US 11,818,187 B2
Mixed-mode synchronous playback
Hrishikesh Gossain, Santa Barbara, CA (US); Cheng Lu, Malden, MA (US); Zhaoyun Huang, Sudbury, MA (US); and Jeffrey Peters, Leominster, MA (US)
Assigned to Sonos, Inc., Santa Barbara, CA (US)
Filed by Sonos, Inc, Santa Barbara, CA (US)
Filed on Aug. 31, 2019, as Appl. No. 16/558,061.
Prior Publication US 2021/0067573 A1, Mar. 4, 2021
Int. Cl. H04L 65/611 (2022.01); H04L 12/18 (2006.01); H04L 41/0893 (2022.01)
CPC H04L 65/611 (2022.05) [H04L 12/189 (2013.01); H04L 41/0893 (2013.01)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A computing device comprising:
one or more processors;
one or more network interfaces; and
tangible, non-transitory computer-readable media comprising program instructions executable by the one or more processors such that the computing device is configured to:
for a playback group comprising a group coordinator and two or more group members, wherein the playback group has a corresponding multicast group having a multicast network address and each group member has a corresponding unicast network address, and wherein the computing device comprises a group member configured to forward packets between the group coordinator and at least one group member, after receiving packets comprising media content, playback timing, and clock timing for the playback group, (i) for packets comprising media content and playback timing to be forwarded to at least one group member operating in a peer-to-peer networking mode, forward the packets comprising the media content and playback timing to the multicast network address for the playback group, (ii) for packets comprising media content and playback timing to be forwarded to a group member operating in an infrastructure networking mode, convert the packets comprising the media content and playback timing addressed to the multicast network address for the playback group to packets addressed to the unicast network address of the group member operating in the infrastructure networking mode and forward the packets comprising the media content and playback timing to the unicast network address of the group member operating in the infrastructure networking mode, and (iii) for packets comprising clock timing to be forwarded to a particular group member, forward the packets comprising the clock timing to the unicast network address of the particular group member regardless of whether the particular group member is operating in the peer-to-peer networking mode or the infrastructure networking mode.