Intermediate Device Protocol Adaptation for Multimedia Streaming
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current digital distribution platforms for interactive applications, such as video games, face challenges in broadcasting multimedia streams to external rendering devices while maintaining efficient user access to their network, due to bandwidth competition and protocol incompatibilities, leading to deteriorated rendering quality and complex, resource-intensive protocol adaptation processes.
Innovation Solution
A method involving an intermediate device that captures and modifies multimedia streams from digital distribution platforms to convert them into compatible protocols for external rendering devices, allowing simultaneous broadcasting without overburdening the user's internet connection, using duplication and protocol adaptation techniques like de-encapsulation and re-encapsulation to ensure real-time compatibility.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a user performs protocol adaptation to broadcast multimedia streams to external rendering devices, then compatibility with external protocols is improved, but processing complexity and resource consumption increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediate device that acts as a mediator between the digital distribution platform and external rendering devices. This device performs protocol adaptation (de-encapsulation and re-encapsulation) in the network layer, allowing the user's terminal to maintain simple client functionality while the intermediate device handles the complex protocol conversion to make streams compatible with external rendering devices
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the protocol adaptation function from the user's terminal and relocates it to an intermediate device in the network. This segmentation allows the terminal to focus on simple stream reception and playback, while the intermediate device handles the complex protocol conversion tasks, reducing overall system complexity at the user end
2Adaptability or versatility
If a user broadcasts multimedia streams to external rendering devices, then broadcasting capability is improved, but internet bandwidth consumption increases due to competition with interactive application streams
Solution Approach 1:
The intermediate device captures the multimedia stream directly from the digital distribution platform's server, bypassing the user's terminal and internet connection. This mediation allows the broadcast function to operate independently on a separate network path, eliminating bandwidth competition with the interactive application stream that travels through the user's internet connection
Solution Approach 2:
The patent extracts the broadcast function from the user's terminal and relocates it to an intermediate device. By taking out the broadcasting capability from the user's system and placing it in the network infrastructure, the solution eliminates the conflict between broadcast traffic and interactive application traffic for bandwidth resources
3Adaptability or versatility
If protocol adaptation is performed at the user's terminal, then external rendering device compatibility is improved, but real-time processing is compromised due to time-consuming operations
Solution Approach 1:
The intermediate device serves as a real-time protocol adaptation intermediary, performing de-encapsulation and re-encapsulation operations in the network layer with optimized processing. This allows protocol compatibility to be achieved without burdening the user's terminal resources, maintaining real-time performance by distributing the processing load to dedicated network infrastructure
Data Source
AI summary
A method is provided for processing multimedia streams between a platform for digital distribution of interactive applications and a customer terminal, connected through a communications network and communicating with each other according to a first communication protocol. The method includes the following acts implemented by an intermediate device distinct from the customer terminal: modifying a multimedia stream compliant with the first communication protocol, obtained from a multimedia stream transmitted from the platform for the digital distribution of interactive applications to the customer terminal, generating at least one modified multimedia stream compliant with at least one second communication protocol, the at least one second communication protocol being distinct from the first communication protocol, and transmitting the at least one modified multimedia stream to at least one rendering device using the at least one second communication protocol.