use of Internet/Web-based services in large scale real-time distributed virtual simulation (RT-DVS) and other real-time applications is fueling extensive interest in overlay multicast protocols. These applications require many-to-many multicast services that are not available as an open Internet service today and are not likely to be offered as an Internet-wide service in the near future. This paper describes an early implementation of the Extensible Modeling and Simulation Framework Overlay Multicast (XOM). XOM is an overlay multicast protocol designed to support many-to-many multicast for RT-DVS applications, using Internet Protocol (IP) multicast above the overlay and IP unicast under the overlay. We summarize the architecture and key design considerations of XOM and provide preliminary analytical, simulation, and laboratory measurement results for our prototype. We conclude with an overview of the range of applications for which the current prototype can be expected to yield satisfactory results.