Guest Editorial: Mobile Multimedia Communications

The papers in this special issue represent the seven best papers from the 6th IEEE International Workshop on Mobile Multimedia Communications (MOMUC'99), which was held in San Diego, November 15–17, 1999. The scope of MO-MUC'99 includes broadband wireless networking for data and multimedia, mobile multimedia systems and applications together with associated mobile computing devices, video processing and enabling software technologies. MOMUC'99 represents the sixth workshop in the series that started in MoMuC has established itself as a premier forum for the presentation and discussion of new ideas and technologies in the area of wireless networking and mobile multimedia communications and computing. The technical program consisted of 28 long and 22 short papers selected from 130 submissions. MOMUC'99 included excellent paper sessions on smart wireless systems, performance analysis, power control, mobile ad hoc networks, mobility management, mobile agents, wireless IP, wireless QOS, new wireless architectures, media access control, wireless broadband trials, adaptive wireless systems and personal area networks. We also had a first class invited program that complemented technical papers presented over three full days. Professor David Goodman (Polytechnic University) presented the keynote address on " Challenges of Mobile Multimedia Communications " and Dr. Mahmoud Naghshineh (IBM) provided the featured talk on " Pervasive Networking ". The meeting also included two lively panels on " Mobile Multimedia: An Industry Perspective " and " IP-based Mobile Telecommunications: Fact or Fiction? " rounding off what was an excellent and informative meeting. The first three papers in this special issue on mobile multimedia communications are concerned with power control and management in wireless networks. Effective power control is essential to promote system quality and efficiency in wireless networks. In the first paper of the special issue, Goodman and Mandayam, discuss the application of microeconomic theories to power control taking into account notions of utility and pricing. Network assisted power control is introduced that maximizes utilities for users while maintaining equal signal-to-interference ratios for all users. The proposed power control algorithm is implemented via signal-to-interference ratio balancing with the assistance of the network that broadcasts the common signal-to-interference ratio target. Mobile multimedia communication systems such as handheld and laptop devices suffer from low operation time due to their limited battery life. In the second paper, Ebert and Wolisz, introduce the concept of protocol harmonization to extend the time between battery charges for mobile devices using IEEE 802.11. This is achieved by combining tuning of the …