Ultra-low latency streaming of real-time media

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2023117444-A1
Application number	US-202117505326-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Oct 19, 2021
Priority date	Oct 19, 2021
Publication date	Apr 20, 2023
Grant date	—

Abstract

Techniques are described for low-latency real-time streaming of media content. For example, streaming media content can be received from a media source, where the streaming media content comprises audio and/or video content. An audio/video stream can be streamed to one or more streaming clients. The audio/video stream is streamed as a sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames, which are independent encoded audio and/or video frames that are not grouped into chunks for streaming. The sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the one or more streaming clients as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the one or more streaming clients for subsequent frames or chunks.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A computing device comprising:
a processor; a network interface; and memory; the computing device configured to perform operations for low-latency real-time streaming of media content, the operations comprising:
receiving, from a media source, streaming media content, wherein the streaming media content comprises audio and/or video content; and
streaming an audio/video stream with a sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames, generated from the streaming media content, to one or more streaming clients, wherein the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed as independent encoded audio and/or video frames without grouping frames into chunks for the streaming;
wherein the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the one or more streaming clients as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the one or more streaming clients for subsequent frames or chunks.

2 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein, the one or more streaming clients comprise one or more end-user clients and one or more client delivery nodes.

3 . The computing device of claim 1 , the operations further comprising:
generating a pre-defined plurality of audio/video streams, wherein each of the pre-defined plurality of audio/video streams is encoded with a different pre-defined quality; wherein the audio/video stream that is streamed to the one or more streaming clients is one of the pre-defined plurality of audio/video streams; and wherein the pre-defined plurality of audio/video streams are client-independent audio/video streams that are not specific to any given streaming client.

4 . The computing device of claim 3 , the operations further comprising:
sending, to the one or more streaming clients, stream metadata comprising information describing the pre-defined plurality of audio/video streams; and receiving, from the one or more streaming clients, requests to receive the audio/video streams from the pre-defined plurality of audio-video streams.

5 . The computing device of claim 1 , the operations further comprising:
receiving, from the one or more streaming clients, a request for available audio/video streams, wherein the available audio/video streams are a set of pre-defined available audio/video streams; sending, to the one or more streaming clients, stream metadata describing the available audio/video streams; receiving, from the one or more streaming clients, a request for the audio/video stream from the available audio/video streams; and sending, to the one or more streaming clients, one or more track setup objects describing properties of the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames for the audio/video stream, wherein the properties are usable by the one or more streaming clients when receiving and decoding the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames.

6 . The computing device of claim 1 , the operations further comprising:
forking the audio/video stream by:
based on stream metadata sent to one or more additional streaming clients, receiving requests from the one or more additional streaming clients to begin streaming the audio/video stream; and
responsive to receiving the requests form the one or more additional streaming clients to begin streaming the audio/video stream, streaming the audio/video stream to the one or more additional streaming clients, wherein the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed as independent encoded audio and/or video frames without grouping frames into chunks for the streaming;
wherein the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the one or more additional streaming clients as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the one or more additional streaming clients for subsequent frames or chunks;
wherein the forking is performed with low overhead based at least in part on the stream metadata and the request to being streaming.

7 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the streaming is performed without caching or buffering the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames.

8 . The computing device of claim 1 , the operations further comprising:
receiving, from one of the one or more streaming clients, a request to switch to a different audio/video stream from a set of pre-defined audio/video streams generated from the streaming media content; and responsive to the request to switch, streaming the different audio/video stream with a different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames, to the streaming client, wherein the different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is not grouped into chunks; wherein the different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the streaming client as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the streaming client for subsequent frames or chunks.

9 . The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the computing device operates as a primary delivery node.

10 . A method, implemented by a computing device, for low-latency real-time streaming of media content, the method comprising:
receiving, from a media source, streaming media content, wherein the streaming media content comprises audio and/or video content; receiving, from a streaming client, a request for available audio/video streams for streaming the streaming media content; sending, to the streaming client, stream metadata describing a set of pre-defined available audio/video streams for streaming the streaming media content, wherein the set of pre-defined available of audio/video streams are client-independent audio/video streams that are not specific to any given streaming client; receiving, from the streaming client, a selection of an audio/video stream from the set of pre-defined available audio/video streams; and streaming the selected audio/video stream to the streaming client, wherein the selected audio/video stream is streamed as a sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames that are independent encoded audio and/or video frames without grouping frames into chunks for the streaming; wherein the sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the streaming client as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the streaming client for subsequent frames or chunks.

11 . The method of claim 10 , further comprising:
receiving, from one or more additional streaming clients, a request for available audio/video streams for streaming the streaming media content; sending, to the one or more additional streaming clients, the stream metadata; receiving, from the one or more additional streaming clients, a selection of the audio/video stream from the set of pre-defined available audio/video streams; and forking the audio/video stream to begin streaming the audio/video stream to the one or more additional streaming clients.

12 . The method of claim 10 , further comprising:
receiving, from the streaming client, a request to switch to a different audio/video stream from the set of pre-defined available audio/video streams for streaming the streaming media content; and responsive to the request to switch, streaming the different audio/video stream with a different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames, to the streaming client, wherein the different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is not grouped into chunks; wherein the different sequence of encoded audio and/or video frames is streamed to the streaming client as a one-way stream and without receiving any requests from the streaming client for subsequent frames or chunks.

13 . The method of claim 10 , further comprising:
stream

Assignees

• Microsoft Technology Licensing Llc

Inventors

• Gunnalan Rajesh
• Konovalov Mihhail
• Qian Tin
• Moore Timothy Mark

Classifications

• H04N21/236 Primary

  Assembling of a multiplex stream, e.g. transport stream, by combining a video stream with other content or additional data, e.g. inserting a URL [Uniform Resource Locator] into a video stream, multiplexing software data into a video stream; Remultiplexing of multiplex streams; Insertion of stuffing bits into the multiplex stream, e.g. to obtain a constant bit-rate; Assembling of a packetised elementary stream {(multiplexing of data packets for data networks, e.g. RTP/UDP H04L65/00)} · CPC title

• H04L65/65

  Network streaming protocols, e.g. real-time transport protocol [RTP] or real-time control protocol [RTCP] · CPC title

• H04L65/75 Primary

  Media network packet handling · CPC title

• H04L65/61

  for supporting one-way streaming services, e.g. Internet radio · CPC title

• H04L65/70

  Media network packetisation · CPC title