JP2008011428A - Program guide preparing apparatus and program guide preparation method - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an apparatus and method for preparing a program guide, which improves user's convenience, making it possible to compare program guide lists matching, with program search condition set according to each user's program taste or the like, according to the broadcasting schedule. <P>SOLUTION: A program guide list by program search profile, which hits for each program search profile as a program search condition set according to a user's program taste or the like, is input to a program guide preparing part 14 by a user inputting part 7, based on program arrangement information recorded in a program arrangement information recording part 6. The program guide preparing part 14 displays a plurality of program guide lists so as to be compared on the time base of broadcasting schedule, by program search profile or by merging them or the like, according to the operation information input indication of the program guide display. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a program guide generation apparatus and a program guide generation method for creating or guide-displaying EPG (Electronics Program Guide) information or the like of a television broadcast obtained via a broadcast wave or the Internet as a program guide in a state that is easy for a user to use About.

In recent years, with the spread of digital television broadcasting, the number of channels for broadcasting television programs has increased significantly. Therefore, it is very difficult for a user to search for a program that the user desires to view or record from a large number of channels.
Therefore, based on program sequence information (SI: Service Information) that can be obtained from EPG (Electronics Program Guide) etc., a program search using a search keyword specified in advance by the user is performed, and the search result is displayed in a list and displayed to the user. So far, methods such as making it possible to browse and automatically making recording reservations have been proposed.
The program sequence information described here refers to the program title, genre, and contents specified by the Radio Industry Association (ARIB) in the "Standard Number: Program Sequence Information Used for ARIB S TD-B10 Digital Broadcasting" This data group includes meta information such as introductions and performers, event information such as start time and duration.

The search keyword specified by the user is used when a desired program is detected in comparison with the character information in the program arrangement information. Recently, in order to improve the accuracy of detecting the desired program, advanced program search conditions are used, combining multiple keywords and search conditions (AND / OR / NOT / XOR) according to user's program preferences etc. It has become common to do.
Here, the program search condition obtained by combining the plurality of keywords and the plurality of search conditions is defined as a “program search profile” and used in the following description.
In the conventional technology for creating a program guide or automatically recording based on the program search result, only one program search profile is used implicitly.
This is because only one program search profile is used, and as a result, a program that matches the program search profile is uniquely determined.
When there are a plurality of users who watch or record TV programs, for example, when there are viewing users such as a father, a mother, and a child in a general home, each user's program preference is different. Naturally, the program search profile created in accordance with is different.

As described above, since only one program search profile is used in the prior art, each program preference of a plurality of users is collected into one program search profile.
As a result, the search keywords and search conditions included in the program search profile used by a plurality of users become a union of the search keywords and conditions registered by each user, and thus increase.
As the number of search keywords / conditions increases, the number of detected programs naturally increases, so that the possibility of detecting different programs overlapping in the same broadcast scheduled time zone increases.

At that time, it cannot be determined which user's program preference detects the detected program in the same time zone.
For this reason, the program guide generated by the prior art does not consider the convenience for the case where programs overlap in the same time zone when there are a plurality of users.
In addition, there is a problem in determining program selection when different programs are detected in the same time period from the program search results.
On the other hand, there is Patent Document 1 as a related public document.
Although this patent document 1 assumes a some user and displays the program suitable for a user's program preference, it matched the program preference of the some user in the same time slot | zone similarly to the prior art mentioned above. It is not the structure which displays a program so that contrast is possible. For this reason, this patent document 1 cannot compare whether the programs overlap in the same time zone, and cannot improve the convenience of the comparison.
JP 2005-294992 A

  The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and a program guide list that matches each program search condition set according to each user's program preference or the like can be compared on the time axis scheduled to be broadcast. It is an object of the present invention to provide a program guide generating apparatus and a program guide generating method capable of improving convenience.

The program guide generation apparatus according to one aspect of the present invention includes broadcast program attribute information, and is adapted to each program search condition set corresponding to the program preference by each user based on obtainable program arrangement information. Program information generating means by program search conditions for generating program information;
A program guide generating unit that generates a program guide composed of a plurality of program guide lists in which the generated program information classified by program search conditions are arranged so as to be comparable with each other along a scheduled time axis;
It is characterized by comprising.

