Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
CONTENT DEPLOYMENT, SCALING, AND TELEMETRY
BACKGROUND
100011 In recent years, the use of electronically presented content has
become
increasingly popular and widespread. In some examples, certain electronically
presented
content, such as multi-player games, may be simultaneously accessed and
engaged by large
numbers of different users. To make their content readily available to users,
content
developers are often forced to become experts in server deployment and
management
technologies that they would otherwise have no interest to invest in. In
particular, many
content developers would prefer to concentrate on the creative aspects of the
content that is
= being developed. Many content developers view server deployment and
management as a
distraction from their core business of trying to create content, make it
enjoyable, and ship it
on time. In addition to the time necessary to gain expertise with server-based
deployment
and management systems, many content developers are often dissatisfied with
other features
of these systems. For example, many content developers are often dissatisfied
with the level
of feedback received from such systems regarding the operation and use of
their content.
The availability of such feedback may often be limited and difficult to
obtain.
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SUMMARY
[0002] In one embodiment there is provided a method for deployment of a
content
item. The method involves receiving an indication that the content item is
ready for the
deployment. The content item is deployed using a plurality of content item
instances, and
one or more of the plurality of content item instances is configurable to have
multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions. The content item is created using a
software
development kit associated with a service that hosts the content item.
Information regarding
quantities of unoccupied user sessions is reported by each of the plurality of
content item
instances. The software development kit provides code embedded into the
content item that
reports the information regarding the quantities of unoccupied user sessions.
The method
further involves installing, based at least in part on the indication, at
least a first content item
instance as an image on a first virtual machine instance, and detecting a
first condition
associated with allocating an additional virtual machine instance to the
plurality of content
item instances. The first condition involves determining that a first average
number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances has met
or dropped below
a first quantity, the first average number based on information provided at a
first time. The
method further involves allocating, based at least in part on the first
condition, the additional
virtual machine instance to the plurality of content item instances. The
method further
involves copying the image onto the virtual machine instance, and detecting a
second
condition associated with de-allocating a second virtual machine instance from
the plurality
of content item instances. The second condition involves determining that a
second average
number of unoccupied user sessions has met or exceeded a second quality, the
second
average number based on information provided at a second time. The method
further
involves de-allocating, based at least in part on the second condition, the
second virtual
machine instance from the plurality of content item instances.
[0002a] The first condition may involve determining that a total number
unoccupied
user sessions for the plurality of content item instances has met or dropped
below a third
quantity.
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10002b11 The method may involve performing at least one of terminating or re-
purposing the second virtual machine instance.
[0002c] The second condition may involve determining that a total number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances meets or
exceeds a third
quantity.
[0002d] The method may involve authenticating users for which a plurality of
requests to access the content item is received.
[0002e] The method may involve determining, based at least in part on stored
information, that users are entitled to access the content item.
1000211 The method of claim 1, may involve causing at least two of the
plurality of
content item instances to execute on a single virtual machine instance.
[0002g] The content item may be a video game.
[0002h] In accordance with another aspect, there is provided a computer
readable
medium storing instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, may
direct the
one or more processors to execute the method and any of its variations above.
[00021] In accordance with another aspect, there is provided a system
including at
least one processor and the computer readable medium above. The at least one
processor and
the computer readable medium are configured to cause the at least one
processor to execute
the instructions stored on the computer readable medium to cause the at least
one processor
to execute the method and any of its variations above.
[0002j] In another embodiment there is provided a system for deployment of a
content item. The system includes one or more computing devices and one or
more
memories having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, upon
execution, cause
the system to perform operations including receiving an indication that the
content item is
ready for the deployment and the content item is deployed using a plurality of
content
item instances, wherein the one or more of the plurality of content item
instances is
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configurable to have multiple simultaneously assigned user sessions, wherein
the content
item is created using a software development kit associated with a service
that hosts the
content item, wherein information regarding quantities of unoccupied user
sessions is
reported by each of the plurality of content item instances, and wherein
through
instructions provided by the content item that is created using the software
development
kit provides code embedded into the content item that reports the information
regarding the
quantities of unoccupied user sessions. The operations further include
installing, based at
least in part on the indication, at least a first content item instance as an
image on a first
virtual machine instance and detecting a first condition associated with
allocating an
additional virtual machine instance to the plurality of content item
instances. The first
condition includes determining that a first average number of unoccupied user
sessions for
the plurality of content item instances has met or dropped below a first
quantity, the first
average number based on information provided at a first time. The operations
further include
allocating, based at least in part on the first condition, the additional
virtual machine instance
to the plurality of content item instances, and copying the image onto the
additional virtual
machine instance. The operations further include detecting a second condition
associated
with de-allocating a second virtual machine instance from the plurality of
content item
instances wherein the second condition involves determining that a second
average
number of unoccupied user sessions has met or exceeded a second quantity, the
second
average number based on information provided at a second time, and de-
allocating, based
at least in part on the second condition, the second virtual machine instance
from the plurality
of content item instances.
[0002k] The first condition may include determining that a total number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances has met
or dropped below
a third quality.
[00021] The operations may include detecting a condition associated with de-
allocating a second virtual machine instance from the plurality of content
item instances, de-
allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the second virtual
machine instance from
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the plurality of content item instances and performing at least one of
terminating or re-
purposing the second virtual machine instance.
[0002m] The second condition may include determining that a total number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances meets or
exceeds a third
quantity.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0003] The following detailed description may be better understood when read
in
conjunction with the appended drawings. For the purposes of illustration,
there are shown in
the drawings example embodiments of various aspects of the disclosure;
however, the
invention is not limited to the specific methods and instrumentalities
disclosed.
[0004] FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example content deployment, scaling
and
telemetry system that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure.
[0005] FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example content scaling and execution
system that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure.
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[0006] FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example telemetry information
routing and
processing system that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure.
[0007] FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example content deployment and
scaling
process that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure.
[0008] FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example process content execution
in
accordance with the present disclosure.
[0009] FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example telemetry information
routing process
that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure.
[0010] FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating an example computing system that may
be used in
accordance with the present disclosure.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0011] Techniques for content deployment, scaling and telemetry are described
herein.
In some examples, a content developer or other party may provide various types
of electronically
presented content items, such as video games and other applications, for
deployment to various
users. In some cases, different versions of content, such as content that is
being tested and/or
content that is fully developed, may be provided and made available at the
same or different
times. In some examples, the content may be created using a software
development kit (SDK) or
other elements that are associated and/or integrated with various backend or
other services or
components that may host or otherwise interact with deployed instances of the
content item, such
as a content item instance information service, an instance interface, and/or
content execution
components, which are each described in detail below. In these examples, the
SDK or other
elements may provide code and other functionality built-in to the content
created by the developer
that may, for example, allow ingestion, configuration, provisioning and
deployment of the content
to be more easily and rapidly accomplished, such as by allowing the content to
interact more
efficiently with a multi-player video gaming or other multi-user environment.
For example, an
SDK used to create the content may assist in configuration of new user
sessions for one or more
users and collection of information about executing content item instances,
such as a number of
occupied user sessions, a number of unoccupied user sessions, content item
instance duration,
memory usage, and the like.
[0012] In addition to the content itself, developers and other parties may
also provide
information associated with identities of various users that are authorized to
use the content and,
in some cases, respective content entitlements for various users. For example,
if different builds
and/or versions of content are available, different authorized users may be
indicated for the
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different builds and/or versions. Once a content item is made accessible for
deployment, one or
more instances of the content item may be installed as an image on a virtual
machine instance.
Additional instances of the content item may then be launched on the same
virtual machine
instance and/or by copying the image onto any number of additional virtual
machine instances.
By way of these and other techniques, the content item may be made to
available to large numbers
of users in a rapid, efficient, reliable and secure manner.
[0013] In some examples, the deployed content may be designed to allow
multiple
different users to control and interact with the content, such as may occur in
a multiplayer video
game or other multi-user applications. In order to allow such multi-user
control and interaction,
the disclosed techniques may employ concepts such as user sessions and content
item instances.
In some examples, one or more instances of a content item may be configurable
to execute with
multiple simultaneously assigned users sessions. This may, for example, allow
multiple users to
play with or against one another, or to otherwise collaborate to provide input
and receive output
from an executing content item instance. Each content item instance may, in
some cases, have an
associated quantity of available user sessions. In some examples, information
associated with
content item instances may be collected, such as a number of occupied user
sessions, a number of
unoccupied user sessions, content item instance duration, memory usage, and
the like. This
information may, in some cases, be used to match and assign authorized users
to appropriate
content item instances. For example, in some cases, when an authorized user
connects to the
system, the user may indicate certain user content preferences, such as
preferred plot lines, story
arcs, virtual locations, levels, modes, characters, weapons, and the like.
This preference
information may be used to match a user to a particular content item instance
having at least one
unoccupied user session. In some examples, if no such content item instance is
available, then an
additional content item instance may be initiated that may better accommodate
the user's
preferences.
