Stream control failover utilizing an attribute-dependent protection mechanism

• US 20060248213A1
• Filed: 03/31/2006
• Published: 11/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/01/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Synamedia Limited
• Original Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Inventors: Oyler, Mel, Sherer, W. Paul, Connery, Glenn, Blattman, Kirk, Major, Robert Drew, Davis, Howard, Kiewlich, Daniel, Sharma, Neeraj K., Chou, Hoi-Tauw
• Granted Patent: US 7,721,117 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/231
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/611 for multicast or broadcast systems for broadcast or conference H04L12/18; arrangements for broadcast or distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/00; arrangements for broadcast applications with a direct linkage to broadcast information or to broadcast space-time H04H60/00; selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS], H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/612 for unicast
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/70 Media network packetisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1001 for accessing one among a plurality of replicated servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1008 based on parameters of servers, e.g. available memory or workload monitoring of computer activity G06F11/30
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/101 based on network conditions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1012 based on compliance of requirements or conditions with available server resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1034 Reaction to server failures by a load balancer
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/40 for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2181 comprising remotely distributed storage units, e.g. when movies are replicated over a plurality of video servers distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS], H04L67/1097
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23116 involving data replication, e.g. over plural servers synchronization of replicated data G06F11/1658; error detection or correction by means of data replication G06F11/2053; replication in distributed file systems G06F16/10; replication in distributed file systems G06F16/27; replication or mirroring of data in data networks H04L67/1095
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2404 Monitoring of server processing errors or hardware failure error or fault detection G06F11/07; monitoring in general G06F11/30
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/266 Channel or content management, e.g. generation and management of keys and entitlement messages in a conditional access system, merging a VOD unicast channel into a multicast channel
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/631 Multimode Transmission, e.g. transmitting basic layers and enhancement layers of the content over different transmission paths or transmitting with different error corrections, different keys or with different transmission protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/64322 IP

Abstract

A technique for managing the streaming of digital video content to multiple clients involves identifying an attribute of a content element that is streamed to a client and selecting a protection mechanism for the content element as a function of the attribute, wherein the protection mechanism enables streaming of the content element to the clients in the event of a resource failure. In an example, the identified attribute is an indication of the popularity of the content element (e.g., as measured by the number of active streams), such that the protection mechanism is selected as a function of the popularity of the content element. In an embodiment, protection mechanisms that offer a higher level of protection are selected for the more popular content elements and protection mechanisms that offer a lower level of protection are selected for the less popular content elements.

Claims

1. A method for managing the streaming of digital video content to multiple clients, the method comprising:

identifying an attribute of a content element that is streamed to a client; and

selecting a protection mechanism for the content element as a function of the attribute, wherein the protection mechanism enables streaming of the content element to the client in the event of a resource failure.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the attribute of the content element is an indication of the popularity of the content element.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the selection of a protection mechanism further comprises selecting a protection mechanism that provides a higher level of protection for a more popular content element and a lower level of protection for a less popular content element.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the attribute of the content element is an indication of the type of the content element.

5. The method of claim 2 wherein the attribute of the content element is an indication of the importance of the content element.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the selection of a protection mechanism further comprises selecting a protection mechanism that provides a higher level of protection for a more important content element and a lower level of protection for a less important content element.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising prioritizing attributes of content elements and associating the prioritized attributes with protection mechanisms.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein prioritizing attributes of content elements comprises establishing popularity categories for content elements and associating the popularity categories with protection mechanisms.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein protection mechanisms that provide higher levels of protection are associated with popularity categories of more popular content elements and wherein protection mechanisms that provide lower levels of protection are associated with popularity categories of less popular content elements.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein a selected protection mechanism comprises:

providing the same digital video content to first and second stream servers in a logical group of stream servers;

storing the digital video content into random access memory (RAM) at both the first and second stream servers;

streaming the digital video content to a client from the first stream server but not the second stream server; and

switching to streaming the digital video content to the client from the second stream server instead of the first stream server after a failure is detected in the first stream server, the steaming including activating an interface of the second stream server that was not activated until after the failure in the first stream server was detected.

11. The method of claim 1 further comprising prioritizing multiple attributes and associating each of the prioritized attributes with a protection mechanism that represents a different level of protection.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising associating higher priorities with protection mechanisms that provide higher levels of protection and associating lower priorities with protection mechanisms that provide lower levels of protection.

13. The method of claim 1 wherein an attribute of a content element is an indication of the popularity of the content element and wherein the popularity of a content element is determined based on real time popularity information.

14. The method of claim 1 wherein identifying an attribute comprises generating popularity information related to the content element.

15. The method of claim 1 wherein selecting a protection mechanism comprises:

identifying the resource requirements of multiple protection mechanisms;

establishing a fault recovery requirement for a content element; and

selecting, for the content element, the protection mechanism with the lowest resource requirement that meets the fault recovery requirement for the content element.

16. The method of claim 2 further comprising establishing a logical group of stream servers and distributing streams associated with the same content element amongst the stream servers in the logical group as a function of the popularity of the content element.

17. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

establishing a logical group of IP-connected stream servers;

generating state information at multiple stream servers within the logical group;

sharing state information amongst stream servers in the logical group; and

using the shared state information to respond to resource failures within the logical group.

18. A system for managing the streaming of digital video content to multiple clients, the system comprising:

an attribute engine configured to identify an attribute of a content element that is streamed to a client; and

a protection mechanism selector configured to select a protection mechanism for the content element as a function of the attribute, wherein the protection mechanism enables streaming of the content element to the client in the event of a resource failure.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the attribute of the content element is an indication of the popularity of the content element.

20. The system of claim 19 wherein the selection of a protection mechanism further comprises selecting a protection mechanism that provides a higher level of protection for a more popular content element and a lower level of protection for a less popular content element.

21. A system for managing the streaming of digital video content to multiple clients, the system comprising:

multiple stream servers that are logically connected into a logical group, wherein at least one of the stream servers in the logical group comprises;

an attribute engine configured to identify an attribute of a content element that is streamed from one of the stream servers in the logical group to a client; and

a protection mechanism selector configured to select a protection mechanism for the content element as a function of the attribute, wherein the protection mechanism enables streaming of the content element from one of the stream servers in the logical group to the client in the event of a resource failure.

22. The system of claim 21 wherein the attribute of the content element is an indication of the popularity of the content element.

23. The system of claim 22 wherein the selection of a protection mechanism further comprises selecting a protection mechanism that provides a higher level of protection for a more popular content element and a lower level of protection for a less popular content element.