Abstract: A content distribution network, including: a content server that stores a set of content items; a plurality of gateways for storing and serving content requests to a subset of the content items, the plurality of gateways being grouped into a plurality of classes of gateways; and a plurality of class trackers corresponding to the plurality of classes; wherein each class tracker manages a placement of content items and an assignment of content requests for its class of gateways; wherein the plurality of class trackers exchange congestion signals among themselves; wherein, for each content item, each class tracker determines a fraction of gateways in its class of gateways that store the content item and a rate of content requests that are forwarded to the content server or other class trackers, based on requests for the content item entering its class and the congestion signals received from other class trackers.

Abstract: The present invention concerns the replication of data, in particular the replication of data in a peer-to-peer network of mobile devices. Each device stores a plurality of data items. When two devices come into range, a decision as to whether to replicate a data item is made in dependence the extent to which that data item has been requested by other devices, and (b) the extent to which that data item is replicated on other devices. In this way, both the demand and supply of a data item are taken into account.

Abstract: A control device belongs to a network equipment connected to a communication network to which are coupled communication equipments of users capable of storing contents. This control device comprises i) a first analyzing means arranged for determining respective popularities of contents of a collection from at least user information, and for determining a number of replicas for each content of this collection from at least its determined content popularity, and/or ii) a second analyzing means arranged for determining content preference(s) of users from content ratings, and iii) a computation means arranged for determining location(s) for storing the replica(s) of each content, from the determined content replica numbers and/or the determined user's content preferences, in order to optimize the access to these contents by the users.

Abstract: A content distribution network, including: a content server that stores a set of content items; a plurality of gateways for storing and serving content requests to a subset of the content items, the plurality of gateways being grouped into a plurality of classes of gateways; and a plurality of class trackers corresponding to the plurality of classes; wherein each class tracker manages a placement of content items and an assignment of content requests for its class of gateways; wherein the plurality of class trackers exchange congestion signals among themselves; wherein, for each content item, each class tracker determines a fraction of gateways in its class of gateways that store the content item and a rate of content requests that are forwarded to the content server or other class trackers, based on requests for the content item entering its class and the congestion signals received from other class trackers.

Abstract: A recommendation system provides improved privacy under the local model, in which users store their data locally, and differential privacy is ensured through randomization of ratings under the control of the user before submitting data to the recommender system. The recommender system performs a clustering on the data collected from a plurality of users and returns the results to the users. The users' devices fine-tune the recommendation based on locally stored, non-randomized ratings. The recommendation system provides a user-adjustable degree of privacy while still allowing for generating recommendations with a decent accuracy.

Abstract: A method for recommending content items to a user is provided. It includes: (i) receiving one of at least an acceptance input and a rejection input from a user in relation to content presented to the user; (ii) in response to an acceptance input, rendering the presented content, or in response to a rejection input, selecting fresh content for presentation; and, (iii) repeating steps (i) and (ii) until a acceptance input is received. Content is selected in dependence on a associated probability associated with that content. The probability is increased in response to an acceptance input, the increase being determined in part on a measure of a predicted reduction in user satisfaction that would be associated with an additional rejection input.

Abstract: Method for managing information propagation in a network, said information being propagated from a source to a receiving node device through a path of the network comprising at least one edge of the network directly linking a first and a second relaying node devices, wherein the method comprises a step of allocating to the second relaying node device a score each time that the receiving node device receives a useful content from the source through said path, wherein the first relaying node device is able to receive information from the second relaying node device at a given rate, and the method further comprises a stop of periodically updating said rate as a function of a sum of the scores allocated to the second relaying node device

Abstract: A method is provided for performing a content search through comparisons, where a user is presented with two candidate objects and reveals which is closer to the user's intended target object. The disclosed principles provide active strategies for finding the user's target with few comparisons. The so-called rank-net strategy for noiseless user feedback is described. For target distributions with a bounded doubling constant, rank-net finds the target in a number of steps close to the entropy of the target distribution and hence of the optimum. The case of noisy user feedback is also considered. In that context a variant of rank-nets is also described, for which performance bounds within a slowly growing function (doubly logarithmic) of the optimum are found. Numerical evaluations on movie datasets show that rank-net matches the search efficiency of generalized binary search while incurring a smaller computational cost.

Abstract: The invention concerns a method for flow control in a peer-to-peer live streaming communication network comprising a plurality of nodes characterized in that the rate at which a node sends information to another node increases proportionally to the quantity of information present at node which has not yet reached node and decreases proportionally to a value attached to the link connecting node to node.

Abstract: A method for controlling the average time a peer spends in a swarm of peers in a file sharing system includes first establishing an autonomous mode of operation in the swarm of peers. In the autonomous mode, peers communicate only with other peers in their swarm in order to gain access to pieces of a desired file. If the swarm size meets a threshold size, then the file sharing system switches to a universal mode. In a universal mode, peers from one swarm are permitted to exchange desired file pieces with other peers in other swarms. If the desired file pieces held by peers within a swarm meets a threshold number, then the file sharing system transitions back to the autonomous mode of operation.

