Multimedia conferencing system having a central processing hub for processing video and audio data for remote users

• US 6,442,758 B1
• Filed: 09/24/1999
• Issued: 08/27/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 09/24/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Radisys Corporation (Reliance Industries Limited)
• Original Assignee: Convedia Corp. (Reliance Industries Limited)
• Inventors: Jang, Raymond Edward, Wilson, Susan Elizabeth, Russell, Paul Robert, Geofroy, Paul Joseph
• Primary Examiner(s): Luu, Le Hien
• Application Number:
  US09/404,310
• Time in Patent Office: 1,068 Days
• Field of Search: 725/119, 725/109, 345/501, 370/216, 710/314, 709/217
• US Class Current: 725/119
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/142 Constructional details of the terminal equipment, e.g. arrangements of the camera and the display
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/152 Multipoint control units therefor

Abstract

A multimedia conferencing system has a plurality of remote user terminals, each of which may be different from any other, and each of which may communicate to a central processing hub using different communications protocols. The central processing hub receives, processes, and sends video and audio data from and to the plurality of remote users, and comprises a media bus for handling video and audio data signals, a packet bus for handling data and control signals, a shelf controller card which issues control messages in keeping with incoming management signals, a bus controller card which provides clock and bus arbitration signals, at least one media processor card for processing video and audio signals, and video encoding means for receiving video data from the one or more media processor cards and delivering video data signals to the packet bus. Video and audio data signals may be received by or delivered from any of the at least one media processor card and the at least one physical interface card. A management node communicates through the shelf controller card to permit management signals to be delivered, which may come from a session manager so as to control the nature of the output video and audio data signals which are sent to the remote user terminals. A video link and a video router permit summing of video data signals, and the resultant summed video data signal is passed to a further video data link via the video router so that the video data signal which is returned to the remote terminals is derived from a cascade of video links.

Claims

1. A multimedia conferencing system comprising a central processing hub and a plurality of remote user terminals, wherein each of said remote user terminals at least comprises means for sending video data signals and audio data signals to said central processing hub and means for receiving video data signals and audio data signals from said central processing hub, wherein said central processing hub receives the video and audio data from each of said plurality of remote user terminals, processes the received video data and audio data, and returns a video data signal and an audio data signal to each of said remote user terminals, and wherein each of said video data signal and audio data signal includes video data and audio data, respectively, from at least one of said plurality of remote user terminals;

wherein said central processing hub comprises;

a media bus for handling video and audio data signals within said central processing hub;

a packet bus for handling data and control signals within said central processing hub;

a shelf controller card for issuing control messages to control the operation of said central processing hub in keeping with incoming management signals delivered directly to said shelf controller card;

a bus controller card for providing at least clock signals and bus arbitration signals within said central processing hub;

at least one physical line interface card for providing at least one physical interface port for said central processing hub;

at least one media processor card for processing video and audio signals within said central processing hub; and

video encoding means for at least receiving video data from each said at least one media processor card, and for delivering video data signals to said packet bus;

wherein video and audio data signals received from said plurality of remote user terminals are received by said central processing bus by any one of said at least one media processor card and said at least one physical interface card, and said video and audio data signals are passed via one of said media bus and said packet bus to said at least one media processor card for further processing;

wherein video and audio data signals delivered from said central processing hub to said plurality of remote user terminals are delivered from said central processing hub by any one of said at least one media processor card and said at least one physical interface card; and

wherein the means for sending and receiving video and audio data signals which are located at each one of said plurality of remote user terminals may differ from one remote user to another, and wherein each of said plurality of remote user terminals may communicate with said central processing hub using a different communications protocol than any other of said plurality of remote user terminals.

2. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein said video encoding means comprises a video encoder card.

3. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein said video encoding means is included in at least one of said at least one media processor card.

4. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein said shelf controller card further comprises means for communicating with a management node, thereby permitting management signals for said central processing hub to be delivered by said management node to and received from said shelf controller card.

5. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 4, wherein a session manager for any multimedia conferencing session may control the nature of the output video and audio data signals sent to said plurality of remote user terminals by communicating with said management node through an input port thereto.

6. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 5, wherein said session manager is chosen from the group consisting of an intelligent network, a personal computer, and an individual person who interacts with an intelligent network or a personal computer.

7. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 5, wherein the input port of said management node operates under a protocol chosen from the group consisting of RS-232, Ethernet, and ATM.

8. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 5, further comprising at least one video link on said at least one media processing card, and a video router on said at least one media processing card, whereby video data signals from any of said plurality of remote user terminals are summed within said media processing card, and the resultant summed video data signal is passed to a further video link via said video router, and whereby said returned video data signal from said central processing hub to said plurality of remote user terminals is derived from a cascade of video links.

9. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 8, wherein said bus controller card further comprises means for connecting said media bus and said packet bus to at least one further media bus and one further packet bus, respectively, of at least one further central processing hub, whereby a plurality of similar central processor hubs are interconnected one to another in such a manner as to share all resources, control signals, clock signals, and bus arbitration signals;

and

wherein said at least one video link on said at least one media processing card on each of said plurality of similar central processor hubs are cascaded one with respect to another.

10. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 9, wherein the nature of the respective summed video data signal which is delivered to any respective one of said remote user terminals is under the control of said session manager, whereby each respective one of said summed video data signals includes video data from at least one other of said remote user terminals;

and

wherein the audio data signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals includes audio data from at least one other of said remote user terminals and excludes audio data from that respective remote user terminal to which the summed audio signal is delivered.

11. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 8, wherein the summed video data signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals is a common signal delivered to all of said remote user terminals;

and

wherein the audio data signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals includes audio data from at least one other of said remote user terminals and excludes audio data from that respective remote user terminal to which the summed audio signal is delivered.

12. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 11, wherein the nature of the summed video signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals is under the control of said session manager, whereby the video signal in said summed signal which is representative of any remote user terminal may be changed by said session manager.

13. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 8, wherein the summed video data signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals is under the control of said session manager, whereby each respective one of said summed video data signals includes video data from at least one other of said remote user terminals;

and

wherein the audio data signal which is delivered to each of said remote user terminals includes audio data from at least one other of said remote user terminals and excludes audio data from that respective remote user terminal to which the summed audio signal is delivered.

14. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 8, wherein the video data signal which is received from any of said plurality of remote user terminals includes a video stream together with other data chosen from the group consisting of graphics data recovered from a computer at the respective remote terminal site, text data recovered from a computer at the respective remote terminal site, spread sheet data recovered from a computer at the respective remote terminal site, and combinations thereof.

15. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 14, wherein any of said graphics data, text data, and spread sheet data that are received by said central processing hub are distributed by said central processing hub to at least one of said remote user terminals as the respective data.

16. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 14, where any of said graphics data, text data, and spread sheet data that are received by said central processing hub are processed by said central processing hub under the control of said session manager before being distributed by said central processing hub to at least one of said remote user terminals as processed data.

17. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein the video and audio data signals received from and delivered to each of said plurality of remote user terminals is in the form of compressed signal packets.

18. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 17, wherein compressed signal packets are delivered from said video encoding means to said packet bus, and bidirectionally between said packet bus and any of said at least one line interface card, and any of said at least one media processor card;

and

wherein uncompressed video and audio real time signals are delivered uni-directionally between said media bus and any of said at least one media processor card and said video encoding means.

19. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein the video and audio data signals received from and delivered to each of said plurality of remote user terminals are in the form of analog signals which are passed to and from said central processing hub via analog ports on said at least one media processor card.

20. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 19, wherein compressed signal packets are delivered from said video encoding means to said packet bus, and bidirectionally between said packet bus and any of said at least one line interface card, and any of said at least one media processor card;

and

wherein uncompressed video and audio real time signals are delivered uni-directionally between said media bus and any of said at least one media processor card and said video encoding means.

21. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein said media bus comprises at least one video bus, and at least one audio bus.

22. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 21, wherein there is a plurality of video buses operating in parallel one to another, whereby the bandwidth of the composite video bus is increased over the bandwidth of any one video bus.

23. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 21, wherein there are at least two audio buses which are adapted to be operated in parallel so as to increase the bandwidth of the composite audio bus over the bandwidth of one audio bus, or as two separate audio buses so as to provide stereo audio signals.

24. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 21, wherein there is a plurality of video buses and a plurality of audio buses, whereby there is redundancy provided with respect to said video buses and said audio buses.

25. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein there is a plurality of physical line interface cards and a plurality of media processor cards, whereby there is redundancy provided with respect to said physical line interface cards and said media processor cards.

26. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein additional physical line interface cards and additional media processor cards are added to said central processing hub, by being connected to said media bus and said packet bus, at any time.

27. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein each respective card performs pre-designated tasks in keeping with respective instruction sets which are in respective microprocessors on each respective card, and further in keeping with control signals delivered to each respective card over said packet bus.

28. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein the video data and audio data received from at least some of said plurality of remote terminals are summed.

29. The multimedia conferencing system of claim 1, wherein said media processor card performs tasks chosen form the group consisting of signal decoding of video data and audio data received by said media processor card, signal routing of video data and audio data received by said media processor card, signal scaling of video data and audio data received by said media processor card, time-base correction for video data and audio data received by said media processor card, linking of video data and audio data received by said media processor card, and combinations thereof.