KR20160031642A - Streaming service server and control method thereof - Google Patents

Abstract

A method for controlling a streaming service server is disclosed. The control method comprises the following steps of: receiving a request with respect to a segment of a first quality among segments having a plurality of qualities for content from a user terminal device; checking a state of a network bandwidth allocated to the first quality; and determining a quality in accordance with a check result and providing a streaming service to a segment of the determined quality. Therefore, the method stably provides streaming content of each quality to a user.

Description

STREAMING SERVICE SERVER AND CONTROL METHOD THEREOF

The present invention relates to a streaming service server and a control method thereof, and more particularly, to a streaming service server capable of providing a stable dynamic adaptive streaming service and a control method thereof.

In recent years, users' satisfaction has increased due to the increase of the internet speed, that is, the transmission bandwidth (which means that the amount of data to be transmitted is increased). Such rapid development of the Internet related technology, the Internet has become possible to view and listen to the combined multimedia of videos through on-line search. His representative is the multimedia streaming service.

In this case, streaming is performed in such a manner that audio data or video data (moving image data) having a large size are not entirely downloaded and executed but are transmitted in real time in succession to a plurality of files.

In order to listen to or display such audio files or video files in a streaming format, various application software must be embedded in the client (or user) terminal device. In other words, for audio streaming / video streaming, an audio streaming application such as a real audio player or a multimedia streaming application such as a windows media player should be embedded.

Such a streaming application is a multimedia plug-in that supports audio / video streaming in real time in real time, and is an additional application program that can operate based on a web browser.

Examples of the services that can be supported through the above-mentioned multimedia streaming include real-time broadcast service such as sports, news, live concerts, etc., Video On Demand (VOD) Many internet service businesses such as movie theaters are emerging one after another.

Streaming service is influenced by network bandwidth, which is the biggest disadvantage. Since it requires a more powerful PC, it has a limit of limited service. Recently, however, Internet access lines are expanding rapidly and PCs are becoming more sophisticated. This problem is gradually disappearing.

In addition, it is necessary to develop an adaptive streaming technology capable of providing contents of appropriate quality in a flexible network environment in order to secure such a shortcoming. A representative service of this technology is the MPEG DASH service.

MPEG DASH is an adaptive video streaming technology using HTTP standardized by MPEG. The basic components of DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP) technology are MPD and segment. MPD (Media Presentation Description) is data in XML format for providing information on media for the purpose of providing a streaming service, and a segment refers to a data unit of the smallest unit capable of representing media data in the MPD. DASH technology is constructed based on the structure that MPD and segment are transmitted from the HTTP server to the user terminal device.

However, it is difficult to provide high-quality streaming service to all users requesting high-quality streaming service in a limited network environment. Therefore, there is a need for a technology that can provide continuous streaming service to the user even if quality is deteriorated. In addition, because the criteria for analyzing MPD differs for each MPEG DASH Player of Client, there is a delay depending on the network condition or it is difficult to stably guarantee the data loss rate.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a streaming service server and a control method thereof, which allocate and manage a network bandwidth for a plurality of qualities. More particularly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a streaming service server that confirms a network bandwidth allocated to a segment of a first quality requested by a user terminal device and provides a streaming service with a segment of a quality determined according to a result of the check, .

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of controlling a streaming service server, the method comprising: receiving a segment of a first quality among a plurality of segments of quality for a content from a user terminal; Determining a quality of the network bandwidth allocated to the mobile terminal, and determining a quality according to the result of the check, and controlling the streaming service to provide the determined segment of the quality.

The receiving step may include identification information indicating a quality of a segment requested by the user terminal.

Storing a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels for the content and attribute information for the plurality of segments; detecting the attribute information for the content requested to be reproduced in the user terminal device; And transmitting the attribute information to the user terminal device, wherein the plurality of qualities are at least two of UHD (Ultra High Definition), FHD (Full High Definition), HD (High Definition) ≪ / RTI >

The streaming service server may allocate the entire network bandwidth to each of the plurality of quality levels.

In addition, the user terminal apparatus determines the quality of a segment to be requested to the streaming service server using at least one of the attribute information, the network bandwidth state of the user terminal apparatus, and the hardware state of the user terminal apparatus, To the streaming service server.

The confirming step may determine whether the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is streaming serviceable to the segment of the first quality.

