KR101764317B1 - Streaming server, streaming system and streaming method - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a streaming server, a streaming system, and a streaming method, capable of implementing a transmission and reception system of conversion contents and MMT between a streaming server, a relay, and a client. To this end, the streaming system according to the present invention includes a first relay; a second relay; and the streaming server which transmits first relay connection information about the connection address of the first relay in response to a first transmission request received from the client, transmits second relay connection information about the connection address of the second relay in response to a second transmission request received from the client, and transmits first MMT content to the first or second relay. Accordingly, the present invention can reduce costs for constructing the streaming system and provide an optimized online streaming service.

Description

STREAMING SERVER, STREAMING SYSTEM, AND STREAMING METHOD

The present invention relates to a streaming server, a streaming system, and a streaming method, and more particularly, to a streaming server, a streaming system, and a streaming method implementing a system for transmitting and receiving contents between a streaming server, a relay, .

Since the standardization of MPEG-2, video compression standards (or audio compression standards) have steadily developed new standards for the past decade such as MPEG-4, H.264 / AVC, and Scalable Video Coding (SVC) (MPEG-2 TS (Transport System)), digital broadcasting, mobile broadcasting (T-DMB, DVB, etc.) have been steadily developed in the market for almost 20 years, -H, etc.), and is widely used for multimedia transmission over the Internet, that is, IPTV service, which was not even considered at the time of standardization.

However, when the MPEG-2 TS is developed, the multimedia transmission environment and today's multimedia transmission environment are undergoing a great change. For example, the MPEG-2 TS standard was developed considering the transmission of multimedia data through the ATM network at the time of enactment. In addition, since the requirements such as multimedia transmission using the Internet are not taken into account at the time of the establishment of the MPEG-2 TS standard, there are factors that are not efficient in recent multimedia transmission through the Internet. Therefore, it is recognized that the establishment of the MMT (MPEG Multimedia Transport Layer), which is a new multimedia transmission standard considering the multimedia service on the Internet, which is suitable for a changing multimedia environment, is recognized as a very important task in MPEG.

As such, the important reason for the progress of MMT standardization is that the MPEG2-TS standard, which was created 20 years ago, is not optimized for IPTV broadcasting service, Internet environment and the like recently. Recently, MMT is being standardized as a new transmission technology standard in MPEG because it is urgently needed for international standard of multimedia transmission optimized for multimedia transmission environment in various heterogeneous networks.

In recent years, the development of mobile communication technology rapidly promoted the popularization of mobile communication terminals, and most ordinary people changed our lives to carry mobile communication terminals such as mobile phones, PDA, and smart phones at all times. The mobile communication terminal has enabled the user to more easily access the communication network and efficiently distribute the system resources of the conventional conventional communication system.

Among these technologies, there is provided a streaming service capable of transmitting and receiving multimedia contents such as audio contents and video contents in real time through a wireless contents communication network while moving with a mobile communication terminal.

A method of providing a streaming service using HTTP (Hyper Text Protocol) operating on a TCP protocol is generally used for a mobile communication terminal such as a smart phone, and is generally referred to as HTTP streaming.

However, since HTTP is a protocol used for transmitting text and images such as hypertext, when a multimedia contents streaming service is provided using HTTP in a mobile communication terminal such as a smart phone, when the capacity of the multimedia contents increases, It is difficult to provide the above-mentioned information.

Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) standardization has been almost completed to provide streaming service of MPEG media in mobile communication terminals such as smart phones.

DASH standardization is to provide streaming service of MPEG media in a mobile communication terminal such as a smart phone and MMT standardization is to provide enhanced media transmission service such as UHD class resolution media in a dynamic network environment such as hybrid transmission .

On the other hand, the DASH-based mobile video streaming method, which is commonly used, has a problem that it is not suitable for providing a real-time live streaming service because the delay time becomes long due to the structure provided by using a chunk.

On the other hand, in case of MMT-based mobile video streaming, since the media source is transmitted in units of MPU (Media Processing Unit), the delay time is short, but a separate application that can accommodate the MMT protocol is required, have.

Since the video streaming service provider needs to provide MMT and DASH streaming servers separately in order to provide both of these two types of services, there is a problem that the cost for the streaming service increases, and this problem is caused not only by the DASH but also by the MPEG2- (MPEG2 Transport System), HLS (HTTP Live Streaming), RTP (Real Time Transport Protocol), RTMP (Real Time Messaging Protocol), RTSP (Real Time Streaming Protocol) The same applies to the case of using for streaming.

In addition, when MMT and other streaming protocol based streaming services are provided, it is required to have flexibility to change MMT and other streaming protocol based streams in response to a connection environment of a relay or a client.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a streaming server, a streaming system, and a streaming method capable of providing MMT and other streaming protocol streaming services to a client using one streaming server.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a streaming server and a streaming system capable of mutually changing an MMT and other streaming protocols in response to a connection environment of a relay or a client when providing a streaming service of MMT and other streaming protocol schemes, And to provide a streaming method.

