JP5784182B2 - Receiving device, query generation method, and program - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a receiving apparatus.

  In recent years, many services for distributing content such as video on the Internet and services for sharing content have been provided. Some of these services not only provide content in various genres by a single distributor, but also specialize in genres with specialties such as sports, news, music, movies, etc. . Such services are expected to increase in the future. In addition to the Internet, NGN (Next Generation Network) is a service that provides high-quality video on a closed IP network with guaranteed bandwidth, such as conventional terrestrial, BS, and CS broadcasting services. In addition, the number of contents accessible to users is increasing explosively. In addition, the capacity and cost of storage devices have increased, and the number of contents that can be stored in the local disk of an AV device that plays back video has become enormous. With the diversification and ubiquity of these services and the explosion of content, it has become very difficult to efficiently find content that users want to see. For this reason, a technique has been developed in which content related to the selected content is searched for in a local disk or network using content metadata and the display of the content is controlled (see, for example, Patent Document 1). .

JP 2008-227947 A

  However, in the technique of Patent Document 1, when searching for content in the network, there is a possibility that the content cannot be searched depending on the service existing on the network. That is, for example, search conditions such as acceptable search conditions, metadata formats, transmission protocols, searchable content genres, and search formulas for searching content and metadata differ depending on each service. obtain. Taking search conditions as an example, a certain service only allows a search by keyword, while another service may allow a search by genre in addition to a search by keyword. In addition, the definition of a genre is often different between services that allow searches by genre. In addition, while there are many services in which a search by keyword implicitly indicates a full-text search of metadata, there is also a service in which a title, an outline description, a keyword, and a performer can be searched by specifying the keyword. Considering such diversity for each service, when a cross-sectional search across a plurality of services is executed by the content receiving device, the search formula for searching for the desired content is matched to the search form of each service. There is a need. However, it has been difficult to project a search expression for searching for desired content into a search expression that matches the search form of each service in a form without hesitation. For this reason, there is a possibility that the content desired by the user cannot be accurately searched in a plurality of services each having a different search form.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above, and when searching for content in a plurality of different services, a receiving device capable of searching for a content desired by a user even if the search form in each service is different. The purpose is to provide.

  In order to solve the above-described problems and achieve the object, the present invention is a receiving device that stores attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state and is connected via a network. A storage unit for storing service information indicating a search form in a plurality of possible storage devices and a connection method corresponding to each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device, and a search condition for searching for content A search query, which is a search condition attribute representing any one of the attributes, and a common search condition attribute that is a value that can be taken by the common search condition attribute and a common search attribute value that is a common expression in the receiving device. A first generation unit that generates a common search query including at least one or more and a search indicated by the service information using the generated common search query A second generation unit that generates a search query according to a state, and transmits the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information A transmission unit; and a reception unit that receives the attribute information obtained as a result of execution of the search query from the storage device, wherein the attribute information is metadata, and the service information is execution of the search query. The metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of the above, the metadata description format that is the description format of the metadata, and the metadata attribute that can be specified as a search condition in the search query A search condition attribute, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, and the search A metadata attribute conversion table representing a correspondence relationship between a condition attribute and the common search condition attribute; and the second generation unit uses the metadata attribute conversion table to include the common search query. The search query including the search condition attribute converted from the search condition attribute is generated in the search query description format, and the common search query includes a service identifier for identifying the service information in a common search condition attribute, When a plurality of the storage devices have a hierarchical relationship, the hierarchical relationship information for identifying the hierarchical relationship is included in the common search condition attribute, and the hierarchy is based on the search query description format represented by the service information. One search query including relationship information as the search condition attribute is generated, or hierarchical relationship is determined by the hierarchical relationship information Further comprising a determination unit that determines whether to generate the search query for each of the storage devices identified, wherein the second generation unit uses the generated common search query according to the determination of the determination unit, The search query is generated.

  According to the present invention, when content is searched for in a plurality of different services in the receiving device, it is possible to search for the content desired by the user even if the search form in each service is different.

