Method and apparatus for distributed arbitration of a right to speak among a plurality of devices participating in a real-time voice conference

摘要

An agent (100) is associated with each of a plurality of devices (201-204) for arbitrating between a talk stream generated by the device and a listen stream intended for the device and generated by another device on a network (210). In the agent a “Talk Mode” (300) is defined in which the agent passes the talk stream from the device to other devices participating in the conference while blocking all listen streams intended for the device, and a “Listen Mode” (400) is defined in which the agent blocks the talk stream of the device from the network and passes a single listen stream from the network to the device. The agent makes a decision to enter one of the Talk Mode and the Listen Mode, wherein the decision is based upon a presence of at least one of the talk stream and the listen stream, and wherein the decision is further based upon a comparison of source identifiers of the talk and listen streams when required to resolve a conflict.