In order to solve the above problem, a streaming server according to the present invention transmits first relay connection information in response to a first transmission request received from a client, or transmits second relay connection information in response to a second transmission request received from the client, A request processing unit for transmitting the first or second relay connection information by reflecting the changed relay connection information; An MMT streaming engine for designating a relay to transmit MMT contents corresponding to the first or second relay connection information and transmitting the MMT contents to a designated one of the first or second relays; And a load balancer for changing the relay connection information and the address at which the MMT streaming engine transmits the MMT contents in response to the monitoring information transmitted from the first or second relay. Wherein the first relay connection information is information on a connection address of a first relay that provides MMT contents to the client and the second relay connection information provides the converted contents in which the MMT contents are converted to the client And the second relay is information on a connection address of the second relay.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a streaming system including: a first relay for modifying header information of a received first MMT content into second MMT content and transmitting the second MMT content to a client; A second relay for converting the received first MMT contents into converted contents and transmitting the converted contents to the client; And transmitting first relay connection information in response to a first transmission request received from a client or transmitting second relay connection information in response to a second transmission request received from the client, A streaming server for transmitting the first MMT contents; .

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a streaming method comprising: receiving a first transmission request or a second transmission request from a client by a streaming server; An access information transmitting step of the streaming server transmitting first relay access information to the client in response to the first transmission request or transmitting second relay access information to the client in response to the second transmission request; A relay connection step in which the client is connected to the first relay in response to the first relay connection information or is connected to the second relay in response to the second relay connection information; A first content transmission step in which the streaming server transmits the first MMT content to the first relay in response to the first transmission request or transmits the first MMT content to the second relay in response to the second transmission request; And the first relay modifies the header information of the first MMT content in response to the connection of the client and converts the header information of the first MMT content into the second MMT content and then transmits the second MMT content to the client, A second content transmission step of converting the first MMT content into converted content corresponding to the connection of the client and transmitting the converted content to the client; .

The present invention provides both MMT and other streaming protocol streaming services to a client using one streaming server, thereby reducing the cost required for the streaming service provider to construct the streaming system.

When MMT and other streaming protocol streaming services are provided, MMT and other streaming protocol streams can be mutually changed in response to the initial connection environment of a relay or a client or a communication situation in a streaming service. Accordingly, it is possible to provide an optimized online streaming service to the client.

1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a streaming system according to the present invention.
2 is a block diagram illustrating the structure of the MMT contents of FIG.
3 is a detailed block diagram of the streaming server of FIG.
4 is a detailed block diagram of the first relay of FIG.
5 is a detailed block diagram of the second relay of FIG.
6 is a detailed block diagram of the client of FIG.
FIG. 7 is a flowchart for illustrating a method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates.
FIG. 8 is a flow chart for explaining another method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates.
FIG. 9 is a flowchart for explaining a method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates.

Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. It is to be understood that the terminology used herein is for the purpose of description and should not be interpreted as limiting the scope of the present invention.

The embodiments described in the present specification and the configurations shown in the drawings are preferred embodiments of the present invention and are not intended to represent all of the technical ideas of the present invention and thus various equivalents and modifications Can be.

1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a streaming system according to the present invention. Referring to FIG. 1, a streaming system of the present invention includes a streaming server 100, a first relay 200, a second relay 300, and a client 400.

The first relay 200 and the second relay 300 may be implemented by the same or different CDN service providers and may be connected to the streaming server 100 through a CDN (Contents Delivery Network). The first relay 200 and the second relay 300 may be connected to the streaming server 100 through a broadcast network, a broadband network, a cable network, Communication Network).

Here, the CDN 20 is a system for storing and delivering data to a distributed server in order to efficiently transmit contents to the client 400 in an Internet-enabled environment. The CDN 20 is used to mitigate bottlenecks caused by a number of users attempting to use the streaming service. The CDN service provider can provide a variety of relay environments to the streaming service provider depending on the region, and the streaming service provider can use an appropriate number of relays according to the demand for the streaming service.

In the present invention, the CDN 20 can be understood not only as a conventional CDN, but also as a concept including transmission and reception of media contents by Cloud Computing.

The first relay 200 and the second relay 300 may be connected to the client 400 through the communication network 30.

Here, the communication network 30 may include a wireless communication such as a wireless LAN (WLAN), a Wi-Fi, a Wibro, a WiMAX, a High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), a CDMA, And a wired communication method such as mobile communication such as Ethernet, xDSL (ADSL, VDSL), HFC (Hybrid Fiber Coax), FTTC (Fiber to the Curb), FTTH (Fiber To The Home) Lt; / RTI >

The streaming server 100 transmits the MMT contents to the first relay 200 or the second relay 300 in response to the first transmission request or the second transmission request of the client 400, Relay connection information or second relay connection information can be transmitted.

