Patent ID: 7180912

Claim:
A method of processing multi-media service requests received at a multi-media services provider system to form a multi-media communication path between at least a first communication device and at least a second communication device of a plurality of communication devices, the method comprising: receiving at least a first request message for at least one multi-media service at a call control element located on the multi-media services provider system from the first communication device; processing the first request message at the call control element located on the multi-media services provider system to generate a second request message for the at least one multi-media service including predetermined attributes of the first request message; receiving and processing the second request message at a service broker located on the multi-media services provider system for generating a first redirect message including predetermined attributes of the second request message; receiving and processing the first redirect message at the call control element located on the multi-media services provider system for generating a third request message including predetermined attributes of the first redirect message; receiving and processing the third request message at one or more application servers located on the multi-media services provider system for generating a second redirect message, wherein the second redirect message includes at least a first contact header having address-related information associated with a primary media server located on the multi-media services provider system and a second contact header having address-related information associated with a secondary media server located on the multi-media services provider system; receiving and processing the second redirect message at the call control element to generate a fourth request message including a Content-Type header having a multipart/mixed media type; wherein the fourth request message further includes a first message body portion including session description protocol associated with the first request message and a second message body portion including service related parameters to establish an interactive session with a predetermined caller; and querying the primary media server for determining whether the primary media server includes resources for processing the fourth request message.