Opportunistically delayed delivery in a satellite network
First Claim
1. A gateway system for delayed content delivery in a communications infrastructure that provides sharing of at least a communications link when communicating with at least some of a plurality of subscriber terminals, the gateway system comprising:
- a content processing subsystem configured to;
receive a plurality of content objects from a plurality of content sources;
determine, for each content object, if the content object is a delayable object by determining that the content object is being communicated in response to an explicit request for the content object from at least one of the plurality of subscriber terminals; and
assign each content object determined to be a delayable object to a delaycast queue; and
a communications processing subsystem communicatively coupled with the content processing subsystem and configured to;
identify next-scheduled data from an associated content object in the delaycast queue;
determine dynamically that excess capacity is presently available on the communications link; and
assign the next-scheduled data to a service flow for communication over the communications link within the excess capacity.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Systems and methods are described for using opportunistically delayed delivery of content to address sub-optimal bandwidth resource usage in network infrastructures that allow subscribers to share forward link resources. According to some embodiments, content is identified as delayable and assigned to a delaycast queue and/or service flow. For example, a server system of a satellite communications system identifies content that can be delayed to exploit future excess link capacity through multicasting and to exploit subscriber-side storage resources. Some implementations attempt to exploit any excess link resources at any time, while others exploit unused bandwidth only during certain times or when a certain threshold of resources is available. Various embodiments also provide content scoring and/or other prioritization techniques for optimizing exploitation of the delaycast queue.
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Citations
29 Claims
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1. A gateway system for delayed content delivery in a communications infrastructure that provides sharing of at least a communications link when communicating with at least some of a plurality of subscriber terminals, the gateway system comprising:
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a content processing subsystem configured to; receive a plurality of content objects from a plurality of content sources; determine, for each content object, if the content object is a delayable object by determining that the content object is being communicated in response to an explicit request for the content object from at least one of the plurality of subscriber terminals; and assign each content object determined to be a delayable object to a delaycast queue; and a communications processing subsystem communicatively coupled with the content processing subsystem and configured to; identify next-scheduled data from an associated content object in the delaycast queue; determine dynamically that excess capacity is presently available on the communications link; and assign the next-scheduled data to a service flow for communication over the communications link within the excess capacity. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A gateway system for delayed content delivery in a communications infrastructure that provides sharing of at least a communications link when communicating with at least some of a plurality of subscriber terminals, the gateway system comprising:
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a content processing subsystem configured to; receive a plurality of content objects from a plurality of content sources; determine, for each content object, if the content object is a delayable object by determining that the content object is being communicated in response to an explicit request for the content object from at least one of the plurality of subscriber terminals; and assign each content object determined to be a delayable object to a delaycast queue; and a communications processing subsystem communicatively coupled with the content processing subsystem and configured to; identify next-scheduled data from an associated content object in the delaycast queue; determine dynamically that excess capacity is presently available on the communications link; and assign the next-scheduled data to a service flow for communication over the communications link within the excess capacity. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
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23. A system for delayed content delivery in a communications infrastructure that provides sharing of at least a communications link when communicating with at least some of a plurality of subscriber terminals, the system comprising:
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means for receiving a plurality of content objects from a plurality of content sources at a gateway of a satellite infrastructure; means for determining, for each content object, if the content object is a delayable object at least by determining that the content object is being communicated in response to an explicit request for the content object via at least one of the plurality of subscriber terminals under a plan that provides opportunistically delayed delivery and local storage of media content to its subscribers; means for assigning each content object determined to be a delayable object to a delaycast queue for delayed delivery over the satellite infrastructure; means for identifying next-scheduled data from an associated content object in the delaycast queue; means for determining dynamically that excess capacity is presently available on the communications link; and means for assigning the next-scheduled data to a service flow for communication over the communications link.
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24. A gateway system for delayed content delivery in a communications infrastructure that provides sharing of at least a communications link when communicating with at least some of a plurality of subscriber terminals, the gateway system comprising:
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a content processing subsystem configured to; determine, for each of a plurality of received content objects, if the content object is a delayable object at least by determining that the content object is being communicated in response to an explicit request for the content object via at least one of the plurality of subscriber terminals under a plan that provides opportunistically delayed delivery and local storage of media content to its subscribers; and maintain a queue of identifiers corresponding to delayable content objects; and a communications processing subsystem communicatively coupled with the content processing subsystem and configured to; determine that excess capacity is presently available on the communications link; identify a next content object to request according to the queue of identifiers; request the next content object from an associated content source in response to determining that the excess capacity is presently available; receive the next content object at the gateway from the associated content source in response to the request; assign the next content object after it is received at the gateway to a delaycast queue local to the gateway for delayed delivery over the communications link; and assign data from the delaycast queue to a service flow for communication over the presently available excess capacity on the communications link. - View Dependent Claims (25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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Specification