Content distribution system and method

A system for distributing content from a source to at least one destination in a content delivery network, the system comprising a computer system at least configured to:

• receive a request from a destination for delivery of content over a network;
• simultaneously transmit the content to the one or more destinations in a plurality of multicast streams using a plurality of multicast trees, each of the plurality of multicast trees carrying one or more multicast streams, wherein the content in each of a plurality of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams is time-shifted relative to the content in another multicast stream,
• determine an availability and a status of the plurality of multicast streams, wherein determining the status of the plurality of multicast streams comprises determining the respective positions of the content that is currently being transmitted in the plurality of multicast streams;
• compute a performance score for each of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with at least one parameter from the group of:
• packet loss;
• jitter;
• link throughput;
• end-to-end delay;
• and/or the topological location of the destination;
• select one of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with the computed performance scores;
• and
• select one or more multicast stream from the one or more multicast streams carried by the selected multicast tree using the determined respective positions of the content that is currently being transmitted in the plurality of multicast streams.

A method of distributing content from a source to at least one destination in a content delivery network, the method comprising:

• receiving a request from a destination for delivery of content over a network;
• simultaneously transmitting the content to the one or more destinations in a plurality of multicast streams using a plurality of multicast trees, each of the plurality of multicast trees carrying one or more multicast streams, wherein the content in each of the plurality of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams is time-shifted relative to the content in another multicast stream,
• determining an availability and a status of the plurality of multicast streams;
• computing a performance score for each of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with at least one parameter from the group of:
• packet loss;
• jitter;
• link throughput end-to-end delay;
• and/or the topological location of the destination;
• selecting one of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with the computed performance scores;
• selecting one or more multicast stream from the one or more multicast streams carried by the selected multicast tree;
• and
• receiving a leave message from the destination to leave at least one of the multicast trees such that delivery of content to the destination by at least one of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams is stopped upon determination that the content to be delivered by that at least one of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams has already been delivered by another of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams.

A system for distributing content from a source to at least one destination in a content delivery network, the system comprising a computer system at least configured to:

• receive a request from a destination for delivery of content over a network;
• simultaneously transmit the content to the one or more destinations in a plurality of multicast streams using a plurality of multicast trees, each of the plurality of multicast trees carrying one or more multicast streams, wherein the content in each of a plurality of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams is time-shifted relative to the content in another multicast stream,
• determine an availability and a status of the plurality of multicast streams;
• compute a performance score for each of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with at least one parameter from the group of:
• packet loss;
• jitter;
• link throughput end-to-end delay;
• and/or the topological location of the destination;
• select one of the plurality of multicast trees in accordance with the computed performance scores;
• select one or more multicast stream from the one or more multicast streams carried by the selected multicast tree;
• and
• receive a leave message from the destination to leave at least one of the multicast trees such that delivery of content to the destination by at least one of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams is stopped upon determination that the content to be delivered by that at least one of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams has already been delivered by another of the simultaneously transmitted multicast streams.