Internet Distribution& Delivery System for the Entertainment Industry


 

The primary objective of this project was to test the hypothesis that metadata will not only increase searching effectiveness on the Internet, but also provide optimisation parameters in data distribution and delivery systems. This project was carried out between 1996-1999.

Metadata - We looked at content, application and system metadata, representation and standards. Instead of developing a new metadata standard we adapted the Dublin Core. We were one of the first projects to use the Dublin Core with Warwick frameworks.

We built two systems that used our metadata sets: the Kendra Cache and the Adaptive Delivery System. Both systems demonstrated that the use of metadata, both static and dynamic, can aid Internet performance significantly.

Internet Caching - We built a cache replacement model based on access trends observed in a broad range of log data obtained from our industrial partner, Cerbernet. The Kendra replacement model bases its policy on popularity, which is a function of both numbers of access and how recently the data item has been used, also it uniquely takes windows of trend periods into account. The results in terms of response time saving or retrieval latency were very encouraging. We observed that the Kendra caching policy provides a hit-rate improvement over traditional caching methods of between 10% and 40%, with many results achieving a greater than 90% hit-rate based on entertainment webpage log files.

Adaptive data delivery - The adaptive delivery mechanism monitors Internet performance and then makes decisions on how best to deliver the data given the resources available. To facilitate the adaptive nature of this system, it was built as a set of components which would come into play on demand. This system was very successful in that it allowed us to look at how adaptive systems using the internet are affected by their sensitivity to their environment and how well the work with pessimistic/optimistic settings. The test system was built to deliver audio.

We have also carried out small project on copyright issues. The work on Kendra have gained much interest and an initiative spun off as a result. The Kendra Initiative was introduced at Streaming Media, Europe in early 2000.

In summary we looked at what metadata is needed to help both adaptive systems and caching systems and how well these systems perform with the extra information. In addition, we have explored the notion of adaptive systems and how their sensitivity to the environment impacts on their adaptive processes. This research has also highlighted a problem in the assumption that requests follow the Zipfian distribution when producing cache replacement policies. We focused on the developing entertainment industry which wants to provide music and video, while minimising providers' costs. 

This work was done with the support of the EPSRC and Cerbernet Limited.

Personnel

Principle Investigator Dr J. A. McCann City University
Research Assistant Dr J. S. Crane City University
Research Assistant Mr P. Howlett City University
Industrial Partner Mr. D. Harris Cerbernet

Last modified: 08 Mar 2002 15:55

(c) J.A.McCann, Imperial College. This information can only be used for review and criticism, no other use is permitted without prior permission by the author.