Apparatus and methods for packetized content delivery over a bandwidth-efficient network

摘要

Methods and apparatus for providing packetized content to users via a bandwidth-optimized network. In one embodiment, legacy and IPTV streams are carried over the same switched digital infrastructure, and freely intermixed without regard to their encoding or type. A user's selection for IPTV content is transmitted to an IP proxy (such as a gateway apparatus or a headend server), then on to the switched digital server which causes provision of the requested content back to the proxy for formatting. The formatted content is then delivered to the requesting IP-capable device. The entire carrier class program stream is therefore available as IP-encapsulated content to the IP capable devices (and as legacy content to legacy devices) without any significant modifications to the network infrastructure or bandwidth penalty.

主权项

1. A method for providing a plurality of content to a consumer device in a content delivery network, said method comprising:
receiving a selection of at least one of said plurality of content from said consumer device; sending a request for said selected at least one of said plurality of content to a server, said server determining that said selected at least one of said plurality of content is not currently being delivered to a service group to which said consumer device is associated, and based at least in part on said determination, selectively switching a content stream associated with said at least one of said plurality of content into a multi-program transport stream (MPTS) for delivery to said service group; receiving from said server said MPTS comprising said selected at least one of said plurality of content encoded in a first Internet Protocol (IP) format and at least a second one of said plurality of content encoded in a second non-1P format; demodulating said MPTS to extract one or more elementary streams associated with said selected at least one of said plurality of content; and providing said one or more elementary streams to said at least one of said plurality of consumer devices.