JP2000197018A - Method for inserting program relating information to mpeg transport stream in digital video contents, method for activating application software corresponding to program related information, and digital video contents transmission-reception system - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To easily and correctly obtain required information by utilizing digital video. SOLUTION: Program related to data such as URL, a mail address, a program title is inserted to private data, a stream type is defined to recognize program relating data at a reception side and it is allowed to flow into an MPEG(Motion Picture Expert Group) transport stream. At the reception side, PMT is obtained in the case of receiving a program, buttons corresponding to URL, the mail address and the program title are displayed on a monitor screen by a graphical user interface, when program relating data is decided to exist and also the button for preservation is displayed. When the display from a viewer exists as against the graphical user interface, application software corresponding to the program relating information is started according to the indication. When the instruction for preserving the program relating information exists, it is stored in a memory.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to MPEG (MotionPictur) of program-related information in digital video contents.
e Expert Group) The present invention relates to a method of inserting into a transport stream, a method of starting application software corresponding to program-related information, and a digital video content transmission / reception system.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, for analog video contents, a URL (Uniform Resource Locato) of the Internet has been used.
In order to notify the viewer of r), a mail address, a program title, and the like, a method of embedding in an analog video using a VBI (Vertical Blanking Interval) is used. When a viewer acquires information such as a URL or an e-mail address, a memo or a VT
It is recorded on an R (video tape recorder) or memorized by the head.

[0003]

By the way, in analog video, information such as the Internet URL, mail address, and program title is information only for the time displayed on the screen. Hard to get. However, there is a danger that the recording may be missed unless the VTR is operated immediately. This problem can be solved by extracting only the target information from the analog video, but it is technically very difficult to extract only the target information from the analog video. Also, when the amount of target information is large, it can be handled by a VTR, but it is difficult to make a memo or store it in the beginning. Also, VBI cannot handle a large amount of information. It should be noted that when digital video is used, it can be solved relatively easily, but at present there is no method or apparatus that can realize it.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned circumstances, and provides an MPEG transport of program-related information in digital video contents in which necessary information can be easily and accurately obtained by using digital video. It is an object of the present invention to provide a method of inserting into a stream, a method of activating application software corresponding to program-related information, and a digital video content transmitting / receiving system.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, a method for inserting program-related information in digital video content into an MPEG transport stream according to the invention according to the first aspect of the present invention, comprises: In the case where information related to a program other than video and audio is inserted into the stream, a stream type is defined so that the receiving side can acquire this information.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the method of inserting program-related information in digital video content into an MPEG transport stream, the program-related information includes a URL of a program provider, a mail address, and a program title. And

According to the method of inserting program-related information in the digital video content into the MPEG transport stream, the transmitting side, which is the program providing side, transmits program-related information (eg, URL,
(E-mail address, program title) can be inserted by a method in accordance with the rules of the MPEG transport stream. The receiving side converts the program-related information from the transmitting side into MPEG
It can be obtained by a method according to the rules of the transport stream. Therefore, since the program-related information can be easily stored, the viewer can easily and accurately acquire the program-related information.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method for starting application software corresponding to program-related information.
Receiving the program content streamed by the MPEG transport stream, it is determined by referring to the stream type whether or not the program content includes information related to a program other than video and audio. ,
It is displayed on a monitor screen as a graphical user interface, and when an instruction is given from the user to the graphical user interface, application software corresponding to the instruction is started.

According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method for activating application software corresponding to program-related information.
If the program-related information includes a URL of a program provider, an e-mail address, and a program title, and if an instruction from the user for the graphical user interface is to display the URL, a browser is started and the e-mail address is displayed. Then, the mail software is started, the text viewer is started if the program title is displayed, and the program is stored in a storage medium if the program related information is stored.

According to the method of starting application software corresponding to the program-related information, the program-related information is displayed on a monitor screen by a graphical user interface, and the application software corresponding to the program-related information is started in accordance with a viewer's instruction. Since the program-related information can be stored, the viewer can easily and accurately acquire the program-related information, and can save the program-related information to view the program at any time.

According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a digital video content transmission / reception system, comprising:
A digital video content transmission / reception system including a transmission device that flows in a transport stream and a reception device that receives the program content from the transmission device, wherein the transmission device transmits a program other than video and audio related to the program. The information processing apparatus further comprises transmitting means for transmitting related information in an MPEG transport stream and defining a stream type so that the receiving apparatus can obtain the information. The receiving apparatus receives program content transmitted in the MPEG transport stream. Receiving means, determining means for determining whether there is information related to a program other than video and audio in the program content received by the receiving means by referring to the stream type, If the program content is determined to have program-related information, Application launching means for displaying program-related information on a monitor screen as a graphical user interface, and launching application software corresponding to the graphical user interface if there is an instruction from the user. I do.

