The (DLNA) is a non-profit collaborative trade organization established by Sony in June 2003, that is responsible for defining interoperability guidelines to enable sharing of digital media such as music, photos and videos between consumer devices such as computers, TVs, printers, cameras, cell phones, and other multimedia devices. These guidelines are built upon existing public standards, but the guidelines themselves are private (available for a fee). These guidelines specify a set of restricted ways of using the standards to achieve interoperability.[3]
DLNA uses Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) for media management, discovery and control.[4] UPnP defines the type of device that DLNA supports ("server", "renderer", "controller") and the mechanisms for accessing media over a network. The DLNA guidelines then apply a layer of restrictions over the types of media file format, encodings and resolutions that a device must support.
As of January 2011,[5] over 9,000 different devices have obtained "DLNA Certified" status, indicated by a logo on their packaging and confirming their interoperability with other devices.[6] It is estimated that more than 440 million DLNA-certified devices, from digital cameras to game consoles and TVs, have been installed in users' homes.[7]
The DLNA Certified Device Classes are separated as follows:[8]
Home Network Devices:
Digital Media Server (DMS): These devices store content and make it available to networked digital media players (DMP) and digital media renderers (DMR). Examples include PCs and network-attached storage (NAS) devices.
Digital Media Player (DMP): These devices find content on digital media servers (DMS) and provide playback and rendering capabilities. Examples include TVs, stereos and home theaters, wireless monitors and game consoles.
Digital Media Renderer (DMR): These devices play content received from a digital media controller (DMC), which will find content from a digital media server (DMS). Examples include TVs, audio/video receivers, video displays and remote speakers for music.
Note: it is possible for a single device (e.g. TV, A/V receiver, etc) to function both as a DMR (receives "pushed" content from DMS) and DMP ("pulls" content from DMS)
Digital Media Controller (DMC): These devices find content on digital media servers (DMS) and play it on digital media renderers (DMR). Examples include Internet tablets, Wi-Fi enabled digital cameras and personal digital assistants (PDAs).
Digital Media Printer (DMPr): These devices provide printing services to the DLNA home network. Generally, digital media players (DMP) and digital media controllers (DMC) with print capability can print to DMPr. Examples include networked photo printers and networked all-in-one printers
****************************** Handheld Devices
****************************** Digital Media Server (M-DMS): These wireless devices store content and make it available to wired/wireless networked ****************************** digital media players (M-DMP), digital media renderers (DMR) and digital media printers (DMPr). Examples include ****************************** phones and portable music players.
****************************** Digital Media Player (M-DMP): These wireless devices find and play content on a digital media server (DMS) or ****************************** digital media server (M-DMS). Examples include ****************************** phones and ****************************** media tablets designed for viewing multimedia content.
****************************** Digital Media Uploader (M-DMU): These wireless devices send (upload) content to a digital media server (DMS) or ****************************** digital media server (M-DMS). Examples include digital cameras and ****************************** phones.
****************************** Digital Media Downloader (M-DMD): These wireless devices find and store (download) content from a digital media server (DMS) or ****************************** digital media server (M-DMS). Examples include portable music players and ****************************** phones.
****************************** Digital Media Controller (M-DMC): These wireless devices find content on a digital media server (DMS) or ****************************** digital media server (M-DMS) and send it to digital media renderers (DMR). Examples include personal digital assistants (PDAs) and ****************************** phones.
Home Infrastructure Devices
****************************** Network Connectivity Function (M-NCF): These devices provide a bridge between ****************************** handheld device network connectivity and home network connectivity.
Media Interoperability Unit (MIU):These devices provide content transformation between required media formats for home network and ****************************** handheld devices.
The specification uses DTCP-IP as "link protection" for copyright-protected commercial content between one device to another.[1][9]
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http://www.dlna.org/