The program table generation method according to one aspect of the present invention includes broadcast program attribute information, and is adapted to each program search condition set corresponding to the program preference by each user based on obtainable program arrangement information. A program information generation step by program search condition for generating program information;
A program guide generation step for generating a program guide composed of a plurality of program guide lists in which the generated program information classified by program search conditions are arranged so as to be comparable to each other along a scheduled time axis;
It is characterized by comprising.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to compare a program guide list that matches each program search condition set according to each user's program preference or the like on the time axis scheduled to be broadcast, thereby improving user convenience.

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram showing a configuration of a program guide generating apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. Hereinafter, each functional block in FIG. 1 will be described.
The program guide display device 1 acquires program sequence information from the program sequence information distribution system 2, searches a program that hits (adapts) a keyword and a search condition by a user, and generates a program guide generation device 3 And a program guide display unit 4 as a display device for displaying the generated program guide.
The program arrangement information distribution system 2 includes program arrangement information including information on broadcast TV programs, for example, program title and genre, meta information such as contents introduction and performers, and information referred to when viewing / recording reservations, etc. Is provided as data that can be acquired from a broadcast station by broadcast means or communication means such as the Internet.
A typical example of the program arrangement information distribution system 2 is a system that provides a so-called EPG service.

The program arrangement information receiving unit 5 constituting the program guide display device 1 (or the program guide generation device 3) receives program arrangement information from a program arrangement information distribution system that provides an EPG service via communication means such as broadcast data or the Internet. It is a functional block (simply abbreviated as a block) to receive (or acquire).
Then, the program arrangement information received by the program arrangement information receiving unit 5 is sent to the program arrangement information recording unit 6 inside the program table generating device 3, and the program arrangement information recording unit 6 records the program arrangement information. To do. The program sequence information recording unit 6 is composed of a hard disk or the like.
The program sequence information receiving unit 5 refers to the program sequence information recorded in the program sequence information recording unit 6 and not only records the program sequence information but also updates or deletes the recorded program sequence information. I do.
The program guide generation device 3 includes a user input unit 7 that receives an operation input from a user who displays (including generation) the program guide.

The user input unit 7 includes a program search profile editing unit 8 that edits a program search profile as a program search condition set by the user, a program search profile priority editing unit 9, and a time zone priority editing unit 10. Each block of the program guide display operation unit 11 is provided.
A program search profile as program search condition (information) set by the user is defined as a program search condition corresponding to the user's program program preference or the like. This program search profile corresponds to information necessary for performing a program search corresponding to a user's program program preferences, that is, a keyword set or designated by the user, a search condition when using the keyword, and the like.

The program search profile editing unit 8 edits a program search profile by a user from program arrangement information including program preference information by group, for example, by user or by category. The edited program search profile is recorded in the program search profile recording unit 12. The program search profile priority editing unit 9 sets different priorities for each program search profile specified by the program search profile editing unit 8 and recorded in the program search profile recording unit 12. The set priority for each program search profile is recorded in the priority information recording unit 13 for each program search profile.
The priority editing unit for each time zone 10 designates the time zone scheduled to be broadcast using the program search profile specified by the program search profile editing unit 8 and recorded in the program search profile recording unit 12 as a unit of comparison. And has a function of setting the priority in that time zone. In this embodiment, a priority is set for each program search profile, and a priority that is prioritized over a priority for each program search profile can be set in other designated (scheduled broadcast) time zones. . In other words, the priority set for each program search profile is applied outside the designated time zone.

