Defining active zones in a traditional multi-party video conference and associating metadata with each zone

摘要

A conference system provides metadata about the display of a multimedia stream to allow communication endpoints to control the format of a video conference. A multipoint control unit (MCU) can provide metadata that describes the display layout and other information about the multimedia stream. After setting up the conference, the MCU can generate a layout description in eXstensible Markup Language (XML) that can be sent to and understood by the communication endpoints. The communication endpoints can read and interpret the XML metadata to determine how the display layout is configured. If desired by the user, the communication endpoint can change the display layout or other multimedia stream function based on the received metadata.

主权项

1. A non-transient computer program product including computer executable instructions stored onto a computer readable medium which, when executed by a processor of a computer, causes the computer to perform a method for changing a display of a video conference, the instructions comprising:
instructions to receive a single multimedia stream, wherein the single multimedia stream is associated with the video conference, and wherein the video conference has a first display format for display of the video conference; instructions to receive metadata associated with the single multimedia stream; instructions to determine a new configuration for a second display of the video conference, wherein the new configuration is to mute a selected participant in the single multimedia stream, wherein muting the selected participant in the single multimedia stream causes the selected participant's video to be collapsed into an icon or thumbnail; instructions to configure the second display; and instructions to provide the second display for the video conference in the single multimedia stream.