What is middleware and why do you need it?

Service providers intent upon introducing TV-based services to subscribers have a steep learning curve. Anyone that has been down this road can attest to the near-overwhelming amount of knowledge that must be mastered before being able to make well-informed decisions about their TV-related technology and capital acquisitions.

Resuming my occasional focus on technology infrastructure, this month we'll talk about middleware. What is it? I frequently define middleware as a "command-and-control" framework that intermediates between the TV subscriber's viewing experience and the electronic infrastructure bringing programming from its sources, through communications networks, to the subscriber's TV set. A number of academic definitions are available as well. Personally, I like the definition that the Internet2 gives us (see http://middleware.internet2.edu/overview/): "[Middleware is] the intersection of the stuff that network engineers don't want to do with the stuff that applications developers don't want to do."

Most readers of this column know what network engineers do, so I won't belabor that here. But to make sure we're clear on the definition of an application in a TV context, there are the generic applications themselves, such as the interactive program guide, video-on-demand, the Walled Garden and digital TV itself. Then, one can talk about what a service provider does with those generic applications. For instance, the "local channel lineup" is a customized application of the interactive program guide. Another is "network PVR (personal video recording)," the ability for a centrally located video server (also used for video-on-demand) to cache the Six O'Clock News at the head-end, so subscribers can use a remote control to call it to the screen and watch it on demand when they get home from work at 8:30. In other words, applications are the meaningful things that are done with the underlying infrastructure, using the middleware like so many marionette strings.

But back to middleware. Middleware systems for interactive TV fall into two broad categories:

• Middleware-only systems originally designed for cable, now used for cable, satellite TV and broadband networks (including IP networks). Suppliers include Liberate Technologies, OpenTV, CanalPlus Technologies, Microsoft and others.

• Integrated middleware-applications systems designed expressly for broadband IP networks. Suppliers include iMagicTV, Myrio, Orca Interactive, Minerva Networks and others.

Although the first group of systems and suppliers were around first, it's the latter group that are most frequently found in telco bid situations today.

Generically speaking, these middleware systems are responsible for four things:

• The subscriber's service experience

• The definition of services, service packages, pricing and service bundles

• Interfaces to external systems

• The management of transactions, media assets, physical assets and subscribers, and the underlying data about them

Physically, middleware systems are essentially client-server systems. The client software resides in the set-top box, while servers are centrally located in the head-end facility. The server not only manages all the clients (subscribers) but also manages services, the interfaces to billing and other external systems, and more, as detailed later.

The middleware client accepts content, TV screen-definition information, subscriber data and programming-related data from the network and visually renders it onto the TV screen, based upon business and presentation rules, creating the subscriber's TV experience. The rendering takes place within a runtime framework that the set-top box supplier pre-installs in the set-top box, such as a Web browser or a Java virtual machine.

In fact, many set-top boxes use specially modified Web browsers licensed from Microsoft, the Mozilla organization (which manages the code that Netscape donated to the open source community) and several of the middleware-only suppliers. Internet old-timers might remember the Spyglass browser; today, Spyglass is owned by OpenTV, a TV middleware supplier, and it is deployed in literally millions of cable TV households.

Each middleware supplier adds its own unique client software for each of the set-top boxes its platform supports, so it can interpret instructions and data from its middleware server. 

Moving on to the middleware servers, some middleware suppliers wrap all of their functionality into a single software system, others break them down into modular components. Depending upon the service provider's own service plans and objectives, this may be an important consideration when developing supplier selection criteria.

Whether they are modular or all-in-one, most middleware suppliers offer the following functionality in their server products:

• Subscriber definition: the ability to define a subscriber, including the subscriber's demographics, the services and service packages that the subscriber is taking, a log of the subscriber's transactions (such as movie orders, upgrade requests, even channel changes), the subscriber's viewing preferences (such as blocking R-rated programming), and more

• Channel assignments: the ability to associate TV channels with slots in the TV program guide and with channel numbers. Behind the scenes, these channel assignments are also mapped to specific video encoders, which in turn are mapped to local program feeds, satellite transponders or other program sources

• Video asset management: the ability for the service provider to create a library of movies and other video-on-demand content, schedule its availability and assign a set of prices to it. Pricing for movies is likely to change over time, as the movie matures within its life cycle and as the service provider opts to run promotions for various titles

• Pricing: the ability for the service provider to associate a price with a service or group of services--even to have multiple pricing levels for each, based upon the need to run promotions designed to capture new subscribers

• Packaging: the ability to group multiple channels into a single offering, such as "Basic," "Pay" and "Premium." And to have multiple combinations of packages at different price points and/or designed for different audiences. A Latino viewer is likely to opt for Spanish language channels, for instance

• Bundling: the ability to combine a TV programming package with other packages, such as phone service and broadband data access

• Transactions: middleware systems are designed to record every channel change made by every subscriber.  Also, it is important to record the viewing of on-demand content so that the subscriber can be billed for the movie he or she watched on Friday night.  The middleware system builds a database of these transactions which can later be mined for statistics that can be used to make informed programming, content acquisition and advertising decisions

• Billing Interfaces: Maybe this one should be at the top of the list! Any billable service, whether it's TV or movies-on-demand, must eventually end up on a subscriber's bill so the service provider can pay its content suppliers and hopefully retain enough money to make a profit

• Metadata management: TV programs, movies and other content have information associated with them. This is the "data about your data," referred to as metadata. Your middleware manages all of this information in such a way that it can be presented to the subscriber when needed. If the subscriber wants to watch a movie, he or she would press the "info" key on the remote control to see a plot synopsis, the names of the actors, the duration of the movie, duration of the rental and of course the price.

Some suppliers offer more, some less. Some integrate with external systems more closely than others. Some have open application programming interfaces that allow customization, and others don't. The most important thing is that the final experience is easy for the subscriber to use while being inexpensive for the service provider to support in toto, and that it meets the service providers business and functional requirements.

In summary, without middleware, your TV deployment might have a backbone - your network, that is - but it would not have a brain. Which middleware should you choose? It depends upon the service provider's individual service requirements.  Take a look back at my June 2002 entry to The Analyst's Corner, entitled " The Product Management Approach," for a refresher on the development of requirements.

Steve Hawley is principal and consulting analyst of Advanced Media Strategies.  He may be reached via his Web site, http://www.tvstrategies.com.