OptIPuter: SAGE Visualcasting with HD Teleconferencing 2008

In fulfillment of his PhD dissertation “SAGE Visualcasting,” UIC/EVL student Byungil Jeong used SAGE Visualcasting to broadcast high-definition (HD) video teleconferences among five sites. SAGE Visualcasting can simultaneously distribute HD video and ultra-high-resolution visualizations in real time to multiple sites. It is a scalable, real-time image broadcasting service that enables applications-centric multi-point collaborative work sessions – i.e., the users decide who participates and when. It does not require multicast, a network-centric technology that requires network engineering at all sites prior to working.

Visualcasting uses commodity clusters (SAGE Bridges) to replicate and send real-time ultra-high-resolution content to multiple sites. To scale up the resolution or number of sites, one must increase the number of cluster nodes. This image shows the HD teleconference from UIC/EVL’s viewpoint; while EVL is not projected on the tiled display (but reflected), one sees connections to U Michigan, SARA, GIST and KISTI.

URL:

www.evl.uic.edu/cavern/sage
www.evl.uic.edu/core.php?mod=4&type=4&indi=566
www.optiputer.net

Collaborators:

USA:
University of Illinois at Chicago/Electronic Visualization Laboratory (UIC/EVL); University of Michigan/School of Information

Netherlands:
SARA

Korea:
Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology (GIST); Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI); Korea


Two 10Gbps SAGE Bridge cluster nodes located at StarLight were used. EVL connects to StarLight via I-WIRE. U. Michigan connects to StarLight via Michigan LightRail (MiLR). GIST and KISTI connect via KREONet2/CANARIE. SARA connects via TransLight/StarLight. In this demo, EVL, Michigan, SARA, KISTI and GIST sent video from their facilities to SAGE Bridge at StarLight, and received only those videos they wanted to receive. For example, while SARA sent its video stream, it chose to only receive streams from EVL and Michigan. The following MTRG chart shows that 1.7Gbps was being streamed over TransLight/StarLight to/from SARA (~600Mb per video stream).