EXTENSIBLE VIDEO PLAYER SELECTION VIA SERVER-SIDE DETECTION OF CLIENT APPLICATION

• US 20120124123A1
• Filed: 11/12/2010
• Published: 05/17/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 11/12/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: PIERCE, Eric, Chaudhuri, Mahua, Dharap, Parag
• Granted Patent: US 8,892,634 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25858 involving client software characteristics, e.g. OS identifier
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4782 Web browsing , e.g. WebTV
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6125 involving transmission via Internet transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6175 involving transmission via Internet broadcast-related systems characterised by the transmission system being the Internet H04H60/82

Abstract

A web server receives from different client applications HTTP requests for the same webpage in which video content is to be embedded. The web server provides to each of the client applications an HTTP response to the HTTP request. The HTML or XHTML text included in the response references the video content solely in a manner that is specific to a single video player. The HTML or XHTML text returned in a response to a request may be different for different client applications, even though the different client applications all requested the same webpage or portion of webpage. The video file referenced by the HTML or XHTML text returned in a response may be different for different client applications, even though the video files encode the same video content.

Claims

1. A method of handling Hypertext Transfer Protocol ‘

HTTP’

requests, the method comprising;

receiving a first HTTP request for a requested webpage or portion thereof that is to have video content embedded therein, the first HTTP request created by a first client application;

providing to the first client application a first HTTP response to the first HTTP request, the first HTTP response including first Hypertext Markup Language ‘

HTML’

or eXtensible HTML ‘

XHTML’

text that references the video content solely in a manner specific to a first video player;

receiving a second HTTP request for the requested webpage or the portion thereof, the second HTTP request created by a second client application that is different from the first client application;

providing to the second client application a second HTTP response to the second HTTP request, the second HTTP response including second HTML or XHTML text that references the video content solely in a manner specific to a second video player that is different from the first video player.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

providing to the first client application a first video file that encodes the video content in a first video file format, where the first HTML or XHTML text references the first video file; and

providing the first video file to the second client application, where the second HTML or XHMTL text references the first video file.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

providing to the first client application a first video file that encodes the video content in a first video file format, where the first HTML or XHTML text references the first video file; and

providing to the second client application a second video file that encodes the video content in a second video file format that is different from the first video file format, where the second HTML or XHMTL text references the second video file.

4. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the first video player is supported by the first client application.

5. The method as claimed in claim 4, wherein the second video player is supported by the first client application.

6. The method as claimed in claim 4, wherein the second video player is not supported by the first client application.

7. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the first video player is not supported by the first client application.

8. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

determining that the first client application created the first HTTP request by analyzing the first HTTP request.

9. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

analyzing a description of the requested webpage to determine that the video content is to be embedded in the requested webpage;

determining whether the first client application supports any video player in an ordered list of one or more video players associated with the requested webpage;

where the first client application does not support any video player in the ordered list, selecting a last video player in the ordered list as the first video player; and

where the first client application supports one or more of the one or more video players in the ordered list, selecting as the first video player a first video player in the ordered list that is supported by the first client application.

10. The method as claimed in claim 9, wherein the description is a static webpage and the first HTML or XHTML text references the video content in a different manner than the manner in which the static webpage references the video content.

11. The method as claimed in claim 9, wherein the description is a description of a dynamic webpage.

12. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

generating the first HTML or XHTML text.

13. The method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining a cache key for a combination of the requested webpage and the first video player;

where the cache key does not correspond to any entry in a cache of HTML or XHTML text, generating the first HTML or XHTML text and caching the first HTML or XHTML text in the cache indexed by the cache key; and

where the cache key corresponds to an entry in the cache, loading the first HTML or XHTML text from the cache.

14. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable components comprising:

a request analyzer to analyze a Hypertext Transfer Protocol ‘

HTTP’

request for a requested webpage in which video content is to be embedded and to determine from the HTTP request which client application created the HTTP request;

a video player selector to receive an identification of the client application that created the HTTP request from the request analyzer and to select a selected video player by;

determining whether the client application that created the HTTP request supports any video player in an ordered list of one or more video players associated with the requested webpage;

where the client application does not support any video player in the ordered list, selecting as the selected video player a last video player in the ordered list; and

where the client application supports one or more of the one or more video players in the ordered list, selecting as the selected video player a first video player in the ordered list that is supported by the client application;

a Hypertext Markup Language/eXtensible Hypertext Markup Language ‘

HTML/XHTML’

generator to receive an indication of the selected video player from the video player selector and to obtain HTML or XHTML text that references the video content solely in a manner specific to the selected video player; and

an HTTP response generator to receive the HTML or XHTML text from the HTML/XHTML generator and to generate an HTTP response to the HTTP request, the HTTP response including the HTML or XHTML text.

15. The computer-readable medium as claimed in claim 14, wherein the HTML/XHTML generator is to generate the HTML or XHTML text that references the video content solely in the manner specific to the selected video player.

16. The computer-readable medium as claimed in claim 14, wherein the HTML/XHTML generator is (i) to obtain a cache key for a combination of the requested webpage and the selected video player, (ii) where the cache key does not correspond to any entry in a cache, to generate the HTML or XHTML text that references the video content solely in the manner specific to the selected video player and to cache the HTML or XHTML text in the cache indexed by the cache key, and (iii) where the cache key corresponds to an entry in the cache, to load the HTML or XHTML text from the cache.

17. A computer system comprising:

a communication connection through which the computer system is able to communicate with client computers;

a processing unit; and

a system memory storing a web server, the web server able to receive a first Hypertext Transfer Protocol ‘

HTTP’

request for a requested webpage or portion thereof that is to have video content embedded therein, the first HTTP request created by a first client application, the web server able to provide to the first client application a first HTTP response to the first HTTP request, the first HTTP response including first Hypertext Markup Language ‘

HTML’

or eXtensible HTML ‘

XHTML’

text that references the video content solely in a manner specific to a first video player, the web server able to receive a second HTTP request for the requested webpage or the portion thereof, the second HTTP request created by a second client application that is different from the first client application, the web server able to provide to the second client application a second HTTP response to the second HTTP request, the second HTTP response including second HTML or XHTML text that references the video content solely in a manner specific to a second video player that is different from the first video player.

18. The computer system as claimed in claim 17, where the web server is able to provide to the first client application a first video file that encodes the video content in a first video file format and to provide the first video file to the second client application, where the first HTML or XHTML text and the second HTML or XHTML text both reference the first video file.

19. The computer system as claimed in claim 17, where the web server is able to provide to the first client application a first video file that encodes the video content in a first video file format and to provide to the second client application a second video file that encodes the video content in a second video file format that is different from the first video file format, where the first HTML or XHTML text references the first video file and the second HTML or XHTML text references the second video file.

20. The computer system as claimed in claim 17, where the web server is able to determine that the first client application created the first HTTP request by analyzing the first HTTP request.