About the P2P Streaming Operation Solution for Entertainment Interaction

　　 Great importance have been attached to streaming broadband operation platforms and network TV applications recently by radio, film and television, telecommunication and numerous broadband operators which are regarded as the broadband value-added services with tremendous market and social values. However, from the objective perspective, there are few vendors currently in the market who are capable of providing such streaming operation services and operation services for entertaining interaction in the real meaning. As a matter of fact, due to technical bottleneck, it's impossible at all to realize the large-scale implementation right now. While in case of reluctant implementation, it requires lots of hardware equipment and the bandwidth of more than 10G . One single server in the legacy VOD system can at most support the concurrent transmission of about 300-1000 users. To support a live broadcasting application for over 30,000 users, 100 highly configured servers and more than 10G bandwidth are required which will cost millions (RMB Yuan) at least. The market desires for a high quality and “high performance-to-price ratio” streaming operation platform. As P2P streaming technology grows and is put into commercial use, ForceTech first launched the commercialized P2P broadband streaming operation platform entertainment in the fall of 2004, backed by ForceTech's long-term technical accumulations in the broadband streaming industry and its strong forces on R&D. As the industry expert, ForceP2P has been always committed to the sophistication and R&D of P2P underlying technology. The uniquely-created P2P Swarming Methodology technology pioneers the domestic market and breaks through the technical barrier which requires massive highly-configured servers and bandwidths for broadband streaming operation, really realizing the streaming operation which enables large-scale, concurrent, smooth video watching.

Overview of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform for entertainment interaction

　　 The application platform for entertainment interaction is a distributed framework over broadband IP network. The system generally includes the service application system (telecom carrier-grade P2P video on demand, P2P TV video live broadcasting, etc.), CMS content management system, operation support system(certification, authentication, billing, reporting and statistics, etc.) and so forth.

Architecture of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform for entertainmeng interaction

　　Based on the overall framework structure of the system, the architecture of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform is described as follows:

　　User's platform: the terminal layer of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform.

　　Application support platform: the core layer of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform, which enables the P2P VOD and live broadcasting applications, etc. including streaming content collection, encoding, auditing, distribution, storage, cataloging and indexing, copyright protection (DRM) and content publishing, etc.

　　Operation support platform: the operation and management layer of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform. Including user management, certification and billing management, system monitoring management, statistical reporting management, the 3 rd party operation management ,etc.;

　　Service platform: the service mode and realization layer of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform. The available applications include video on-demand, digital TV live broadcasting, multimedia data broadcasting, interactive programs, video phone, Internet browsing as well as online education, etc.

Main features and advantages of the ForceP2P streaming broadband operation platform entertainment interaction

　·Save servers and server bandwidth resources dramatically

　　Compared to the legacy non-commercial P2P streaming system, its more particular algorism makes it more accurate for file block requests and checking transmission, thus reducing invalid requests and files transmission dramatically and saving network bandwidth occupancy significantly. The ForceP2P streaming system single server can save the bandwidth resources by over 15 times than the legacy streaming system. In the test, the ForceP2P VOD system proves to be able to support the concurrent application for more than 3000 users with 100M bandwidth on each server.

　·Fast response and quality playing

　　The ForceP2P live broadcasting and VOD feature fast response and quality video playing so that users hardly feel any delay when requesting for streaming services and the playing of sounds and videos keeps smooth and continuous all the time, without stop, jittering and discontinuity, etc. As a matter of fact: as long as customer are connected to broadband, we can provide smooth playing.

　·Widely supported formats

　　The system supports various mainstream media such as MPEG-1 (mpg, dat, mp3), MPEG-4 (avi, asf, wmv), REAL (rm, rmvb), REAL10, realizing the real full-compatibility.

　·Easy to manage

　　The modular design and it fully commercial application-orientation allow P2P advantages to be embedded into applications in all other industries flexibly and easily. Focusing on the Force CMS (Content Management System), it realizes multiple service links including collection and production, cataloging and storage, copyright protection, auditing and publishing, network distribution and certification and playing, etc. of audio/video content. In addition, the Force CMS (Content Management System) also supports the outsourced program importing from content providers (ICP), supports the cooperation in program encryption, and supports the interactions of video flows, data flows and fee flows with content providers and broadband operators, etc., really realizing the seamless integration of all systems.  

　·The unified operation platform on the Client specially tailored for entertaining interaction

Figure I: “XTV” Example Screen Capture