2 is a diagram illustrating a functional configuration of a receiving device 100 according to the first embodiment. FIG. The figure which illustrates the data structure of common metadata. The figure which illustrates the common metadata expressed with an XML format. The figure which illustrates the data structure of reproduction history information or skip history information. The figure which illustrates the data structure of service information. The figure which illustrates the data structure of keyword information. The figure which illustrates the data structure of execution result information. The figure which illustrates the screen for designating search conditions. The figure which illustrates the data structure of a common search query. The figure which illustrates common search conditions shown in a common search condition list. The figure which illustrates common search conditions expressed with a logical formula. The figure which illustrates the structure at the time of comprising an attribute conversion table and an attribute value conversion table integrally. The figure which illustrates common search conditions shown in a common search condition list. The figure which illustrates a search query. The figure which illustrates common search conditions shown in a common search condition list. The figure which illustrates a search query. 10 is a flowchart showing a procedure of metadata acquisition processing performed by the receiving apparatus 100. The figure which shows the structure of receiving apparatus 100 'concerning 2nd Embodiment. The flowchart which shows the procedure of the service detection process which detects the service which can be used in a metadata acquisition process. The flowchart which shows the procedure of the search query production | generation process which produces | generates a search query after a service detection process in metadata acquisition process. The figure which shows the structure of receiving apparatus 100 '' concerning 3rd Embodiment. The flowchart which shows the procedure of the metadata acquisition process which receiving apparatus 100 "performs. The flowchart which shows the procedure of the metadata acquisition process which receiving apparatus 100 "performs. The flowchart which shows the detailed procedure of the filter process which the filter part 107 performs. The flowchart which shows the detailed procedure of the alignment process which the display control part 108 performs.

  Embodiments of a receiving apparatus according to the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

[First embodiment]
First, the hardware configuration of the receiving apparatus according to this embodiment will be described. The receiving apparatus according to the present embodiment includes a control unit such as a CPU (Central Processing Unit) that controls the entire apparatus, and a ROM (Read Only Memory) and a RAM (Random Access Memory) that store various data and various programs. A normal computer having a storage unit, an auxiliary storage unit such as an HDD (Hard Disk Drive) or a CD (Compact Disk) drive device for storing various data such as contents and various programs, and a bus connecting them It has a hardware configuration that uses In addition, the receiving device includes a display unit for displaying information, an operation input unit such as a keyboard, a mouse, and a remote controller (remote controller) that accepts user instruction input, and a communication I / F (for controlling communication with an external device). interface) are connected by wire or wirelessly. Communication with an external device is performed via a network. The network is, for example, a LAN (Local Area Network), an intranet, Ethernet (registered trademark), the Internet, a WAN (Wide Area Network), or a quality-guaranteed closed network NGN (Next Generation Network). The receiving device is realized by a mobile device such as a personal computer, a digital television, a hard disk recorder, an STB (Set Top Box), or a mobile phone. Such a receiving device obtains content stored in the auxiliary storage unit or content from an external device via a network, or obtains metadata that is attribute information representing the attribute of the content and uses this to obtain content. Acquire or play content. In the present embodiment, the content represents video, but is not limited thereto, and may be other types of content representing music, images, books, and the like.

  Next, various functions realized by executing various programs stored in the main storage unit and the auxiliary storage unit by the CPU of the receiving device in such a hardware configuration will be described. FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a functional configuration of the receiving device 100. The receiving apparatus 100 includes a content / metadata display unit 101, a selection unit 102, a second generation unit 103, an execution control unit 104, an acquisition unit 105, a communication (transmission / reception) unit 106, a metadata accumulation management unit 201, and a content viewing / listening unit. A skip history storage management unit 202, a service information storage management unit 203, a keyword generation / storage management unit 204, a search query execution history storage management unit 205, and a content / metadata display unit attribute information storage management unit 206. The content / metadata display unit 101, the selection unit 102, the second generation unit 103, the execution control unit 104, the acquisition unit 105, and the communication unit 106 are generated on a main storage unit such as a RAM when the CPU program is executed. is there. The metadata accumulation management unit 201, content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202, service information accumulation management unit 203, keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204, and search query execution history accumulation management unit 205 are databases constructed in the auxiliary storage unit It is a management system. This may be an XML database or a relational database. Moreover, this does not need to be constructed by a single database management system, and a plurality of database management systems such as SQL3, Oracle, and MySQL may be used in combination. Further, it may be constructed on one physical auxiliary storage unit, or a plurality of physical auxiliary storage units such as NAS and SAN may be used as a database management system. In addition, these storage management units are not database management systems, but have a means for acquiring unit information (entries) that is data stored in each storage management unit, and are simply a group of files such as CSV format. It may be configured.