The set priority by time zone is recorded in the priority information recording unit 13 by program search profile.
Further, the program guide display operation unit 11 performs instruction setting of a configuration such as a display layout when the program guide generation unit 14 creates a program guide to be displayed on the program guide display unit 4.
In this case, the configuration of the displayed program guide can be selected from a combination of a program search result using a program search profile, priority information by program search profile, and priority by time zone, and the configuration is limited. is not.
The program search profile recording unit 12 registers a keyword for program search specified by the program search profile editing unit 8 and a search condition for using the keyword, that is, a program search profile including recording or changing / deleting.
As information for program search, it is conceivable that various information can be used as search conditions depending on the level of detail and method of search, and information to be specified is not limited.

For example, search of AND / OR / NOT / XOR using multiple keywords can be combined, search results can be changed depending on program attributes, such as series programs, rebroadcast programs, etc. However, the present embodiment is applicable to any case, and the program search profile or the program search condition is arbitrary.
In addition, priority information can be added to each set of keywords and search conditions, and used when organizing search results.
FIG. 2 shows a program search profile recording table as an example of program search profile information recorded in the program search profile recording unit 12.
In the example of FIG. 2, a plurality of program search profiles corresponding to a plurality of users (in the specific example, father, mother, Taro, and Hanako) are set. However, some users (dad in the specific example) are set as a plurality of program search profiles (dad A and B) in the specific example.

In the specific example of FIG. 2, each program search profile includes information such as a keyword, a keyword to be excluded, an attribute, and a priority (whether priority is given).
Here, a table is adopted as a format for recording information, but it is not limited to this format.
The priority information recording unit 13 by program search profile has a function of recording priority information for each program search profile set by the priority editing unit 9 by program search profile and the priority editing unit 10 by time zone.
FIG. 3 shows a priority information recording table by program search profile as an example of information recorded in the priority information recording unit 13 by program search profile. Of course, the recording format is not limited to table information.
In the example of FIG. 3, the information set in the “default” row in the time zone column indicates the priority ranking of each program search profile priority.
In this example, the priority is the highest in the number 1 indicating the priority order, the number increases as the priority decreases, and the same priority can be specified. In addition, when there are a plurality of priorities with the same rank, the rank of the subsequent priority is a rank that takes into account the number of higher priorities. For example, if there are two priority rankings of 2, the next ranking is 4th.
Similarly, in the example of FIG. 3, the row in which the time zone is set indicates the priority ranking of each program search profile for each time zone.

The prioritization is the same as described above. NG can be set for the priority by time zone. The program search profile for which NG has been set enables processing such as not being included in the program table even if a program search keyword hits in the designated time zone.
The program guide generation unit 14 uses the keyword group for each program search profile recorded in the program search profile recording unit 12 and the program search profile information as a search condition group when using these keywords as program information by program search condition. It is sent to the program search list by program search profile 15 as a generating means.
Then, the program search list by program search profile generating unit 15 performs a program search for the program sequence information recorded in the program sequence information recording unit 6 for each program search profile using the sent information. A program table list by program search profile is created as program information that is hit (matched) by search condition (by program search condition).

The program guide generating unit 14 refers to the program guide list by program search profile generated by the program search list by program search profile 15 or inquires about the search result for the program arrangement information. Then, the program guide generation unit 14 refers to the priority information recorded in the program search profile priority information recording unit 13 according to the program guide layout or display form instructed from the program guide display operation unit 11. , Has a function to generate a program guide.
Further, the program guide generated by the program guide generating unit 14 is sent to the program guide display unit 4 and the program guide recording unit 16.
The program guide display unit 4 displays an image of the program guide based on the display data of the program guide output from the program guide generation unit 14.
The program guide recording unit 16 records a program guide. The recorded program guide is used for a television broadcast recording device such as a DVD / HDD recorder (not shown) that can be connected to the output terminal of the program guide recording unit 16, a recording reservation and a viewing reservation of a television broadcast program by a television receiver or the like. Available.
Note that the program guide recorded in the program guide recording unit 16 can also be output to a DVD / HDD recorder or the like via the program guide generation unit 14.

