Patent ID: 8370426

Claim:
A method of providing a content-on-demand service to a user terminal in a system comprising a plurality of content-on-demand servers and a packet-switched network, the method comprising: a first of the content-on-demand (CoD) servers seeking to reserve packet switched network resources to enable service delivery to the user terminal by seeking to set up a path with sufficient resources through the network, said first server sending a message indicating that resource reservation was insufficient, thereafter a further of the content-on-demand servers seeking to resource packet-switched network resources to enable service provision to the user terminal by seeking to set a path with sufficient resources through the network, the further server receiving a reservation acknowledgment; said further server sending a message indicating that resource reservation is sufficient, and said further server providing the content to the user terminal via the packet-switched network; in which a further controller uses a list of candidate content-on-demand servers to determine a sequence in which the content-on-demand servers are to be requested to seek to reserve resources, the further controller requesting in turn the servers to reserve resources and to send a message indicating whether resource reservation was sufficient, until one reports that resource reservation is sufficient and in which each server has an associated coverage area, and the first server is selected dependent upon in which coverage area the user terminal requesting the service currently resides.