[0014] As set forth above, in some examples, information associated with
content item
instances may be collected, such as a number of occupied user sessions, a
number of unoccupied
user sessions, content item instance duration, memory usage, and the like. In
some cases, this
information may be provided periodically to a routing function that routes the
information to one
or more available recipients. In some examples, the available recipients may
be associated with a
content item instance information service, a content item fleet information
service, and a historical
information service, and others. The content item instance information service
may, for example,
provide information for matching and assignment of user sessions to content
item instances,
launching of new content item instances, and content item instance-level
feedback and metrics to
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content developers and other parties. The content item fleet information
service may, for
example, provide content item fleet-level feedback and metrics to developers
and other parties. A
content item fleet is a grouping of instances of the same or related content
items, such as a
grouping of content item instances that are all executing the same version of
a content item. The
historical information service may, for example, provide historical feedback
and metrics to
developers and other parties. In some examples, the routing function and/or
processing functions
for the content item instance information service, the content item fleet
information service, and
historical information service may be distributed computing-based (e.g., cloud-
based) functions
that execute code based, at least in part, on events, such as the receiving of
telemetry information
for routing and/or processing. Generally speaking, such cloud-based functions,
and service
providing such functions, can run code in response to events and automatically
manage the
compute resources. In addition, such cloud-based functions and services may
start running the
code or trigger computing resources in a small amount of time, and those
computing resources
can be eliminated once the code has been run.
10015] A diagram of an example content deployment, scaling and telemetry
system 150
that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure is shown in FIG. 1.
As shown, content
developer compute node 100 may include, for example, various interfaces,
consoles, and/or
dashboards operated by content developers or other parties. User compute node
110 may
communicate with identity and entitlement services 105, content item instance
information
service 115, and/or telemetry components 125 using, for example, one or more
networks,
including one or more wide area networks (WANs) such as the Internet and/or
one or more local
area networks (LANs). As should be appreciated, although only a single
developer compute node
100 is shown in FIG. 1, system 150 may include any number of different
developers and other
parties deploying any number of different content items. In some cases,
content developer
compute nodes 100 may execute one or more integrated development environment
(IDE)
applications, or portions thereof, to assist in development of content.
Generally, as will be
described in greater detail below, content developer compute node 100 may
allow, for example,
developers to design and develop content items, to provide access to content
items for
deployment, to provide user identity and/or entitlement information, to
monitor and obtain
feedback and metrics associated with content item instances, content item
fleets, and historical
information, and other operations. As will also be described in greater detail
below, when a
developer is ready to deploy a certain content item, information for accessing
the content may, for
example, be provided to content execution components 120, which may perform
various
operations for executing instances of the content item, which are made
accessible to various users.
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[0016] In some examples, in addition to developing and providing of content,
developers
and other parties may also provide identity and/or entitlement information for
various users to
access the provided content. In particular, developer compute node 100 may
sometimes interact
with identity and entitlement services 105 to provide this identity and/or
entitlement information.
In other examples, information may be provided to identity and entitlement
services 105 by other
parties. In some cases, developers or other parties may configure an identity
pool by providing
indications of authorized users that may access one or more content items. In
some examples,
identity and entitlement services 105 may generate or receive identity
authentication information,
such as user names, passwords, and the like, for authenticating the identities
of various users.
User identities and their associated authentication information may be stored,
for example, in
identity information 107. Also, in some examples, developers or other parties
may provide
entitlement information 106, which may indicate the content items with which
each authorized
user is entitled to interact. In some examples, certain users may only be
permitted to access test
versions, or fully developed versions, certain versions for which the user has
paid or subscribed,
or any other types of content.
[0017] User compute node 110 may be employed by a user to request access to
content,
such as a user session for interaction with a particular content item
instance. User compute node
110 may communicate with identity and entitlement services 105, content item
instance
information service 115, and/or content execution components 120 using, for
example, one or
more networks, including one or more wide area networks (WANs) such as the
Internet and/or
one or more local area networks (LANs). As should be appreciated, although
only a single user
compute node 110 is shown in FIG. 1, system 150 may include any number of
different users
accessing the same or different content. In some cases, in order for a user to
requests access to
content, a determination may be made of whether the user is authorized to
access content that is
deployed by system 150. In some examples, system interface 111 may provide
identity
authentication information for the user to identity and entitlement services
105, which may
attempt to match the provided user identity authentication information to
identity authentication
information for the user that is stored in identity information 107. If no
match is determined, then
the user may, for example, be denied access to any content and/or may be
prompted to register,
pay, and/or subscribe for access to content and/or may be redirected to
various services for
performing those operations. If, on the other hand, the user's provided
identity authentication is
matched to stored identity authentication information, then the user's
identity may be
authenticated and the user may be permitted to further interact with system
150 and request access
to content.
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[0018] Content client 112 of user compute node 110 may then communicate with
content item instance information service 115 to provide information about the
user to content
item instance information service 115. In turn, content item instance
information service 115 may
communicate with identity and entitlement services 105 to determine, based at
least in part on
entitlement information 106, content that the user is authorized for and
entitled to access. As will
be described in greater detail below, the user may then request access to a
selected content item
that the user is entitled access, and content item instance information
service 115 may match and
assign a user session for the user to a particular instance of the selected
content item that executes
within content execution components 120. This assignment information may be
forwarded to
content execution components 120, which may establish communications between
content client
112 and its assigned matched content item instance.
[0019] In addition to scaling and executing of content, content execution
components
120 may also collect various telemetry information about executing content
item instances, such
as a number of occupied user sessions, a number of unoccupied user sessions,
content item
instance duration, memory usage, and the like. Content execution components
120 may provide
this collected telemetry information to telemetry components 125, which, as
will be described in
greater detail below, may route and process the telemetry data. For example,
telemetry
components may provide content item instance information to content item
instance information
service 115. This content item instance information may, for example, enable
matching and
assignment of user sessions to content item instances, launching of new
content item instances,
and content item instance-level feedback and metrics to content developers and
other parties. In
addition to content item instance information service 115, telemetry
information may also be
provided to other services, such a content item fleet information service and
a historical
information service. These and other telemetry data services are described in
greater detail below
with reference to FIG. 3.
[0020] FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example content scaling and execution
system
that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure. As shown in FIG.
2, content
execution components 120 (also shown in FIG. 1) include scaling components
230, which may
perform various operations for scaling deployed content. In particular, when a
content item is
ready for deployment using system 150, a message may be sent via developer
compute node 100
indicating that the content item is ready for deployment and providing
information for accessing
the content, such as location and/or address information. In some examples,
the developer may
also provide additional information such as a name for the content item fleet,
a development
stage, and a description of the content item. The access information and, in
some cases,
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additional information may be provided to content scaling component 230, which
may issue
instructions to install one or more instances of the content item as an image
on a virtual machine
instance. As will be described in greater detail below, additional instances
of the content item
may then be launched on the same virtual machine instance and/or by copying
the image onto any
number of additional virtual machines instances.
100211 A grouping of content item instances for the deployed content item is
referred to
as the content item fleet. In FIG. 2, content execution components 120 execute
an example
content item fleet 210. As should be appreciated, although only a single
content item fleet 210 is
shown in FIG. 2, content execution components 120 may execute any number of
different content
item fleets at the same or different times. In the particular example of FIG
2, content item fleet
210 includes two virtual machine instances 220A and 220N, each executing three
content item
instances. In particular, virtual machine instance 220A executes content item
instances 201A-N,
while virtual machine instance 220N executes content item instances 221A-N. It
is noted,
however, that a content item fleet in accordance with the disclosed techniques
may include any
number of virtual machine instances each executing any number of different
content item
instances. In some examples, one or more of content item instances 201A-N and
221A-N, and in
some cases all of content item instances 201A-N and 221A-N, may be
configurable to execute
with multiple simultaneously assigned users sessions. This may, for example,
allow multiple
users to play with or against one another, or to otherwise collaborate within
a single content item
instance, such as may occur in a multiplayer video game or other multi-user
applications.
100221 In some examples, each content item instance 201A-N and 221A-N may
receive
input, such as control input (e.g., character movement, weapons firing, menu
selections, etc.),
from its assigned user sessions. Also, in some examples, each content item
instance 201A-N and
221A-N may then transmit content information, such as state data updates,
event data updates and
other information to user compute nodes for the assigned user sessions. The
user compute nodes
may use this data to render and present content at their respective content
compute nodes. In
some examples, each user node may include one or more graphics processing
units (GPUs) for
rendering of graphics data associated with the content item.
[0023] In some other examples, content may be rendered by content execution
components 120 based on content information that is generated and/or
maintained by the content
item instances 201A-N and 221A-N. In these examples, content item instances
201A-N and
221A-N may, in some cases, each have access to one or more GPUs. The rendered
content may
then be transmitted by the content item instances 201A-N and 221A-N to user
compute nodes for
the assigned user sessions.
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[0024] As shown in FIG. 2, each content item instance 201A-N and 221A-N
includes a
respective instance interface 202A-N and 222A-N. In some examples, each
instance interface
202A-N and 222A-N may be associated with and/or implemented using a software
development
kit (SDK) and may assist in enabling configuration of a content item instance,
initiation of user
sessions in the content item instance, and collection of information from the
content item instance,
such as telemetry information. For example, in some cases, various
instructions associated with
instance interfaces 202A-N and 222A-N, such as one or more SDKs, may be
exposed and/or
provided to developers. These instructions may assist in enabling the content
item instances
201A-N and 221A-N to perform the tasks described above and possibly other
tasks. The
developers may, in turn, include, embed or otherwise associate these
instructions with the content
item that is made accessible for deployment. Telemetry information provided by
instance
interfaces 202A-N and 222A-N may include, for example, information about
executing content
item instances, such as a number of occupied user sessions, a number of
unoccupied user sessions,
content item instance duration, memory usage, and the like.
