Classifications

• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N21/00—Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD]
  • H04N21/20—Servers specifically adapted for the distribution of content, e.g. VOD servers; Operations thereof
  • H04N21/25—Management operations performed by the server for facilitating the content distribution or administrating data related to end-users or client devices, e.g. end-user or client device authentication, learning user preferences for recommending movies
  • H04N21/258—Client or end-user data management, e.g. managing client capabilities, user preferences or demographics, processing of multiple end-users preferences to derive collaborative data
  • H04N21/25808—Management of client data
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N19/00—Methods or arrangements for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals
  • H04N19/40—Methods or arrangements for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals using video transcoding, i.e. partial or full decoding of a coded input stream followed by re-encoding of the decoded output stream
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N21/00—Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD]
  • H04N21/40—Client devices specifically adapted for the reception of or interaction with content, e.g. set-top-box [STB]; Operations thereof

Definitions

• An image display system includes a web server with web pages containing images in a first format.
• the first format includes a Graphics Interchange Format (GIF), a Joint Photographies Experts Group (JPEG) format and/or a Motion Pictures Experts Group (MPEG) format.
• GIF Graphics Interchange Format
• JPEG Joint Photographies Experts Group
• MPEG Motion Pictures Experts Group
• a distributed communications system is connected to the web server.
• a proxy server is connected to the distributed communications system. The proxy server decompresses the first format images.
• the proxy server converts the first format images to a second format that includes either JPEG or
• FIG. 8A is a flowchart illustrating steps for converting a GIF image with animation into MPEG I-frame(s);
• FIG. 8B is a flowchart illustrating steps for converting a GIF image with translucency into MPEG I-frame(s);
• the set top box 26 is illustrated in further detail and includes an input/output interface 150, a processor 154, and memory 156 that can include random access memory (RAM), read only memory (ROM), and other electronic storage such as a hard drive, a floppy drive, an optical storage device, or any other suitable memory.
• RAM random access memory
• ROM read only memory
• other electronic storage such as a hard drive, a floppy drive, an optical storage device, or any other suitable memory.
• an operating system 160 is loaded into the memory 156.
• a set top box browser 162 is also loaded into the memory 156 when needed.
• the set top box 26 is connected to a broadcast network 163.
• the set top box 26 is connected to the distributed communication system 18 in any of the ways described above with respect to FIG 2A.
• the proxy server 22 creates a first JPEG frame 206 from the GIF image 202.
• a second JPEG frame 208 or a GIF image is created therefrom.
• the area 204 is transparent, a single bit for each pixel is sufficient to describe the transparent mask. In this situation, the transparent information is preferably sent as a GIF image. If the area 204 is translucent, 8 bits or more may be employed to describe the translucency mask for each pixel in the frame 200. In these circumstances, an MPEG I-frame (first embodiment) or JPEG frame (second embodiment) is preferably used.
• control decompresses the GIF image.
• control recovers GIF frames within the GIF image animation.
• control creates an MPEG header and an MPEG I-frame for the frames as previously described.
• control compresses the MPEG I- frame or frames and transmits the MPEG I-frame(s) to the set top box 26 and/or stores the MPEG I-frame(s) at the proxy server 22.

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Multimedia (AREA)
• Signal Processing (AREA)
• Databases & Information Systems (AREA)
• Computer Graphics (AREA)
• Compression Or Coding Systems Of Tv Signals (AREA)

Applications Claiming Priority (3)

Publications (1)

Family

ID=24430432

Family Applications (1)

Country Status (2)

Families Citing this family (4)

Family Cites Families (4)

• 2001
  • 2001-06-27 EP EP01948749A patent/EP1295480A2/de not_active Withdrawn
  • 2001-06-27 WO PCT/US2001/020413 patent/WO2002003705A2/en not_active Application Discontinuation

Non-Patent Citations (1)

Also Published As

Similar Documents

Legal Events