  The communication unit 106 is connected to the network 301 and is a network interface for communicating with the content distribution servers 401 and 402 connected to the network 301. In this embodiment, it is assumed that there is one network interface. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and a plurality of network interfaces may be provided. The content distribution servers 401 and 402 are storage devices that store content and content metadata in a searchable state, and have an interface for transmitting to the receiving device 100 via the network 301. This interface includes a search query character string in a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) and transmits metadata in hypertext that is assumed to be displayed via a Web browser such as HTML (HyperText Markup Language). Alternatively, it may be transmitted as an XML (Extensible Markup Language) document like RSS. Further, even if the HTTP request body and response body are used, such as SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol), the search query information and search result metadata that is the result of executing the search query are transmitted. good. In the present embodiment, it is assumed that the content distribution servers 401 and 402 transmit metadata by text-type unicast communication based on the TCP / HTTP protocol. However, the present invention is not limited to these. is not. For example, the search query and metadata may be in a binary format. In addition, the present invention is not limited to the unicast communication between the receiving apparatus 100 and the content distribution servers 401 and 402 based on the TCP / HTTP protocol as described above. May be transmitted. In this case, the receiving apparatus 100 performs signaling communication that participates in and leaves the multicast address to which metadata is distributed, using IGMP (Internet Group Management Protocol) and MLD (Multicast Listener Discovery). In FIG. 1, two content distribution servers 401 and 402 are shown as content distribution servers. However, many other content distribution servers are connected to the network 301 to communicate with the receiving apparatus 100. May be. In the present embodiment, in order to simply explain an example in which the content search form is different, the description is limited to two content distribution servers 401 and 402.

  The metadata accumulation management unit 201 stores metadata different for each service as common metadata, and manages common metadata by controlling storage, access, and deletion of the common metadata. Note that the service stores content and metadata of the content in a searchable state, such as the content distribution servers 401 and 402 shown in FIG. 1 and the metadata accumulation management unit that stores the metadata. 201 or the like. The common metadata is metadata whose expression format is unified within the receiving apparatus 100. For example, when the content represents video, a standard specification of a metadata description format has been formulated by TV-Anytime and the like, and this may be used as common metadata. Alternatively, a minimum set of metadata used by the content / metadata display unit 101 of the receiving device 100 for display and internal control may be defined and used as common metadata. The minimum set of metadata includes, for example, a content identifier for identifying content, a title, an outline description (synopsis), a content scale, information on release / broadcast date and time, information on age restriction, genre, keyword (tag), A service identifier for identifying the service of the provider. As for the genre, for example, a genre code is given in advance for subdivisions such as “sports”, “entertainment”, and “economy”, and the genre code can be designated. Alternatively, a union of contents included in all target services may be taken and used as common metadata.

  In the case where the metadata accumulation management unit 201 stores metadata acquired from a plurality of services as common metadata, it is necessary to include at least a service identifier. The common metadata may be acquired from the content distribution servers 401 and 402, or generated by the metadata accumulation management unit 201 using the metadata acquired from the content distribution servers 401 and 402. It may be. For example, when the metadata includes a summary description, the metadata storage management unit 201 performs morphological analysis on the summary description text, extracts information such as keywords and person names, and includes the extracted information. Metadata may be generated and stored.

  FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a data configuration of common metadata. As shown in the figure, the common metadata is composed of three values of the acquisition start index (from), the number of acquisitions (count) and the total number of cases (total), and the common content metadata of the number of counts. . Furthermore, each common content / metadata is composed of two types of common metadata attributes that do not depend on a media type / media subtype, which will be described later, and common metadata attributes that depend on a media type / media subtype. The acquisition start index (from), acquisition count (count), and total count (total) are the total number (total) of content that corresponds to the common search query described later. Indicates whether it is metadata. Hereinafter, each common metadata attribute constituting the common content metadata will be described. The common content metadata includes a media type (mediaType), a media subtype (mediaSubType), a content identifier (contentId), a content name (name), a content description (synopsis), and a content keyword (keyword).

  The media type (mediaType) is information indicating the type of content such as video, music, books, and photos. The common metadata may include only one specific media type, or may include a value obtained by OR-linking a plurality of media types. In the example of FIG. 2, video is represented as a media type. The media subtype (mediaSubType) is information representing a finer-grained content type defined for each media type. When the media type is video, program information, group information representing a set of programs, chapter information (information representing one point on the time axis in the program), segmentation information (representing one section on the time axis in the program) Information), license information, and the like. In the example of FIG. 2, program information (programInfo) is represented as a media subtype.

