FR2812161A1 - Digital television favourites service list function having principal television services storage zone and user favourites selection list with associated access rights output. - Google Patents

Abstract

The TV unit (100) has a display mechanism (120) and receiver module (101) with a tuner (104). A list of TV services transmitted by the operator is stored (160). The user can select (140,141,142,145) a set of services forming a favourites list. A unit (143,144,162) provides information on the rights of access to each service.

Description

Television device with function for creating favorite lists.

  The present invention relates to a television device offering a function for creating favorite lists. The invention is more particularly intended for the field of so-called digital television, the signals for the latter being able to be transmitted by cable as well (in frequency bands at transmission from 110 to 862 MHz), by a satellite ( in frequency bands at emission from 10.3 to 12.8 GHz), or by terrestrial way (in frequency bands at emission from 17 to 862 MHz). The object of the invention is to facilitate a user of the television device according to the invention the constitution by himself of a list of his preferred services from a main list of services available within the television device . By television device, it is necessary to understand the television set itself associated with its peripherals of the type VCR and / or decoder. The various elements involved in the implementation of the device are preferably arranged within a television decoder

  digital, but it is not an obligation.

  In the field of digital television, digital television decoders are used, in particular in order to access a set of television channels which are transmitted encrypted and which are decrypted within the decoder. Television decoders are interface elements between systems for transmitting television signals, in particular digital television signals in MPEG and DVB format, and display monitors. Often, the monitor itself contains circuits for decoding these television signals, but this is not an obligation. The signals exchanged are most often digital signals, but a decoder can also have processing powers.

analog signals.

  The transmission means which transmit the television broadcasts to these decoders / receivers are either conventional aerial transmission means, or coaxial or even optical cables, or retransmission satellites which serve a region. The decoder comprises reception means for receiving the transmitted signals and formatting means for transforming the received signals into applicable signals

  directly on the control devices of the display device.

  For a cathode ray tube, these are for example the commands applied to the scanning members and to the various electron guns producing colored pixels on the screen. The formatting is carried out while respecting for each of the images to be represented parameter tables. There are different types of tables: SI tables (System Information), PSI tables (Specific Program Information), NIT tables (Network Information Tables), EIT tables (Event Tables), PAT tables (Table of Associated Programs), the CAT table (Access Control Table) or even

  PMT tables (Table of Program Components) ...

  In digital television, it is expected that signals from

  parameters are transmitted in the stream (i.e. with the video signal itself

  same) in data packets. The transmitted data packets are arranged in sections, the sections conventionally comprising 1024 bytes or, in certain cases, 4096 bytes. Once received, the different packets are assigned to the appropriate tables. Packages from the same table are not necessarily grouped in the same section. They can be divided into successive sections, interleaved with information packets relating to other tables or to the video, audio, data or other signal. In each section, identifiers allow

  assign data packets to particular tables among others.

  At reception, a decoder does not know at first glance how the data packets are distributed but it can recognize a division of the sections. The decoder must therefore read the identifier in each section and reorganize the data to assign them to the correct tables. All the parameter signals relating to the different tables are edited by the television operators or the transport media managers, are incorporated into the flow of this operator, and are routed to the

  users by different media.

  In general, transmission and reception means comprising satellites, cables or terrestrial rebroadcasting devices constitute transmission networks. For each transmission medium there is a NIT table, Network Information Table, which indicates the name of the network, the network number, and when it is a question of satellite link, for each of the network multiplexes which are in this case transponders, information such as modulation frequency, orbital position of bits, polarization, etc. Similar information is contained in the NIT tables of cable or terrestrial transmission media. The information contained in the NIT tables are physical parameters essentially allowing a decoder to calibrate in frequency to pick up each multiplexed signal stream. Each NIT table includes, for a designated transponder, a list of services carried by the transponder. This list is normally limited, sometimes to 8 services, due to the bandwidth limitation reserved for a transponder. By service, we conventionally mean what users call a television channel, for example a channel broadcasting on

  during the day successive programs to each other.

  However, the services can be audio only services or

data or other services.

  Each service is thus identified in the NIT table by a triplet of information: - information known as Original Network Id (ontwkid) Identification of

network origin.

  - information called Transport Stream Id (tsid) - Multiplex identification; this information typically designates one of the transponders in

relationship with the satellite.

  - information called Service Id (svcid) - Service Identification-, which will in practice be a number assigned by an operator who manages the satellite

upon transmission of this service.

  In the message corresponding to the NIT table, the decoder essentially retrieves the triplet according to the DVB standard as well as the physical parameters of the transponder. Each transponder transmits an SDT table which includes sub-tables. Each sub-table describes each of the services which are conveyed by the transponder. These services can be part of the services distributed by the transponder concerned or by another

  transponder. This is identified from the NIT table.