[0025] As also shown in FIG. 2, instance interfaces 202A-N may communicate
with
proxy component 203 for virtual machine instance 220A, while instance
interfaces 222A-N may
communicate with a proxy component 223 for virtual machine instance 220N.
Proxy components
203 and 223 may generally allow exchange of information and commands between
content items
202A-N and 222A-N and components external to virtual machine instances 220A-N,
such as
scaling components 230 and telemetry landing 301. In particular, in some
examples, proxy
components 203 and 223 may receive commands from scaling components 230, such
as
commands to launch content item instances and commands to add a user sessions
to a particular
content item instance. In some examples, proxy components 203 and 223 may also
provide
information to scaling components 230 and/or telemetry landing 301 about
executing content item
instances. The information provided by proxy components 203 and 223 may
include, for
example, any of the information collected by instance interfaces 202A-N and
222A-N, such as
any of the telemetry information described above or other relevant
information. Proxy
components 203 and 223 may provide content item instance information at any
desired interval,
such as at regular repeating intervals (e.g., every minute or every five
minutes), in response to
particular events or conditions, in continuous or intermittent streams, or
using any combination of
these or other techniques.
[0026] In some examples, scaling components 230 may monitor content item fleet
210
based on, for example, information provided by proxy components 203 and 223
such as described
above. In some cases, scaling components 230 may use this information to
automatically scale
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content item fleet 210 by allocating additional virtual machine instances
and/or content item
instances to the content item fleet 210 and/or by de-allocating existing
virtual machine instances
and/or content item instances from the content item fleet 210. In some
examples, certain
configurable conditions may cause scaling components 230 to allocate
additional virtual machine
instances and/or content item instances to a content item fleet. These
conditions may include for
example, determining that the total and/or average number of unoccupied user
sessions for all
content item instances in the fleet have met or dropped below a particular
quantity, determining
that the total number of unoccupied user sessions for one or more individual
content item
instances in the fleet have met or dropped below a particular quantity, and/or
other conditions.
Also, in some examples, scaling components 230 may allocate additional virtual
machine
instances and/or content item instances to a content item fleet based on a
determination that a
particular sub-set of a content item fleet, such as a sub-set of content item
instances having
particular content attributes (e.g., modes, virtual locations, characters,
weapons, plot lines, story
arcs, etc.) meets any of the example allocation conditions described above or
other conditions.
[0027] Also, in some examples, certain configurable conditions may cause
scaling
components 230 to de-allocate virtual machine instances and/or content item
instances from a
content item fleet. These conditions may include for example, determining that
the total and/or
average number of unoccupied user sessions for all content item instances in
the fleet have met or
exceeded a particular quantity, determining that the total number of
unoccupied user sessions for
one or more individual content item instances in the fleet have met or
exceeded a particular
quantity, and/or other conditions. Also, in some examples, scaling components
230 may de-
allocate virtual machine instances and/or content item instances from a
content item fleet based on
a determination that a particular sub-set of a content item fleet, such as a
sub-set of content item
instances having particular content attributes (e.g., modes, virtual
locations, characters, weapons,
plot lines, story arcs, etc.) satisfies any of the example de-allocation
conditions described above or
other conditions. The de-allocated virtual machine may then eventually be
terminated and/or re-
purposed. It is noted that, in some cases, it may not be advantageous to
terminate and/or re-
purpose a particular virtual machine instance immediately upon determining
that a de-allocation
condition has occurred. This is because the virtual machine instance selected
for de-allocation
may still be executing content item instances with assigned user sessions. In
some examples, a
determination may be made to stop assigning additional user sessions to
content item instances on
the virtual machine instance that is selected for de-allocation. The de-
allocated virtual machine
instance may then be terminated and/or re-purposed once the currently existing
user sessions have
expired.
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[0028] As set forth above, in addition to providing information to scaling
components
230, proxy components 203 and 223 may provide information to telemetry landing
301. This
information may be routed and processed by various telemetry components, which
are now
described in detail. In particular, FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an
example telemetry
information routing and processing system that may be used in accordance with
the present
disclosure. As shown in FIG. 3, information provided by content execution
components 120
(including, for example, proxy components 203 and 223, as shown in FIG. 2) may
be delivered to
telemetry landing 301 of telemetry components 125 (also shown in FIG. 1). Upon
being delivered
to telemetry landing 301, telemetry information may be accessed by telemetry
routing function
302, which may generally examine the provided information and, based on
various factors, route
the provided information to one or more recipients, such as processing
functions 303A-D. In
particular, instance-level processing function 303A receives and processes
information for content
item instance information service 115 (also shown in FIGS. 1 and 2). Fleet-
level information
processing function 303B receives and processes information for content item
fleet information
service 304. Historical information processing function 303C receives and
processes information
for historical information service 305. Additionally, telemetry routing
function 302 may route
information to any number of additional processing functions 303D that may
receive and process
information for any number of additional services 306.
[0029] In some examples, when writing telemetry information to telemetry
landing 301,
proxy components 203 and 223 may tag or otherwise identify the information
with certain keys or
other identification information according to a set of conventions. These
conventions may assist
the telemetry routing function 302 to quickly and efficiently route the
telemetry information to
appropriate recipients. For example, in some cases, the telemetry information
may be identified
using the following format: fleet identifier / instance identifier / route
identifier / timestamp
globally unique identifier (GUID). The fleet identifier may be an identifier
for the particular
content item fleet with which the information is associated. The instance
identifier may be an
identifier for the particular content item instance with which the information
is associated. The
route identifier may be an identifier that indicates one or more recipients
(e.g., any or all of
processing functions 303A-D) to which the information should be sent. The
timestamp may be a
timestamp associated with the information, such as a time at which the
information is collected.
In some cases, this identification information may be all that is required for
the telemetry routing
function 302 to route respective telemetry information to the appropriate
recipients.
[0030] In some examples, any of telemetry routing function 302 and/or
processing
functions 303A-D may be distributed computing-based (e.g., cloud-based)
functions that execute
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code based, at least in part, on events, such as the receiving of telemetry
information for routing
and/or processing. For example, in some cases, telemetry routing function 302
may detect and/or
may be informed of the receiving of telemetry information at telemetry landing
301. In response
to this, telemetry routing function 302 may automatically initiate execution
of code for routing the
telemetry information, based on, for example, the identification information
such as described
above. Likewise, processing functions 303A-D may then detect and/or may be
informed of
telemetry information that has been routed thereto, and may then automatically
initiate execution
of code for processing the received information, such as by organizing and
storing the received
information and generating any appropriate alarms or notifications. In some
examples,
implementation of telemetry routing function 302 and/or processing functions
303A-D using
distributed computing-based (e.g., cloud-based) functions that execute code
based, at least in part,
on events may be advantageous by, for example, reducing the amount of
computing resources and
cost that may be required for routing and/or processing services that
maintained a constant
execution even during times when no new telemetry information was available
for routing and/or
processing.
[0031] Content item instance information service 115 may generally receive and
provide
information regarding individual content item instances executed by content
execution
components 120, including, for example, content item instances 201A-N and 221A-
N of FIG. 2.
This information may include, for example, a number of occupied user sessions
for each
executing content item instance, a number of unoccupied user sessions for each
executing content
item instance, content item instance duration information, memory usage by in
each executing
content item instance, and the like. Content item instance information service
115 may use this
information, for example, to assist in matching and assigning of user sessions
to particular content
item instances. In particular, referring back to FIG. 1, it is seen that
content client 112 of user
compute node 110 may communicate with content item instance information
service 115 to
request information about available content and to request access to available
content. As also
shown in FIG. 1, content item instance information service 115 may communicate
with identity
and entitlement services 105 to determine, based at least in part on
entitlement information 106,
which content items the user is entitled to access. It is noted that
entitlement information 106 may
indicate user entitlements at various different levels of granularity. For
example, in some cases,
entitlement information 106 may indicate whether the user is generally allowed
access to the
content executed by system 150. In other cases, entitlement information 106
may be provided at
finer granularity levels and may indicate particular content to which the user
is entitled to access,
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such as particular titles, particular versions, particular story arcs or
plotlines, particular virtual
locations, particular modes, particular characters, particular weapons, and
the like.
[0032] In some examples, content client 112 may request that content item
instance
information service 115 provide information about available content items that
the user is entitled
to access, such as a listing of all available content items or content items
having certain content
attributes, such as certain plot lines, story arcs, virtual locations, levels,
modes, characters,
weapons, and the like. Upon receiving this information, in some examples, the
user may select a
particular content item and submit a request to access to selected content
item via content client
112. Additionally, content client 112 may also provide to content item
instance information
service 115 information about certain content preferences desired by the user,
such as certain plot
lines, story arcs, virtual locations, levels, modes, characters, weapons, and
the like. Content item
instance information service 115 may then, based at least in part on the
user's request, the user's
preferences, and the telemetry information received from telemetry components
125, match the
user's request to a particular instance of the user's selected content item.
