and for traffic smoothing all as part of systems and techniques for media transcoding application_number US 12540708 A description incompatibilities that prevent a user from viewing any media content anywhere using any device at any time can be addressed by converting the source media content to a target media format while encoding parameters that are compatible with a user 39 s device and then delivering the media data to the user 39 s device using a compatible protocol this can be done in one of three ways server side real time transcoding independent real time transcoding and integrated real time transcoding fig1 illustrates a server side real time transcoding architecture fig2 illustrates an independent real time transcoding architecture fig3 illustrates an integrated real time transcoding architecture in fig1 a server side encoding system 10 is embodied in a content provider that supplies content from content storage 14 to a media content server 16 that is coupled to a transcoding and streaming server 18 that is in turn connectable via a network cloud 20 to a user device 22 for media playback this architecture is designed for content providers who want to operate and manage both the media content server 16 and the real time transcoding server 18 with this architecture the content provider 10 does not need to modify the existing user interface or backend systems not shown including media encoding media storage and media server compatible user 39 s devices 22 are served using the network cloud 20 providing an appropriate conventional data path i e via the existing media data format and media server when an.