The streaming server 100 may receive the MMT contents from the encoder (Encoder) 11. The encoder 11 processes the media source to be streamed into MMT contents. Here, the MMT content refers to a media source encoded by the encoder 11 in the form of MMT packets conforming to the MPEG standard. The MMT content encoded by the encoder 11 is provided to the streaming server 100.

The first transmission request or the second transmission request can be regarded as a streaming request transmitted from the client 400 through the communication network 30. [ When the streaming server 100 receives the first transmission request or the second transmission request, the streaming server 100 determines whether the streaming server 100 is a request for a streaming media source. If the request for the media source streamed by the streaming server 100 is correct, the streaming server 100 initiates the streaming service for the client 400 in response to the first transmission request or the second transmission request.

The first transmission request or the second transmission request may include connection environment information for the connection environment of the client 400 and the streaming server 100 may extract the connection environment information and transmit the first relay connection information or the second relay Connection information can be transmitted. That is, the first transmission request is for the client 400 to request streaming of the MMT format to the streaming server 100, and the second transmission request is for the client 400 to transmit the streaming server 100 a different method It can be seen as requesting streaming.

Whether the client 400 transmits the first transmission request or the second transmission request can be determined by the user of the client 400 or by the application installed in the client 400.

Herein, the connection environment information includes information on the client terminal used by the user of the client 400, the internal application thereof, the browser, the IP (Internet Protocol) band used by the client 400 for connection or the protocol information And the like. That is, the connection environment information includes the information of the initial connection start step that helps the streaming server 100 to select one of the MMT contents or the converted contents for providing to the client 400 through the relays 200 and 300 .

The streaming server 100 determines which of the converted content or MMT content is advantageous to the streaming service according to the connection environment information included in the first transmission request or the second transmission request.

Basically, the streaming server 100 determines that the MMT content is provided in response to the first transmission request, and the converted content is provided in response to the second transmission request. However, it can correspond to the MMT content characteristic information or the monitoring information in a manner different from the above.

Here, the transformed content refers to a media source formed by a form of a packet according to a protocol other than the MMT, which is the content converted by the second relay 300 to be performed by the MMT content. In the present invention, various types of streaming protocols that are not MMT but can be used for streaming can be exemplified. For example, Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH), MPEG2-TS (MPEG2 Transport System), HLS HTTP Live Streaming), RTP (Real Time Transport Protocol), RTMP (Real Time Messaging Protocol), RTSP (Real Time Streaming Protocol), and RTCP (Real Time Control Protocol).

When the streaming server 100 intends to provide the MMT contents to the client 400, the streaming server 100 may transmit the first relay connection information to the client 400. [ When the streaming server 100 intends to provide the converted content to the client 400, the streaming server 100 may transmit the second relay access information to the client 400. [

The characteristic information included in the MMT content received from the encoder 11 may be used in determining which relay the streaming server 100 uses to transmit the streaming image to the client 400. [

Here, the characteristic information may mean a setting value separately input by the provider of the streaming service or the provider of the media source to the streaming image. For example, in the case of a sports channel or a live event, it is important to provide the streaming service in real time without a delay as much as possible, so it must be provided by the MMT method. On the contrary, there is a need to provide compatibility with a streaming protocol other than the MMT depending on the business model of the streaming service provider, regardless of the delay time.

In this case, the MMT contents generated through the encoder 11 may include characteristic information that the corresponding contents should be provided to the client 400 through the MMT and other streaming protocols. When the MMT contents are to be provided to the client 400 through the MMT method, the streaming server 100 transmits the first relay access information, and the MMT contents are transmitted to the client 400 through the MMT The second relay connection information can be transmitted when it is to be provided by a different streaming protocol.

When the first relay 200 or the second relay 300 communicates with the client 400 in order to determine which relay the streaming server 100 uses to transmit the streaming video to the client 400 The monitoring information generated by sensing the communication state can be used. The contents of the monitoring information will be described in the following description of the relay.

When the streaming server 100 determines which relay is used to transmit the streaming image to the client 400, the CDN information about the environment of the CDN (Content Delivery Network) to which the streaming server 100 is connected is used .

The CDN information is information provided by the CDN service provider, and includes information on the current status of the relays available to the streaming server 100, the access frequency of the connected client 400, and the amount of data to be communicated . The streaming server 100 may determine the relay to which the client 400 accesses based on the CDN information. The streaming server 100 may provide the first relay connection information or the second relay connection information to the client 400 according to the determination result.