Abstract: In interactive content search through comparisons, a search for a target object in a database is performed by finding the object most similar to the target from a small list of objects. A new object list is then presented based on the earlier selections. This process is repeated until the target is included in the list presented, at which point the search terminates. A solution to the interactive content search problem is provided under the scenario of heterogeneous demand, where target objects are selected from a non-uniform probability distribution. It has been assumed that objects are embedded in a doubling metric space which is fully observable to the search algorithm. Based on these assumptions, an efficient comparison-based search method is provided whose cost in terms of the number of queries can be bounded by the doubling constant of the embedding c, and the entropy of demand distribution, H.

Abstract: A method for determining a power outage probability of an electrical power grid for a time period, the method comprising the following steps carried by a processor of a data processing unit: dividing the time period into several time intervals, determining a power generation capacity of a power generation facility and an energy storage unit size for an energy storage unit for said time period, determining an effective load unit demand for each time interval from a load unit demand of a load unit for each time interval, and computing the power outage probability using a grid parameter that comprises the power generation capacity, the energy storage unit size and the effective load unit demand, wherein the grid parameter is optimized for its maximum value with respect to all time intervals of the time period

Abstract: An apparatus and method are provided for tracking and positioning content within a domain including a plurality of devices that provide content data to users. The apparatus and associated method include a communication interface that receives requests for content from respective ones of the plurality of devices. An optimization processor analyzes all requests for each piece of content, and determines at least one of an actual request rate and a target request rate for each piece of content and, in response to the determination of the actual and target request rates, instructs individual devices of the plurality of devices to store respective pieces of content in a memory.

Abstract: A method is intended for controlling dissemination of content in a peer-to-peer mode between peers having wireless communication capacities and comprising a cache memory for storing contents. This method consists, each time a peer, having a group of variable values each associated to a content it can store into its cache memory and representative of utility that storing of this content represents for it and for other peers, accesses to a wireless network or to another peer offering access to these contents, in downloading N contents having the N highest variable values into its group, N being a number depending on the storage capacity the peer is ready to use into its cache memory to store contents to be downloaded.

Abstract: The invention relates to a system for managing the supply of energy of a client device connected to an energy transport network, said system comprising a switching device connected to said network, said system comprising an energy storage means connected to said network via the switching device, wherein the switching device is able to be configured according to three configuration modes, the system also comprising a control device comprising means for comparing a level of energy stored in the storage means and a local threshold of charge of the storage means and means for determining and assigning to the switching device a configuration mode from among the three configuration modes according to the result of said comparison.

Abstract: The invention relates to a system for managing the supply of energy for a number n of local energy networks where n?2, each local energy network comprising at least one client device. Said system comprises a switching device connected to each network, an energy storage means, and a station for supplying the n networks with energy via switching devices, the station receiving the energy from a supply system, and the station is configured to determine and assign to each switching device: A first mode wherein the energy storage means supplies energy to said network; or A second mode wherein the station supplies energy simultaneously to said network and to said energy storage means.

Abstract: The present invention concerns the replication of data, in particular the replication of data in a peer-to-peer network of mobile devices. Each device stores a plurality of data items. When two devices come into range, a decision as to whether to replicate a data item is made in dependence the extent to which that data item has been requested by other devices, and (b) the extent to which that data item is replicated on other devices. In this way, both the demand and supply of a data item are taken into account.

Abstract: The invention concerns a method for assigning parts of multimedia files to distributed storage devices, the number of said devices being an integer n, characterized in that it comprises the following steps: a step consisting in dividing each multimedia file in windows, which represent data for contiguous playback of a given duration; a step consisting, for each multimedia file, in determining a number k so that any original window of file can be recovered from any k distinct symbols; a step consisting, for each window of each said multimedia files, in assigning n corresponding symbols to said devices, one to each device, the n distinct symbols being created using erasure coding; and a step consisting in partially or totally filling the storage memory left on each device after said first steps with prefix windows of said multimedia files.

Abstract: A method for recommending content items to a user is provided. It includes: (i) receiving one of at least an acceptance input and a rejection input from a user in relation to content presented to the user; (ii) in response to an acceptance input, rendering the presented content, or in response to a rejection input, selecting fresh content for presentation; and, (iii) repeating steps (i) and (ii) until a acceptance input is received. Content is selected in dependence on a associated probability associated with that content. The probability is increased in response to an acceptance input, the increase being determined in part on a measure of a predicted reduction in user satisfaction that would be associated with an additional rejection input.

Abstract: The invention concerns a method for flow control in a peer-to-peer live streaming communication network comprising a plurality of nodes characterized in that the rate at which a nod sends information to another node increases proportionally to the quantity of information present at node which has not yet reached node and decreases proportionally to a value attached to the link connecting node to node.