When the user instructs the program guide layout from the program guide display operation unit 11 to the program guide generation unit 14, the program guide generation unit 14 displays the program guide display unit 4 in response to the instruction (a plurality of program guides). Change the layout of the program guide (consisting of a list).
Specific examples of the layout or display form of the program guide are shown in FIGS.
The program table of FIG. 4 is displayed in columns (or columns) along a common (scheduled broadcast) time axis in which the program search list by program search profile that has been hit by each program search profile is set in the vertical direction. To do. In FIG. 2 and FIG. 3, the number of program search profiles is five. However, in FIG. 4, four program guide lists are displayed in a row for each of four program search profiles (for simplicity, four are shown). It is displayed as a program guide.

On the other hand, FIG. 5 merges a part or all of a plurality of program guide lists obtained from search results for each program search profile and displays them in a row.
In FIG. 4, based on the program search results in all the program search profiles, the corresponding programs are arranged in the horizontal direction along the common time axis set in the vertical direction. The display form is a program guide list in which each column is displayed so that comparison is possible.
In the program guide list by program search profile constituting the program guide, for example, the name of each program search profile by program search profile is displayed in the top row.
In this specific example, assuming that there are four program search profiles, a program guide list by program search profile suitable for each is displayed from program search profile A to program search profile D simultaneously.

Each program table list in the column display is arranged in time series in which the current time is the base time and the programs after the current time are found by the search, but the time in the unit of the vertical axis is not always continuous. do not have to.
That is, for a time zone in which the program hit by the program search does not exist in the program sequence based on the search result of any program search profile, the shortened time zone near the center in FIG. 4 (indicated by T in FIGS. 4 and 5). ) Can be shortened and displayed. By displaying the program table using the shortened time period in this way, the program that the user desires to display can be displayed simultaneously and simply over a wider time range.
The time may be omitted instead of shortening the time. In this case, the frame portion of the omitted time zone portion may be cut or made a dotted line to make it easier for the user to grasp it.
The time axis can be scrolled by a user operation. Moreover, in FIG. 4 etc., you may enable scrolling also in the horizontal direction orthogonal to the time axis. Then, the number of program guide lists displayed in one screen may be changeable in accordance with a user's display size instruction or the like.

Also, in the search result of one program search profile, there may be a case where a plurality of programs hit in the search at the same time zone. In the program search profiles B and C in FIG. 4, an example in which a plurality of programs are searched in the same time zone is shown.
In such a case, the number of programs with overlapping time zones is a specified threshold, and in the case of FIG. 4, for example, when there are more than two, a plurality of programs are searched such as “Multiple Hit (3 channels)”. It is possible to switch to a display that can be seen.
When confirming details about the program arrangement information displayed in this manner, the target program cell or program frame in the program table is selected by GUI operation, and the display screen or display window is switched for details. It can be displayed.
Furthermore, among the searched programs, there are cases where the same program is repeatedly broadcast for a certain period, for example, one week or one month, with the broadcast start time being changed.
These programs can be viewed at other times (time zones) compared to other programs when multiple programs are hit between searches within the same program search profile or within the same program search profile. Probability is high.

That is, it is only necessary to view or record when the program is broadcast at a time that does not overlap with other programs. In order to allow a user to easily recognize a program that is repeatedly broadcast in this manner, an icon, a mark, or other display may be added to the program frame.
As shown in FIG. 4, the program guide generation unit 14 in the program guide generation device 3 according to the present embodiment generates a plurality of program guide lists each consisting of program information that matches each of the plurality of program search profiles (program search conditions). In addition, a program guide having an arrangement configuration for simultaneous display along a common broadcast schedule time axis is generated.
Therefore, the user can easily grasp whether or not a plurality of programs are overlapped in the same time zone by comparing on the time axis by looking at the program guide. And when it overlaps, the adjustment between users becomes easy from the name of the program guide list by program search profile, and the convenience is improved as compared with the prior art.

