System and method for monitoring whole home digital video recorder usage for internet protocol television

• US 10,652,601 B2
• Filed: 10/03/2017
• Issued: 05/12/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 10/16/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Opsalik, Kenneth, Earnshaw, Marisa, Malee, Daniel P., Mathew, John, Tektumandize, Giya
• Primary Examiner(s): Bruckart, Benjamin R
• Assistant Examiner(s): Tesfaye, Aklil M
• Application Number:
  US15/723,772
• Publication Number:
  US 20180041790A1
• Time in Patent Office: 952 Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2393 involving handling client requests scheduling or organising the servicing of application requests H04L67/60
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2402 Monitoring of the downstream path of the transmission network, e.g. bandwidth available traffic monitoring in data switching networks H04L43/00; monitoring data switching networks utilization H04L43/0876
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26216 involving the channel capacity, e.g. network bandwidth admission control, resource allocation in open networks H04L12/5692; flow control in packet networks H04L47/10; establishing a schedule or organising the servicing of application requests taking into account QoS H04L67/61
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2662 Controlling the complexity of the video stream, e.g. by scaling the resolution or bitrate of the video stream based on the client capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47202 for requesting content on demand, e.g. video on demand
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6125 involving transmission via Internet transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6582 Data stored in the client, e.g. viewing habits, hardware capabilities, credit card number arrangements where receivers interact with the broadcast H04H20/38
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/17336 Handling of requests in head-ends

Abstract

The subject disclosure describes identifying a table associated with a set-top box that receives services from equipment of a video head-end office, where the table indicates that the set-top box has requested a video stream that would exceed a first number of video streams allocated to the set-top box and would exceed a bandwidth configuration, detecting a conflicting event according to information in the table, reconfiguring the bandwidth configuration allocated to the plurality of set-top boxes to resolve the conflicting event, determining a second number of video streams requested by the plurality of set-top boxes when the conflicting event occurred, determining a third number of video streams to resolve the conflicting event based on a difference between the first number of video streams and the second number of video streams, and instructing the equipment to provide the third number of video streams to the set-top box. Other embodiments are disclosed.

Claims

1. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium, comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a processing system including a processor, facilitate performance of operations, comprising:

receiving a request for a video stream from among services from a first equipment of a plurality of customer premises equipment that receive services from equipment of a video head-end office of an interactive television network;

detecting a conflicting event based on a determination that supplying the video stream to the first equipment would exceed a bandwidth configuration of the plurality of the customer premises equipment;

determining a number of times that other conflicting events were created by the first equipment; and

updating the bandwidth configuration based on the number of times that other conflicting events were created by the first equipment.

2. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise determining whether to reconfigure the bandwidth configuration of the first equipment and the equipment of the video head-end office to resolve the conflicting event.

3. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the bandwidth configuration includes a number of video streams for the plurality of customer premises equipment.

4. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the bandwidth configuration comprises a first number of high definition video streams and a second number of standard definition video streams allocated to the first equipment.

5. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the first equipment comprises a set-top box.

6. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise storing the bandwidth configuration of the plurality of customer premises equipment.

7. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 6, wherein the bandwidth configuration of the plurality of customer premises equipment is stored at a first server as stored configuration information, and wherein the receiving the request for the video stream is stored at the first server as stored request information.

8. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein the operations further comprise translating a first format of the stored configuration information and a second format of the stored request information to a third format of the stored configuration information and a fourth format of the stored request information, wherein the third format and the fourth format are formatted for use in a second server.

9. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise transmitting the third format and the fourth format to the second server.

10. A method, comprising:

determining, by a processing system comprising a processor, a bandwidth configuration of a plurality of customer premises equipment that receive services from equipment of a video head-end office of an interactive television network;

receiving, by the processor, a request for a video stream from among the services from a first equipment of the plurality of the customer premises equipment;

receiving, by the processor, an indication of a conflicting event based on a received indication that supplying the video stream to the first equipment would exceed the bandwidth configuration of the plurality of the customer premises equipment;

determining, by the processor, a number of times that other conflicting events were created by the first equipment responsive to the indication; and

updating, by the processor, the bandwidth configuration based on the number of times responsive to the indication.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising determining whether to reconfigure the bandwidth configuration of the first equipment and the equipment of the video head-end office to resolve the conflicting event.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the bandwidth configuration comprises a number of video streams for the plurality of customer premises equipment.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the bandwidth configuration comprises a first number of high definition video streams and a second number of standard definition video streams allocated to the first equipment.

14. The method of claim 10, further comprising storing the bandwidth configuration of the plurality of customer premises equipment.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the bandwidth configuration of the plurality of customer premises equipment is stored at a first server as stored configuration information, and wherein the receiving the request for the video stream is stored at the first server as stored request information.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising transmitting the stored configuration information and the stored request information to a second server.

17. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium, comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a processing system including a processor, facilitate performance of operations, comprising:

receiving a bandwidth configuration of a customer premises for customer premises equipment that receives services from equipment of a video head-end office of an interactive television network;

receiving an indication that a first equipment of the customer premises equipment requested a video stream exceeding a first bandwidth configuration of the plurality of the customer premises;

determining a number of times that the first equipment of the customer premises equipment requested a video stream exceeding a limit of the first bandwidth configuration of the customer premises; and

updating the bandwidth configuration to an updated bandwidth configuration responsive to the indication and based on the number of times that the first equipment of the customer premises equipment requested a video stream exceeding a limit of the first bandwidth configuration of the customer premises.

18. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the operations further comprise determining a second bandwidth configuration based on a number of video streams received by the customer premises when the indication was received.

19. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the first bandwidth configuration is based on an allocated bandwidth for the customer premises.

20. The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the updated bandwidth configuration is based on a difference between the first bandwidth configuration and the second bandwidth configuration.