CMX2: Content Management

Overview

For today's rich media-centric mobile applications, a powerful storage and management solution for content assets is essential. CMX2 provides a feature-rich content repository which is fully manageable using a web interface.

All your content managed in one place

From music videos to mobile wallpapers, polyphonic ringtones to Symbian applications, CMX2 provides a unified approach to managing all types of content. Whether the content is being delivered via a 3G Video Shortcode, XHTML portal or plain text SMS, available from a single service or multiple co-branded offerings, it can all be centrally managed within the CMX2 interface.

Wide variety of formats

For each type of content (Image, Audio, Video, etc) CMX2 can support and automatically detect a wide range of popular file formats. Be it a SMAF ringtone, MPEG4 video, PNG image or text document, it can be uploaded and distributed from CMX2.

Multiple versions of an asset are grouped together

It is often desirable to treat the various formats of a ringtone, a wallpaper and its thumbnail, or a Java game and its sample screenshots as a single asset when dealing with large volumes of content. In CMX2, every item of content supports an unlimited number of constituent versions, be they in different formats, handset-specific sizes or intended for different purposes, and for naming, sorting and categorisation purposes, all these versions are grouped together.

Organisation via "collections" and user-defined categories

Content administrators using CMX2 are able to create any number of independent collections (folders) for separating content intended for different purposes. Within these collections, user-defined categories can be created and assigned to content for flexible organisation of media.

Searching and browsing display

When dealing with large amounts of content, good tools for viewing the available media are critical. CMX2 allows content to be filtered and sorted according to its categories, type, name and other metadata and tabulated as an expanding tree list or grid of thumbnails. Complicated search parameters can be saved for use in future, or in other areas of CMX2 (showing a list of available content on a WAP portal, for example).

Content is independent of service

Having uploaded and organised your content once, the deep integration between the features of CMX2 means that it is available for use by any number of services configured within the application. The same content can be offered for WAP Push delivery via IVR ordering, published to an operator portal such as Vodafone Live, or delivered as part of a daily MMS subscription, all without having to upload or configure metadata in multiple places. In short, CMX2 allows the same content to be seamlessly delivered in multiple channels in multiple territories at multiple price points.

Individual and batch uploading

The CMX2 web interface allows individual files to be uploaded into the repository and all their associated metadata to be completed in a form. In addition, it supports automated creation of multiple content items and grouping of versions from an uploaded ZIP file containing many files, as well as an optional metadata manifest file to ease automated importing of content from other sources. Version formats are detected automatically, and key metadata fields are automatically populated (image dimensions, video codec, etc).

Automated upload post-processing

Often content fresh from a supplier is not in a fit state for immediate delivery to a mobile device. CMX2 provides a number of labour-saving features as part of the upload process including automatic video transcoding and JPEG profile stripping, ensuring that the content stored in CMX2 is suitable for use on a mobile handset.

Device capabilities based content selection

Using information drawn from the mobile networks, handset manufacturers, public databases and the experience of MX Telecom and its customers, CMX2 boasts a database containing the capabilities of the vast majority of mobile handsets available on the market today. By identifying the type of device which an end-user possesses, CMX2 is able to select the best available version of a content item based on what the phone supports and a quality ranking of each format, ensuring the best possible user experience.

On-the-fly content transcoding

In addition to automatically selecting the closest matched content for each consumer device, CMX2 is able to take further steps to tailor the content specifically for the target phone. For example, using screen size and colour depth data for every mobile handset, CMX2 is able to pick an original image most closely matching the aspect ratio and then automatically shrink that image to fit the screen, delivering far higher quality and faster downloads than letting the phone shrink the original itself. CMX2 can also generate thumbnails and superimpose watermarks over images, all on-the-fly and seamless from the user's point of view.

Built in DRM support

For media owners wanting to protect their assets, an effective Digital Rights Management solution is a must. CMX2 provides support for a number of DRM and content protection schemes built right into the repository, including expiring download URLs, the Nokia, H3G and OMA standards for Forward Locking, and OMA DRM 1.0. Unlike other platforms which require you to pre-encode content using separate DRM tools, CMX2 can automatically package unprotected content in the appropriate DRM wrappers on-the-fly. This behaviour can be downgraded for unsupported handsets, or the end user can be warned that they require a compliant device to access the content. Usage rights information is stored right alongside all the other metadata for a content item for ease of management.

Automatic retrieval of content from user-defined remote location

When content is created or changed frequently, manually uploading individual items or batches of content is not always appropriate. To simplify the ingress of content from external sources, CMX2 supports automatically polling a remote server for available items and downloading them into the repository without any user intervention.

Flexible metadata management

In addition to a name, type and description, CMX2 supports storing large amounts of additional data alongside every content item and version. This includes properties detected during the upload process (codec, size, etc) and a number of optional additional property groups for specific types of data. These additional properties include end-user billing information and DRM rights data, and can be internationalised to aid offering the same content in multiple territories.

About MX Telecom MX Telecom is a leader in wireless technology. MX Telecom offers an easily accessible gateway to data, voice and video messaging services including 2-way and premium SMS, multimedia messaging, interactive voice response, location-based services, video short codes, Internet and TV related solutions. For more information, MX Telecom can be reached on 1-877-MXTELECOM (+1 877 698 3532), or via email at sales@mxtelecom.com.