The first relay connection information indicates information including the connection address of the first relay 200 so that the client 400 can access the first relay 200 and the second relay connection information indicates that the client 400 2 relay 300 in order to access the first relay 300 and the second relay 300, respectively. The first relay connection information and the second relay connection information can be transmitted to the client 400 via the communication network 30. [

The streaming server 100 may transmit the MMT contents to the first relay 200 together with the transmission of the first relay connection information or may transmit the MMT contents to the second relay 300 together with the transmission of the second relay connection information .

2 is a block diagram illustrating the structure of the MMT contents of FIG.

The MMT contents transmitted from the streaming server 100 can be transmitted in the form of one of TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) and UDP (User Datagram Protocol) Or the intent of the system designer.

When the MMT contents are transmitted in the TCP format 40, the MMT contents may include the encoded streaming image data 45 and the transmission overhead of the corresponding data. The transmission overhead may include MMTPH (MMT Packet Header) 41, PLH (MMT Payload Format Header) 42, MPUH (MPU Header) 43, and MFUH (MFU Header)

The MMTPH 41 is a header for an MMT packet and the PLH 42 is a header of a payload format for transmitting MMT Asset and for transmitting information used for consumption of a MMT application protocol or a streaming protocol such as RTP .

The MPUH 43 is a header for the MPU. The MPU (Media Processing Unit) is a container independent of the media codec, and accommodates at least one AU (Access Unit) and additional transmission and consumption related information. For non-temporal data, the MPU accepts portions of data that do not fall within the AU range. The MPU is coded media data that can be processed completely and independently.

The MFUH 44 is a header for the MFU, and the Media Fragment Unit (MFU) is a container independent of the media codec and receives encoded media data that can be consumed independently by the media decoder. It has a size less than or equal to AU and accepts information that can be used in the transport layer.

When the MMT contents are transmitted in the UDP type 50, unlike TCP, the transmission overhead may include RTPH (Real-time Transport Protocol Header) 51 instead of the MMTPH 41.

The RTPH 51 is a header for RTP, and RTP is a transport layer protocol for transmitting and receiving voice and / or moving pictures in real time.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the streaming server 100 of FIG. 1 in detail. Referring to FIG. 3, the streaming server 100 includes an MMT streaming engine 110, a load balancer 120, and a request processing unit 130.

The MMT streaming engine 110 designates a relay for transmitting the MMT contents in the form of TCP or UDP in response to the first or second relay connection information and transmits the MMT contents to the designated first relay 200 or the second relay 300 Can be transmitted. The MMT streaming engine 110 may transmit the first or second relay connection information again by reflecting the changed relay connection information.

More specifically, after the load balancer 120 receives the monitoring information, the MMT streaming engine 110 transmits the MMT contents to the changed relay in response to an instruction to change the relay to receive the MMT contents from the streaming server 100 can do.

The load balancer 120 transmits relay access information transmitted by the request processing unit 130 and MMT streaming engine 110 in response to the monitoring information transmitted from the first relay 200 or the second relay 300, Address can be changed. That is, the load balancer 120 can be understood as performing load balancing of the streaming server 100.

The load balancer 120 transmits certain relay access information to the client 400 according to the characteristic information included in the MMT contents received from the encoder 11 or the connection environment information included in the first transmission request and the second transmission request Can be determined. In addition, the load balancer 120 may determine to change the relay receiving the MMT contents from the streaming server 100 in response to the monitoring information in the process of transmitting the MMT contents.

The request processing unit 130 transmits the first relay connection information for the connection address of the first relay providing the MMT contents to the client 400 in response to the first transmission request received from the client 400, In response to the second transmission request received from the client 400, the second relay access information for the connection address of the second relay providing the converted contents to the client 400. [

4 is a detailed block diagram of the first relay 200 of FIG. Referring to FIG. 4, the first relay 200 includes a first receiving unit 210, a first parsing unit 220, a first transmitting unit 230, and a first relay controlling unit 240.

The first receiving unit 210 receives the MMT contents from the streaming server 100. The first receiving unit 210 may include a UDP processing unit (not shown) or a TCP processing unit (not shown) in order to process MMT contents differently according to the manner in which the streaming server 100 transmits the MMT contents. The UDP processing unit may serve as a buffer for receiving the MMT contents provided by the UDP method and temporarily storing the MMT contents for the smooth image reproduction of the client 400. [ The TCP processing unit may receive the MMT content provided by the TCP scheme and may serve as a buffer for temporarily storing the MMT content for smooth image reproduction of the client 400. [ The MMT contents temporarily stored in the UDP processing unit or the TCP processing unit are provided to the first parsing unit 220.

The first parser 220 may modify the header information of the MMT content by parsing the received packet of the MMT content. Hereinafter, the MMT contents transmitted by the streaming server 100 are defined as the first MMT contents in order to distinguish the MMT contents received by the first relay 200 from the MMT contents transmitted by the first relay 200, 1 relay 200, MMT contents whose header information is modified are defined as second MMT contents. The first MMT contents and the second MMT contents are different from each other in header information, and the data about the streaming video viewed by the user of the client is the same.