In addition, when the program guide list is displayed in parallel for each program search profile as shown in FIG. 4, it may be displayed in order of priority for each program search profile as described in FIG. 5 below.
In this way, it is possible to easily grasp whether or not a plurality of programs overlap in the same time zone. And when it overlaps, it can grasp | ascertain which program is prioritized from a priority and a user's convenience improves.
On the other hand, FIG. 5 shows an example of a program guide display created based on the result of merging all the column displays of two program guide lists generated from the search results for each program search profile.
In the specific example of FIG. 5, the priority of the program search profile of the program search profile A in the example of FIG. 4 is the highest, and the priority is set lower in the order of program search profile B → program search profile C → program search profile D. It is assumed.
The highest priority program guide list shown on the left in FIG. 5 is the highest priority program guide list that is merged in consideration of the priority of the program search profile from the search results in all program search profiles.

Here, due to the priority of the set program search profile, the programs are assigned in order from the leftmost program guide list in FIG. However, the program selection algorithm used in the merge process is not limited to this.
If the preference information as in the preference information table shown in FIG. 2 has a priority attribute, this information can be used during the merge process.
For example, if the result of the program search profile A having the highest priority in the program search profile in FIG. 4 is a program that has been hit by a search based on preference information with the attribute “non-priority”, It is also possible to give priority to programs searched based on the preference removal method with the “priority” attribute of the program search profile.
Further, in addition to the top priority program guide list (on the left side) as shown in the two program guide lists (separate candidates A and B) on the right side from the center of FIG. Is also possible.

In FIGS. 4 and 5, each program is arranged in a column display (column display) along the vertical time axis. However, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the time axis is displayed in the horizontal direction. It is obvious that the program guide list may be displayed in a row by setting.
The program guide composed of the plurality of program guide lists shown in FIGS. 4 and 5 is generated by the program guide generator 14.
The display form of the program guide generated by the program guide generating unit 14 is determined by the program guide display operating unit 11 by an instruction operation for displaying the program guide.
The configuration of the program guide as described above can be selected from a combination of a program search result using a program search profile, priority information for each program search profile, and priority information in the program search profile. It is not limited to the display form of FIG.

As described above, the display example described above is merely an example, and the search result for each program search profile, priority information for each program search profile, and all attribute information recorded for program search in the program search profile are displayed. All program guide displays that can be configured by use are included in the scope of the present invention.
Next, referring to FIG. 6, the operation from the program sequence information acquired from the program sequence information distribution system to the display of the program table with reference to the registered program search profile and priority information by program search profile will be described. .
FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the processing procedure of the program guide display operation corresponding to the program guide display request for each program search profile from the user, that is, the operation information input.
Prior to the operation of FIG. 6, the program table generation device 3 prioritizes each program search profile by the user by the program search profile priority editing unit 9 and the time slot priority editing unit 10 of the user input unit 7 in advance. It is assumed that a degree and a priority by time zone are set.

The program guide display process of the program search profile starts with the operation information input of the program guide display by the operation from the user as a trigger, as shown in step S1.
The user can use the program guide display operation unit 11 in FIG. 1 to display option information for displaying a program guide specified by the user, for example, instruction information for merging and displaying part or all of a plurality of registered program search profiles, Input operation information such as display time zone instruction information. These operation information inputs are received by the program guide display operation unit 11, and the program guide display operation unit 11 notifies the program guide generation unit 14 in FIG. 1.
As shown in step S2, the program guide generation unit 14 in FIG. 1 receives the operation information input of the program guide display, and then determines whether or not the program guide information in the time zone to be displayed exists. It is confirmed by referring to the program arrangement information recorded in

If it is determined by the confirmation process that the desired program arrangement information does not exist, the program guide generation unit 14 performs a process of acquiring the program arrangement information as shown in step S3.
In this case, the program guide generation unit 14 instructs the program arrangement information receiving unit 5 in FIG. 1 to receive the latest program arrangement information.
In response to this instruction, the program sequence information receiving unit 5 receives and acquires the latest program sequence information from the program sequence information distribution system 2. In the next step S4, the acquired program arrangement information is recorded in the program arrangement information recording unit 6, and the process returns to step S2.
In this way, when program arrangement information exists in the process of step S2, the process proceeds to step S5. In step S5 to step S7, the program guide generation unit 14 and the program guide list by program search profile 15 generate a program while referring to the program search profile of the program search profile recording unit 12 (via the program guide generation unit 14). A program guide list is generated for each search profile.

