JP2009260670A - Recording playback device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve the problem that a user overlooks viewing of contents as a viewing period expires in a device which records and plays back contents in which the audiovisual period is set. <P>SOLUTION: When the user views a screen displaying a contents list recorded in a recording playback device, a remnant time up to the viewing period of the contents which have not yet been viewed is calculated, and when there are the contents in which the viewing period expires within a given period, the contents are preferentially displayed at a spot where the contents easily attract the user in a display of the contents list. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

The present invention relates to a system for recording content distributed via a communication medium such as a broadcast wave or a network, and playing back the recorded content. In particular, when a content with a specified viewing period is recorded, The present invention relates to a method for preventing content from being missed due to a viewing expiration.

Conventionally, when displaying a list of recorded contents in a recording / reproducing apparatus, the recorded contents are displayed in the order of recording date and time. However, when content with a viewing deadline is recorded, the length of the viewing period set for all content is not necessarily constant, so the order in which the content is recorded and the order in which the content viewing period is cut off Does not match. In such a case, there is a problem that even if there is unviewed content whose viewing period will expire soon, the user will not notice the presence and miss the content. In order to solve this problem, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-199109, when there is content that has passed a predetermined time until the viewing time limit expires, the user uses a message display or the like to notify the user that the viewing time has expired. Prevents you from missing content.
JP 2003-199209 A

However, in the above Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-199909, when there is content whose viewing time limit expires within a predetermined time, the user is notified regardless of whether or not the content has already been viewed. There is. Also, even if alerts are displayed by message display or EPG, etc., it is not distinguished from unviewed content and content that has already been viewed, so search for content that has not been viewed from the content that has a viewing deadline. There was a problem that oversight occurred in this process. In view of the above problems, the present invention presents the content with priority when the user whose expiration date is about to expire will be presented preferentially, so that the user does not perform an operation for searching for the unviewed program. An object of the present invention is to provide a method for presenting a content list that can find content to be viewed, thereby preventing a user from overlooking content that has a viewing deadline.

In order to achieve the above object, according to the present invention, in a system for receiving, recording and reproducing content set with a viewing time limit distributed via a communication medium such as a broadcast wave or a network, the received content is recorded. Recording control means for recording in the storage device, content list management means for managing information of all recorded contents, viewing time limit detecting means for detecting that the viewing time limit of the recorded content expires within a predetermined time, OSD (On Screen Display) control means for presenting a content list to a user, playback control means for playing back recorded content and outputting it to a display device, an input unit for inputting a user operation and notifying the OSD control means, A display device for displaying the reproduced content and the user operation screen created by the OSD control means. To provide a reproducing apparatus.
Furthermore, in order to achieve the above object, according to the present invention, in the content list display method in the recording / playback apparatus for receiving the content with the viewing time limit and recording it on the storage medium, the content held by the content list management means Based on the viewing time limit and the current time information, the viewing time limit detecting means detects the content whose viewing time limit of the previous period content expires within a predetermined time, and displays the detected content with priority in the content list display. Provided is a content display method in a recording / reproducing apparatus.

When presenting a list of contents recorded in a storage device to a user, the recording / reproducing apparatus of the present invention detects content with a viewing time limit set from the content list information, and within a predetermined period of the detected content. Content that expires and the user has not yet viewed the content, the content is displayed in the content list display by giving priority to a place where the user can easily find it. It is possible to prevent content from being missed due to expiration.

