Video conferencing with multipoint conferencing units and multimedia transformation units

• US 9,497,417 B2
• Filed: 02/17/2015
• Issued: 11/15/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 04/06/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc. (Cisco Systems, Inc.)
• Inventors: Puri, Rohit, Chou, Jim
• Primary Examiner(s): Ho, Chuong T
• Application Number:
  US14/624,115
• Publication Number:
  US 20150163456A1
• Time in Patent Office: 637 Days
• Field of Search: 370260-263, 348/14.09, 348/14.08, 709/204
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/0041 Arrangements at the transmitter end
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/0045 Arrangements at the receiver end
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/0057 Block codes H04L1/0061, H04L1/0064 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1822 Conducting the conference, e.g. admission, detection, selection or grouping of participants, correlating users to one or more conference sessions, prioritising transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1863 comprising mechanisms for improved reliability, e.g. status reports arrangements for detecting or preventing errors by carrying supervisory signal the return channel H04L1/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2001/0096 Channel splitting in point-to-point links
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/765 intermediate
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2343 involving reformatting operations of video signals for distribution or compliance with end-user requests or end-user device requirements video transcoding H04N19/40; media packet handling at the source H04L65/762
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2365 Multiplexing of several video streams
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/26275 for distributing content or additional data in a staggered manner, e.g. repeating movies on different channels in a time-staggered manner in a near video on demand system
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/15 Conference systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/152 Multipoint control units therefor

Abstract

In one embodiment, a method includes receiving at a multimedia transformation unit, media streams from a plurality of endpoints, transmitting audio components of the media streams to a multipoint conferencing unit, receiving an identifier from the multipoint conferencing unit identifying one of the media streams as an active speaker stream, processing at the multimedia transformation unit, a video component of the active speaker stream, and transmitting the active speaker stream to one or more of the endpoints without transmitting the video component to the multipoint conferencing unit. An apparatus is also disclosed herein.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving at a multimedia transformation unit, media streams from a plurality of endpoints;

transmitting from the multimedia transformation unit, audio components of said media streams to a multipoint conferencing unit;

receiving at the multimedia transformation unit, an identifier from the multipoint conferencing unit identifying one of said media streams as an active speaker stream;

processing at the multimedia transformation unit, a video component of said active speaker stream; and

transmitting from the multimedia transformation unit, said active speaker stream to one or more of said plurality of endpoints without transmitting said video component to the multipoint conferencing unit;

wherein said video components of said media streams not identified as active speaker streams are dropped at the multimedia transformation unit.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein said active speaker streams comprise currently and previously active speaker streams.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising maintaining a list of previously active speaker streams at the multimedia transformation unit.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein processing said video component comprises decoding and encoding said video component.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein additional decoding and encoding processes are bypassed at the multimedia transformation unit.

6. An apparatus comprising:

an interface for receiving media streams from a plurality of endpoints at a multimedia transformation unit; and

a processor at the multimedia transformation unit for transmitting audio components of said media streams to a multipoint conferencing unit, identifying one of said media streams as an active speaker stream based on an identifier received from the multipoint conferencing unit, processing a video component of said active speaker stream, and transmitting said active speaker stream to one or more of said plurality of endpoints without transmitting said video component to the multipoint conferencing unit;

wherein said video components of said media streams not identified as active speaker streams are dropped at the multimedia transformation unit.

7. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein said active speaker streams comprise currently and previously active speaker streams.

8. The apparatus of claim 6 further comprising maintaining a list of previously active speaker streams at the multimedia transformation unit.

9. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein processing said video component comprises decoding and encoding said video component.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 wherein additional decoding and encoding processes are bypassed at the multimedia transformation unit.

11. One or more non-transitory computer readable media comprising instructions, wherein the instructions when executed operable to:

process at a multimedia transformation unit, media streams from a plurality of endpoints;

transmit from the multimedia transformation unit, audio components of said media streams to a multipoint conferencing unit;

identify one of said media streams as an active speaker stream process at the multimedia transformation unit based on an identifier received from the multipoint conferencing unit;

process at the multimedia transformation unit, a video component of said active speaker stream; and

transmit from the multimedia transformation unit, said active speaker stream to one or more of said plurality of endpoints without transmitting said video component to the multipoint conferencing unit;

wherein said video components of said media streams not identified as active speaker streams are dropped at the multimedia transformation unit.

12. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 11, wherein said active speaker streams comprise currently and previously active speaker streams.

13. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 11, further comprising maintaining a list of previously active speaker streams at the multimedia transformation unit.

14. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 11 wherein processing said video component comprises decoding and encoding said video component.

15. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 14, wherein additional decoding and encoding processes are bypassed at the multimedia transformation unit.