The first parser 220 can convert the first MMT content into the second MMT content by modifying the header information of the received first MMT content and provide the second MMT content to the first transmitter 230 have.

In this case, the header information modified by the first parser 220 may be information related to the sender of the corresponding MMT content, such as the address of the relay transmitting the content. More specifically, the first parsing unit 220 may modify the headers associated with the transmission overhead disclosed in FIG. When the MMT contents are transmitted in the TCP format, the transmission overhead used for the MMT contents may include the MMTPH 41, the PLH 42, the MPUH 43, and the MFUH 44. The first parser 220 receives the MMT contents from the streaming server 100 in the above transmission overhead and relays the relay address, transmission time, and information related to the protocol used for transmission to the client 400 Can be modified. The transmission overhead used for the MMT contents may include the RTPH 51, the PLH 42, the MPUH 43, and the MFUH 44 when the MMT contents are transmitted in the UDP scheme. A part of the header information can be modified by the first parsing unit 220. The first transmitting unit 230 receives the second MMT contents from the first parsing unit 220, And transmits the content to the client 400.

In this case, when the first MMT contents are received in the UDP scheme, the first transmission unit 230 can transmit the second MMT contents to the client 400 in the UDP scheme, and when the first MMT contents are received in the TCP scheme , It is possible to transmit the second MMT contents to the client 400 through the TCP method.

The first relay control unit 240 monitors the process of the first relay 200 receiving the first MMT content and transmitting the second MMT content to the client 400 and transmits the monitoring information generated in the monitoring process to the streaming server 100). In addition, the first relay control unit 240 can transmit a session end signal to the streaming server 100 when the communication process with the client 400 is completed. The first relay control unit 240 may control the transmission and reception functions of the first receiving unit 210, the first parsing unit 220, or the first transmitting unit 230 according to a request from the streaming server 100.

The first relay control unit 240 receives the first MMT contents from the streaming server 100 through the first receiving unit 210 in response to the connection with the client 400 and transmits the first MMT contents to the first transmitting unit 230, The second content can be transmitted to the client 400 via the second network.

The first relay control unit 240 controls the jitter, delay, packet loss, and error ratio generated in the communication between the first relay 200 and the client 400, The monitoring information can be generated by monitoring at least one of numerical values for the streaming server 100, and the monitoring information can be provided to the streaming server 100 in real time. The load balancer 120 of the streaming server 100 changes the relay access information transmitted by the request processing unit 130 and the address at which the MMT streaming engine 110 transmits the MMT contents when the values of the monitoring information are out of a predetermined range . Here, the range of the monitoring information is determined by the designer or the service provider of the streaming system by determining whether the buffer of the relay or client 400 is usable or the user of the client 400 is difficult to view a normal image due to a delay or an error rate Can be arbitrarily set.

The first relay control unit 240 may transmit a session end signal to the streaming server 100 indicating that the communication between the first relay 200 and the client 400 is completed.

The first relay 200 may further include a capture unit 250 and a first database 260.

When a streaming service provider wishes to provide a VOD (Video On Demand) service or a full-length streaming service to a user of the client 400, the MMT package transmitted in real time must be able to be stored in a separate storage location .

The capture unit 250 may capture the second MMT content to provide the same image as the second MMT content to the client 400 in response to the VOD request of the client 400. [ The capture unit 250 captures the second MMT content converted by the first parsing unit 220 and stores the captured second MMT content in the first database 260. Thus, the second relay 200 transmits the second MMT contents to the client 400, and the second MMT contents are stored in the first database 260 by the capture unit 250. The video stored in the first database 260 may then be utilized by the streaming service provider to provide the VOD service.

If the capture and storage function of the first relay 200 is not utilized, the first relay control unit 240 receives the second MMT contents converted from the first parsing unit 220 by the capture unit 250 The first parsing unit 220 and the capture unit 250 may be controlled so that the first parsing unit 220 and the capturing unit 250 can be directly transmitted to the first transmitting unit 230 without being captured.

5 is a detailed block diagram of the second relay 300 of FIG. 5, the second relay 300 includes a second receiving unit 310, a second parsing unit 320, a protocol converting unit 330, a second transmitting unit 340, and a second relay controlling unit 350 .