  The content identifier (contentId), content name (name), content description (synopsis), and content keyword (keyword), together with the media type (mediaType) and media subtype (mediaSubType), are common meta-data independent of the media type / media subtype. It is defined as a data attribute. The content identifier (contentId) is an identifier for identifying content. The content name (name) represents a name given to the content. The content description (synopsis) represents an outline or characteristics of the content. The content keyword (keyword) represents a keyword included in the content. The common metadata attribute described below is an attribute when the media type is video and the media subtype is programInfo. In the example of FIG. 2, the program information includes a video format (format), age restriction ( The example includes parentalRate), genre (genre), content scale (duration), public / broadcast start date / time (startDate), public / broadcast end date / time (endDate), and thumbnail image (imagePath).

  The common metadata may be an object such as a structure or a class on a software program, or may be expressed in, for example, an XML (eXtensible Markup Language) format as shown in FIG.

  Program information when the media type is video includes the video format (format), age restriction (parentalRate), genre (genre), content scale (duration), release / broadcast start date (startDate), release / It is not limited to the one including the broadcast end date and time (endDate) and the thumbnail image (imagePath), and may be configured with more common metadata attributes. For example, as shown in FIG. 3, when the common metadata is expressed in the XML format, the common metadata attribute constituting the common content metadata is moved by editing the XML schema representing the common metadata. It may be configured to be changeable. In the present embodiment, the common metadata attribute included in the common content / metadata is defined by binary of media type / submedia type. However, it is not essential that this is binary. It may be defined by one value, and if the media type to be used is limited to program information related to video, there may be a configuration that is not defined by the media type / sub-media type.

  Returning to the description of FIG. The content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 stores reproduction history information representing the history of the content reproduced by the content / metadata display unit 101 and skip history information representing the history of skipping reproduction. This information is managed by controlling access and deletion. “Skip” represents a case where the reproduction of the content is interrupted within a defined time after the reproduction of the content. The reproduction history information and the skip history information include a content identifier of content to be reproduced. When both the reproduction history information and the skip history information are managed in the same table, the reproduction history information and the skip history information further include type information indicating whether the reproduction history information or the skip history information. When these are managed by separate tables, the reproduction history information and skip history information may not include type information. Further, the playback history information and the skip history information include a service identifier for identifying the destination service from which the content to be played back has been acquired. However, when the metadata stored in the metadata accumulation management unit 201 includes a service identifier, the playback history information and the skip history information may not include the service identifier.

  FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example of the data structure of reproduction history information or skip history information. The viewing / skip flag shown in the figure is type information indicating whether it is reproduction history information or skip history information, and the event occurrence date / time represents the date / time when the content reproduction or the skip during the content reproduction was performed.

  The service information accumulation management unit 203 stores, for each service, service information indicating a search mode in a service that the receiving apparatus 100 searches for content and a connection method (communication protocol, access path, etc.) for connecting to the service. The service information is managed by controlling storage, access and deletion of the service information. As information representing a search form, the service information includes information on an interface provided by the service for acquiring metadata when searching for content. Specifically, the service information is defined for each service, and an attribute (search condition attribute) representing a metadata attribute that can be specified as a search condition in the search query and a value that can be taken by the search condition attribute (search condition attribute value) (Unit information, genre, age limit, list of valid values such as evaluation values, etc.), metadata format that is the description format of metadata that can be provided by the service as a result of execution of search query, metadata attributes The metadata attribute to represent and the value that the metadata attribute value can take (metadata attribute value) (similar to the search condition attribute, unit information, a list of valid values such as genre, age limit, evaluation value, etc.) and service Includes a search query format that is a description format of a search query that can be processed. The search query format may include a search rule such as a search condition linking method. The metadata format may take the form of a conversion table for metadata attribute names and metadata attribute values corresponding to the common metadata attributes, or a script language such as JavaScript (registered trademark) Python, Perl, Ruby, or the like. May take the form of providing the analysis process itself. The service information includes a common search condition attribute, an attribute conversion table for converting the search condition attribute and metadata attribute of each service into a common metadata attribute, and a common search condition attribute from a search condition attribute defined for each service. An attribute value conversion table for converting into The common search condition attribute is a search condition attribute whose expression method is unified in the receiving apparatus 100. Such “common” is used in order to handle search condition attributes and search condition attribute value expressions that differ depending on the service in an integrated manner. The attribute conversion table may be a correspondence table representing a correspondence relationship between the common search condition attribute, the search condition attribute and metadata attribute of each service, and the common metadata attribute, or a program described in a script language or the like It may be. Similarly, the attribute value conversion table may be a correspondence table representing a correspondence relationship between the search condition attribute defined for each service and the common search condition attribute, or may be a program described in a script language or the like. . How to use these attribute conversion table and attribute value conversion table will be described later.