A first embodiment of a content list display method according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
<Configuration of recording / reproducing apparatus>
First, the configuration of the recording / reproducing apparatus according to the present invention will be described.
FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram of the recording / reproducing apparatus 1. The recording / reproducing apparatus 1 records content distributed via a communication medium such as a broadcast wave or a network in a storage device, and can reproduce the content recorded by a user operation. Hereinafter, the function of each part will be described with reference to FIG.
The communication control unit 101 receives broadcast wave content via an antenna, for example, or receives content distributed from a content server via a network (for example, a wide area network such as the Internet). Further, the communication control unit 101 receives a license necessary for reproducing the received content. Here, the license may be distributed by a broadcasting group, or may be acquired from a license server prepared by a content distribution company, for example. The license information to be acquired includes a content viewing time limit, and further includes a decryption key for decrypting the content if the content is encrypted.
The recording control unit 102 records the content received by the communication control unit 101 and the license in the storage device 103 in association with each other. When recording content, the content list management unit is notified of information such as the title and file name of the content to be recorded and the viewing time limit described in the license.
The storage device 103 is a storage medium such as a hard disk drive, and stores content data and license data.
The content list management unit 104 manages information necessary for presenting the content list recorded in the storage device 103 to the user. This information is updated when new content is recorded, when unviewed content is reproduced, when the user operates the content list screen, and the like.
The viewing time limit detection unit 105 acquires the viewing time limit of each content from the content list management unit 104, further acquires the current time from the time management unit 106, calculates the remaining time from the current time until the viewing time limit expires, Whether or not each content expires within a predetermined time is determined based on whether or not the remaining time is less than the predetermined time set in the viewing detection unit. Note that a fixed value (for example, one day) held by the recording / reproducing apparatus 1 may be used for the predetermined time until the viewing expiration date, or the value set by the user is held by the viewing expiration detection unit. The value may be used.
The playback control unit 107 instructs the recording control unit 103 to read the content and the license corresponding to the content from the storage device 103, and outputs a video obtained by decoding the read content to the display device.
The OSD control unit 108 performs display control processing in accordance with display of a user operation screen such as a menu or content list, and input from the input unit 110 with respect to the displayed user operation screen. If the user selects content list display from the menu or presses a content list display button included in the input unit 110 and detects that the user desires to display the content list, the content is displayed. Content list information is acquired from the list management unit, and a content list screen is generated and output to the display device.
The display device 109 displays a video in which the video signal received from the OSD control unit 108 is superimposed on the video signal received from the playback control unit 107.
The input unit 110 is a remote controller or a keyboard that communicates with the recording / reproducing apparatus 1 wirelessly or by wire, and is used by the user to select a desired operation on the user operation screen.
<Information handled by the content list management unit>
Next, information handled by the content list management unit 105 will be described.
FIG. 2 is an example of content list information held by the content list management unit 104. For each content, “title”, “viewing deadline”, “viewing status”, “focus”, and “content entity” are held, and are held as a list in accordance with the display order in the content list. “Title” is the title of the content. “Viewing time limit” represents an expiration date during which the content can be viewed, and after this time limit, the user cannot view the content. The “viewing situation” indicates whether the user has already viewed or not viewed the content, and is changed to viewed when the user has viewed the unviewed content. Here, unviewed content means content that has never been reproduced since the user recorded the content. It should be noted that the user may be able to set the content so that the content that has been partially reproduced but has not been completely reproduced is treated as unviewed content. “Focus” means whether or not the content is initially selected when the content list screen is displayed. The “content entity” represents the actual state of the content recorded in the storage device 103, and for example, a file name can be used.
<Flow of Content List Display Processing in First Example>
Next, the flow of processing when displaying the content list screen will be described.
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the flow of processing of content list screen display.
First, in step S <b> 11, the viewing time limit detection unit 105 acquires content list information from the content list management unit 104.
In step S12, one piece of content information is extracted from the acquired list of content list information, and the process proceeds to step S13. As the content information to be extracted, information at the top of the list is extracted in the first time, and the next item in the list is sequentially extracted from the next time onward.
In step S13, the viewing situation is extracted from the content information extracted in S12, and it is confirmed whether or not the user has viewed the content. As a result, if it has not been viewed, the process proceeds to step S14, and the viewing time limit confirmation process proceeds. If it has already been viewed, there is no need to notify the user even if the viewing expiration is imminent, so the process proceeds to step S17 without confirming the viewing expiration.
In step S14, the viewing time limit detecting unit 105 extracts the viewing time limit from the content information extracted in step S12. Further, the current time is acquired from the time management unit 106, and the remaining time from the current time until the viewing time limit expires is calculated.