10033] In some examples, content item instance information service 115 may
attempt to
identify one or more instances of the selected content item having content
attributes that match, or
at least partially match, content attributes of the user's requested
preferences. Content item
instance information service 115 may obtain content attribute information for
executing content
item instances through a variety of different techniques. In some examples,
content attribute
information may be collected and provided as part of telemetry information
made available from
telemetry components 125, may be retrieved from scaling component 230 of FIG.
2, or may be
otherwise made available to content item instance information service 115.
Upon identifying one
or more content item instances with content attributes that at least partially
match the user's
preferences, content item information service may then determine, based at
least in part on
telemetry information from telemetry components 125, whether there are any
unoccupied user
sessions for any of the identified content item instances. In some examples,
content item instance
information service 115 may then assign the user to one of the identified
content item instances
with at least one unoccupied user session. In some examples, the user may be
assigned to the
identified content item instance with at least one unoccupied user session
that has content
attributes that most closely matches the user's preferences. In other
examples, the user may be
assigned to a content item instance based on a combination of factors
including, for example, the
user's preferences, a number of unoccupied user sessions, and the like. For
example, consider the
scenario in which a user specifies five different content attribute
preferences for a content item
instance to join. Now suppose that a first content item instance matches all
five of the user's
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preferences but only has one unoccupied user session, while a second content
item instance
matches four out of five of the user's preferences but has ten unoccupied user
sessions. In this
scenario, it may be advantageous to assign the user to the second content item
instance, in order to
keep the single remaining unoccupied user session of the first content item
instance available for
other users whose preferences may be even more strongly correlated to the
first content item
instance. Also, in some examples, content item instance information service
115 may provide
information about identified content item instances with at least one
unoccupied user session that
at least partially match a user's preferences to content client 112 in order
to allow the user to
select one of the identified content item instances for assignment or to
otherwise provide input for
making such a selection.
[0034] In some examples, content item instance information service 115 may,
instead of
matching and assigning the user to an existing already launched and executing
content item
instance, request that scaling components 230 launch an additional content
item instance to which
to assign the user. This may occur, for example, when none of the existing
content item instances
within the fleet have any remaining unoccupied user sessions and/or when none
of the existing
content item instances within the fleet have content attributes that are
determined to sufficiently
match the user's requested content attribute preferences.
[0035] Once the user has been matched and assigned to a particular content
item
instance, content item instance information service 115 may provide an
indication of the assigned
content item instance (or instructions to launch a new content item instance)
to scaling
components 230. Scaling components 230 may, in turn, establish communications
between a user
session for the user and the assigned content item instance by, for example,
instructing the
assigned content item instance to communicate with content client 112 at user
compute node 110.
As set forth above, in some examples, these communications may include
transmitting, by the
assigned content item instance, state information, event information, rendered
graphics and audio,
and/or other information associated with the content item instance to the
content client 112
corresponding to the user session. Also, in some examples, these
communications may include
transmitting, by the content client 112, input, such as control input (e.g.,
character movement,
weapons firing, menu selections, etc.) to the assigned content item instance.
[0036] Thus, as described above, content item instance information service 115
may use
content item instance-level telemetry information provided by telemetry
components 125 to assist
in the process of matching and assigning users sessions to content item
instances. In addition to
these matching techniques, content item instance-level telemetry information
provided to content
item instance information service 115 may also be used, for example, to
provide content item
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instance-level feedback and metrics to developers and possibly other parties.
In particular, as
shown in both FIGS. 1 and 3, developer compute node 100 may access content
item instance
information service 115 to request content item instance-level information,
such as a number of
occupied user sessions for each executing content item instance, a number of
unoccupied user
sessions for each executing content item instance, content item instance
duration information,
memory usage by in each executing content item instance, and the like.
[0037] Referring back to FIG. 3, in addition to content item instance
information service
115, telemetry routing function 302 may route telemetry information, though
respective
processing functions 303B-D, to content item fleet information service 304,
historical information
service 305, and other additional services 306. Content item fleet information
service 304 may
generally receive and provide content item fleet-level telemetry information
to developers and/or
other parties. Content item fleet-level information may include information
regarding occupied
user sessions within the fleet, unoccupied user sessions within the fleet,
instance duration
information for the fleet, memory usage by the fleet, a number of executing
instances within the
fleet, instance termination information, and the like. For occupied user
sessions, the fleet-level
information may include, for example, the total number of occupied user
sessions for all fleet
instances, an average number of occupied user sessions for all fleet
instances, a number of
occupied sessions in the fleet instance with the least occupied sessions, a
number of occupied
sessions in the fleet instance with the most occupied sessions and the like.
For unoccupied user
sessions, the fleet-level information may include, for example, the total
number of unoccupied
user sessions for all fleet instances, an average number of unoccupied user
sessions for all fleet
instances, a number of unoccupied sessions in the fleet instance with the
least unoccupied
sessions, a number of unoccupied sessions in the fleet instance with the most
unoccupied sessions
and the like. For instance duration information, the fleet-level information
may include, for
example, total, average, maximum, and minimum duration for fleet instances
that terminated
within a particular period as well as a number of instances that terminated
within a particular
period. For memory usage information, the fleet-level information may include,
for example,
total, average, maximum, and minimum memory usage for fleet instances.
[0038] In some examples, content item fleet information service 304 and/or
content item
instance information service 115 may allow developers or other parties to set
alarms and/or other
notifications such that they may be notified of certain events or conditions
associated with content
item fleets and/or instances. Some example conditions that may trigger alarms
are a total number
of occupied fleet sessions meeting, exceeding or falling below specified
levels, one or more fleet
instances having less than a specified number of occupied sessions, a total
number of unoccupied
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fleet sessions meeting, exceeding or falling below specified levels, fleet
instances having less than
a specified average time duration, fleet instances having more than a
specified average or
maximum memory usage, and other conditions.
[0039] Historical information service 305 may generally receive, maintain, and
provide
historical information regarding content item fleets and/or content item
instances. In some
examples, historical information service may include historical information
about content item
fleets and/or content item instances that have been previously terminated
and/or information about
content item fleets and/or content item instances that may wholly are
partially continue to be
executed. Historical information service 305 may, for example, provide any, or
all, of the
instance-level information and or fleet-level information set forth in detail
above and/or any other
relevant historical information. In some examples, historical information may
allow developers
and/or other parties to request information for certain specifiable historical
periods, such as for the
past sixty or ninety days, or any other relevant period.
[0040] Some example processes for performing various aspects of the disclosed
techniques will now be described in detail. In particular, FIG. 4 is a diagram
illustrating an
example content deployment and scaling process that may be used in accordance
with the present
disclosure. As set forth above, content may be deployed using a plurality of
instances of the
content item, referred to herein as a content item fleet. In some examples,
one or more of the
content item instances in the fleet may be configurable to have multiple
simultaneously assigned
user sessions. In some examples, all of the content item instances in the
fleet may be configurable
to have multiple simultaneously assigned user sessions. Also, in some
examples, at least two
content item instances in the fleet may execute on a single virtual machine
instance. As shown in
FIG. 4, at operation 410, an indication may be received that a content item is
ready for
deployment. As set forth above, the content item may include content, such as
a video game, that
is being developed and/or tested or content that is fully developed and tested
and being sold or
otherwise deployed to customers or other users. As also set forth above, in
some examples, the
content may be created using an SDK or other elements that are associated
and/or integrated with
various backend or other services or components that may host or otherwise
interact with
deployed instances of the content item, such as content item instance
information service 115,
instance interfaces 220A-N and 222A-N, and/or content execution components 120
of FIG. 2. In
these examples, the SDK or other elements may provide code and other
functionality built-in to
the content created by the developer that may allow, for example, ingestion,
configuration,
provisioning and deployment of the content to be more easily and rapidly
accomplished, such as
by allowing the content to interact more efficiently with a multi-player video
gaming or other
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multi-user environment. For example, an SDK used to create the content may
assist in
configuration of new user sessions for one or more users and collection of
information about
executing content item instances, such as a number of occupied user sessions,
a number of
unoccupied user sessions, content item instance duration, memory usage, and
the like. The
indication may, for example, be received by content execution components, such
as content
execution components 120 of FIG .1 from a developer compute node, such as
developer compute
node 100 of FIG. 1. At operation 412, content item information is received.
Such content items
may include files, binaries, or code, such as binary files associated with a
video game that has
been created with the SDK associated with the content item instance
information service 115
and/or content execution components 120. The information received at operation
412 may
include, for example, information for accessing the content, such as a
location at which the code
of other data associated with the content item is stored or other information
for accessing the
content item. The information received at operation 412 may also include, for
example, a name
for a fleet of instances of the content item, a stage of development for the
content item, a
description of the content item, and other information. At operation 414, at
least one instance of
the content item is installed as an image on a virtual machine instance.
Operation 414 may be
performed based on, for example, the indication that the content item is ready
for deployment and
any associated content item information. In some examples, scaling component
230 of FIG. 2
may receive location information for the content item code and issue
instructions for the content
item code to be installed from the location identified in the received
location information as an
image on a particular virtual machine.
