System, apparatus for content delivery for internet traffic and methods thereof

• US 9,386,116 B2
• Filed: 05/11/2011
• Issued: 07/05/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/13/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Futurewei Technologies Incorporated (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Futurewei Technologies Incorporated (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Li, Sanqi, Qian, Tao, Han, Houxiao, Tian, Hongbo, Lin, Kui
• Primary Examiner(s): Duong, Oanh
• Application Number:
  US13/105,666
• Publication Number:
  US 20110283011A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,882 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/217, 709/219, 709/223, 709/231
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/14 Charging , metering or billing arrangements for data wireline or wireless communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1435 volume-based
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1439 time-based
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1485 Tariff-related aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1489 dependent on congestion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5029 Service quality level-based billing, e.g. dependent on measured service level customer is charged more or less
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5067 Customer-centric QoS measurements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/30 for supporting lawful interception, monitoring or retaining of communications or communication related information circuit switched telephony call monitoring H04M3/2281
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/306 intercepting packet switched data communications, e.g. Web, Internet or IMS communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1063 Application servers providing network services systems providing special services to telephonic subscribers H04M3/42
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/60 Network streaming of media packets
• 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 65/80 Responding to QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/143 Termination or inactivation of sessions, e.g. event-controlled end of session
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/2885 Hierarchically arranged intermediate devices, e.g. for hierarchical caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/5681 Pre-fetching or pre-delivering data based on network characteristics
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/324 : in the data link layer [OSI layer 2], e.g. HDLC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/325 : in the network layer [OSI layer 3], e.g. X.25 H04L69/16 takes precedence
• 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: H04M 15/83 : Notification aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/84 : Types of notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/844 : Message, e.g. SMS
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/85 : characterised by the type of condition triggering a notification
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/852 : Low balance or limit reached
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/88 : Provision for limiting connection, or expenditure
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/888 : severing connection after predetermined time or data
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/80 : Arrangements enabling lawful interception [LI]

Abstract

In one embodiment, a method of serving media includes receiving user profiles from a layer3 node in an access network, and receiving a request to serve media content to a user equipment. The user profiles include information relating to user account and/or network characteristics of the user equipment. The method further includes using an user equipment information from the user profiles, assigning a first media server from a hierarchical set of media servers to serve the user equipment if the media content to be served is cacheable. The hierarchical set of media servers include a plurality of first type of media servers deployed in a plurality of layer2 (L2) access networks. The user equipment is coupled to a content delivery network through a layer2 access network of the plurality of layer2 access networks.

Claims

1. A method of media streaming, the method comprising:

receiving user profiles from a layer3 (L3) node in an access network, the user profiles including information relating to user account and/or network characteristics of a user equipment;

receiving, at an inter-working function (IWF), a request to serve media content to the user equipment;

assigning a first media server from a hierarchical set of media servers to serve the user equipment determined according to the user profiles if the media content to be served is cacheable, the hierarchical set of media servers comprising a plurality of first type media servers deployed in a plurality of layer2 (L2) access networks, wherein at least one media server is in a content delivery network, and at least one media server is in a packet delivery network (PDN) peering point or a border gateway, and wherein the user equipment is coupled to a content delivery network through a L2 access network of the plurality of L2 access networks;

intercepting, by the IWF, a first protocol type message and forwarding the first protocol type message to one of the plurality of first type media servers deployed in the L2 access networks if an internet protocol (IP) address of the first protocol type message matches an address in an IP table indicating that the content is cached in the one of the plurality of first type media servers deployed in the L2 access networks; and

transparently passing, by the IWF, second protocol type messages between an radio network controller (RNC) and a serving general packet radio services (GPRS) support node (SGSN).

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the user profiles are received at a media controller in the content delivery network.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the user profiles comprise at least one of the information from the group consisting of user service plan information, user equipment types, user general location, user roaming status, user group type, and user billing preference types.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the first type media servers is assigned if the user profile comprises a user service plan of a high importance type of user, and wherein the first type media servers is not assigned if the user profile comprises a user service plan of a normal importance type of user.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising

sending user equipment information to the first media server.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising

sending user equipment information to a media data function configured to collect and analyze traffic usage of the user equipment.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the user profiles comprise quality of service profiles.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the user profiles are received from a gateway server node.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the user profiles are received from a policy charging rules function unit (PCRF).

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving caching information regarding the media content, the caching information comprising information regarding whether the media content requested by the user equipment is cacheable.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising redirecting the request to serve the media content to the first media server.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the first media server is the first type media servers.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving caching information regarding the media content, wherein the caching information is received from a content deep packet inspection (DPI-C) node.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the DPI-C node is in the content delivery network.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein said receiving a request comprises receiving a forwarded GET request at a media controller.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising redirecting the GET request to the first media server through the user equipment, wherein redirecting the GET request comprises:

generating a HTTP redirect message including the GET request to the user equipment; and

forwarding the GET request to the first media server through an inter-working function node in the layer2 access network.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein assigning the first media server comprises:

selecting the first media server from;

the first type media servers deployed in the plurality of L2 access networks,

a second type media servers deployed in a plurality of L3 networks,

a third type media servers deployed in border gateway, and

a fourth type media servers deployed in a peering point.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein said assigning the first media server comprises selecting a media server in a packet data protocol path of the user equipment, the media server being deployed in the L2 access network.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the first type media servers are configured to interface with L2 nodes in the L2 access networks via an inter-working function (IWF) unit and with L3 nodes in L3 networks via a separately routable internet protocol (IP) address.

20. An apparatus for media streaming, the apparatus comprising:

a receiver configured to receive user profiles from a layer3 (L3) node in an access network, the user profiles including information relating to user account and/or network characteristics of a user equipment, the receiver configured to receive a request to serve media content to the user equipment, the receiver configured to intercept a first protocol type message and forward the first protocol type message to one of a plurality of first type media servers deployed in a L2 access networks if an internet protocol (IP) address of the first protocol type message matches an address in an IP table indicating that the content is cached in the one of the plurality of first type media servers deployed in the L2 access networks, and the receiver configured to transparently pass second protocol type messages between a radio network controller (RNC) and a serving general packet radio services (GPRS) support node (SGSN); and

an assignor configured to assign a first media server from a hierarchical set of media servers to serve the user equipment determined according to the user profiles if the media content to be served is cacheable, the hierarchical set of media servers comprising a first type media servers deployed in a plurality of layer2 (L2) access networks, at least one media server is in a content delivery network, and at least one media server is in a packet delivery network (PDN) peering point or a border gateway, wherein the user equipment is coupled to a content delivery network through a L2 access network of the plurality of L2 access networks.

21. The apparatus of claim 20, wherein the apparatus is a media controller deployed in the content delivery network.

22. The apparatus of claim 20, wherein the user profile includes user equipment information, and wherein the assignor is configured to assign the first type media servers if the user equipment information represents a high importance user.

23. The apparatus of claim 20, wherein the user profile includes user equipment information, and wherein the assignor is configured not to assign one of the first type media servers as the first media server if the user equipment information represents a normal importance user.

24. The apparatus of claim 20, further comprising

a sender configured to send user equipment information to the first media server.

25. The apparatus of claim 20, further comprising

a sender configured to send user equipment information to a media data unit configured to collect and analyze traffic usage of the user equipment.