In step S15, if the calculated result is shorter than the predetermined time held by the viewing time limit detection unit 108, the content may be missed by the user. Therefore, in order to change the display content of the content list, step S16 is performed. Proceed to If a period longer than the predetermined time remains before the viewing time limit expires, the process proceeds to step S17.
In step S16, since the content extracted in step S12 may be missed because the user has expired, the content list information is updated by display order update processing to be described later in order to display the content at the top of the content list so that the user can easily access it. To do. Thereafter, the process proceeds to step S17.
In step S17, it is determined whether the content information selected in step S12 is at the end of the list. If the content information is at the end of the list, the process proceeds to step S18, and not the end of the list but unscanned content information remains. If YES, return to step S12 to continue scanning.
In step S18, the content to be focused first is designated when the content list is displayed. Here, since the content at the top of the list is the content that is closest to the viewing expiration date and is to be displayed preferentially, the “focus” item of the content information at the top of the content list information is set to ON, and the other Set “focus” of the content information to OFF. Thereafter, the process proceeds to step S19.
In step 19, the OSD control unit 108 acquires content list information from the content list management unit 104, and displays it on the content list screen in order from the top of the list. FIG. 2 is an example of the content list information acquired here, and the content is focused on the first item. Further, the screen display 200 of FIG. 5 is an example of a content list screen generated based on this content list information, and displays thumbnail images, titles, expiration dates, and the like of each content, and is the first item of the content list information. Focus is set on the item 201, and the thumbnail image is highlighted by thickening the border or changing the color. In the list display, the number of contents displayed on one screen may be increased by displaying only the character information without displaying the thumbnail images.
<Flow of display order update processing>
Next, the flow of the display order update process performed in step S16 of the flowchart of FIG. 2 will be described.
FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the flow of the list display order update process.
In step S161, one piece of content information is extracted from the content list information. Here, the first item to be extracted is the first item, and the next item is extracted from the next time.
In step S162, the item that is to be inserted is compared by comparing the viewing expiration date of the item that is extracted in step S12 and inserted in the upper part of the list with the viewing expiration date of the item acquired in step S161. If the viewing time limit for the first time expires, the process advances to step S163, and the item to be added is inserted before the item extracted in step S161. If the item extracted in step S161 expires earlier, the process proceeds to S164.
In S164, it is confirmed whether the item acquired in S161 is the end of the list of the content list information. If it is at the end, the process is terminated, and if there are remaining items, the process returns to step S161 to continue the process.
As described above, according to the first embodiment of the present invention, when the user displays the content list screen, the content whose viewing deadline is approaching is displayed at the top of the list display, so that the user It is possible to prevent a certain content from being missed. In addition, when there are multiple content items that are close to the viewing deadline, the content that has a short remaining time until the viewing time limit expires is displayed in order from the top to prevent the user from overlooking the content with the viewing time limit. Can do.
<Second Embodiment>
Next, a second embodiment of the content list display method according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
The functional configuration of the recording / reproducing apparatus is represented by the recording / reproducing apparatus 1 shown in FIG. The information managed by the content list management unit 104 is also the same as that in the first embodiment, and a description thereof will be omitted.
<Flow of Content List Display Processing in Second Embodiment>
Subsequently, a flow of content list display processing in the present embodiment will be described. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the flow of content list display processing in the present embodiment. In this flowchart, the processing from step S61 to step S65 is the same as the processing from step S11 to step S16 in the flowchart of FIG.
In step S66, first, the content information with “focus” set to ON (content information A) is selected from the content list information, and the viewing time limit is extracted therefrom. Further, the viewing time limit is extracted from the content information (referred to as content information B) detected by the processing from step S61 to step S65. Here, when the expiration date of the content information B expires before the expiration date of the content information A, the “focus” of the content information A is changed to OFF, and further, the “focus” of the content information B is set to ON. To do. When the expiration date of the content information A expires first, the focus setting is not changed. After performing the above processing, the process proceeds to step S67.
The processing in step S67 is the same as step S17 in the flowchart of FIG.
In step S68, the OSD control unit 108 acquires content list information from the content list management unit 104, and first extracts content information for which “focus” is set to ON. FIG. 8 is an example of content list information generated as a result of the processing up to step S67. In the case where 30 pieces of content are recorded, the setting is made to focus on the 14th item. . The OSD control unit 108 calculates the first page to be displayed from the number of contents to be displayed per screen in the content list display and the position of the content information where the focus is set. For example, when 6 contents are displayed per screen, the 14th content is arranged on the third screen among the five screens in total. Therefore, the OSD control unit 108 generates a screen for the third page and outputs it to the display device. A screen display 300 shown in FIG. 8 is an example of a content list display generated in step S68.
As described above, according to the second embodiment of the present invention, when the user displays the content list screen, the viewing deadline is approaching without changing the display order in the content list display so far. By displaying a page including the content and focusing on the content, the user can preferentially display the content that has a viewing deadline and has not been viewed, thereby preventing an oversight due to the expiration.