  Further, the service information includes a service identifier for identifying each service, a service name, a display attribute such as an icon representing the service, and a user ID and password input by the user of the receiving apparatus 100 when using the service. Various types of information such as authentication attributes, subdivisions of content genres supported by the service (corresponding genres), and quality of content may be included. Note that the service supports content means that the service can store the content and its metadata and can provide the content to the receiving apparatus 100. Further, instead of the corresponding genre, the service information may include subdivisions of the content genre that the service does not support. In addition, the common search condition attribute value of the common search condition attribute corresponds to all the contents in which the metadata stored in the service whose connection method is represented by the service information is represented by the service information. In this case, the common search condition attribute and the common search condition attribute value pair may be included. For example, for a service that stores metadata of content relating to news, “news” can be implicitly applied as a genre, and the genre code representing the genre and “news” is included in the service information. The service information may also include address information such as the URL of a portal site that is open to the public, IP address family to be used, protocol, and protocol-dependent information (HTTP method to be used, HTTP extension header). Also, the average response time information indicating the average response time, the average size information indicating the average size of metadata, and the genre, which are statistically obtained from the information stored in the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205 described later The service information may include information such as average total number information indicating the average number of metadata obtained when the search condition is specified.

  FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating a data configuration of service information. The service information shown in the figure includes a service path as a connection method for connecting to the service. When a plurality of services are configured to have a hierarchical relationship, the service information includes hierarchical relationship information for identifying the hierarchical relationship. For example, for a service having a parent-child relationship, service information of a child service (referred to as a subordinate service) includes a service identifier of the parent service (referred to as a parent service). This corresponds to hierarchical relationship information. This may be the case where there are a plurality of local database services that can be detected by the receiving apparatus 100 ′ as described in detail in the second embodiment described later, or even metadata provided from the same content distribution server. Since the metadata format may not be unified within the content distribution server, a hierarchical configuration can be applied even in such a case. Specifically, in a service that provides metadata only as an HTML document of a portal site, it may be possible to define a dependent service for each genre when the layout differs for each category (genre). The service information accumulation management unit 203 may additionally manage information necessary for mapping the subordinate service to the parent service when the search query is actually generated. For example, in the case of a database management system, for example, a database name for attaching to a main database is applicable. In the case of WebAPI, for example, relative path information from route URL information included in main service information is assumed. Further, the service information may be stored in advance in the service information accumulation management unit 203. Alternatively, a server that centrally manages service information of services that can be searched by the receiving apparatus 100 exists on the network 301, and the receiving apparatus 100 appropriately acquires service information from this server and stores the service information in the service information accumulation management unit 203. You may do it. Alternatively, the acquisition unit 105 may acquire service information from the content distribution servers 401 and 402 corresponding to each service and store the service information in the service information accumulation management unit 203.

  The keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204 stores keyword information representing a keyword extracted from the metadata acquired by the acquisition unit 105, and manages the keyword information by controlling storage, access, and deletion of the keyword information. . Alternatively, a server (not shown) having an interface for providing keywords to which the statistical information and weight information are added to the receiving apparatus 100 is provided on the network 301, and the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204 receives the keyword from the server. May be acquired and managed. Further, the keyword information may include a date and time (extraction date and time) when the keyword is extracted, and a genre code representing a genre to which the content including the keyword belongs. In this case, for example, the keyword information may be configured such that a topical keyword is output for each genre of content, or a keyword that is highly interested in a certain period (for example, the latest one week) can be output. For example, the statistical information represents the frequency of appearance of keywords appearing in the topic for each genre, and the weight information represents the weight that increases as interest increases. By managing keyword information together with such statistical information and weight information, the second generation unit 103 described later can perform a pseudo-genre search for a service that does not have a genre as a search condition attribute. Keyword information including the corresponding genre can be acquired from the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204.

  FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating a data configuration of keyword information. As shown in the figure, the keyword information includes a keyword, a service name of a service that stores the content from which the keyword is extracted, a common search condition attribute, and a common search condition attribute value. In the figure, the common search condition attribute includes, for example, “genre”, and the common search condition attribute value includes “genre” representing “sports”.