[0041] At operation 416, identity information for users is received. User
identity
information, such as identity information 107 of FIG. 1, may be received from
developers or from
other parties. As set forth above, identity information for users may include,
for example, identity
authentication information for authenticating the identity of the authorized
users, such as a user
name and password. As should be appreciated, user identity information may be
received at any
time and need not necessarily be received either before or after a particular
content item is
actually deployed. At operation 418, entitlement information is received.
Entitlement
information, such as entitlement information 106 of FIG. 1, may be received
from developers or
from other parties. As set forth above, entitlement information may include,
for example, for
various authorized users and indications of which content items are entitled
to be access by the
authorized users. As also set forth above, entitlement information may
indicate entitlements at
various levels of granularity, such as particular titles, particular versions,
particular story arcs or
plotlines, particular virtual locations, particular modes, particular
characters, particular weapons,
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and the like. As should be appreciated, entitlement information may be
received at any time and
need not necessarily be received either before or after a particular content
item is actually
deployed.
[0042] At operation 420, requests are received from authorized and entitled
users to
access the content item. Some example techniques for authenticating users and
determining and
enforcing their respective entitlements are described in detail above and are
not repeated here. At
operation 422, the content item fleet for the content item is scaled based on,
for example, the user
requests received at operation 420. Scaling of the content item fleet may be
performed by, for
example, scaling component 230 of FIG. 2. In some examples, the scaling
performed at operation
422 may include copying the image installed at operation 414 onto additional
virtual machine
instances based, at least in part, on the user requests received at operation
420. Also, in some
examples, scaling of the content item fleet may include detecting of
allocation and/or de-
allocation conditions and performing various operations in response thereto.
[0043] In particular, at sub-operation 424, it is determined whether an
allocation
condition is detected. As set forth above, an allocation condition may
include, for example,
determining that the total and/or average number of unoccupied user sessions
for all content item
instances in the fleet have met or dropped below a particular quantity,
determining that the total
number of unoccupied user sessions for one or more individual content item
instances in the fleet
have met or dropped below a particular quantity, and/or other conditions. If,
at sub-operation 424,
an allocation condition is detected, then at sub-operation 426, an additional
virtual machine
instance may be allocated to the content item fleet. This allocation may occur
based on, for
example, the detection of the allocation condition. At operation 428, the
image installed at
operation 414 is copied onto the additional virtual machine instance, thereby
enabling the
launching of additional content item instances. The additional virtual machine
may handle one or
many additional users or sessions.
[0044] If no allocation condition is detected at sub-operation 424, then, at
sub-operation
430, it is determined whether a de-allocation condition is detected. As set
forth above, a de-
allocation condition may include, for example, determining that the total
and/or average number
of unoccupied user sessions for all content item instances in the fleet have
met or exceeded a
particular quantity, determining that the total number of unoccupied user
sessions for one or more
individual content item instances in the fleet have met or exceeded a
particular quantity, and/or
other conditions. If no de-allocation condition is detected at sub-operation
430, then the process
may return to sub-operation 424. If, at sub-operation 430, a de-allocation
condition is detected,
then at sub-operation 432, a virtual machine instance may be de-allocated from
the content item
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fleet. This de-allocation may occur based on, for example, the detection of
the de-allocation
condition. At sub-operation 434, the de-allocated virtual machine instance may
be terminated
and/or repurposed. As set forth above, in some cases, it may not be
advantageous to terminate
and/or repurpose a de-allocated virtual machine instance immediately upon
determining that a de-
allocation condition has occurred. Rather, a determination may be made to stop
assigning
additional user sessions to content item instances on the de-allocated virtual
machine instance and
to terminate and/or repurpose the de-allocated virtual machine instance after
its existing user
sessions have expired.
[0045] It is noted that the detection of allocation and de-allocation
conditions at sub-
operations 424 and 430 are merely an example of how a content item fleet may
be scaled. In
particular, there is no requirement that sub-operations 424 and 430 must be
performed in the order
shown in FIG. 4 and may be performed in different orders and/or may be
performed wholly or
partially dependently or independently relative to one other. For example, in
some cases, the
determination of whether a de-allocation condition exists may be performed
based, at least in part,
on a clean-up process that may run at particular intervals and/or in response
to certain
configurable events, such as termination of user sessions. Additionally, in
some examples, the
determination of whether an allocation condition exists may be performed at
particular intervals
and/or in response to certain configurable events, such as generation of user
sessions.
Furthermore, it is noted that the allocation and/or de-allocation
determination may also be
performed based on historical data, such as a number of user sessions that
have been generated or
terminated over a particular time period.
[0046] FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example process for content
execution in
accordance with the present disclosure. At operation 510, identity information
may be received
from a user that is attempting to gain access to content. For example, at
operation 510, identity
and entitlement services 105 of FIG. 1 may receive identity information from
system interface
111 of user compute node 110 of FIG. 1. As set forth above, the identity
information received at
operation 510 may include, for example, a username and password for the user.
At operation 511,
it is determined whether the received identity information matches stored
identity information.
For example, identity and entitlement services 105 of FIG. 1 may attempt to
match the identity
information received at operation 510 to stored identity information, such as
identity information
107 of FIG. 1. In some examples, a usemame and password received at operation
510 may be
matched to a usemame and password within stored identity information. If a
match is detected at
operation 511, then, at operation 512, the user may be authenticated. If no
match is detected at
operation 511, then at operation 513, the user is not authenticated. As set
forth above, if the user
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cannot be authenticated (e.g., if no match is determined), then the user may,
for example, be
denied access to any content and/or may be prompted to register, pay, and/or
subscribe for access
to content and/or may be redirected to various services for performing those
operations.
[0047] At operation 514, content entitlements may be determined for the user.
For
example, as shown in FIG. 1, content item instance information service 115 may
request content
entitlement information for the user from identity and entitlement services
105. In some
examples, stored entitlement information, such as entitlement information 106
of FIG. 1, may
indicate content entitlement information for authenticated users, such as
various content items that
the user is entitled to access. At operation 516, information is provided to
the user regarding
content items to which the user is entitled. For example, content item
instance information
service 115 may provide, to content client 112, information about available
content items that the
user is entitled to access, such as a listing of all available content items
or content items having
certain content attributes, such as certain plot lines, story arcs, virtual
locations, levels, modes,
characters, weapons, and the like.
[0048] At operation 518, a request is received for the user to access a
content item. For
example, the user may employ the information provided at operation 516 to
select a particular
content item that the user wishes to access. Content client 112 may then
submit a request to
access a selected content item, which may be received, at operation 518, by
content item instance
information service 115. Additionally, at operation 520, user preferences for
the selected content
item are received. The user preferences may include, for example, certain plot
lines, story arcs,
virtual locations, levels, modes, characters, weapons, and the like desired by
the user. At
operation 522, telemetry information is received. For example, telemetry
information regarding
content item instances in a content item fleet may be received by content item
instance
information service 115 via telemetry components 125. In some examples, the
received telemetry
information may include an indication of user session availability on the
content item fleet, such
as an indication of whether there are any unoccupied user sessions for one or
more content item
instances in the fleet, a number of unoccupied user sessions for one or more
content item
instances in the fleet, or other availability information. Examples of some
other telemetry
information that may be received by content item instance information service
115 are described
in detail above and are not repeated here. It is noted, that telemetry
information may be received
and updated repeatedly by content item instance information service 115, such
as at one minute or
five minute intervals or at any other desired times or intervals.
10049] At operation 524, a user session associated with the user is assigned
to a content
item instance based on, for example, the telemetry information and/or the user
preferences. For
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example, in some cases, content item instance information service 115 may,
based on telemetry
information, identify one or more executing content item instances with at
least one unoccupied
user session that have content attributes that match or partially match the
user's preferences. In
some examples, content item instance information service 115 may then assign
the user to one of
the identified content item instances. Also, in some examples, content item
instance information
service 115 may assign the user to a content item instance that at least
partially matches one or
more of the user preferences. Some other example techniques for user
assignment are set forth in
detail above and are not repeated here. As also set forth above, in some
examples, content item
instance information service 115 may, instead of matching and assigning the
user to an existing
already launched and executing content item instance, request that scaling
components 230 launch
an additional content item instance to which to assign the user. This may
occur, for example,
when none of the existing content item instances within the fleet have any
remaining unoccupied
user sessions and/or when none of the existing content item instances within
the fleet have content
attributes that are determined to sufficiently match the user's requested
content attribute
preferences.
[0050] At operation 526, an indication of the assigned content item instance
may be
provided to scaling components, such as scaling components 230 of FIG. 2. If
the user is being
assigned to a content item instance that has not yet been launched, then this
may also be indicated
as part of the indication provided at operation 526. At operation 528,
instructions are provided to
establish communications between the user session and the assigned content
item. For example,
scaling components 230 may instruct the assigned content item instance to
communicate with the
user session associated with content client 112 at the user compute node 110
operated by the user.
[0051] FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example telemetry information
routing process
that may be used in accordance with the present disclosure. At operation 610,
telemetry
information is collected from a content item instance. In some examples,
telemetry information
may be collected at operation 610 by proxy components 203 and 223 of FIG. 2,
which may
receive the information from content item instances 201A-N and 221A-N through
instance
interfaces 202A-N and 222A-N, respectively. As set forth above, in some
examples, various
instructions associated with instance interfaces 202A-N and 222A-N, such as
one or more
software development kits (SDKs) may be exposed and/or provided to developers.
