Patent ID: 9100464
Filing Date: 2015-08-04
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A method by at least one network node for controlling communication of content streams through a content distribution network, the method comprising: defining subscriber-level weight values corresponding to a plurality of subscribers being served by an edge replication server node, wherein each subscriber is associated with a corresponding subscriber account and a subscriber-level weight value is operative for regulating bandwidth of a shareable virtual pipe associated with a particular one of the subscribers; receiving a set of priority values assigned by a subscriber with respect to a group of user equipment (UE) nodes registered with the subscriber; generating a set of device-level weight values corresponding to the UE nodes based at least in part upon the priority values of the UE nodes and storing the device-level weight values in a data repository; accessing the data repository to retrieve information which identifies the user equipment nodes registered with the subscriber and which further identifies the device-level weight values that are associated with the group of the user equipment nodes; regulating, by a weighted fair queuing (WFQ) scheduler node, bandwidth allocation to each virtual pipe associated with a corresponding subscriber, responsive to the subscriber-level weight value defined for the corresponding subscriber; and regulating, by the WFQ scheduler node, communication bit rates of a group of content streams within a particular virtual pipe of the corresponding subscriber, wherein each content stream is delivered to a particular one of the group of user equipment nodes registered with the corresponding subscriber and regulated responsive to the device-level weight value of the corresponding UE node.