Method for continuing data transfer to network cache from server without transferring said data to user terminal irrespective of user interruption of the data transferring request

Abstract

In a network cache and a cache control method involving the transfer of a large volume of data as the time of reproduction of multimedia data including video data, a stabilized data transfer is made by eliminating the waste of cached data or a useless cache processing which may be caused by the interruption of a user's operation. When a data transfer request from a user terminal connected to a local network is made to a server existing on the internet, a user request processing program starts a cache program. The cache program performs a cache processing independently of the data delivery to the requesting user terminal by the user request processing program so that even if the user's request is interrupted, the storage of transferred data into a cache file is performed without ceasing. Also, a required bit rate for data made an object of transfer is analyzed for comparison with a network throughput between the server and the network cache. When the network throughput is larger, the caching of transferred data is not performed so that the discard of data having been cached is not caused. Thereby, it is possible to prevent the cache hit rate from being lowered.