Demarcation Between Service Provider And User In Multi-Services Gateway Device At User Premises

• US 20100205301A1
• Filed: 09/07/2007
• Published: 08/12/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/29/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Tyson King
• Original Assignee: Prodea Systems, Inc.
• Inventors: Clavenna, Robert A. II, McQuarters, Alvin R., Ramayya, Jude P., Nicholls, Leon E., Masina, Ramprakash, Cowgill, George A., Ansari, Amir, Raissyan, Atousa
• Granted Patent: US 8,280,978 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/225
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/042 using digital processors G05B19/05 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/2642 Domotique, domestic, home control, automation, smart house
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/64 Browsing; Visualisation therefor generation of a list or set of audio data G06F16/638
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/68 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/04 Billing or invoicing
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19656 Network used to communicate with a camera, e.g. WAN, LAN, Internet
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/223 Execution procedure of a spoken command
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2803 Home automation networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2807 Exchanging configuration information on appliance services in a home automation network arrangements for maintenance or administration involving network analysis for automatically determining the actual topology of a network H04L41/12; hardware or software tools for network management using graphical user interfaces H04L41/22; address allocation H04L61/50
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2812 describing content present in a home automation network, e.g. audio video content retrieval from the Internet G06F16/95
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2814 Exchanging control software or macros for controlling appliance services in a home automation network arrangements for maintenance or administration involving configuration of the network and network elements H04L41/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2816 Controlling appliance services of a home automation network by calling their functionalities arrangements in telecontrol or telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station; in which substation desired apparatus is selected for applying a control signal thereto or for obtaining measured values therefrom H04Q9/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2818 from a device located outside both the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; arrangements for transmitting signals characterised by the use of a wireless eletrical link G08C17/00; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with remote control systems H04M11/007
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/66 Arrangements for connecting between networks having differing types of switching systems, e.g. gateways
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/2849 Audio/video appliances
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0803 Configuration setting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/22 comprising specially adapted graphical user interfaces [GUI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/80 : Actions related to the user profile or the type of traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/83 : based on usage prediction
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/25 : Routing or path finding in a switch fabric
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/4552 : Lookup mechanisms between a plurality of directories; Synchronisation of directories, e.g. metadirectories
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/02 : for separating internal from external traffic, e.g. firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/08 : for authentication of entities cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication H04L9/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0876 : based on the identity of the terminal or configuration, e.g. MAC address, hardware or software configuration or device fingerprint
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 : for controlling access to devices or network resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/20 : for managing network security; network security policies in general filtering policies H04L63/0227
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/102 : Gateways arrangements for connecting between networks having differing types of switching systems, e.g. gateways, H04L12/66
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 : Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1108 : Web based protocols, e.g. webRTC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 : Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 : Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/125 : involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/141 : Setup of application sessions admission control or resource allocation in data switching networks H04L47/70
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 : Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/53 : using third party service providers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/325 : in the network layer [OSI layer 3], e.g. X.25 H04L69/16 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/00 : Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD] real-time bi-directional transmission of motion video data H04N7/14 ; broadcast or conference over packet switching networks H04L12/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/40 : Client devices specifically adapted for the reception of or interaction with content, e.g. set-top-box [STB]; Operations thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/181 : for receiving images from a plurality of remote sources
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/00 : Security arrangements; Authentication; Protecting privacy or anonymity
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/033 : of the user plane, e.g. user's traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/0431 : Key distribution or pre-distribution; Key agreement
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/06 : Authentication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/065 : Continuous authentication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/08 : Access security
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/35 : Protecting application or service provisioning, e.g. securing SIM application provisioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/80 : Services using short range communication, e.g. near-field communication [NFC], radio-frequency identification [RFID] or low energy communication
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 370/911 : Bridge, e.g. brouter, bus extender

Abstract

The disclosed examples of a multi-services gateway device (10) comprise application service programming (140) logically positioned on a user premises side of a logical network demarcation forming an edge of the wide area network at the user premises. The programming also defines a logical service provider-user demarcation between the user premises and the application service provider. The application service programming (110, 120, 130) resides on the service provider side of the service provider-user demarcation and only provides a logical application service interface across that demarcation to deliver an application service to an endpoint device. The logical service provider-user demarcation also provides a demarcation in accessibility to hardware resources (152) of the gateway device, whereby some hardware resources (152) of the gateway device are on the service provider side (156) of the logical service provider-user demarcation and are inaccessible to an endpoint device from the user side (155) o he logical service provider-user demarcation.

Claims

1. A gateway device for operation at a user premises to provide a managed service to one or more endpoint devices associated with the gateway device, the gateway device comprising:

a first interface for enabling bi-directional communications within the premises, with an associated endpoint device within the premises;

a second interface for enabling bi-directional communications for the endpoint device within the premises via a wide area network, and for enabling at least some bi-directional communications with a service management center external to the premises via the wide area network;

a processor coupled to the interfaces;

storage coupled to the processor; and

programming in the storage for execution by the processor, wherein;

(a) the programming comprises application service programming of an application service provider, logically positioned on a user premises side of a logical network demarcation forming an edge of the wide area network at the user premises, the application service programming being accessible and controllable by the service management center via communications through the second interface,

(b) the programming in the storage defines a logical service provider-user demarcation between the user premises and the application service provider, whereby the application service programming resides on the service provider side of the logical service provider-user demarcation and only provides a logical application service interface across the logical service provider-user demarcation to deliver an application service of the service provider to one or more of the associated endpoint devices via the first or second interface, and

(c) the logical service provider-user demarcation provides a demarcation in accessibility to hardware resources of the gateway device, whereby at least some hardware resources of the gateway device are logically positioned on the service provider side of the logical service provider-user demarcation and are inaccessible to an endpoint device from the user side of the logical service provider-user demarcation.

