Multicasting in DIS: A unified solution

Abstract

Multicasting, as an alternative to broadcasting, has great potential to improve DIS scalability by reducing the demands on network bandwidth and computational resources. We take an eclectic approach to incorporating multicasting into DIS, blending new ideas based on insights discussed here with the best schemes proposed previously. To our knowledge, no previous work has provided such a unification. The simplicity and completeness of our approach make it more promising than previous ones. In general (and in DIS in particular), the multicast problem should be considered as consisting of two parts: i) definition and use of multicast groups, and ii) efficient implementation of these groups. We describe a method for defining and using multicast groups, present its implementation requirements and show these to be realizable. Further, we provide insights into the configuration of DIS networks in order to obtain the most benefit from multicasting. Finally, we note that management of static objects is inherently related to any multicast solution. The integration of static object management with our multicast solution is made possible by its static nature and use of a regular grid.