Systems and Methods for Performing Quality Based Streaming

• US 20190327510A1
• Filed: 05/20/2019
• Published: 10/24/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 05/11/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: MediaMelon, Inc.
• Original Assignee: MediaMelon, Inc.
• Inventors: Kalagi, Ameet, Satija, Rupesh Kumar, Begen, Ali C.
• Granted Patent: US 11,076,187 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0882 Utilisation of link capacity
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/00 Traffic control in data switching networks arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received H04L1/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/38 by adapting coding or compression rate
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/613 for the control of the source by the destination control signals issued by the client directed to the server or network components specially adapted for selective content distribution H04N21/637
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/65 Network streaming protocols, e.g. real-time transport protocol [RTP] or real-time control protocol [RTCP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/70 Media network packetisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/762 at the source reformatting of additional data in video distribution servers H04N21/2355
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/80 Responding to QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23439 for generating different versions
• 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 21/2662 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 21/44004 involving video buffer management, e.g. video decoder buffer or video display buffer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44209 Monitoring of downstream path of the transmission network originating from a server, e.g. bandwidth variations of a wireless network arrangements for maintenance or administration in data switching networks involving bandwidth and capacity management H04L41/0896
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6125 involving transmission via Internet transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8456 by decomposing the content in the time domain, e.g. in time segments
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8543 using a description language, e.g. Multimedia and Hypermedia information coding Expert Group [MHEG], eXtensible Markup Language [XML] information retrieval of semistructured data, the underlying structure being taken into account, e.g. mark-up language structure data G06F16/80
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8586 by using a URL processing chained hypermedia data for information retrieval G06F16/94; information retrieval from the Internet by using URLs G06F16/955; URL in broadcast information H04H20/93; Web-based protocols H04L67/02

Abstract

Systems and methods in accordance with various embodiments of the invention enable quality based streaming. A content player in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes: a processor; a network interface; and memory containing a content player application. The content player application can direct the processor to: receive quality metadata describing a plurality of streams, where: the plurality of streams are encoded at different maximum bitrates; each stream is divided into content segments; and the quality varies between content segments in each stream. Furthermore, the content player application directs the processor to measure available bandwidth; request content segments from the plurality of streams based upon the available network bandwidth and the quality metadata, where the requested content segments include content segments encoded at a maximum bitrate and having quality that is the lowest maximum bitrate that achieves a target quality level.

Claims

1. A quality based streaming content player system comprising:

a processor;

a network interface; and

a memory connected to the processor, where the memory contains a content player application;

wherein the content player application directs the processor to;

receive quality metadata describing a plurality of streams, where;

the plurality of streams are encoded at different maximum bitrates;

each stream is divided into content segments; and

the quality varies between content segments in each stream based upon the content encoded by the content segment;

measure available bandwidth via the network interface; and

request content segments from the plurality of streams based upon the available network bandwidth and the quality metadata describing the plurality of streams, where the requested content segments include content segments encoded at a maximum bitrate and having quality that is the lowest maximum bitrate that achieves a target quality level.