In addition, the controlling may include: controlling to provide a streaming service with the first quality segment if it is determined that the streaming service is possible with the first quality segment, and if it is determined that the streaming service is not possible with the first quality segment , And to control the streaming service to provide a segment of a quality different from the first quality.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a streaming service server for receiving a first quality segment of a plurality of quality segments for content from a user terminal, Determining a quality of the network bandwidth according to the check result, and controlling the streaming service to provide the determined quality segment.

And a storage unit for storing a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels for the content and attribute information for the plurality of segments, Wherein the control unit controls the control unit to detect the attribute information and transmit the detected attribute information to the user terminal device, wherein the plurality of qualities are at least one of a UHD (Ultra High Definition), a FHD (Full High Definition) ). ≪ / RTI >

The apparatus may further include a plurality of streaming service providing units for providing a streaming service in segments corresponding to the plurality of quality levels, and each of the plurality of streaming service providing units may be allocated a bandwidth of a total network bandwidth.

The controller may check whether the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is streaming serviceable to the segment of the first quality.

If it is determined that the streaming service can not be performed with the segment of the first quality, the control unit may control the streaming service to provide the streaming service with the first quality segment, It is possible to control the streaming service to provide a segment of a quality different from the first quality.

According to various embodiments of the present invention, the streaming server distributes and allocates the network bandwidth according to the quality of the streaming contents to be provided to the user terminal device, thereby assuring the delay time or the data loss rate on the network (guaranteeing QoS) It is possible to stably provide quality streaming contents to the user side.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service system according to an embodiment of the present invention.
2 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service server according to an embodiment of the present invention.
3 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service server according to another embodiment of the present invention.
4 is a timing diagram illustrating an operation of a streaming service system according to an embodiment of the present invention.
5 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of a streaming service server according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 6 is a flowchart specifically illustrating an operation of determining a quality for a streaming service of a streaming service server according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
7 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service system according to another embodiment of the present invention.

The following merely illustrates the principles of the invention. Thus, those skilled in the art will be able to devise various apparatuses which, although not explicitly described or shown herein, embody the principles of the invention and are included in the concept and scope of the invention. Furthermore, all of the conditional terms and embodiments listed herein are, in principle, only intended for the purpose of enabling understanding of the concepts of the present invention, and are not to be construed as limited to such specifically recited embodiments and conditions do.

It is also to be understood that the detailed description, as well as the principles, aspects and embodiments of the invention, as well as specific embodiments thereof, are intended to cover structural and functional equivalents thereof. It is also to be understood that such equivalents include all elements contemplated to perform the same function irrespective of the currently known equivalents as well as the equivalents to be developed in the future, i.e., the structure.

Thus, it should be understood that all flow diagrams, state transitions, pseudo code, etc. are representative of various processes that may be substantially represented on a computer-readable medium and executed by a computer or processor, whether the computer or processor is explicitly shown .

The functions of the various elements shown in the figures, including the functional blocks depicted in the processor or similar concept, may be provided by use of dedicated hardware as well as hardware capable of executing software in connection with appropriate software. When provided by a processor, the functions may be provided by a single dedicated processor, a single shared processor, or a plurality of individual processors, some of which may be shared.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent from the following detailed description of the present invention when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which: There will be. In the following description, well-known functions or constructions are not described in detail since they would obscure the invention in unnecessary detail.

Various embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service system according to an embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 1, a streaming service system 1000 includes all or a part of a plurality of user terminal devices 100-1, 100-2, .. 100-N, and a streaming service server 200. [

The user terminal apparatuses 100-1, 100-2,... 100-N may be provided with an application capable of receiving audio, video, multimedia contents combined with audio and video streaming, Such as a personal computer, a tablet computer, a notebook computer, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a portable multimedia player (PMP), a wearable smart glass, a wearable smart watch, a digital TV, and the like.

The user terminal apparatuses 100-1, 100-2,... 100-N request the streaming service server 200 for the attribute information and the content segment of the content requested by the user to reproduce, By receiving the content from the server 200, the user can receive the content requested to be played back by streaming.

Here, the attribute information may be a MPD (Media Presentation Description) document of Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) technology. The MPD document describes segment information in XML (eXtensible Markup Language) format, The URL, the size, and the like that the user terminal device 100 should recognize in advance.

Also, the segment may be a minimum data unit of a bitstream cut at a predetermined time that can be provided to the user terminal device 100 in a streaming service request of the user terminal devices 100-1, 100-2, ... 100-N .

