RTPSRTP

RTPSRTP is a hybrid communication protocol concept that combines Real-Time Publish-Subscribe (RTPS) with the Real-Time Transport Protocol (RTP) to move data in real time. It aims to provide the data-centric semantics of RTPS—the publish-subscribe model, built-in discovery, and Quality of Service (QoS) controls—together with the streaming reliability and timing guarantees of RTP used for media and sensor data transport.

In typical deployments, RTPSRTP maps RTPS data samples into RTP payloads and uses an RTP session to carry the traffic between producers and consumers. The RTPS layer handles domain discovery, topic definitions, and QoS negotiation, while the RTP layer handles packetization, sequencing, timestamps, and network transport. RTCP can be used to provide feedback on packet loss, jitter, and latency, which can be used by the RTPS layer to adapt data delivery.

Security may be addressed by using SRTP for confidentiality and integrity, and by applying RTPS security extensions if available. Multicast delivery is supported where network infrastructure permits, enabling scalable dissemination to multiple subscribers.

Standards and adoption: RTPS is part of the DDS/RTPS ecosystem, while RTP is defined by RFC 3550. RTPSRTP as a combined protocol is not a formal standard in most ecosystems; implementations are mostly research projects or vendor-specific solutions that bridge DDS/RTPS middleware with RTP stacks.

Use cases for RTPSRTP include real-time robotics telemetry, industrial automation, telepresence, and mixed-reality streaming where both data-centric QoS and real-time transport are required. Challenges include complexity, alignment of QoS semantics, and firewall/NAT traversal.