Functional block diagram of recording / reproducing apparatus according to the present invention Example of first content list information Flow chart of first content list display process Flow chart of content display position update processing First content list screen display example Flow chart of second content list display process Example of second content list information Second content list screen display example

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 100 Recording / reproducing apparatus 101 Communication control part 102 Recording control part 103 Storage apparatus 104 Content list management part 105 Viewing time limit detection part 106 Time management part 107 Playback control part 108 OSD control part 109 Display apparatus 110 Input part 200 First screen display example 201 Focus content 300 in the first screen display example Second screen display example 301 Focus content in the second screen display example

Claims (9)

In a recording / reproducing apparatus that receives content in which a viewing period is set and records the content on a recording medium,
Recording means for recording content received from outside;
Playback means for playing back the recorded content;
A time management means for managing the current time;
Viewing period detection means for detecting a viewing period of content recorded in the recording medium;
Viewing period management means for detecting content whose viewing period expires within a predetermined time;
A recording / reproducing apparatus comprising: a content list display unit that preferentially displays the content detected by the viewing time limit management unit so as to be easily noticed by a user. 2. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein content whose viewing period expires within a predetermined time detected by the viewing period management means is limited to content that is not viewed by the user. 3. The recording / playback apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the content handled as content that is not viewed by the user is content that the user has played back from the beginning to the end of the content, or the user plays back even a part of the content. A recording / reproducing apparatus, characterized in that a user can select whether the content is a modified content. 2. The recording / playback apparatus according to claim 1, wherein when the viewing time limit management unit detects content whose viewing time limit expires within a predetermined time, the content list display unit changes the order in which content is displayed. A recording / reproducing apparatus that displays the detected content at the top. 4. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein when the viewing time limit managing unit detects a plurality of contents whose viewing time limit expires within a predetermined time, the remaining time until the viewing time limit expires is displayed in order from the top. A characteristic recording / reproducing apparatus. 2. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the predetermined period of time used by the viewing period management means to detect the content whose viewing period is about to expire can be changed according to a user setting. 2. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein when the viewing time limit management unit detects content whose viewing time limit expires within a predetermined time, the detection is performed without changing the arrangement order of the content in the content list display. A recording / reproducing apparatus for displaying a list screen including contents. 7. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 6, wherein when the list screen is displayed, the list screen in a state where the content detected by the viewing time limit managing unit is selected is displayed. In a recording / reproducing method for receiving content with a viewing deadline and recording it on a recording medium,
Detecting the viewing deadline of the content recorded on the recording medium by the viewing deadline detecting means;
When the content whose viewing deadline expires within a predetermined time is detected by the viewing deadline detection means, the detected content is displayed by the content list display means in preference to a place where the user can easily find it. Content list display method in a recording / reproducing apparatus.

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