METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SUPPORTING APPLICATION-LAYER MEDIA MULTICASTING

摘要

A method and apparatus for delivering media to a group of target communication devices provides for multicasting media to the group of target communication devices to save network resources. The disclosed embodiments provide for a significant reduction in network traffic and media processing time by transmitting media in multicast transport mode, where a single copy of the media destined for a group of target recipients is transmitted to a wireless infrastructure over the multicast path. The wireless infrastructure replicates and transmits one copy of the media to each of the target recipients that are assigned to dedicated channels, but multicasts one copy of the media to the target recipients that are assigned to a shared channel.