Low-Latency Video Conferencing System for Geo-Distributed Data Centers

In the face of rising global demand for audio/video meetings, managing traffic across geographically distributed (geo-distributed) data centers presents a significant challenge due to the dynamic and limited nature of inter-DC network performance. Facing these issues, this paper introduces two novel techniques, VCRoute and WMJitter, to optimize the performance of geo-distributed video conferencing systems. VCRoute is a routing method designed for video conferencing data packets. It treats the routing problem as a Multi-Armed Bandit issue, and utilizes a tailored Thompson Sampling algorithm for resolution. Unlike traditional approaches, VCRoute uses predicted end-to-end latency as the routing selection reward for each packet, enabling effective and timely end-to-end latency optimization. In conjunction with VCRoute, we present WMJitter, a watermark-based mechanism for managing network jitter. Leveraging a window-based statistic method, WMJitter enables real-time network jitter estimation, leading to significant reductions in end-to-end delay and an improved balance between latency and loss rate. Evaluations based on real geo-distributed network performance demonstrate the effectiveness and scalability of VCRoute and WMJitter, offering robust solutions for optimizing video conferencing systems in geo-distributed settings.