The second receiving unit 310 receives the first MMT content from the streaming server 100. The second receiving unit 310 may include a UDP processing unit (not shown) or a TCP processing unit (not shown) for differently processing the first MMT contents according to the manner in which the streaming server 100 transmits the MMT contents. The UDP processing unit may receive the first MMT content provided by the UDP method and may serve as a buffer for temporarily storing the first MMT content for smooth image reproduction of the client 400. [ The TCP processing unit may receive the first MMT content provided by the TCP method and may serve as a buffer for temporarily storing the first MMT content for smooth image reproduction of the client 400. [ The first MMT contents temporarily stored in the UDP processing unit and the TCP processing unit are provided to the second parsing unit 320. [

The second parser 320 may modify the header information of the first MMT content by parsing the packet of the provided first MMT content. Here, the header information of the first MMT contents modified by the second parsing unit 320 and the method thereof are the same as those of the first parsing unit 220 described above, and thus description thereof will be omitted.

The protocol conversion unit 330 converts the first MMT content whose header information is modified through the first parsing unit 320 to one of a DASH, MPEG2-TS, HLS, RTP, RTMP, RTSP, and RTCP Conversion contents can be converted.

More specifically, the transformed content may be non-MMT streaming protocols such as DASH, MPEG2-TS, HLS, RTP, RTMP, RTSP and RTCP as illustrated above. The protocol conversion unit 330 converts the MMT content into a protocol corresponding to one of the converted contents.

For example, when converting the MMT contents into the DASH contents, the protocol conversion unit 330 of the second relay 300 extracts MFU (Media Fragment Unit) information from the parsed first MMT contents, Create a unit chunk. The protocol conversion unit 330 may convert the first MMT contents into DASH contents by repeating the generation of the chunks.

In addition, non-MMT streaming protocols such as MPEG2-TS, HLS, RTP, RTMP, RTSP, and RTCP may be converted by the protocol conversion unit 330 as defined in each standard protocol.

The protocol conversion unit 330 may be arranged in a plurality of the second relays 300 according to the number of types of protocols to be converted and may be configured for each of the plurality of second relays 300. The configuration of the protocol conversion unit 330 may be set by the system designer in various ways according to the streaming communication environment.

The converted content converted by the protocol converting unit 330 is provided to the second transmitting unit 340.

The second transmitting unit 340 receives the converted content from the protocol converting unit 330 in response to the connection with the client 400 and transmits the converted content to the client 400.

The second relay control unit 350 monitors the process of the second relay 300 receiving the first MMT content and transmitting the converted content to the client 400 and transmits the monitoring information generated in the monitoring process to the streaming server 100. [ As shown in FIG. Also, the second relay controller 350 may provide a session end signal to the streaming server 100 when the communication process with the client 400 is completed. In addition, the transmitting and receiving functions of the second receiving unit 310 and the second transmitting unit 340 can be controlled according to a request of the streaming server 100. [

More specifically, the second relay controller 350 controls the second relay 300 to receive the first MMT content from the streaming server 100 through the second receiver 310 in response to the connection with the client 400 The protocol conversion unit 330 converts the first MMT content into the converted content and controls the second transmission unit 340 to transmit the converted content to the client 400. [

The second relay controller 350 controls the jitter, delay, packet loss, and error ratio generated in the communication between the second relay 300 and the client 400, The monitoring information can be generated by monitoring at least one of numerical values for the streaming server 100, and the monitoring information can be provided to the streaming server 100 in real time.

The second relay controller 350 may transmit a session end signal to the streaming server 100 indicating that the second relay 300 has terminated the communication between the second relay 300 and the client 400. [

The second relay 300 may further include a second database 360.

When the streaming service provider intends to provide a VOD (Video On Demand) service or a full-length streaming service to the user of the client 400, the converted content transmitted in real time must be stored in a separate storage location .

The protocol conversion unit 330 may capture the converted content to provide the same image as the converted content to the client 400 in response to the VOD request of the client 400. [ The protocol conversion unit 330 may store the converted content in the second database 360 in the second parsing unit 320. Thus, while the second relay 300 transmits the transformed content to the client 400, an image such as the transformed content may be stored in the second database 360. The video stored in the second database 360 may then be utilized by the streaming service provider to provide the VOD service.

6 is a detailed block diagram of the client of FIG. Referring to FIG. 6, the client 400 may include a first processing unit 410, a second processing unit 420, and an output unit 430.

The client 400 may be a mobile communication terminal such as a mobile phone or a smart phone as well as a portable multimedia player (PMP), a mobile internet device (MID), a desktop PC, a tablet PC, A netbook, and a smart TV supporting internet service through the communication network 10 in addition to a broadcasting reception function.

The first processor 410 transmits a first transmission request to the streaming server 100 and is connected to the first relay 200 corresponding to the first relay connection information received from the streaming server 100, Lt; RTI ID = 0.0 > MMT < / RTI >

The second processing unit 420 transmits a second transmission request to the streaming server 100 and is connected to the second relay 300 corresponding to the second relay connection information received from the streaming server 100, (300). ≪ / RTI >

The output unit 430 may output the second MMT content or the converted content to the user of the client 400.