Therefore, in step S5, the program guide generation unit 14 checks whether or not there is an unsearched program search profile, that is, a program search profile that has not yet been subjected to the program guide list generation processing.
If there is an unsearched program search profile, the program table generator 14 stores a keyword group recorded as the unsearched program search profile and a search condition group when using these keywords, that is, each program search profile. The information is sent to the program search list by program search profile 15.
As shown in step S6, the program search list by program search profile generating unit 15 searches for programs by program search profile.
Further, as shown in step S7, the program search list for each program search profile 15 generates (creates) a program guide list for each program search profile based on the program search result for each program search profile. Then, the process returns to step S5.

Then, the program guide list by program search profile generating unit 15 returns information about the completion of generating the program guide list by program search profile to the program guide generating unit 14. In this way, for example, the program search profile-specific program table list shown in FIG. 4 becomes a prototype (for example, one having no shortened time zone in FIG. 4 or one before the time axis in FIG. 4 is set in common). A program guide list for each program search profile is generated.
When program search results for all program search profiles are obtained, the process proceeds from step S5 to step S8.
In step S8, the program guide generation unit 14 confirms whether there is an instruction to merge and display part or all of a plurality of program search profiles (or program guide lists) as option information for creating or displaying a user-specified program guide. To do.
If there is no merge instruction, the process proceeds to step S11. In this step S11, the program guide generation unit 14 obtains information on the program search list by program search profile generated by the program guide list generation unit 15 by program search profile. Based on this, program table layout data creation processing for arranging program guide lists for each program search profile along a common time axis is performed.

Then, the generated program guide layout data is output to the program guide display unit 4, and the program guide display unit 4 performs a final program guide display process as shown in step S12. In this case, the displayed program guide is a program guide list by a plurality of program search profiles as shown in FIG. The program guide data generated by the program guide generator 14 is recorded in the program guide recorder 16. On the other hand, if the user gives an instruction to merge and display a plurality of program search profiles, the process proceeds to step S9.
In step S9, the program guide generation unit 14 refers to the priority information for each program search profile in the priority information recording unit 13 for each program search profile and obtains priority information necessary for the merge process.
Further, in the next step S10, the program guide generation unit 14 performs a merge process of the priority information necessary for the merge process and the program guide list by program search profile generated in step S7 according to the user designation. Then, the process proceeds to the next step S11.

In step S11, the program guide generation unit 14 uses a common time axis as described above for the program guide list by program search profile that has been merged with the program guide list by program search profile and the program guide list by program search profile that has not been merged. A process for creating layout data of a program guide in which each program guide list is arranged along is performed.
Then, in the next step S12, the program guide display unit 4 performs a final program guide display process. In this case, as shown in FIG. 5, the displayed program guide displays, for example, the highest priority program list generated by the merge process and the program guide that becomes the remaining alternative candidates A and B.
Next, as shown in FIG. 4 or FIG. 5, the processing contents of creating the program table layout data in step S11 in FIG. 6 when the program table is displayed along a common time axis will be described in more detail with reference to FIG. explain.

When the process of step S11 is started, in the first step S21 of FIG. 7, the program guide generation unit 14 acquires a base time (base time) as a display start position according to the operation information of the program guide display.
For example, the current time is used as the base time when the program guide display is started for the first time. On the other hand, when the user designates the base time as the display start position, the designated base time can be adopted.
In the next step S22, the program guide generation unit 14 searches the program search result list for a time zone in which there is no hit program in order from the base time. This step S22 is a step of searching for such a target time zone in order to omit the display of the time zone that was not hit in the search in the program guide display.

In the next step S23, the program guide generation unit 14 records, for example, in order of time as a shortened time zone for program display, a time zone longer than a certain time among the above time zones where no program exists.
This step S23 is a step of recording the time zone information obtained by the process of the previous step S22. It should be noted that “a time period greater than a certain time” can be controlled such that, for example, if it is less than 30 minutes, it is not set as a shortened time period, and this includes the case where such control is performed.
In the next step S24, the program guide generator 14 deletes the last shortened time zone from the recorded shortened time zones. This step S24 corresponds to the fact that it is not necessary to set the last shortened time zone at the time of layout as the shortened time zone.

