Method and apparatus to manage a conference

• US 20040042601A1
• Filed: 08/28/2002
• Published: 03/04/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 08/28/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Original Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Inventors: Miao, Kai X.
• Granted Patent: US 7,280,650 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 379/202.01
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/567 Multimedia conference systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/568 audio processing specific to telephonic conferencing, e.g. spatial distribution, mixing of participants echo suppression in two-way loud-speaking telephone systems H04M9/02; sound field processing per se H04S7/30

Abstract

A method and apparatus to manage delay in a multimedia conference session is described.

Claims

1. A method to perform multimedia conferencing, comprising:

receiving at least three streams of multimedia information for a conferencing session;

determining a delay parameter for at least one of said streams; and

delaying at least one of said streams using said delay parameter.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein one of said streams comprises Pulse Code Modulating (PCM) signals.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein one of said streams comprises media data packets.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein said multimedia information comprises voice information.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said delay parameter represents a length of time to delay a stream of multimedia information.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein said determining comprises:

determining a first parameter representing a delay time associated with jitter;

determining a second parameter representing a delay time associated with a voice coding algorithm; and

determining said delay parameter using said first and second parameters.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein said delay parameter is updated on a periodic basis.

8. A system to perform multimedia conferencing, comprising:

a set of call terminals to communicate streams of multimedia information;

a conferencing server to combine said streams for a conference session;

a delay management module to determine a delay parameter for one of said streams; and

a synchronization buffer to receive said delay parameter and delay one of said streams in accordance with said delay parameter.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein said call terminals comprise at least one of a telephone, a packet telephony telephone and a wireless transceiver.

10. The system of claim 8, wherein said conferencing server further comprises a PSTN interface to convert PSTN signals to packet signals.

11. The system of claim 8, further comprising a jitter buffer associated with one of said streams, and wherein one of said call terminals include a voice codec, with said delay management module determining said delay parameter by determining a delay associated with said voice codec and a delay associated with said jitter buffer.

12. An article comprising:

a storage medium;

said storage medium including stored instructions that, when executed by a processor, result in performing multimedia conferencing by receiving at least three streams of multimedia information for a conferencing session, determining a delay parameter for at least one of said streams, and delaying at least one of said streams using said delay parameter.

13. The article of claim 12, wherein the stored instructions, when executed by a processor, further result in said determining by determining a first parameter representing a delay time associated with jitter, determining a second parameter representing a delay time associated with a voice coding algorithm, and determining said delay parameter using said first and second parameters.

14. The article of claim 12, wherein the stored instructions, when executed by a processor, further result in updating said delay parameter on a periodic basis.

15. A system, comprising:

a computing platform adapted to perform multimedia conferencing;

said platform being further adapted to receiving at least three streams of multimedia information for a conferencing session, determining a delay parameter for at least one of said streams, and delaying at least one of said streams using said delay parameter.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein said platform is further adapted to determining said delay parameter by determining a first parameter representing a delay time associated with jitter, determining a second parameter representing a delay time associated with a voice coding algorithm, and determining said delay parameter using said first and second parameters.

17. The system of claim 15, wherein said platform is further adapted to updating said delay parameter on a periodic basis.