The streaming service server 200 can manage the overall operation of the streaming service. Specifically, the streaming service server 200 may store a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels and attribute information for a plurality of segments with respect to the content. For example, the streaming service server 200 may be configured to generate at least two quality levels of UHD (Ultra High Definition), FHD (Full High Definition), HD (High Definition) And can store attribute information for a plurality of segments and a plurality of segments.

In addition, the streaming service server 200 may allocate the entire available network bandwidth to each of a plurality of qualities. In this case, when the streaming service server 200 receives a request for a segment of the first quality among the plurality of segments of the quality in the user terminal units 100-1, 100-2, ... 100-N, And determine whether to provide the streaming service with the segment of the first quality according to the result of the check. Then, the streaming service server 200 can provide the streaming service using the segment of the quality corresponding to the determination result.

2 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service server according to an embodiment of the present invention. 2, the streaming service server 200 includes all or some of a storage unit 210, a plurality of streaming service providing units 220, and a control unit 230.

The storage unit 210 stores various data and applications necessary for the operation of the streaming service server 200. In particular, the storage unit 210 may store a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels for the content and attribute information for the plurality of segments. For example, the storage unit 210 stores attribute information on a plurality of segments and a plurality of segments generated with a quality of UHD (Ultra high definition), FHD (full high definition) and HD (high definition) And a plurality of segments generated with the quality of UHD (Ultra High Definition), FHD (Full High Definition), HD (High Definition) and SD (Standard Definition), and attribute information Can be stored.

Herein, the storage unit 210 may be implemented as a random access memory (RAM), a flash memory, a ROM (Read Only Memory), an EPROM (Erasable Programmable ROM), an EEPROM (Electronically Erasable and Programmable ROM) Card, a Universal Subscriber Identity Module (USIM), or the like, as well as a detachable type storage device such as a USB memory.

The storage unit 210 may be implemented in the streaming service server 200 or in the form of an external database connected to the streaming service server 200.

Each of the plurality of streaming service providing units 220 can allocate some bandwidths of the entire network bandwidth that can be operated by the streaming service server 200 and allocate bandwidths of the corresponding quality to the user terminal device 100 within the allocated network bandwidth range. Segment can be provided to provide a streaming service. For example, the plurality of streaming service providers 220 may provide at least two of UHD quality streaming service, FHD quality streaming service, HD quality streaming service, SD quality streaming service, . When the total network bandwidth that can be operated by the streaming service server 200 is 8 Gbps, 4 Gbps is provided for UHD quality streaming service, 2 Gbps is provided for providing streaming service of FHD quality, 1 Gbps is provided for providing HD quality streaming service, The network bandwidth of 1 Gbps may be allocated to the streaming service providing unit. Accordingly, each of the plurality of streaming service providers 220 can provide a streaming service by transmitting a segment of a corresponding quality to the user terminal device 100 within the allocated network bandwidth.

The control unit 230 controls the entire operation of the streaming service server 200. Specifically, the control unit 230 can control all or a part of the storage unit 210 and the plurality of streaming service providing units 220. [

In particular, the controller 230 may control the user terminal 100 to detect the attribute information of the content requested to be reproduced and transmit the detected attribute information to the user terminal. Herein, the attribute information may be an MPD document. The MPD document describes the segment information in an XML format. If the user terminal device 100, such as the position, URL, and size on the content time corresponding to the segment, And may include information to be provided.

In this case, the user terminal device 100 may use at least one of the attribute information, the network bandwidth state of the user terminal device 100, and the hardware state of the user terminal device 100 to determine the quality of the segment to be requested to the streaming service server 200 Can be determined. For example, the user terminal device 100 may determine the quality of a segment to be requested to the streaming service server 200 as one of the quality of UHD, FHD, HD, and SD.

Then, the user terminal device 100 may transmit to the streaming service server 200 a request including identification information enabling identification of the determined quality.

If the user terminal device 100 receives a request for a first quality segment of a plurality of quality segments for streaming content, the controller 230 determines that the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is a segment of the first quality It is possible to check whether or not the streaming service is available to the user terminal device 100, and determine the quality according to the confirmation result.

If it is determined that the streaming service is available in the first quality segment, the quality for the streaming service is determined as the first quality, and if it is determined that the streaming service is not possible in the first quality segment, May be determined to be of a different quality, preferably a lower quality.

For example, a bit rate of 32 Mbps is required for a streaming service of UHD quality. When 4 Gbps is allocated for providing a streaming service of UHD quality, about 125 users can simultaneously receive streaming service of UHD quality . In this state, when the UHD quality segment of the plurality of segments of the streaming content is requested from the user terminal device 100, the controller 230 determines that the state of the network bandwidth is not available for the streaming service, Quality can be determined with FHD, HD or SD quality lower than UHD quality.