These
instructions may assist in enabling the content item instances 201A-N and 221A-
N to report the
telemetry information to the proxy components 203 and 223 through instance
interfaces 202A-N
and 222A-N. The developers may, in turn, include, embed or otherwise associate
these
instructions within the content item that is made accessible for deployment.
As described in detail
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above, telemetry information collected from each content item instance may
include, for example,
information regarding a number of occupied user sessions, a number of
unoccupied user sessions,
content item instance duration, memory usage, and the like.
[0052] At operation 612, identification information may be assigned to the
telemetry
information received at operation 610. For example, as set forth above, proxy
components 203
and 223 may tag telemetry information with certain keys or other
identification information
according to a set of conventions. In one specific example, the telemetry
information may be
identified using the following format: fleet identifier / instance identifier
/ route identifier /
timestamp globally unique identifier (GUID). The fleet identifier may be an
identifier for the
particular content item fleet with which the telemetry information is
associated. The instance
identifier may be an identifier for the particular content item instance with
which the telemetry
information is associated. The route identifier may be an identifier that
indicates one or more
recipients (e.g., any or all of processing functions 303A-D of FIG. 3) to
which the information
should be sent.
[0053] At operation 614, the telemetry information and the identification
information are
provided to a location accessible to a routing function, such as telemetry
landing 301 of FIG. 3
(which is accessible to telemetry routing function 302). As set forth above,
in some examples, the
telemetry information may be provided to telemetry landing 301 at regular
repeating intervals,
such as every minute or every five minutes. In some other examples, telemetry
information may
be provided as a continuous stream of information or at any other time or
interval.
[0054] At operation 616, the telemetry information and the identification
information are
routed to one or more recipients based on, for example, the identification
information and/or the
telemetry information itself. For example, as set forth above, telemetry
information may be
routed to recipients such as any one or more of processing functions 303A-D of
FIG. 3, which
may be associated with and may process information for content item instance
information service
115, content item fleet information service 304, historical information
service 305, and additional
services 306. Processing functions 303A-D may be associated with various
services for content
item instance information analysis, such as services 115 and 304-306. As set
forth above, in some
examples, instance-level information processing function 303A may be for
information associated
with each instance in a fleet of content item instances, fleet-level
information processing function
303B may be for information associated with the fleet of content item
instances, and historical
information processing function 303C may be for historical information. In
some cases, the
telemetry information may be routed to one or more of processing functions
303A-D or other
recipients based on, for example, the route identifier within the
identification information
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assigned at operation 612. At operation 618. the telemetry information and the
identification
information are sent to the one or more recipients determined at operation
616. As set forth
above, in some examples, any of telemetry routing function 302 and/or
processing functions
303A-D may include compute services that execute based, at least in part, on
events, such as the
receiving of telemetry information for routing and/or processing. In some
examples,
implementation of telemetry routing function 302 and/or processing functions
303A-D using
distributed computing-based (e.g., cloud-based) functions that execute code
based, at least in part,
on events may be advantageous by, for example, reducing the amount of
computing resources and
cost that may be required for routing and/or processing of telemetry
information.
[0055] At operation 620, the telemetry information and the identification
information are
received by the one or more recipients, such as one or more of processing
functions 303A-D. At
operation 622, the telemetry information may be processed, which may include
updating
previously received telemetry information, organizing the telemetry
information such that it may
be efficiently accessed by developers, users or other parties, and generating
any alarms or other
notification based on the telemetry information, such as those described
above. In addition, at
operation 622, one or more of processing functions 303A-D may provide the
telemetry
information to the appropriate services (e.g., one or more of services 115
and/or 304-306). As set
forth above, in some examples, the route identifier within the identification
information assigned
at operation 612 may be accessed by telemetry routing function 302 and any of
processing
functions 303A-D to indicate one or more recipients to which to route the
telemetry information.
As also set forth above, in some examples, instance-level processing function
303A may provide
information to content item instance information service 115, fleet-level
information processing
function 3038 may provide information to content item fleet information
service 304, historical
information processing function 303C may provide information to historical
information service
305, and any number of additional processing functions 303D may provide
information to any
number of additional services 306. In some examples, any or all of services
115 and 304-306 may
be at least partially accessible to a content item developer item for
providing information to the
content item developer.
[0056] In at least some embodiments, one or more compute nodes that implement
a
portion or all of one or more of the technologies described herein may include
or may be
associated with a computer system that includes or is configured to access one
or more computer-
accessible media. A compute node, which may be referred to also as a computing
node, may be
implemented on a wide variety of computing environments, such as commodity-
hardware
computers, virtual machines, web services, computing clusters and computing
appliances. Any of
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these computing devices or environments may, for convenience, be described as
compute nodes.
FIG. 7 depicts a computer system that includes or is configured to access one
or more computer-
accessible media. In the illustrated embodiment, computing device 15 includes
one or more
processors 10a, 10b and/or 10n (which may be referred herein singularly as "a
processor 10" or in
the plural as "the processors 10") coupled to a system memory 20 via an
input/output (I/O)
interface 30. Computing device 15 further includes a network interface 40
coupled to I/O
interface 30.
[0057] In various embodiments, computing device 15 may be a uniprocessor
system
including one processor 10 or a multiprocessor system including several
processors 10 (e.g., two,
four, eight or another suitable number). Processors 10 may be any suitable
processors capable of
executing instructions. For example, in various embodiments, processors 10 may
be embedded
processors implementing any of a variety of instruction set architectures
(ISAs), such as the x86,
PowerPC, SPARC or MIPS ISAs or any other suitable ISA. In multiprocessor
systems, each of
processors 10 may commonly, but not necessarily, implement the same ISA.
[0058] System memory 20 may be configured to store instructions and data
accessible
by processor(s) 10. In various embodiments, system memory 20 may be
implemented using any
suitable memory technology, such as static random access memory (SRAM),
synchronous
dynamic RAM (SDRAM), nonvolatile/Flash -type memory or any other type of
memory. In the
illustrated embodiment, program instructions and data implementing one or more
desired
functions, such as those methods, techniques and data described above, are
shown stored within
system memory 20 as code 25 and data 26.
[0059] In one embodiment, I/O interface 30 may be configured to coordinate I/O
traffic
between processor 10, system memory 20 and any peripherals in the device,
including network
interface 40 or other peripheral interfaces. In some embodiments, I/O
interface 30 may perform
any necessary protocol, timing or other data transformations to convert data
signals from one
component (e.g., system memory 20) into a format suitable for use by another
component (e.g.,
processor 10). In some embodiments, I/O interface 30 may include support for
devices attached
through various types of peripheral buses, such as a variant of the Peripheral
Component
Interconnect (PCI) bus standard or the Universal Serial Bus (USB) standard,
for example. In
some embodiments, the function of I/O interface 30 may be split into two or
more separate
components, such as a north bridge and a south bridge, for example. Also, in
some embodiments
some or all of the functionality of I/O interface 30, such as an interface to
system memory 20,
may be incorporated directly into processor 10.
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[0060] Network interface 40 may be configured to allow data to be exchanged
between
computing device 15 and other device or devices 60 attached to a network or
networks 50, such as
other computer systems Or devices, for example. In various embodiments,
network interface 40
may support communication via any suitable wired or wireless general data
networks, such as
types of Ethernet networks, for example. Additionally, network interface 40
may support
communication via telecommunications/telephony networks, such as analog voice
networks or
digital fiber communications networks, via storage area networks such as Fibre
Channel SANs
(storage area networks) or via any other suitable type of network and/or
protocol.
[0061] In some embodiments, system memory 20 may be one embodiment of a
computer-accessible medium configured to store program instructions and data
as described
above for implementing embodiments of the corresponding methods and apparatus.
However, in
other embodiments, program instructions and/or data may be received, sent or
stored upon
different types of computer-accessible media. Generally speaking, a computer-
accessible medium
may include non-transitory storage media or memory media, such as magnetic or
optical media¨
e.g., disk or DVD/CD coupled to computing device 15 via I/O interface 30. A
non-transitory
computer-accessible storage medium may also include any volatile or non-
volatile media, such as
RAM (e.g.. SDRAM, DDR SDRAM, RDRAM, SRAM, etc.), ROM (read only memory) etc.,
that
may be included in some embodiments of computing device 15 as system memory 20
or another
type of memory. Further, a computer-accessible medium may include transmission
media or
signals such as electrical, electromagnetic or digital signals conveyed via a
communication
medium, such as a network and/or a wireless link, such as those that may be
implemented via
network interface 40. Portions or all of multiple computing devices, such as
those illustrated in
FIG. 7, may be used to implement the described functionality in various
embodiments; for
example, software components running on a variety of different devices and
servers may
collaborate to provide the functionality. In some embodiments, portions of the
described
functionality may be implemented using storage devices, network devices or
special-purpose
computer systems. The term "computing device," as used herein, refers to at
least all these types
of devices and is not limited to these types of devices.
[0062] Each of the processes, methods and algorithms described in the
preceding
sections may be embodied in, and fully or partially automated by, code modules
executed by one
or more computers or computer processors. The code modules may be stored on
any type of non-
transitory computer-readable medium or computer storage device, such as hard
drives, solid state
memory, optical disc andior the like. The processes and algorithms may be
implemented partially
or wholly in application-specific circuitry. The results of the disclosed
processes and process steps
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may be stored, persistently or otherwise, in any type of non-transitory
computer storage such
as, e.g., volatile or non-volatile storage.
