User-centric universal multimedia access in home networks

• Published in: The Visual computer Vol. 24; no. 7-9; pp. 837 - 845
• Main Authors: Reiterer, Bernhard, Concolato, Cyril, Lachner, Janine, Le Feuvre, Jean, Moissinac, Jean-Claude, Lenzi, Stefano, Chessa, Stefano, Fernández Ferrá, Enrique, González Menaya, Juan José, Hellwagner, Hermann
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer-Verlag 01-07-2008; Springer Nature B.V; Springer Verlag
• Subjects: Artificial Intelligence; Computer Graphics; Computer Science; Image Processing and Computer Vision; Multimedia; Original Article; Rendering; UPnP AV; Content sharing; Universal Multimedia Access; Multimedia adaptation; Context awareness
• ISSN: 0178-2789; 1432-2315; 1432-8726
• DOI: 10.1007/s00371-008-0265-5

Much research is currently being conducted towards Universal Multimedia Access, aiming at removing barriers that arise when multimedia content is to be consumed with more and more heterogeneous devices and over diverse networks. We argue that users should be put at the center of the research work to enable user-centric multimedia access.
In this paper we present the requirements for a user-centric multimedia access system in a networked home environment. These requirements are easy access to available content repositories, context awareness, content adaptation and session migration. After showing the limits of state-of-the-art technologies, we present the architecture of a system which allows unified access to the home network content, automatically delivered to rendering devices close to the user, adapted according to the rendering device constraints, and which is also capable of session mobility.