In this case, the controller 230 may sequentially check the network bandwidth from the highest quality to the lowest quality to determine the quality for the streaming service. For example, the control unit 230 can confirm the network bandwidth in the order of FHD, HD, and SD.

On the other hand, when the quality for the streaming service is determined, the controller 230 controls the streaming service provider 220 corresponding to the quality so that a segment of the corresponding quality is transmitted to the user terminal 100 to provide a streaming service Can be controlled.

3 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service server according to another embodiment of the present invention. 3, a streaming service server 200 includes a storage unit 210, a streaming service providing unit 220, a control unit 230, a transcoding unit 240, a segment generating unit 250, (260). ≪ / RTI > Here, a part of the configuration of the streaming service server 200 shown in FIG. 3 is the same as the configuration described with reference to FIG. 2, and a description of the duplicated configuration will be omitted below.

The transcoding unit 240 may encode the content at a plurality of different qualities to generate a plurality of bit streams for one content. Specifically, the transcoding unit 240 can encode one content to a plurality of different qualities by adjusting factors such as a bit rate, a resolution, a frame rate and the like based on the codec information have.

The segment generator 250 may generate a plurality of bit streams encoded with different quality at predetermined time intervals to generate an initial segment and a media segment necessary for reproduction of each bit stream. Here, the generated segments may be stored in the storage unit 220.

The attribute information generation unit 260 may generate an MPD document including a position, a URL, a size, and the like on the content time corresponding to the segment based on the information about the generated segment. Here, the generated MPD documents may be stored in the storage unit 220.

4 is a timing diagram illustrating an operation of a streaming service system according to an embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 4, a user may select specific contents during a web surfing using the user terminal 100 and input a playback command of the selected contents (S101).

In this case, the web server 300 transmits address information for receiving streaming contents, for example, address information of the streaming service server 200 and unique resource locator (URL) information indicating the path of the selected streaming contents ) To the user terminal device 100 (S102).

Then, the user terminal device 100 may request the streaming service server 200 using the received address information for attribute information about the selected streaming content (S103).

In this case, the streaming service server 200 may transmit the requested attribute information to the user terminal device 100 (S104).

In this case, the user terminal device 100 may use at least one of the attribute information, the network bandwidth state of the user terminal device 100, and the hardware state of the user terminal device 100 to identify the segment to be requested to the streaming service server 100 The quality can be determined as the first quality (S105). Here, the first quality may be one of UHD, FHD, HD, and SD.

Then, the user terminal device 100 can transmit a request including the identification information of the determined quality to the streaming service server 200 (S106).

In this case, the streaming service server 20 confirms the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality (S107), and determines the quality for the streaming service according to the confirmation result (S108). Then, the streaming service server 20 can control to provide a streaming service with a determined quality segment (S109).

5 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of a streaming service server according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 5, the streaming service server 200 may store a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels and attribute information of a plurality of segments with respect to the content (S201).

Then, the streaming service server 200 may detect the attribute information on the content requested to be reproduced in the user terminal device 100 (S202).

Then, the detected attribute information can be transmitted to the user terminal device 100 (S203).

Then, the user terminal device 100 may request a segment of the first quality among a plurality of segments of the quality of the streaming contents (S204).

Then, the streaming service server 200 can check the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality (S205).

Then, the streaming service server 200 determines the quality according to the result of the check, and controls the streaming service to provide the determined quality segment (S206).

FIG. 6 is a flowchart specifically illustrating an operation of determining a quality for a streaming service of a streaming service server according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 6, first, the streaming service server 200 may allocate the entire network bandwidth to each of a plurality of qualities (S301).

Then, the streaming service server 200 may receive a segment of the first quality among a plurality of segments of the quality of the streaming contents from the user terminal device (S302).

Then, the streaming service server 200 can check whether the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is a streaming service of the first quality segment (S303).

If it is confirmed that the streaming service is available in the first quality segment (S303: Y), the streaming service can be controlled to provide the streaming service with the first quality segment (S304). However, if it is confirmed that the streaming service can not be performed with the first quality segment (S303: N), the streaming service may be controlled to provide the streaming service with a segment of a quality different from the first quality (S305).

7 is a block diagram illustrating a streaming service system according to another embodiment of the present invention. 7, a streaming service system 2000 includes a plurality of user terminal devices 100-1, 100-2, ... 100-N, a streaming control server 200-1, a plurality of streaming servers 200-2, , ≪ / RTI > 200-5).