Whether the client 400 transmits the first transmission request or the second transmission request is determined based on a command inputted by the user of the client 400 via the interface of the client 400 or an application installed in the client 400 .

FIG. 7 is a flowchart for illustrating a method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates. FIG. 7 illustrates a process in which the streaming server 100 corresponds to two transmission requests received from the client 400, respectively.

The streaming server 100 transmits the first relay connection information to the client 400 in response to the first transmission request received from the first processing unit 410 of the client 400. [ The first processor 410 of the client 400 is connected to the first relay 200 in response to the first relay connection information and transmits the second MMT content between the first relay 200 and the client 400 . Thereafter, when the transmission is completed, the first relay 200 transmits a session end signal to the streaming server 100.

The streaming server 100 then transmits the second relay connection information to the client 400 in response to the second transmission request received from the second processing unit 420 of the client 400. [ The second processing unit 420 of the client 400 is connected to the second relay 300 in response to the second relay connection information and the converted content is transferred between the second relay 300 and the client 400. Thereafter, when the transmission is completed, the second relay 300 transmits a session end signal to the streaming server 100.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart for explaining another method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates.

8, the streaming server 100 receives the monitoring information generated in the process of transmitting the second MMT contents to the client 400 by the first relay 200, unlike in FIG.

The streaming server 100 checks the monitoring information and determines whether the first relay 200 or the second relay 300 is in a process of communicating with the client 400 so that a delay or an error rate is detected by the first relay 200 or the second relay 300. [ To the client 400 to change the relay connected to the client 400 from the first relay 200 to the second relay when the buffer size of the client 400 exceeds a level that can be accommodated by an increase in the buffer size of the client 300 Lt; / RTI > The client 400 is connected to the second relay 300 in response to the second relay connection information and receives the remaining content from the second relay 300 in a converted manner instead of the MMT. The second relay 300 transmits the converted content to the client 400 and then transmits a session end signal to the streaming server 100. [

FIG. 9 is a flowchart for explaining a method in which the embodiment of FIG. 1 operates.

9, when the streaming server 100 receives a first transmission request or a second transmission request from the client 400 (S10), the streaming server 100 extracts connection environment information included in the request and transmits characteristic information And transmits the first or second relay connection information to the client according to the determined streaming method (S12).

The client 400 is connected to the relay corresponding to the received first or second relay connection information (S14). Thereafter, the streaming server 100 transmits the first MMT contents to the relay connected to the client 400 (S16), and the relay converts the first MMT contents into the second MMT contents or the converted contents, (S18).

The streaming server 100 checks the monitoring information generated in the content transmission process (S20), and if the relay transmitting the content needs to be changed (S22), the streaming server 100 changes the relay connection information and transmits it to the client 400, The client 400 is connected to the relay corresponding to the changed relay connection information and receives the contents again.

Thereafter, if the streaming process is not completed, the streaming server 100 continuously receives the monitoring information from the relay and repeats the selection of the streaming method.

As described above, the present invention provides both a MMT and other streaming protocol streaming services to a client using one streaming server, thereby reducing the cost required for the streaming service provider to construct the streaming system .

In addition, the present invention provides an MMT and other streaming protocol type services corresponding to a connection environment of a relay or a client, characteristic information of MMT contents, communication environment in a streaming service, Since streaming can be changed, it is possible to provide an optimized online streaming service to the client depending on the situation.

Claims (20)

