  For most wireless services with variable rate transmission, both average rate
and rate oscillation are important performance metrics. The traditional
performance criterion, utility of average transmission rate, boosts the average
rate but also results in high rate oscillations. We introduce a utility
function of instantaneous transmission rates. It is capable of facilitating the
resource allocation with flexible combinations of average rate and rate
oscillation. Based on the new utility, we consider the time and power
allocation in a time-shared wireless network. Two adaptation policies are
developed, namely, time sharing (TS) and joint time sharing and power control
(JTPC). An extension to quantized time sharing with limited channel feedback
(QTSL) for practical systems is also discussed. Simulation results show that by
controlling the concavity of the utility function, a tradeoff between the
average rate and rate oscillation can be easily made.
