Dynamic video-on-demand navigation and on demand ingest
View Patent ↗A technique for supporting over-the-top video-on-demand separates metadata ingest and real content ingest such that navigation needs only the metadata ingest to have been completed. The real content ingest can occur later if the navigation results in the real content being selected and if the selected content has not been ingested already. Additionally, content identifiers with limited range are used over and over to identify a practically unlimited range of available over-the-top content by mapping virtual content identifiers to dynamic content. The content metadata and real content ingest are synchronized on a video-on-demand system using the dynamically allocated content identifiers. Playlists can be virtualized with a logical content identifier which maps to a list of virtual content identifiers. Existing video-on-demand infrastructures can simultaneously support both static and dynamic content with preexisting video-on-demand back offices and video-on-demand clients.
1. A method for supporting over-the-top video-on-demand services at a client, the method comprising:
ingesting metadata for over-the-top content titles at a navigation server such that a client navigation operation of the titles of the over-the-top content depends only on the metadata ingest having been completed at the navigation server;
providing a limited number of virtual content identifiers to the navigation server;
in response to a user of the client selecting a title of over-the-top content, at the navigation server, mapping the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers, wherein the mapping includes the virtual content identifier, an ingest location, and a time-to-live value that indicates how long the ingested content should remain on a video-on-demand server;
passing the virtual content identifier to the client;
passing the virtual content identifier and the ingest location to the video-on-demand server;
receiving a request for the title from the client, the request identifying the title using the virtual content identifier;
ingesting real content corresponding to the title of the over-the-top content at the video-on-demand server in response to the request from the set-to-box; and
allowing the virtual content identifier to be reused to identify another title of the over-the-top content after the expiration of the time-to-live value.
2. The method of claim 1 further comprising postponing the reuse of the virtual content identifier until after an asynchronous feedback message from the video-on-demand server verifies the deletion of the old virtual content identifier and its corresponding content.
3. The method of claim 1 wherein mapping the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers comprises dynamically associating a World Wide Web uniform resource locator (URL) with an available one of the virtual content identifiers.
4. An over-the-top video-on-demand system comprising:
a navigation server; and
video-on-demand server;
wherein the navigation server is configured to:
ingest metadata for over-the-top content titles such that a client navigation operation of the titles of the over-the-top content depends only on the metadata ingest having been completed at the navigation server;
in response to a user of the client selecting a title of over-the-top content, map the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers, wherein the mapping includes the virtual content identifier, an ingest location, and a time-to-live value that indicates how long the ingested content should remain on a video-on-demand server;
pass the virtual content identifier to the client;
pass the virtual content identifier and the ingest location to the video-on-demand server;
wherein the video-on-demand server is configured to:
receive a request for the title from the client, the request identifying the title using the virtual content identifier;
ingest real content corresponding to the title of the over-the-top content at the video-on-demand server in response to the request from the client; and
wherein the navigation server is further configured to allow the virtual content identifier to be reused to identify another title of the over-the-top content after the expiration of the time-to-live value that is mapped to the selected title.
5. The over-the-top video-on-demand system of claim 4 wherein the navigation server is further configured to postpone the reuse of the virtual content identifier until after an asynchronous feedback message from the video-on-demand server verifies the deletion of the old virtual content identifier and its corresponding content.
6. The over-the-top video-on-demand system of claim 4 wherein mapping the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers comprises dynamically associating a World Wide Web uniform resource locator (URL) with an available one of the virtual content identifiers.
7. An over-the-top video-on-demand system comprising:
a navigation server, wherein the navigation server is configured to:
ingest metadata for over-the-top content titles such that a client navigation operation of the titles of the over-the-top content depends only on the metadata ingest having been completed at the navigation server;
in response to a user of the client selecting a title of over-the-top content, map the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers, wherein the mapping includes the virtual content identifier, an ingest location, and a time-to-live value that indicates how long the ingested content should remain on a video-on-demand server;
pass the virtual content identifier to the client;
pass the virtual content identifier and the ingest location to a video-on-demand server;
wherein the navigation server is further configured to allow the virtual content identifier to be reused to identify another title of the over-the-top content after the expiration of the time-to-live value that is mapped to the selected title.
8. The over-the-top video-on-demand system of claim 7 , further comprising a video-on-demand server configured to:
receive a request for the title from the client, the request identifying the title using the virtual content identifier; and
ingest real content corresponding to the title of the over-the-top content at the video-on-demand server in response to the request from the client.
9. The over-the-top video-on-demand system of claim 7 wherein the navigation server is further configured to postpone the reuse of the virtual content identifier until after an asynchronous feedback message from a video-on-demand server verifies the deletion of the old virtual content identifier and its corresponding content.
10. The over-the-top video-on-demand system of claim 7 wherein mapping the selected title to an available one of the virtual content identifiers comprises dynamically associating a World Wide Web uniform resource locator (URL) with an available one of the virtual content identifiers.