Program Distribution Service Multicast Unicast Segmentation
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Content delivery network providers face significant challenges in managing infrastructure costs and maintaining quality-of-service standards for delivering programs to users on a national scale, particularly in determining the most efficient delivery methods between multicast and unicast systems.
Innovation Solution
A system that assigns programs to multicast or unicast delivery based on popularity, geographic region, and network resource availability, allowing users to select delivery methods and enabling error correction through unicast for multicasted programs, with in-home media devices storing and managing program data for flexible viewing.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of energy
If multicast delivery is used for popular programs, then network resource utilization is improved and infrastructure costs are reduced, but delivery reliability deteriorates due to error correction difficulties
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments program delivery into two distinct modes: multicast for popular programs to optimize network resources, and unicast for error-prone or less popular programs to ensure reliability. This segmentation allows the system to achieve both efficient network utilization and reliable delivery by selecting the appropriate mode based on program characteristics and network conditions.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically changes delivery parameters (multicast vs. unicast mode) based on real-time conditions including program popularity, network congestion levels, and error rates. This parameter adaptation enables the system to optimize network resource usage while maintaining delivery reliability by switching modes as conditions change.
2Reliability
If unicast delivery is used for all programs, then delivery reliability is maintained, but infrastructure costs increase and network congestion worsens
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies different delivery qualities to different programs based on their characteristics. Popular programs receive multicast delivery with optimized network resources, while less popular or error-prone programs receive unicast delivery for reliability. This local differentiation optimizes the balance between infrastructure costs and delivery reliability for each program type.
3Productivity
If multicast delivery is used, then network congestion is reduced, but error correction capability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The system introduces an intermediary mechanism that monitors delivery quality and can switch between multicast and unicast modes based on real-time error rates and network conditions. This intermediary control enables the system to maintain network efficiency through multicast while providing error correction capability when needed through unicast fallback.
Data Source
AI summary
A method, a device, and a non-transitory storage medium provide for receiving data that indicates programs available to users, wherein the programs include linear television programs, video-on-demand programs, and pay-per-view programs; determining, by the network device, a popularity value for each program; comparing, by the network device, each popularity value with a threshold popularity value; determining, by the network device, whether each popularity value satisfies the threshold popularity value; assigning, by the network device, each program associated with each popularity value that satisfies the threshold popularity value to multicast delivery based on the determining, wherein one or more programs assigned to multicast delivery include one or more of a video-on-demand program or a pay-per-view program; and multicasting each program assigned to multicast delivery.