System, method and computer readable medium for providing redundancy in a media delivery system

• US 7,975,166 B2
• Filed: 03/05/2008
• Issued: 07/05/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/05/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Wallace, Robert, Asbun, Eduardo
• Primary Examiner(s): Iqbal; Nadeem
• Application Number:
  US12/074,671
• Publication Number:
  US 20090228933A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,217 Days
• Field of Search: 714 1- 8, 714 10- 13, 714/15, 714/16, 714/20, 714/21, 714/25, 714 37- 39, 714/43, 714/44, 714/47
• US Class Current: 714/4.1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2007 using redundant communication media
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2035 without idle spare hardware
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2041 with more than one idle spare processing component
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/32 Arrangements for monitoring conditions of receiving stations, e.g. malfunction or breakdown of receiving stations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/22 using redundant apparatus to increase reliability
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/102 using shared medium, e.g. bus or ring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/206 Real Time traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/557 Error correction, e.g. fault recovery or fault tolerance
• 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 65/80 Responding to QoS
• 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 21/26208 the scheduling operation being performed under constraints
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4126 The peripheral being portable, e.g. PDAs or mobile phones
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4345 Extraction or processing of SI, e.g. extracting service information from an MPEG stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/442 Monitoring of processes or resources, e.g. detecting the failure of a recording device, monitoring the downstream bandwidth, the number of times a movie has been viewed, the storage space available from the internal hard disk arrangements for monitoring broadcast services or broadcast-related services H04H60/29; arrangements for identifying or recognising characteristics with a direct linkage to broadcast information H04H60/35; monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; monitoring in wireless networks H04W24/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6375 for requesting retransmission , e.g. of data packets lost or corrupted during transmission from serverARQ protocols H04L1/18; implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP] H04L69/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6405 Multicasting data broadcast and multicast in packet switching networks H04L12/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/64723 Monitoring of network processes or resources, e.g. monitoring of network load traffic related reporting in data switching networks H04L43/062
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6473 Monitoring network processes errors for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40

Abstract

In a digital video system, high availability distribution is provided using spare modules such as an integrated receiver decoder, multimedia transcoder and streaming module in support of the primary modules. The primary modules multicast status messages which are monitored by the spare modules. When failure of a primary module is detected, the spare module takes over the role of the failed module, for example by joining the same multicast groups as the failed module and taking over processing of the streams of the failed module. Multiple redundancy schemes are described.

Claims

1. A media delivery system comprising:

at least one primary device; and

at least one spare device separate from the at least one primary device that;

monitors said at least one primary device;

upon detection of failure of said least one primary device, performs a function of the failed primary device, wherein the at least one spare device is recognized by the media delivery system as at least one of not currently operating during operation of the at least one primary device and not designated as a spare device until the failure in the at least one primary device has occurred.

2. The media delivery system according to claim 1 wherein said at least one primary device and said at least one spare device comprise at least one multimedia transcoder.

3. The media delivery system according to claim 2 wherein said at least one primary device provides a status message and wherein said at least one spare device determines a status of said at least one primary device from said status message.

4. The media delivery system according to claim 3 wherein said at least one spare device determines a failure of said at least one primary device if greater than a threshold number of status messages are not received from said at least one primary device.

5. The media delivery system according to claim 3 wherein said at least one primary device multicasts said status message.

6. The media delivery system according to claim 3 wherein said at least one spare device determines from said status message one or more multicast groups from which said failed primary device is receiving one or more input streams.

7. The media delivery system according to claim 6 wherein upon detection of failure of said failed primary device, said spare device joins said one or more multicast groups.

8. The media delivery system according to claim 3 wherein said at least one spare device determines from said status message one or more multicast groups to which a failed primary device is sending processed streams.

9. The media delivery system according to claim 8 wherein upon detection of failure of said failed primary device, said spare device joins said one or more multicast groups.

10. The media delivery system according to claim 3 wherein said status message is provided at a regular period between 0.1 and 10.0 seconds.

11. The media delivery system according to claim 1 wherein said at least one primary device and said at least one spare device comprise at least one streaming device.

12. The media delivery system according to claim 11 wherein said at least one primary device provides a SAP announcement providing status information to said at least one spare device and wherein said at least one spare device determines a status of said at least one primary device from said SAP announcement.

13. The media delivery system according to claim 12 wherein each primary device monitors said SAP announcement and wherein each primary device and each spare device share a function of a failed primary device.

14. The media delivery system according to claim 1 comprising a digital video system.

15. A digital video system comprising:

at least one primary upstream device; and

at least one spare upstream device separate from the at least one primary upstream device;

wherein said at least one spare upstream device monitors the primary upstream device and duplicates said at least one primary upstream device, wherein the at least one spare upstream device is recognized by the digital video system as at least one of not currently operating during operation of the at least one primary upstream device and not designated as a spare upstream device until the failure in the at least one primary upstream device has occurred.

16. The digital video system according to claim 15 further comprising at least one downstream device that:

receives data from said at least one primary upstream device;

upon detection of failure of said at least one upstream device, connects to said at least one spare upstream device.

17. The digital video system according to claim 16 wherein said at least one primary upstream device multicasts to said at least one downstream device.

18. The digital video system according to claim 16 wherein said at least one primary device and said at least one spare device comprises an integrated receiver decoder.

19. A method for switching a redundant device to an active state comprising:

in said redundant device, receiving multicast status messages from one or more active devices separate from said redundant device;

in said redundant device, determining a health of said one or more active devices from said status messages; and

upon determining that a health of said one or more active devices is unhealthy, switching said redundant device to perform a function of an unhealthy device, wherein the redundant device is designated as at least one of not currently operating during operation of the at least one active device and not designated as a redundant device until the at least one active device has been determined to be unhealthy.

20. A method of providing redundancy in a media delivery system comprising:

providing a primary device;

providing a spare device in a monitoring state, said spare device being separate from the primary device;

monitoring performance of said primary device using said spare device;

detecting failure of said primary device; and

switching said spare device from said monitoring state to perform a role of said primary device, wherein the spare device is recognized by the media delivery system as at least one of not currently operating during operation of the primary device and not designated as a spare device until the failure in the primary device has occurred.

21. The method according to claim 20 further comprising

multicasting status messages from said primary device, said status messages indicating a health of said primary device.

22. The method according to claim 21 wherein monitoring performance of said primary device comprises receiving said status messages from said primary device.

23. The method according to claim 22 further comprising

determining from said multicast status messages one or more multicast groups to which said primary device belongs and wherein switching said spare device from said monitoring state to perform a role of said primary device comprises joining said spare device to said one or more multicast groups.

24. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium comprising instructions for:

receiving periodic status messages from one or more primary devices, said status messages indicating a function of said one or more primary devices;

determining an absence of said periodic status messages from a failed primary device of said one or more primary devices; and

performing a function of said failed primary device via a spare device, wherein the spare device is recognized by the media delivery system as at least one of not currently operating during operation of the one or more primary devices and not designated as a spare device until the failure in the one or more primary devices has occurred.

25. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 24 further comprising instructions for:

maintaining an association between said one or more primary devices and one or more respective processing streams;

determining the primary device has failed; and

taking over the processing streams of the failed primary device.