  Ultimately, an entire table architecture is thus distributed, in particular according to standard EN 300 468 and the purpose of the decoder is to reconstruct all the tables in order to have the setting information thus

  only information to be displayed for users.

  With regard to the transponders, each one also distributes a table called PAT, Program Association Table, a table which itself gives the list of PMT tables, Program Map Table, which are associated with each of the services. For each service, there is in the PMT table in particular access control information associated with this service. The CAT access control table allows this information to be taken and causes this information to be transmitted to a decoder microprocessor, which can then determine whether the user of the decoder has the rights to this service. If this is the case, the microprocessor returns appropriate information which makes it possible to obtain a digital decryption key for the service in question. The latter can then be reproduced in clear on a screen of

viewing.

  The MPEG2 standard makes it possible to multiplex several services in the same Transport Stream (TS) or channel. This standard is supplemented by the DVB standard which allows the constitution and the change of service, or

  zapping on several transponders within the same single network.

  Services are always identified by the triplet of information (ontwk_id, tsid, and svc_id). Each operator therefore broadcasts more or less complete signaling allowing the constitution of a list of accessible services, called the main list of services, from a single connection on a transponder. In this context, the connection parameters are either entered by the user on the screen or frozen in the decoder. In order to allow a user to retrieve a complete list of all the services broadcast on all networks regardless of their operator, a scan (also called scanning) has been implemented. It results in a succession of transponder visits making it possible to recover

  services of several networks, and no longer of a single installation.

  Each operator is likely to offer a set of services to its customers; among these services, there is in particular the possibility of constituting, for each user of the decoder, one or more lists of services called favorite lists from the main list of services. Most often, the procedure for creating favorite lists is as follows: the main list of services is displayed on the television in a graphic window; The user can then select certain services present in the main list and place them in another graphic window displayed on the television, thus progressively constituting one of his favorite lists. He can then assign to the favorite list that he has composed a name or a code which will allow him later to identify this list. Thus, the user can have a reduced list of services, most often corresponding to his preferred services, and, when he wishes, he can limit to this favorite list the services which he will access directly with the remote control or with a so-called zapping operation consisting in this case of scrolling successively on the screen

  different services from this reduced list of services.

  However, the constitution of favorite lists remains quite

  summary and gives little information to the user as to the nature of the services he

  selected. So, for example, when a user selects a service from the main list to insert it into his favorite list, he does not have information indicating whether he has rights to this service, or whether this service is received satisfactorily by the television device it uses. In addition, in the case of a child whose parents consider that he does not have the right to access and be selected from a favorite list of certain services, no indication is provided to this child and no functionality is implemented to prevent it from inserting these services

in his favorite list.

  The television device according to the invention overcomes all of the problems which have just been described. In fact, in the invention, when a user constitutes his favorite list, he has precise information as to his access rights to the service he selects, whether it be decryption rights or special rights, for example granted by a third party. In addition, in the invention, when a user has selected a service for which he had access rights and these access rights have been modified, the device according to the invention makes it possible to indicate to the user this modification of rights. Finally, the invention can allow a user, when he wishes to insert a service into his favorite list, to have an opinion as to the quality of the

signals received for this service.

  The invention therefore relates to a television device comprising in particular a display device, a reception module equipped with a tuner for receiving and selecting, from a set of available signal streams, a multiplexed audio and / or video signal stream, each signal corresponding to an audio and / or video service emitted by an operator, means for constituting a main list of the set of services characterized in that it comprises means for allowing a user of the decoder to select a set of services to build a favorite list, and means to provide information

  relating to user access rights on each selected service.

  The access rights considered are decryption access rights and / or specific access rights. The decryption access rights are those which give access to services for which a subscription has been paid, and the decryption access rights are rights of access to services for which no access ban has been programmed at

  within the device according to the invention.

  According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the means for giving information relating to the access rights on each selected service comprise video information representative of the video signal of a selected service and means for displaying this video information on the display screen. Furthermore, the device according to the invention comprises means for indicating to a user who has created a favorite list an evolution in the access rights for each service of his favorite list. Finally, means for giving information relating to the quality of reception of each selected service, and means for restricting the specific access rights for different services depending on the user of the device are implemented in the device. according to the invention. The different methods using the different means to perform assisted operations for creating image lists

  favorites are also an object of the present invention.

  The invention and its different applications will be better understood on

  reading the following description and examining the figures which

  accompany it. These are presented for information only and in no way

limiting of the invention.