[0063] The foregoing may be better understood in view of the following
clauses:
1. A system for execution of an electronically presented content item
comprising:
one or more computing devices; and
one or more memories having stored thereon computer-executable instructions
that,
upon execution, cause the system to perform operations comprising:
receiving a request for a user to access the content item;
receiving information associated with a plurality of instances of the content
item, wherein one or more of the plurality of instances is configurable to
have multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions, and wherein the information comprises
an indication
of user session availability on the plurality of instances;
assigning, based at least in part on the information, a user session
associated
= with the user to an instance of the content item; and
providing instructions to establish communications between the user session
and the instance of the content item.
2. The system of clause I. wherein the operations further comprise
receiving
information indicating one or more user preferences associated with the
content item, and
wherein the user session is assigned to the instance of the content item
further based, at least
in part, on the one or more user preferences.
- 3. The system of clause 1, wherein the indication of user session
availability
comprises an indication of a number of unoccupied user sessions for each of
the plurality of
instances.
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4. The system of clause I, wherein at least two of the plurality of
instances
execute on a single virtual machine instance.
5. A method for execution of an electronically presented content item
comprising:
receiving a request for a user to access the content item;
receiving information associated with a plurality of instances of the content
item,
wherein one or more of the plurality of instances is configurable to have
multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions, and wherein the information comprises
an indication
of user session availability on the plurality of instances;
assigning, based at least in part on the information, a user session
associated with the
user to an instance of the content item; and
providing instructions to establish communications between the user session
and the
instance of the content item.
6. The method of clause 5, further comprising receiving information
indicating
one or more user preferences associated with the content item, and wherein the
user session
is assigned to the instance of the content item further based, at least in
part, on the one or
more user preferences.
7. The method of clause 5, wherein the content item is created using an SDK
associated with a service hosting the plurality of instances of the content
item.
8. The method of clause 5, wherein the instance of the content item is
launched
and executing when the user session is assigned to the instance of the content
item.
9. The method of clause 5, wherein the instance of the content item is
launched
for execution after the user session is assigned to the instance of the
content item.
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10. The method of clause 5, wherein the indication of user session
availability
cornprises an indication of a number of unoccupied user sessions for each of
the plurality of
instances.
11. The method of clause 5, further comprising:
determining, based at least in part on stored information, one or more content
items
that the user is entitled to access; and
providing an indication of at least one of the one or more content items that
the user is
entitled to access, wherein the content item to which the user requests access
is included
within the provided indication.
12. The method of clause 5, wherein at least two of the plurality of
instances
execute on a single virtual machine instance.
13. One or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media having
stored
thereon instructions that, upon execution on at least one compute node, cause
the at least one
compute node to perform operations comprising:
receiving a request for a user to access an electronically presented content
item;
receiving information indicating one or more user preferences associated with
the
=
content item;
receiving information associated with a plurality of instances of the content
item,
wherein the information comprises an indication of user session availability
on the plurality
of instances;
assigning, based at least in part on the information associated with the
plurality of
instances and the one or more user preferences, a user session associated with
the user to an
instance of the content item; and
providing instructions to establish communications between the user session
and the
insfance of the content item.
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14. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein the content item is created using an SDK associated with a service
hosting the
plurality of instances of the content item.
15. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein one or more of the plurality of instances is configurable to have
multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions.
_ 16. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
= wherein the instance of the content item is launched and executing when
the user session is
assigned to the instance of the content item.
17. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein the instance of the content item is launched for execution after the
user session is
assigned to the instance of the content item.
18. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein the indication of user session availability comprises an indication of
a number of
unoccupied user sessions for each of the plurality of instances.
19. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein the operations further comprise:
determining, based at least in part on stored information, one or more content
items
that the user is entitled to access; and
providing an indication of at least one of the one or more content items that
the user is
entitled to access, wherein the content item to which the user requests access
is included
within the provided indication.
20. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 13,
wherein at least two of the plurality of instances execute on a single virtual
machine instance.
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[0064] The foregoing may also be better understood in view of the
following
clauses:
14. A system for deployment of an electronically presented content item
comprising:
one or more computing devices; and
one or more memories having stored thereon computer-executable instructions
that,
upon execution, cause the system to perform operations comprising:
receiving an indication that the content item is ready for deployment, wherein
the content item is deployed using a plurality of content item instances, and
wherein one or
more of the plurality of content item instances is configurable to have
multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions;
installing, based at least in part on the indication, at least a first content
item
instance as an image on a first virtual machine instance;
detecting a condition associated with allocating an additional virtual machine
instance to the plurality of content item instances;
allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the additional virtual
machine instance to the plurality of content item instances; and
copying the image onto the additional virtual machine instance.
15. The system of clause14, wherein the condition associated with
allocating
comprises at least one of determining that a total number of unoccupied user
sessions for the
plurality of content item instances has met or dropped below a particular
quantity or
determining that an average number of unoccupied user sessions for the
plurality of content
item instances has met or dropped below a particular quantity.
16. The system of clause15, wherein the operations further comprise:
detecting a condition associated with de-allocating a virtual machine instance
from
the plurality of content item instances;
=
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de-allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the virtual machine
instance
from the plurality of content item instances; and
performing at least one of terminating or re-purposing virtual machine
instance.
17. The system of clause 1 6, wherein the condition associated with de-
allocating
comprises at least one of determining that a total number of unoccupied user
sessions for the
plurality of content item instances meets or exceeds a particular quantity or
determining that
an average number of unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content
item instances
meets or exceeds a particular quantity.
IS. The system of clause 14, wherein the content item is created using
an SDK
-
associated with a service hosting the plurality of content item instances.
19. A method for deployment of an electronically presented content item
comprising:
receiving an indication that the content item is ready for deployment, wherein
the
content item is deployed using a plurality of content item instances, and
wherein one or more
of the plurality of content item instances is configurable to have multiple
simultaneously
assigned user sessions;
installing, based at least in part on the indication, at least a first content
item instance
as an image on a first virtual machine instance;
receiving a plurality of requests for users to access the content item; and
copying, based at least in part on the plurality of requests, the image onto
one or more
other virtual machine instances.
20. The method of clause 19, further comprising:
detecting a condition associated with allocating an additional virtual machine
instance
to the plurality of content item instances;
allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the additional virtual
machine
instance to the plurality of content item instances; and
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copying the image onto the additional virtual machine instance.
21. The method of clause 20, wherein the condition comprises at least one
of
determining that a total number of unoccupied user sessions for the plurality
of content item
instances has met or dropped below a particular quantity or determining that
an average
number of unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances
has met or
dropped below a particular quantity.
22. The method of clause 19, further comprising:
detecting a condition associated with de-allocating a virtual machine instance
from
the plurality of content item instances;
de-allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the virtual machine
instance
from the plurality of content item instances; and
performing at least one of terminating or re-purposing virtual machine
instance.
23. The method of clause 22, wherein the condition comprises at least one
of
determining that a total number of unoccupied user sessions for the plurality
of content item
instances meets or exceeds a particular quantity or determining that an
average number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances meets or
exceeds a
- particular quantity.
24. The method of clause19, further comprising authenticating the users for
which
the plurality of requests is received.
25. The method of clause 19, further comprising determining, based at least
in
part on stored information, that the users are entitled to access the content
item.
26. The method of clause 19, wherein at least two of the plurality of
content item
instances execute on a single virtual machine instance.
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27. The method of clause 19, wherein the content item is created using an
SDK
associated with a service hosting the plurality of content item instances.
28. The method of clause 19, wherein the content item is a video game.
29. One or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media having
stored
thereon instructions that, upon execution on at least one compute node, cause
the at least one
compute node to perform operations comprising:
receiving an indication that an electronically presented content item is ready
for
deployment, wherein the content item is deployed using a plurality of content
item instances,
and wherein one or more of the plurality of content item instances is
configurable to have
multiple simultaneously assigned user sessions:
installing, based at least in part on the indication, at least a first content
item instance
as an image on a first virtual machine instance;
receiving a plurality of requests for users to access the content item; and
copying, based at least in part on the plurality of requests, the image onto
one or more
other virtual machine instances.
30. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the operations further comprise:
detecting a condition associated with allocating an additional virtual machine
instance
to the plurality of content item instances;
allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the additional virtual
machine
instance to the plurality of content item instances; and
copying the image onto the additional virtual machine instance.
31. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 30,
wherein the condition comprises at least one of determining that a total
number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances has met
or dropped below
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a particular quantity or determining that an average number of unoccupied user
sessions for
the plurality of content item instances has met or dropped below a particular
quantity.
32. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the operations further comprise:
detecting a condition associated with de-allocating a virtual machine instance
from
the plurality of content item instances;
de-allocating, based at least in part on the condition, the virtual machine
instance
fronn the plurality of content item instances; and
performing at least one of terminating or re-purposing virtual machine
instance.
33. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 32,
wherein the condition comprises at least one of determining that a total
number of
unoccupied user sessions for the plurality of content item instances meets or
exceeds a
particular quantity or determining that an average number of unoccupied user
sessions for the
plurality of content item instances meets or exceeds a particular quantity.
34. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the operations further comprise authenticating the users for which the
plurality of
requests is received.
35. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the operations further comprise determining, based at least in part on
stored
information, that the users are entitled to access the content item.
36. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein at least two of the plurality of content item instances execute on a
single virtual
machine instance.
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37. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the content item is created using an SDK associated with a service
hosting the
plurality of content item instances.
38. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 29,
wherein the content item is a video game.
[0065] The foregoing may also be better understood in view of the
following
clauses:
39. A system for providing information from an instance of a plurality of
content item
instances comprising:
one or more computing devices; and
one or more memories having stored thereon computer-executable instructions
that,
upon execution, cause the system to perform operations comprising:
collecting the information from the instance of the plurality of content item
instances, wherein each instance of the plurality of instances is configurable
to have multiple
simultaneously assigned user sessions, wherein the information comprises an
indication of at
least one of a number of occupied user sessions for the instance, a number of
open user
sessions for the instance, a duration of the instance, or memory usage by the
instance;
determining, based at least in part on the information, at least one of a
plurality of recipients to which to route the information, wherein a first
recipient of the
plurality of recipients is for information associated with each instance of
the plurality of
content item instances, and wherein a second recipient of the plurality of
recipients is for
information associated with the plurality of content item instances; and
sending the information to the at least one of the plurality of recipients.
40. The system of clause 39, wherein the determining and the routing arc
performed by a routing function, and wherein at least one of the routing
function or at least
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one of the plurality of recipients is .a cloud-based function that executes
code based, at least
in part, on events.
41. The system of clause 39, wherein the operations further comprise
assigning
identification information to the information from the instance of the
plurality of content item
instances, wherein the determining is based, at least in part, on the
identification information.
42. The system of clause 41, wherein the identification information
comprises at
least one of a content item fleet identifier, a content item instance
identifier, a route identifier,
a timestamp, and a globally unique identifier (GUID).
43. A method for providing information from an instance of a plurality of
content
item instances comprising
collecting the information from the instance of the plurality of content item
instances;
determining at least one of a plurality of recipients to which to route the
information,
wherein a first recipient of the plurality of recipients is for information
associated with each
instance of the plurality of content item instances, and wherein a second
recipient of the
plurality of recipients is for information associated with the plurality of
content item
instances; and
sending the information to the at least one of the plurality of recipients.
44. The method of clause 43, wherein the information comprises an
indication of
at least one of a number of occupied user sessions for the instance, a number
of open user
sessions for the instance, a duration of the instance, or memory usage by the
instance.
45. The method of clause 43, wherein the determining and the routing are
performed by a routing function, and wherein at least one of the routing
function or at least
one of the plurality of recipients is a cloud-based function that executes
code based, at least
in part, on events.
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46. The method of clause 43, further comprising assigning identification
information to the information from the instance of the plurality of item
instances,
wherein the determining is based, at least in part, on the identification
information.
47. The method of clause 46, wherein the identification information
comprises at
least one of a content item fleet identifier, a content item instance
identifier, a route identifier,
a timestamp, and a globally unique identifier (GUID).
48. The method of clause 43, wherein the plurality of recipients further
comprises
a third recipient for historical information.
49. The method of clause 43, wherein each of the plurality of instances is
configurable to have multiple simultaneously assigned user sessions.
50. The method of clause 43, wherein the information associated with each
instance of the plurality of content item instances is used to assign user
sessions to each
instance of the plurality of content item instances.
51. The method of clause 43, wherein the plurality of recipients are
associated
with a plurality of services for content item instance information analysis.
52. The method of clause 51, wherein the plurality of services are at least
partially
accessible to a developer of the content item for providing information to the
developer.
53. One or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media having
stored
thereon instructions that, upon execution on at least one compute node, cause
the at least one
compute node to perform operations comprising:
collecting information from an instance of a plurality of content item
instances;
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determining at least one of a plurality of recipients to which to route the
information,
wherein a first recipient of the plurality of recipients is for information
associated with each
instance of the plurality of content item instances, and wherein a second
recipient of the
plurality of recipients is for information associated with the plurality of
content item
instances; and
sending the information to the at least one of the plurality of recipients.
54. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage
media of clause 53,
wherein the information comprises an indication of at least one of a number of
occupied user
= sessions for the instance, a number of open user sessions for the
instance, a duration of the
instance, or memory usage by the instance.
55. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 53,
_ wherein the determining and the routing are performed by a routing function,
and wherein at
least one of the routing function or at least one of the plurality of
recipients is a cloud-based
function that executes code based, at least in part, on events.
56. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 53,
wherein the operations further comprise assigning identification information
to the
information from the instance of the plurality of content item instances,
wherein the
determining is based, at least in part, on the identification information.
= 57. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media
of clause 56,
wherein the identification information comprises at least one of a content
item fleet identifier,
a content item instance identifier, a route identifier, a timestamp, and a
globally unique
identifier (GUID).
58. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage
media of clause 53,
wherein the plurality of recipients further comprises a third recipient for
historical
information.
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59. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 53,
wherein each of the plurality of instances is configurable to have multiple
simultaneously
assigned user sessions.
60. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 53,
wherein the information associated with each instance of the plurality of
content item
instances is used to assign user sessions to each instance of the plurality of
content item
instances.
61. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 53,
wherein the plurality of recipients are associated with a plurality of
services for content item
instance information analysis.
62. The one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media of
clause 61,
wherein the plurality of services are at least partially accessible to a
developer of the content
item for providing information to the developer.
[0066] The various features and processes described above may be used
independently of one another, or may be combined in various ways. All possible
combinations and subcombinations are intended to fall within the scope of this
disclosure. In
addition, certain methods or process blocks may be omitted in some
implementations. The
methods and processes described herein are also not limited to any particular
sequence, and
the blocks or states relating thereto can be performed in other sequences that
are appropriate.
For example, described blocks or states may be performed in an order other
than that
specifically disclosed, or multiple blocks or states may be combined in a
single block or state. =
The example blocks or states may be performed in serial, in parallel or in
some other manner.
Blocks or states may be added to or removed from the disclosed example
embodiments. The
example systems and components described herein may be configured differently
than
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described. For example, elements may be added to, removed from or rearranged
compared to
the disclosed example embodiments.
[0067] It will also be appreciated that various items are illustrated
as being stored
in memory or on storage while being used, and that these items or portions
thereof may be
transferred between memory and other storage devices for purposes of memory
management
and data integrity. Alternatively, in other embodiments some or all of the
software modules
and/or systems may execute in memory on another device and communicate with
the
illustrated computing systems via inter-computer communication. Furthermore,
in some
embodiments, some or all of the systems and/or modules may be implemented or
provided in
other ways, such as at least partially in firmware and/or hardware, including,
but not limited
to, one or more application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), standard
integrated circuits,
controllers (e.g., by executing appropriate instructions, and including
microcontrollers and/or
embedded controllers), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), complex
programmable
logic devices (CPLDs), etc. Some or all of the modules, systems and data
structures may also
be stored (e.g., as software instructions or structured data) on a computer-
readable medium,
- such as a hard disk, a memory, a network or a portable media article to be
read by an
appropriate drive or via an appropriate connection. The systems, modules and
data structures
may also be transmitted as generated data signals (e.g., as part of a carrier
wave or other
analog or digital propagated signal) on a variety of computer-readable
transmission media,
including wireless-based and wired/cable-based media, and may take a variety
of forms (e.g.,
as part of a single or multiplexed analog signal, or as multiple discrete
digital packets or
frames). Such computer program products may also take other forms in other
embodiments.
Accordingly, the concepts described herein may be practiced with other
computer system
configurations.
100681 Conditional language used herein, such as, among others, -can,"
"could,"
"might," -may," -e.g." and the like, unless specifically stated otherwise, or
otherwise
understood within the context as used, is generally intended to convey that
certain
embodiments include, while other embodiments do not include, certain features,
elements,
and/or steps. Thus, such conditional language is not generally intended to
imply that features,
elements and/or steps are in any way required for one or more embodiments or
that one or
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more embodiments necessarily include logic for deciding, with or without
author input or
prompting, whether these features, elements and/or steps are included or are
to be performed
in any particular embodiment. The terms "comprising," "including," "having"
and the like
are synonymous and are used inclusively, in an open-ended fashion, and do not
exclude
additional elements, features, acts, operations and so forth. Also, the term
"or" is used in its
inclusive sense (and not in its exclusive sense) so that when used, for
example, to connect a
list of elements, the term "or" means one, some or all of the elements in the
list.
100691 While certain example embodiments have been described, these
embodiments have been presented by way of example only and are not intended to
limit the
scope of the disclosure herein. Thus, nothing in the foregoing description is
intended to imply
that any particular feature, characteristic, step, module or block is
necessary or indispensable.
Indeed, the novel methods and systems described herein may be embodied in a
variety of
other forms; furthermore, various omissions, substitutions and changes in the
form of the
methods and systems described herein may be made without departing from the
concepts
disclosed herein. The accompanying claims and their equivalents are intended
to cover such
forms or modifications as would fall within the scope and spirit of concepts
disclosed herein.
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