If there is no program that has been hit in the search, all the time zones are recorded as a shortened time zone, but this is also deleted, so no program information is displayed during layout. The layout of the program guide is not displayed.
In the next step S25, the program guide generation unit 14 sets the frame of the program display sequence for each list of program search results in the time sequence recorded from the base time to the previous step in time order, if that time zone exists. Layout in the display area while shortening.
This step S25 lays out a display frame of each program list, for example, a list for each program search profile or a merged program list display frame from the base time to a displayable time while omitting the shortened time period from the base time. It is a step to do.

In the next step S26, the program guide generation unit 14 lays out information cells of programs hit in the search from the list of corresponding program search results within the frame of each program display sequence. This step S26 is a layout step in which the program information hit by the search is embedded in the frame laid out in the previous step.
In step S26, layout processing such as adding an icon to a program that is repeatedly broadcast if necessary, or displaying a multiple display when there are a plurality of programs in the same time frame, or displaying “Multiple Hit”. including.
In this way, a program table having a plurality of program table lists shown in FIGS. 4 and 5 is generated so as to be comparable on the time axis.

In this embodiment for generating a plurality of program guide lists in this way, the program search results are divided and displayed as a program guide list for each group of programs preferred by the user or for each program search profile.
As a result, compared to the conventional method of handling a user's preference group for a program uniformly, that is, having a single program search profile, the program search result for each program search profile has the same time zone. Confirmation of overlapping programs and priority determination of programs that the user wants to view or record become much easier. Therefore, this embodiment can improve user convenience.

The block diagram of the whole structure of the program schedule production | generation apparatus which concerns on one embodiment of this invention. The figure which shows an example of a program search profile recording table. The figure which shows the priority information recording table according to program search profile. The figure which shows an example of a display at the time of displaying a program schedule according to program search profile. The figure which shows an example of the display of the program table merged in consideration of the priority information of a program search profile. The flowchart which shows the content of the display process containing the production | generation of a program schedule. The flowchart which shows the detail of the production | generation process of the layout data of the program schedule in FIG.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Program guide display apparatus 2 ... Program arrangement | sequence information delivery system 3 ... Program guide production | generation apparatus 4 ... Program guide display part 7 ... User input part 13 ... Priority information recording part 14 by program search profile 14 ... Program guide generation part 15 ... Program Program table list generator by search profile

Claims (5)

Program information generation by program search condition that includes attribute information of the broadcast program and generates program information suitable for the program search condition set corresponding to the program preference by each user based on the obtainable program arrangement information Means,
A program guide generating means for generating a program guide composed of a plurality of program guide lists in which the generated program information classified by program search conditions are arranged so as to be comparable with each other along a scheduled time axis;
A program guide generating apparatus comprising:   Furthermore, it has a priority designation | designated means which designates the priority according to program search conditions, Based on the said priority information, the program table which merged at least one part of these several program table lists is produced | generated, It is characterized by the above-mentioned. The program guide production | generation apparatus of Claim 1.   Furthermore, it has a time zone priority designation means for designating a priority for each broadcast scheduled time zone in the program search condition, and based on the priority information for each time zone, at least one of the plurality of program table lists. The program guide generation apparatus according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the program guide is generated by merging sections.   4. The predetermined time zone is shortened or omitted on the time axis when there is a predetermined time zone in which there is no program information that matches any program search condition. The program guide production | generation apparatus as described in any one of Claims. Program information generation by program search condition that includes attribute information of the broadcast program and generates program information suitable for the program search condition set corresponding to the program preference by each user based on the obtainable program arrangement information Steps,
A program guide generation step for generating a program guide composed of a plurality of program guide lists in which the generated program information classified by program search conditions are arranged so as to be comparable to each other along a scheduled time axis;
A program guide generation method comprising:

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