[0012] In the digital video content transmitting / receiving system according to the present invention, the program related information includes a URL of a program providing side, a mail address, and a program title.
The application activating means receives an instruction from the user for the graphical user interface, and
If it displays RL, it activates a browser; if it displays the e-mail address, it activates e-mail software; if it displays the program title, it activates a text viewer. It is characterized in that if it is to be stored, it is stored in a storage medium.

According to the digital video content transmission / reception system, the transmitting side transmits the program-related information (eg, URL, mail address, program title) other than the video and audio related to the program in accordance with the rules of the MPEG transport stream. At the receiving end, the MP
The program-related information can be obtained by a method in accordance with the EG transport stream regulations, and the obtained program-related information is displayed on a monitor screen by a graphical user interface. The application software corresponding to the information is started, and if there is an instruction to save the program-related information, the program-related information is stored in the storage medium, so that the viewer can easily and accurately obtain the program-related information, and By saving related information, you can view it at any time.

[0014]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. (I) Overall Configuration of Digital Video Content Transmission / Reception System FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the overall schematic configuration of a digital video content transmission / reception system according to an embodiment of the present invention. In this figure, reference numeral 1 denotes a broadcast station and a content provider that provides contents to be broadcast, 2 denotes a transmission path (MPEG transport stream) such as an optical fiber, 3 denotes a receiver having a display function, and 4 denotes operation on the receiver 3. The application 5 is a base application that provides the minimum required functions as the receiver 3. The base application 5 is software having a function of at least starting and ending another application. Reference numeral 6 denotes a tuner unit and a control unit (CP
U, a memory, etc.), and hardware such as a monitor. It is also possible to provide an OS (operation system) to replace the base application 5.

(II) Overview of Operation of Digital Video Content Transmission / Reception System The content provider 1 includes a program (program) and program-related data (URL, mail address,
Program titles and the like are multiplexed by MPEG and transmitted (see FIG. 2). The method of multiplexing program-related data will be described below. Base application 5 of receiver 3
After receiving the program transmitted from the content provider 1 and the program-related data relating to the program, starts the application corresponding to the program-related data according to an instruction from the user. For example, if there is an instruction to display a URL, the browser is started. If there is an instruction to send an e-mail, the e-mail software is started. If there is an instruction to display the title of the program, the text viewer is started. The method of receiving the program-related data and the activation of the application corresponding to the program-related data will be described below.

(III) Details of Operation of Digital Video Content Transmission / Reception System (a) Method of Transmitting Program-Related Data When digital video content is transmitted in an MPEG transport stream, the following is performed. -Video data-Audio data-Private data (user-defined) Private data can be handled freely by the content provider 1, and URLs, mail addresses, program titles, etc. can be entered. In the present invention, these URLs, mail addresses, program titles and other program-related data are multiplexed by MPEG. The relationship between the three types of data, video, audio, and private data,
This is described in the PMT (program map table; see FIG. 3) of the G transport stream. PMT is a table showing the configuration of a program, in which the correspondence between the elementary streams making up the program and the PID (packet ID; packet identifier) is described. For example,

The program (program) No. 10 Video PID 100 Audio PID 101 Private data PID 102 This means that, as shown in FIG. 3, the data flowing by PID 100 in the MPEG transport stream is the video of the 10th (No. 10) program, PID10
The data flowing in 1 is the audio of the 10th program,
The data flowing by ID 102 is program-related data of the tenth program.

Here, a new type is defined as a stream type for program-related data to determine whether a program has program-related data such as a URL, a mail address, and a program title. This allows
By acquiring the PMT and determining whether or not a stream of that type is flowing in the stream type of the elementary stream, it is possible to determine the presence or absence of program-related data. The program-related data is in the following form, for example. URL: WWW.toshiba.co.jp MailAddress: xxxx @ toshib
a.co.jp Address: 2-9suehiro-cho, ome, tokyo 198 Japan
ProgramTitle: Toshiba CM The ProgramTitle is the name of the program on which the URL, mail address, and the like are flowing.