  Figure 1 shows a schematic representation of the

television according to the invention.

  In this figure, a digital television decoder 100 which comprises a reception module 101 for television signals, the reception module 101 receiving via an antenna 102 a set of available streams. Each signal stream thus received is composed of several multiplexed audio and / or video signals, each signal corresponding to an audio and / or video service transmitted by an operator. The reception module 101 could also be connected to a cable television network or to a satellite reception system. Furthermore, the reception module 101 is connected to a control circuit 103 of the reception module 101. The control circuit 103 transmits to the reception module 101 a control signal indicating which service it must extract from the set of available flows received by the antenna 102. To this end, the reception module 101 consists of a tuner 104 which makes it possible to select, thanks in particular to the information contained in the NIT tables, a given carrier frequency corresponding to a given stream. Within the reception module 101, the tuner 104 is connected to an extraction module 105 which makes it possible to extract from the signal stream selected by the tuner 104 a determined service, in accordance with the instructions contained in the signal transmitted by the reception module. command 103. At a given instant, the reception module 101 can therefore only extract a single service from the set of available flows. The signals relating to the extracted services are digitized within the reception module 101. These signals consist of audio signals

  and / or video and parameter signals.

  A first sensor 106, in this infrared example, receives signals emitted by a remote control 107. An infrared cell of the first sensor 106 delivers a signal which allows the user to control the control circuit 103. The digitized video signals coming from the module reception 101 are sent to a video memory 108 via a first bidirectional communication bus 109. A program memory 110 is intended for the management of the various operations which may occur within the decoder 100, and more particularly to the various operations which may occur when building a favorite list. A circuit of

  size 111 is connected to the bidirectional communication bus 109.

  An image overlay module 112, or OSD module (On Screen Display in English literature) is connected by a unidirectional link 113 to a data memory 114. A superposition module 115 admits signals at a first input from the video memory 108 and at a second input of the signals from the OSD module 112. The function of this overlay module is to make it possible to display elements

  graphics on a video image background.

  A microprocessor 116 is connected by means of a second bidirectional communication bus 117 in particular to the program memory 110, to the data memory 114, to the reception module 101 and to the control circuit 103. The microprocessor 116 is also connected by means of a unidirectional link 118 to a second sensor 119 which is preferably similar to the first sensor 106. The user can thus trigger directly, by means of the remote control 107, the implementation of applications contained in the memory of programs 110. The two sensors 106 and 119 can receive signals from the same remote control 107. In a variant of the invention, the two sensors 106 and 119 can be combined. The second bidirectional communication bus 117 carries control, address or data signals. The first unidirectional communication bus 109 essentially conveys information relating to the images to be displayed on a

  television type display device 120.

  Furthermore, it is obvious that the elements represented in FIG. 1 can be arranged in any device other than the decoder 100 connected to a television set, or in the television set itself; if the invention is described in the context of a digital television decoder, the term decoder must be interpreted very broadly so as to encompass all the devices capable of receiving audio signals and / or

  video and capable of reproducing these signals on a display device.

  The operation of the device according to the invention is now explained. It uses different applications from program memory, these applications can be replaced by electronic circuits

  specific in other embodiments of the device according to the invention.

  When the user wishes to constitute a favorite list, he first of all displays on the display device 120 a graphic window 121, called the main list window, in which the main list of available services appears. To this end, an application 140, called an application for opening graphic windows, is implemented. This application 140 makes it possible to determine an area of the screen to display therein elements contained in the program memory 114. In this case, these elements correspond here to the main list of available services including the data, retrieved by the previously mentioned scanning operation, are contained in an area of the data memory 114, called main list memory 160. An application 141, called main list display application, is implemented to display in the graphic window 121 , thanks to a read operation

  of the main list memory 160, the elements of the main list.

  Once the main list is displayed, the user can implement an application 142, called the service selection application. This application 142 makes it possible to select one of the services from the main list, for example by means of the remote control 107. The service thus selected is for example highlighted in the main list window 121. According to the invention, when the application service selection 142 is implemented, an application 143, called access rights verification application, runs automatically. In a first embodiment, this application for checking access rights 143 has the effect of triggering the following operations: - tuning of the tuner 104 on the carrier frequency associated with the signal flow comprising the selected service, - recovery, thanks to the extraction module 105, data relating to the selected service, and orientation via the communication bus 117 of the parameter data contained in the parameter signals to an area 161 of the data memory 114, called the parameter data memory; - interpretation of the access control data contained in the parameter data, and more particularly of the data of the PMT table of the service considered; - transmission of information relating to the right of decryption access

for the selected service.

