Software-defined media platform

A network node configured for facilitating media delivery, the network node comprising:

• one or more processors;
• and
• one or more persistent memory modules coupled to the one or more processors, the one or more persistent memory modules having program instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the one or more processors, are configured to:
• responsive to determining that processing of a source media stream is required:
• dynamically configuring and instantiating:
• a plurality of transcoding processing units that are sequentially connected to one another such that each subsequent transcoding processing unit receives an input segment stream from an upstream transcoding processing unit and generates one or more output segment streams having encoding bitrates that are different from an encoding bitrate of the input segment stream;
• and
• one or more packager processing units;
• processing the source media stream into one or more levels of work product segments having different media characteristics using the dynamically instantiated plurality of transcoding processing units;
• packaging the one or more levels of work product segments into one or more final work product segments having select media characteristics by the dynamically instantiated one or more packager processing units;
• and
• causing to upload the one or more final work product segments packaged by the dynamically instantiated one or more packager processing units to one or more storage nodes for delivery to a plurality of end stations over a media streaming network;
• and
• responsive to determining that the source media stream is segmented and encoded at one or more bitrates acceptable for delivery, avoiding the instantiation of the plurality of transcoding processing units and the processing of the source media stream into one or more levels of work product segments by the plurality of transcoding processing units.

A non-transitory tangible computer-readable medium having program instructions stored thereon, which are configured to perform following acts when executed by one or more processors of a network node:

• responsive to determining that processing of a source media stream is required:
• dynamically configuring and instantiating:
• a plurality of transcoding processing units that are sequentially connected to one another such that each subsequent transcoding processing unit receives an input segment stream from an upstream transcoding processing unit and generates one or more output segment streams having encoding bitrates that are different from an encoding bitrate of the input segment stream;
• and
• one or more packager processing units;
• processing the source media stream into one or more levels of work product segments having different media characteristics using the dynamically instantiated plurality of transcoding processing units;
• and
• packaging the one or more levels of work product segments into one or more final work product segments having select media characteristics by the dynamically instantiated one or more packager processing units;
• and
• uploading the one or more final work product segments packaged by the dynamically instantiated one or more packager processing units to one or more storage nodes for delivery to a plurality of end stations over a media streaming network;
• and
• responsive to determining that the source media stream is segmented and encoded at one or more bitrates acceptable for delivery, avoiding the instantiation of the plurality of transcoding processing units and the processing of the source media stream into one or more levels of work product segments by the plurality of transcoding processing units.