Development and standardization of an embedded Linux based triple-play IP settop box

Abstract

With the recent enhancements to the delivery of IP services and of the video codecs such as h.264, transmission of television through IP-based communication systems has been a viable option. An IP settop box (IPSTB) constructs a bridge between a television set and a broadband IP network such as DSL, cable modem, powerline or wireless broadband. IPSTB brings new challenges for the system designers, especially in the areas of inherently organized home networking systems, protocols, and architectures. Future IPSTB products are candidate to converge the information and entertainment technologies. This thesis suggests newly developed device and service discovery methods for the design of an IPSTB software structure that is compatible with the Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) audio video (AV) device descriptions. At the design process, it suggests optimized communication schemes between the servers that are in the control of service providers, and the consumer IPSTBs. As a newly developed technology, since there is not any standardization for most parts of the overall IPTV system, this thesis takes proven mechanisms as basis and adapts them to the overall design that consists of the hardware drivers, middleware, and the additional programs which helps the middleware to handle the external components of the system connected via USB or serial interfaces. Being an innovative idea, we have used a control system called Virtual Bus Manager so as to communicate between the aforementioned system components. Some system components such as web browser is based on the X Windows architecture, so cross compiling the X system for the embedded platform has also been a challenge for the feasibility of the final design. Being the second part of the Triple-Play system, Voice over IP application has also been included and based on the compilation of open source software for the corresponding embedded system. Finally, the web browser itself has been based on the popular Gecko web-core that is derived from Firefox.