Patent ID: 7698451
Filing Date: 2010-04-13
Classification: G06N,H04L,H04N

Abstract:
1. A method for fragmenting a file pertaining to a title, to be distributed to one or more devices in a network, the method comprising: dividing the file into a sequence of data blocks, the sequence of data blocks being partitioned into a first portion and a second portion, wherein each of the data blocks includes at least several Kbytes; forming a header from the data blocks in the first portion, the data blocks in the header being consecutive, a data size of the header being predetermined to ensure that a playback of the title proceeds without jitters; forming N segments, each of the N segments including some of the data blocks in the second portion, the data blocks in each of the N segments being nonconsecutive, wherein N is a finite integer; wherein (i) at least one of the devices coupled to the network is configured to download data at a rate D, and (ii) a downloading on the at least one device is affected by one or more interruptions that cause the first device to not receive any data for a period of time X; and wherein the data size of the header is dynamically defined to account for possible abnormal conditions in the network, the data size being at least D*X+Max(over all times t>=X) [byte offset for corresponding frame−D*t].