2. The gateway device of claim 1, wherein the demarcation in accessibility to hardware resources of the gateway device provided by the logical service provider-user demarcation delineates a portion of the storage accessible by a user via an endpoint device from an application service provider portion of the storage containing the application service programming and/or data of the application service provider.

3. The gateway device of claim 2, wherein logical location of the demarcation line separating the portions of the storage is controllable by the application service provider, from the service management center, via the wide area network and the second interface.

4. The gateway device of claim 2, wherein execution of the programming by the processor:

enables a user of an associated endpoint device to store and retrieve data files in the user accessible portion of the storage of the gateway device;

enables the application service provider, via the service management center, to control storage and retrieval of data files in the application service provider portion via the of the wide area network; and

prevents the user of the associated endpoint device from accessing one or more of the data files in the application service provider portion.

5. The gateway device of claim 4, wherein execution of the programming by the processor enables the application service provider, via the service management center, to allow storage and retrieval of data files in the application service provider portion via the wide area network for other gateway devices.

6. The gateway device of claim 1, wherein:

the application service programming comprises logic for implementing a plurality of application services; and

for each respective application service, execution of the application service programming logic by the processor causes the gateway device to provide application server communication with a client functionality of one or more endpoint devices, for the respective service, communicated on top of network layer communications via one or both of the interfaces.

7. The gateway device of claim 1, wherein execution of the application service programming by the processor controls user access to one or more application services delivered by the gateway device to any associated endpoint devices in accordance with user privileges associated with a service subscription.

8. The gateway device of claim 7, wherein:

the application service programming comprises logic for implementing a plurality of application services; and

for each respective application service, execution of the programming by the processor causes the gateway device to provide functions in relation to a respective service for one or more endpoint devices including;

(1) enforcement regarding authorization, authentication, configuration, or use of the respective service via the one or more endpoint devices; and

(2) management of the application service based upon the communications with the service management center via the wide area network through the second interface.

9. The gateway device of claim 1, wherein the second interface comprises a data communication interface for coupling to a Network Service Provider wide area network Termination Apparatus (NSP-TA) providing broadband data connectivity to the wide area network.

10. The gateway device of claim 1, wherein the second interface comprises a Network Service Provider wide area network Termination Apparatus (NSP-TA) within the gateway device, for providing broadband data connectivity to the wide area network.

11. A product comprising a machine-readable medium and programming embodied in the medium for a gateway device located at a premises comprising:

a first interface for enabling bi-directional communications within the premises;

a second interface for enabling bidirectional communications external to the premises via a wide area network; and

a processor coupled to the interfaces for execution of the programming to provide a managed service for one or more endpoint devices associated with the gateway device, wherein the programming embodied in the medium comprises;

application service programming of an application service provider, logically positioned on a user premises side of a logical network demarcation forming an edge of the wide area network at the user premises, the application service programming being accessible and controllable by the service management center via communications through the second interface, wherein;

(a) the programming in the storage defines a logical service provider-user demarcation between the user premises and the application service provider, whereby the application service programming resides on the service provider side of the logical service provider-user demarcation and only provides a logical application service interface across the logical service provider-user demarcation to deliver an application service of the service provider to one or more of the associated endpoint devices via the first or second interface, and

(b) the logical service provider-user demarcation provides a demarcation in accessibility to hardware resources of the gateway device, whereby at least some hardware resources of the gateway device are logically positioned on the service provider side of the logical service provider-user demarcation and are inaccessible to an endpoint device from the user side of the logical service provider-user demarcation.

12. The product as in claim 11, wherein:

programming of the application service provider, logically positioned between the logical network demarcation forming the edge of the wide area network at the user premises and the logical service provider-user demarcation, comprises programming for a plurality of application services, and

for each respective application service, execution of the programming by the processor causes the gateway device to provide application server communication with a client functionality of one or more endpoint devices, for the respective service, communicated on top of network layer communications via one or both of the interfaces.

13. The product as in claim 11, wherein:

programming of the application service provider, logically positioned between the logical network demarcation forming the edge of the wide area network at the user premises and the logical service provider-user demarcation, comprises programming for a plurality of application services, and

for each respective application service, execution of the programming by the processor causes the gateway device to provide functions in relation to a respective service for one or more endpoint devices including;

(1) enforcement regarding authorization, authentication, configuration, or use of the respective service via the one or more endpoint devices; and

(2) management of the application service based upon the communications with the service management center via the wide area network through the second interface.

14. The product as in claim 11, wherein:

programming of the application service provider, logically positioned between the logical network demarcation forming the edge of the wide area network at the user premises and the logical service provider-user demarcation, comprises;

logic for a plurality of application services,

logic for interfaces for the application services,

logic for a services framework, and

logic for platform management; and

interaction and interoperability of the application service interfaces logic, the application services logic, the services framework logic, and the platform management logic is managed responsive to the communications with the service management center via the wide area network through the second interface.

15. The product of claim 14, wherein the logic for the services framework comprises program modules for providing common application support service processes on which are built the logic for the application services.

16. The product of claim 15, wherein the common application support service processes provided by the services framework logic include two or more functions selected from the group consisting of:

an authentication manager, a billing manager, a fault manager, a database manager, a control channel interface, a configuration manager, a user manager, a service manager, and a statistics manager.

17. The product of claim 14, wherein functions provided by the platform management logic include two or more functions selected from the group consisting of:

a platform manager for implementing rules based notification services on operational failure, a scheduler for managing scheduled device maintenance and scheduled services, a resource manager for managing device resources and/or contention for access to the device resources, a display manager, and a logger for tracking gateway log-in activity of users and/or applications.