(B) Method of receiving program-related data The above-described program-related data is processed by the base application 5 of the receiver 3. Here, the PID of the PAT (program association table) is normally set to “0”. The base application 5 of the receiver 3 first receives the PID from the MPEG transport stream sent from the content provider 1.
Retrieve 0 and retrieve PAT. PMTP during PAT
At least one ID is defined and the PMT PID
Can be obtained. For example, as shown in FIG.
When two of 0 and PID20 are defined (that is, when two programs are running in total), the video of the tenth program is transmitted with PID100, the audio is transmitted with PID101, and the program-related data is transmitted with PID102. Is shown.
For the 10th program, PID100 video, PID
The voice 101 and the program-related data PID 102 are fetched. The information of the second program is obtained from PAT to PID2.
It is understood that PMT is obtained by searching for 0.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the flow of processing until the base application 5 of the receiver 3 determines whether program-related data exists in a program. Basically, a method up to program selection of an MPEG transport stream is used, and detection of an elementary stream having a stream ID of a newly created stream type after PMT detection is added to standard program selection processing. First, the tuner is tuned to a certain frequency band of the target program, and then PID0 is searched to obtain the PMT. Then, the PMT of the target program is obtained from the obtained PMT, and the target program configuration is checked from the PMT. And
It is determined whether or not there is an elementary stream having a stream ID for program-related data. If there is an elementary stream having a stream ID for program-related data, the process proceeds to a process for activating an application corresponding to the program-related data. I do. On the other hand, if there is no elementary stream having the stream ID for program-related data, the process directly exits.

(C) Activation of Application Corresponding to Program-Related Data Upon receiving a program, the base application 5 of the receiver 3 acquires a PMT and determines whether there is program-related data. When it is determined that there is program-related data, a button indicating the found content and a button for saving are displayed on the screen. At that time, if those buttons are pressed by the viewer (mainly operated by the remote control),
Start another application. The pressed button is U
If it is RL, start a browser and access the target site. If the pressed button is Mail, the mail software is started up so that the mail can be sent to the target address. If the pressed button is Info, a text viewer is activated to display a program title or the like. When the Save button is pressed, the information is stored in its own memory (storage medium) together with the program title. The saved data is requested by the user,
Be able to handle it later.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the flow of the above processing. First, in step S10, it is determined whether or not there is program-related data.
In step S12, a GUI (Graphical User Interfac
e) on the screen using the various buttons ("Info", "U
RL "," Mail ", and" Save "). If there is no program-related data, the process of step S10 is repeated. After the program-related data is present and the various buttons are displayed, it is determined in step S14 whether or not the program has ended. If the program has ended, the process proceeds to step S16, and after deleting all the buttons displayed on the screen, It returns to step S10. If the program has not ended, the process proceeds to step S18,
It is determined whether there is an input from the viewer to the GUI. If there is an input from the viewer to the GUI, the process proceeds to step S20; otherwise, the process returns to step S14.

When it is determined that there is an input from the viewer to the GUI and the process proceeds to step S20, it is determined whether the input is for a URL button. If it is for the URL button, the process proceeds to step S22, where the browser is started to open the homepage of the program. The input is U
If it is not for the RL button, the process proceeds to step S24, and it is determined whether or not it is for the Mail button. If the input is for a Mail button,
Proceeding to step S26, the mail software is activated so that the viewer can send a mail. If the input is not for the Mail button, the process proceeds to step S28, and it is determined whether the input is for the Info button. If the input is for the Info button, the process proceeds to step S30 to activate the text viewer and display the program title or the like. If the input is not for the Info button, the process proceeds to step S32 and the input is Sa.
It is determined whether the operation is for the "ve" button. If the input is for the Save button, step S
Proceeding to 34, the data is stored in the memory of the control unit so that it can be used in the subsequent processing. If the input is not for the Save button, the process returns to step S14.

As described above, in this embodiment, the stream type is defined so that the program-related data such as the URL, the mail address, and the program title is inserted into the private data, and the receiver 3 can recognize the program-related data. Stream to the MPEG transport stream.
When receiving the program, the base application 5 of the receiver 3 acquires the PMT, determines whether or not there is program-related data, and when it determines that there is program-related data, displays the PMT on the monitor screen by the graphical user interface. Buttons corresponding to URLs, mail addresses, and program titles that are program-related data are displayed, and a Save button for saving program-related data in a memory is displayed. Then, if there is an instruction from the viewer to the graphical user interface, the application software corresponding to the group-related information is started according to the instruction, and if there is an instruction to save the program-related information, it is stored in the memory. In this case, if the pressed button is a URL, the browser is started. If the pressed button is Mail, the mail software is started. If the pressed button is Info, the text viewer is started. Button is Sa
If it is "ve", the program related information is stored in the memory.

