DLNA Scope and Strategy

Scope

In order to achieve the vision of digital interoperability in the home, DLNA has published a common set of industry design guidelines that allow manufacturers to participate in a growing marketplace of networked devices, leading to more innovation, simplicity and value for consumers. The DLNA Networked Device Interoperability Guidelines specify the interoperable building blocks that are available to build platforms and software infrastructure (see Figure 5). These Guidelines focus on interoperability between networked entertainment and media devices for personal media uses that involve images, audio and video. As new technology and standards become available, the Guidelines may broaden to cover other areas, such as home control, communications and advanced entertainment scenarios. Phased development of these Guidelines will take place to enable new user scenarios as they become important to consumers.

This Figure 5 shows the technology ingredients covered by the DLNA Networked Device Interoperability Guidelines. For 2006 and beyond, the basic criteria for specific technology ingredients selected for these Guidelines include:

Technology ingredients that should be based on standards from standards bodies, SIGs (Special Interest Groups) and industry forums, or be readily available and in relatively wide deployment on a variety of platforms in the marketplace. Intellectual Property should be available on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms for all manufacturers.
In cases where multiple DLNA-approved technology ingredients are specified, it should be possible to bridge or translate (as required) between any two technology ingredients. For example, there should be a means to seamlessly bridge wired and wireless networking technologies.

Strategy

To deliver on the vision of interoperability in the digital home, DLNA has focused on three key elements:

Industry collaboration
Standards-based interoperability
Compelling products

The following is an overview of each of these elements.

Industry Collaboration

Aligning the key leaders in the CE, PC and mobile device industries on digital interoperability has been an essential first step for DLNA. However, industry collaboration has not been limited to just CE, PC and mobile device manufacturers—it has developed into an entire ecosystem of companies that together offer consumers a broad set of complementary products and services. This ecosystem includes contributors that are helping to bring all the necessary elements of the digital home to market and encompasses manufacturers, software and application developers, and service and content providers. In addition, the collaboration of industry leaders in DLNA has facilitated industry marketing and promotion while encouraging development, interoperability and support of home networked devices.

Standards-Based Interoperability

Under DLNA's leadership, the industry has cooperated in the development of workable guidelines for product design that define interoperable building blocks for devices and software infrastructure. It covers physical media, network transports, media formats, streaming protocols and digital rights management mechanisms. Standards for these areas are defined in many different forums and compliance with these standards has been an important first step. The DLNA Networked Device Interoperability Guidelines were created in a unique cross-industry effort that combined the efforts of over 200 CE, PC, and mobile device manufacturers and other DLNA member companies from around the world, working together with the aim of achieving the world's first substantial platform for true interoperability between consumer electronics, personal computer and mobile devices. Since technology and standards continually change and improve, these DLNA Guidelines will also evolve over time and ensure continued interoperability as new and old technologies are mixed together and addressed by DLNA.

Compelling Products

Finally, diverse and interoperable products are necessary to provide consumers with broad, compelling experiences and value throughout their homes. To this end, the DLNA Networked Device Interoperability Guidelines define a total of twelve Device Classes in three Device Categories. Since a Device Class is the certifiable entity in DLNA, a DLNA CERTIFIED™ product must embody the functionality of one or more of the Device Classes. The initial set of DLNA guidelines mostly covered use cases between media servers and players in a home network. DLNA Networked Device Interoperability Guidelines Expanded, March 2006, added two new device class categories: Mobile Handheld Devices and Home Interoperability Devices. These Expanded Guidelines also include additional device classes and new usage scenarios; for example, enabling consumers to use a third device (such as a PDA) to control content flow between two primary player and server devices, like a television and a media server.

The Home Network Device (HND) category is made up of five Device Classes that share system usages in the home network with the same media format and network connectivity requirements.

Digital Media Server (DMS) devices provide media acquisition, recording, storage, and sourcing capabilities, as well as content protection enforcement as required. DMS products will often include Digital Media Player (DMP) capabilities and may have intelligence, such as device and user services management, rich user interfaces and media management, aggregation and distribution functions.
Digital Media Player (DMP) devices find content exposed by a DMS or M-DMS and then pulls the selected content from the server to provide playback and rendering capabilities. Some examples of DMP devices include televisions, stereo and home theaters, personal digital assistants, multimedia mobile phones, wireless monitors and game consoles.
Digital Media Renderer (DMR) devices play content received from a DMS or M-DMS after being setup by another Home Network Device (DMC or devices which include a DMC). Some examples of DMR devices include televisions, audio/video receivers, video displays and remote speakers for music.
Digital Media Controller (DMC) devices find content exposed by a DMS and match it to the rendering capabilities of a DMR, setting up the connections between the DMS and DMR. An intelligent remote control is one example of a DMC device; a multifunction device such as a mobile multimedia phone may also include a DMC.
Digital Media Printer (DMPr) devices provide printing services to the DLNA home network. Photo printing is the application DLNA prioritized, but other types of content can also be printed from a DMPr. When selected for media output, a DMPr combines images with an Extensible HyperText Markup Language (XHTML) template to create the printed page. DLNA provides several basic photo templates to assist new manufacturers in quickly adding photo printing to their DLNA devices. It is easy to add printing to device applications because the DMPr is based on the Universal Plug and Play (UPnP™) PrintEnhanced:1 Service and the W3C XHTML Print specification.

Some examples of DMPr devices include a networked photo printer and a networked all-in-one printer. Also, an application running on a PC may expose DMPr functionality to an ordinary USB-attached printer peripheral.

The Mobile Handheld Device (MHD) category is made up of five Device Classes that share the same system usages as the HND Device Category, but have different requirements for media format and network connectivity. The MHD category includes these Device Classes and functionalities:

Mobile Digital Media Server (M-DMS) devices expose and distribute content. A mobile phone and a portable music player are examples of M-DMS devices.
Mobile Digital Media Player (M-DMP) devices find content exposed by an M-DMS or DMS and play the content locally on the M-DMP. A media tablet designed for viewing multimedia content is an example of an M-DMP device.
Mobile Digital Media Uploader (M-DMU) devices send content to an M-DMS or DMS with upload functionality. A digital camera and a camera phone are examples of M-DMU devices.
Mobile Digital Media Downloader (M-DMD) devices find and download content exposed by an M-DMS or DMS and play the content locally on the M-DMD after download. A portable music player is an example of an M-DMD device.
Mobile Digital Media Controller (M-DMC) devices find content exposed by an M-DMS or DMS and match it to the rendering capabilities of a DMR, setting up the connections between the server and renderer. A personal digital assistant (PDA) and an intelligent remote control are examples of M-DMC devices.

MHDs interoperate with stationary devices on the DLNA home network, permitting a variety of use cases. Some examples include:

Push images and video taken from an MHD to a television
Function as a remote control
Upload images, music and video clips from an MHD to a media server
Download images from an MHD to a server using server's controls

The Home Infrastructure Device (HID) category is comprised of two Device Classes:

Mobile Network Connectivity Function (M-NCF) devices provide a bridging function between the MHD network connectivity and the HND network connectivity.
Media Interoperability Unit (MIU) devices provide content transformation between required media formats for the HND Device Category and the MHD Device Category.