  The step of interpreting the data in the PMT table for a service in question requires the intervention of the CAT access control table, which takes the access control information from the PMT table and transmits it to the microprocessor which knows how to determine if the user has decryption rights for the selected service. If necessary, an authorization accompanied by a digital decryption key is returned by the microprocessor. The step of transmitting information relating to the right of access of the selected service is implemented by means of a specific application 144, known as application for transmitting information 144. This application for transmitting information 144 executes the following operations: opening by means of the application for opening graphic windows 140 of a second graphic window 122, called the rights window; - transfer of a symbol contained in a specific area of the data memory 114, called symbol memory 162, to the OSD module 112 which allows the display of the corresponding symbol in the window 122. By symbol, a explicit graphic representation which

  indicates to the user if he has access rights to the selected service.

  This symbol can for example be simply a red rectangle in the case where it does not have access rights, and a green rectangle in the case where it has

access permissions.

  To insert a service into a favorite list, the user can then implement an application called service transfer application 145 of the program memory 110. This application automatically opens a third graphical window 123, called the favorite list window, in which appears all the services whose user has confirmed the selection after having read his access rights to this service. When a service is inserted into a favorite list, the latter is updated and stored in a specific area of the

  data memory 114, called favorite list memory 164.

  In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the second operation of the application for transmitting information relating to rights 144 is as follows: transfer from the extraction module 105 to the data resizing circuit 111 video related to the selected service. The scaling circuit allows the video image of the selected service 11 to be scaled to the size of the rights window 122 that has been opened. The scaled video image is then transferred to the video memory 108 and is displayed in the graphic window 122. Thus, in case the user has the decryption access rights to the selected service, the image appears in clear in the graphics window 122. Otherwise, the image appears in encrypted form. The user thus has the possibility of quickly seeing whether he has the access rights to the selected service. Preferably, the user should only insert a service into his favorite list if he has access rights to this service. In this embodiment, the user also has information

  relating to the quality of the video image received for the selected service.

  Appreciation of this information may encourage or dissuade him from inserting the

  service selected from his favorite list.

  In an improved embodiment of the device according to the invention, a user can delete access rights to another user for certain services. To this end, it can implement an application 146, called an application for modifying particular access rights, which allows each potential user of the device according to the invention to assign or confiscate specific access rights to certain services. This information is stored in a specific area of the data memory 114, called the special rights memory 163. In this embodiment, each user has a code which

  it is its own, which allows the system to identify it and interpret its rights.

  In this particular embodiment, the application for transmitting information relating to rights 144 includes the additional operation of comparing the identity of the user with information contained in the memory of special rights 163 to determine whether the The user in question has specific access rights in addition to the decryption access rights. If the user does not have the specific access rights for the selected service, the implementation of the transfer application

  145 services may be prohibited for this service.

  In a particular embodiment of the device according to the invention, when the access rights are modified for a given user, be it decryption access rights or particular access rights, relative information to this modification is restored in one of the graphic windows of the display screen 120 thanks to the automatic implementation of an application for warning of modification of rights 147 of the program memory 110. A user can then take it into account

  to modify their favorite service list.

  In all the embodiments of the device according to the invention, a user can obviously consult the data of his favorite list thanks to an application 148, called consultation application, and modify the various services present in his favorite list thanks to an application

  149 said modification application.

Claims (5)

  1 - Television device (100) comprising in particular a display device (120), a reception module (101) equipped with a tuner (104) for receiving and selecting, from a set of available signal streams, a stream of multiplexed audio and / or video signals, each signal corresponding to an audio and / or video service transmitted by an operator, means (160; 161) for constituting a main list of all the services characterized in that it comprises means (140; 141; 142; 145) for allowing a user of the decoder to select a set of services in order to constitute a favorite list, and means (143; 144; 162) for giving information relating to access rights of the user on each service selected.   2- television device (100) according to the preceding claim characterized in that the access rights are access rights of   decryption and / or specific access rights.   3- television device (100) according to one of claims   previous characterized in that the means for giving information relating to the access rights on each selected service include video information representative of the video signal of a selected service, and means (101; 108; 111; 140) for displaying this video information on the viewing screen.   4- television device (100) according to one of claims   previous characterized in that it comprises means (140; 147) for indicating to a user having constituted a favorite list an evolution in   the access rights of each service of its favorite list.   - Television device (100) according to one of claims   previous characterized in that it comprises means (108; 122) for giving information relating to the quality of reception of each service selected.   6- television device (100) according to one of claims   previous characterized in that it comprises means (146; 163) for defining the specific access rights on different services according to the user of the device.