[0025]

According to the first and second aspects of the present invention, the transmitting side specifies program-related information (eg, URL, mail address, program title) other than video and audio related to the program in the MPEG transport stream. , And the receiving side can acquire the program-related information in a manner in accordance with the rules of the MPEG transport stream, so that the program-related information can be easily stored, so that the viewer can easily and accurately receive the program-related information. Program related information can be obtained.

According to the third and fourth aspects of the present invention, the program-related information is displayed on the monitor screen by the graphical user interface, and the application software corresponding to the program-related information is started according to the instruction of the viewer, or the program-related information is activated. Since the information can be stored, the viewer can easily and accurately acquire the program-related information, and the viewer can view the program-related information at any time.

According to the fifth and sixth aspects of the present invention, the transmitting side transmits the program-related information (eg, URL, mail address, program title) other than video and audio related to the program to the MP.
EG transport stream can be inserted in accordance with the provisions, and the receiving side can acquire the program-related information by a method in accordance with the MPEG transport stream, and can also use the graphical user interface to acquire the acquired program-related information. Displayed on the monitor screen, if there is an instruction from the viewer, the application software corresponding to the instructed program-related information is started, and if there is an instruction to save the program-related information, it is saved in the storage medium. The user can easily and accurately acquire the program-related information, and can view the program-related information at any time by saving the program-related information.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a digital video content transmission / reception system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining the operation of the digital video content transmission / reception system of the embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining an operation of the digital video content transmission / reception system of the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing an operation of the digital video content transmitting / receiving system of the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing an operation of the digital video content transmitting / receiving system of the embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining a conventional URL notification method for analog video.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Broadcasting station and content provider 2 Transmission line 3 Receiver 4 Application 5 Base application 6 Hardware

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuation of the front page (54) [Title of the Invention] A method for inserting program-related information in digital video contents into the MPEG transport stream, a method for starting application software corresponding to the program-related information, and a method for digitally displaying the program. Video content transmission / reception system

Claims (6)

[Claims] When inserting information related to a program other than video and audio into program content streamed in an MPEG transport stream, a stream type is defined so that the receiving side can acquire the information. MP of program related information in digital video contents
How to insert into EG transport stream. 2. The program-related information includes a UR of a program providing side.
2. The method for inserting program-related information in an MPEG transport stream in digital video content according to claim 1, wherein the method includes L, a mail address, and a program title. 3. Receiving a program content streamed by an MPEG transport stream, and determining whether the program content includes information related to a program other than video and audio by referring to the stream type. If there is related information, it is displayed on the monitor screen as a graphical user interface, and when there is an instruction from the user to this graphical user interface,
A method for activating application software corresponding to program-related information, characterized by activating application software corresponding to the instruction. 4. The program-related information is a UR of a program providing side.
L, an e-mail address, a program title, and if the user's instruction to the graphical user interface is to display the URL, start a browser; if the instruction is to display the e-mail address, start mail software; 4. The application software corresponding to the program-related information according to claim 3, wherein a text viewer is started if the program-related information is displayed, and stored in a storage medium if the program-related information is stored. How to start. 5. A digital video content transmission / reception system comprising: a transmission device for flowing program content in an MPEG transport stream; and a reception device for receiving the program content from the transmission device. The apparatus further comprises transmitting means for transmitting information related to the program other than the video and audio related to the program in an MPEG transport stream and defining a stream type so that the receiving apparatus can acquire the information. Receiving means for receiving the program content streamed in the port stream; and determining whether or not the program content received by the receiving means has information related to programs other than video and audio by referring to the stream type. Determining means for executing the program content by the determining means. If it is determined that there is program-related information in the program, the program-related information is displayed on a monitor screen as a graphical user interface,
A digital video content transmission / reception system, comprising: an application starting unit that starts an application software corresponding to the instruction from the user when the user inputs an instruction to the graphical user interface. 6. The program-related information is a UR of a program providing side.
L, an e-mail address, and a program title.
If it displays RL, it activates a browser; if it displays the e-mail address, it activates e-mail software; if it displays the program title, it activates a text viewer. 6. The digital video content transmission / reception system according to claim 5, wherein the storage means stores the content in a storage medium if it is to be stored.