That is, the streaming service server 200 may be implemented as one server that performs all of the functions described above as shown in FIG. 1, or may be implemented by a streaming control server 200- 1), and a plurality of servers including a plurality of streaming servers 200-2, 200, and 200-N. In this case, the streaming control server 200-1 can perform the function of the control unit 230 of the streaming service server 200, and each of the plurality of streaming servers 200-2, 200, and 200- And may perform the functions of each of the plurality of streaming service providers 220 of the server 200.

Meanwhile, the control method according to various embodiments of the present invention described above can be implemented by a program and provided to a server or devices. Accordingly, each device can access the server or the device in which the program is stored, and download the program.

In addition, the control method according to various embodiments of the present invention described above can be implemented as a program and stored in various non-transitory computer readable media. A non-transitory readable medium is a medium that stores data for a short period of time, such as a register, cache, memory, etc., but semi-permanently stores data and is readable by the apparatus. In particular, the various applications or programs described above may be stored on non-volatile readable media such as CD, DVD, hard disk, Blu-ray disk, USB, memory card, ROM,

While the present invention has been particularly shown and described with reference to exemplary embodiments thereof, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed exemplary embodiments, but, on the contrary, It will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and detail may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention.

1000: streaming service system 100: user terminal device
200: streaming service server 210:
220: providing streaming service 230:
240: transcoding unit 250: segment generating unit
260: Attribute information generating unit

Claims (12)

A method of controlling a streaming service server,
Receiving a first quality segment of a plurality of quality segments for content from a user terminal device;
Confirming the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality; And
Determining quality according to the result of the check, and controlling the streaming service to provide the segment of the determined quality. The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the requesting step comprises:
And identification information indicating a quality of a segment requested by the user terminal. The method according to claim 1,
Storing a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of quality levels for the content and attribute information for the plurality of segments;
Detecting the attribute information of the content requested to be reproduced by the user terminal device; And
And transmitting the detected attribute information to the user terminal device,
The plurality of qualities may include:
Wherein at least two of the UHD (Ultra High Definition), FHD (Full High Definition), HD (High Definition) and SD (Standard Definition) The method according to claim 1,
The streaming service server includes:
And allocating the entire network bandwidth to each of the plurality of qualities. The method of claim 3,
Wherein the user terminal device determines the quality of a segment to be requested to the streaming service server using at least one of the attribute information, the network bandwidth state of the user terminal device, and the hardware state of the user terminal device, And transmits a request including information to the streaming service server. The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the verifying step comprises:
And determining whether the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is streaming serviceable to the segment of the first quality. The method according to claim 6,
Wherein the controlling comprises:
If it is determined that streaming service is possible with the first quality segment, control to provide a streaming service with the first quality segment,
Wherein if it is determined that the streaming service can not be performed with the first quality segment, control is performed to provide the streaming service with a segment of a quality different from the first quality. A streaming service server comprising:
Receiving a segment of a first quality among a plurality of segments of quality for a content from a user terminal device, determining a state of a network bandwidth allocated to the first quality, determining a quality according to the result of the determination, And a controller for controlling the streaming server to provide the streaming service to the segment of the streaming service server. 9. The method of claim 8,
Further comprising: a storage unit for storing a plurality of segments generated with a plurality of qualities with respect to the contents and attribute information about the plurality of segments,
Wherein,
The control unit controls the user terminal to detect the attribute information of the content requested to be reproduced and transmit the detected attribute information to the user terminal,
The plurality of qualities may include:
Wherein the streaming service server comprises at least two of UHD (Ultra High Definition), FHD (Full High Definition), HD (High Definition), and SD (Standard Definition). 9. The method of claim 8,
Further comprising: a plurality of streaming service providers for providing streaming services in segments corresponding to the plurality of quality,
Wherein each of the plurality of streaming service providing units comprises:
And a part of bandwidth of the entire network bandwidth is allocated to the streaming service server. 9. The method of claim 8,
Wherein,
And determines whether the state of the network bandwidth allocated to the first quality is streaming serviceable to the segment of the first quality. 12. The method of claim 11,
Wherein,
If it is determined that streaming service is possible with the first quality segment, control to provide a streaming service with the first quality segment,
And controls the streaming service server to provide the streaming service with a segment of a quality different from the first quality if it is determined that the streaming service can not be performed with the first quality segment.

Images