And transmits the first relay connection information in response to the first transmission request received from the client or transmits the second relay connection information in response to the second transmission request received from the client, 1 or the second relay connection information;
An MMT streaming engine for designating a relay to transmit MMT contents corresponding to the first or second relay connection information and transmitting the MMT contents to a designated one of the first or second relays; And
A load balancer for changing the relay connection information and an address at which the MMT streaming engine transmits the MMT contents in response to the monitoring information transmitted from the first or second relay; Lt; / RTI >
Wherein the first relay connection information is information on a connection address of a first relay providing MMT contents to the client and the second relay connection information is information on a connection And information on a connection address for the relay. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the load balancer
And transmits the first or second relay access information corresponding to the characteristic information included in the MMT contents received from the encoder. 2. The method of claim 1,
Wherein the monitoring information is information generated by monitoring at least one numerical value of jitter, delay, packet loss, error rate occurring during communication with the client by the first or second relay,
Wherein the load balancer changes the relay access information transmitted by the request processing unit and the address at which the MMT streaming engine transmits the MMT contents when the values of the monitoring information are out of a preset range. The system of claim 1, wherein the MMT streaming engine
And transmitting the MMT contents including a transmission overhead for modifying header information in the first or second relay in a UDP or TCP manner. The system of claim 1, wherein the MMT streaming engine
And transmits the MMT contents to be converted to one of a DASH, an MPEG2-TS, a HLS, an RTP, an RTMP, an RTSP, and an RTCP in the second relay in response to the second transmission request. A first relay for modifying the header information of the received first MMT content to convert it into second MMT content, and transmitting the second MMT content to the client;
A second relay for converting the received first MMT contents into converted contents and transmitting the converted contents to the client; And
Transmitting first relay connection information in response to a first transmission request received from a client or transmitting second relay connection information in response to a second transmission request received from the client, A streaming server for transmitting 1 MMT content; . The method of claim 6, wherein the streaming server
To the client, first relay access information for the connection address of the first relay in response to the first transmission request, and transmits, to the client in response to the second transmission request, 2 A streaming system for transmitting relay connection information. 7. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the first relay
A first receiving unit for receiving the first MMT contents from the streaming server;
A first parser for modifying header information of the received first MMT content and converting the modified header information to the second MMT content;
A first transmitter for transmitting the second MMT contents to the client;
A first relay controller for controlling the receiver, the first parser and the first transmitter in response to connection of the client; . 9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the first relay
A capture unit capturing the second MMT content to provide the same image as the second MMT content transmitted to the client in response to the VOD request of the client;
A first database for storing the captured second MMT contents; The streaming system further comprising: 7. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the second relay
A second receiver for receiving the first MMT contents from the streaming server;
A second parser for modifying header information of the received first MMT contents;
A protocol conversion unit for converting the first MMT content in which the header information is modified into a conversion content composed of a streaming protocol of any one of DASH, MPEG2-TS, HLS, RTP, RTMP, RTSP, and RTCP;
A second transmitting unit for transmitting the converted content to the client;
A second relay control unit for controlling the second receiving unit, the second parsing unit, the protocol converting unit, and the second transmitting unit in response to connection of the client; . 11. The method of claim 10,
The second relay captures the converted content to provide the same image as the second MMT content transmitted to the client in response to the VOD request of the client,
A second database for storing the converted contents captured; The streaming system further comprising: The method of claim 6, wherein the streaming server
Receiving the monitoring information on the environment in which the first or second relay communicates with the client, relay connection information transmitted by the streaming server in response to the monitoring information, and relay connection information transmitted by the streaming server Change the address,
Transmits the changed relay connection information to the client, and transmits the first MMT contents to the changed address. The method according to claim 6,
Transmitting the first or second transmission request to the streaming server, receiving the second MMT content in connection with the first relay connection in response to the first relay connection information, A client connected to the second relay to receive the converted content; The streaming system further comprising: 14. The method of claim 13, wherein the client
A first processor for transmitting the first transmission request, being connected to the first relay in response to the first relay connection information, and receiving the second MMT contents from the first relay;
A second processing unit transmitting the second transmission request, being connected to the second relay corresponding to the second relay connection information, and receiving the converted content from the second relay; And
An output unit for outputting the second MMT contents or the converted contents to a user of the client; . 7. The method of claim 6, wherein the first or second MMT content
And the header information included in the transmission overhead of the MMT contents is modified in the first or second relay. A request reception step in which the streaming server receives a first transmission request or a second transmission request from a client;
An access information transmitting step of the streaming server transmitting first relay access information to the client in response to the first transmission request or transmitting second relay access information to the client in response to the second transmission request;
A relay connection step in which the client is connected to the first relay in response to the first relay connection information or is connected to the second relay in response to the second relay connection information;
A first content transmission step in which the streaming server transmits the first MMT content to the first relay in response to the first transmission request or transmits the first MMT content to the second relay in response to the second transmission request; And
Wherein the first relay modifies header information of the first MMT content in response to connection of the client and converts the header information of the first MMT content into second MMT content and then transmits the second MMT content to the client, A second content transmitting step of converting the first MMT content into the converted content corresponding to the connection of the first MMT content and transmitting the converted content to the client; ≪ / RTI > 17. The method according to claim 16, wherein in the connection information transmitting step
Wherein the streaming server determines one of the first relay connection information and the second relay connection information in response to the characteristic information included in the first MMT content and transmits the determined one. 17. The method of claim 16,
Wherein the streaming server receives monitoring information on an environment in which the first or second relay communicates with the client and changes an address for transmitting the relay access information and the first MMT contents to transmit in response to the monitoring information Monitoring phase; Further comprising:
After the monitoring step, the streaming server transmits the changed relay connection information, and the streaming server transmits the first MMT contents to the relay corresponding to the changed relay connection information,
Wherein the first and second contents transmission steps are performed again according to the changed relay connection information and an address for transmitting the changed first MMT contents after the monitoring step. 17. The method of claim 16, wherein the first or second MMT content
And the header information included in the transmission overhead of the MMT content is modified in the first or second relay. 17. The method of claim 16,
DASH, MPEG2-TS, HLS, RTP, RTMP, RTSP, and RTCP.

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