  The search query execution history accumulation management unit 205 stores execution result information indicating a result of the execution of the search query by the acquisition unit 105, and controls the storage, access, and deletion of the execution result information, thereby obtaining the execution result information. to manage. The execution result information includes, for example, information such as latency (response time) from execution of a search query to reception of metadata as a response, and the number of received metadata. Further, the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205 acquires statistical information from the execution history information, extracts attribute information of a target service that executed the search query using the statistical information, and uses this as service information The information is stored in the information storage management unit 203. The statistical information is, for example, an average response time from when a search query is executed until metadata is received as a response, or the number of contents held for each service that matches a search condition represented by the search query. The service attribute information is, for example, information that a certain service has only content belonging to a specific genre or does not have content belonging to a specific genre.

  FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating a data configuration of execution result information. As shown in the figure, the execution result information includes the number of acquired metadata, the common search condition attribute, the common search condition attribute value, the response time, and the date and time (execution date and time) when the search query was executed. Including. In the figure, when executing a search query, for example, “genre” is designated as a common search condition attribute, and a genre code representing “sports” is designated as a subdivision of the genre as a common search condition attribute value. It has been shown.

  The content / metadata display unit attribute information accumulation management unit 206 stores attribute information (referred to as display attribute information) related to display when the content / metadata display unit 101 displays content or metadata on the display unit, and displays the display. The display attribute information is managed by controlling storage, access, and deletion of the attribute information. The display attribute information includes screen size information representing the screen size, aspect ratio information representing the aspect ratio, and format information representing the format of the content that can be displayed on the display unit. When the content / metadata display unit 101 has a function of controlling display for each user, the display attribute information may include information related to display control for each user, such as age restriction information indicating age restriction.

  The content / metadata display unit 101 includes a first generation unit 101a, and controls display of information on the display unit, and processes an operation input input from a user via the operation input unit as a control signal. A GUI (Graphical User Interface) is provided. Specifically, the content / metadata display unit 101 displays metadata on the display unit, accepts an operation input from the user via the operation input unit, and identifies the content selected according to the operation input. The content is reproduced by displaying the content on the display unit. Further, the content / metadata display unit 101 stores the reproduction history information indicating the history of the reproduced content or the skip history information indicating the history of skipping the reproduction in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 together with the operation history. . In addition, the content / metadata display unit 101 generates a screen for the user to explicitly generate a common search query and displays the screen on the display unit. The common search query represents one or more common search conditions for searching for the content desired by the user, and is a search query in which the expression method is unified in the receiving apparatus 100. The reason for “common” is that, as described above, search condition attributes and search condition attribute value expressions that differ depending on services are handled in an integrated manner.

  FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating a screen for designating search conditions. In the screen shown in the figure, the user can search the search target service, the genre code indicating the genre of the search target content, the keyword, the release date (release / broadcast start) via the operation input unit. It is possible to specify the date and time (public / broadcast end date and time), content length (content scale), and rearrangement (alignment condition). The alignment condition is a processing condition for aligning metadata obtained as a result of the search, and may be specified in ascending order and descending order for all common metadata attributes. For example, they can be arranged according to title, genre, end date / time, content scale, number of views, evaluation value, and the like. Thus, the designated search conditions can include various processing conditions such as alignment conditions.

  The first generation unit 101a included in the content / metadata display unit 101 displays a search condition for searching for a content related to the content being played back or a screen shown in FIG. Generates a common search query including the search condition explicitly specified by the user and outputs it to the selection unit 102 or the second generation unit 103.

  Here, the data structure of the common search query will be described with reference to FIG. As shown in the figure, the common search query includes a media type (mediaType), a media subtype (mediaSubType), an acquisition target common metadata attribute name (acquisition target metadata attribute name) (requestField), an acquisition range ( An acquisition start index (index) and an acquisition number (count)), a sort key (sortKey), a sort order (sortOrder), and a common search condition list (predicateBag) are included. The acquisition target metadata attribute name (requestField) is expressed in a list format. For example, in the example of FIG. 9, four values of name, synopsis, genre, and imagePath are listed. This means that only the content name (title), the outline description, the genre, and the thumbnail image are acquired as the metadata attributes of the program information (video.programInfo) when the media type is video. The sort key (sortKey) is a common metadata attribute name used for sorting as the sorting condition. The sort order (sortOrder) represents the order in which the items are arranged as an alignment condition. In the example of FIG. 9, it is shown that the sort order is descending order (DESC), that is, new arrival order, and that the sort key is designated to be the public metadata broadcast start date / time (startDate). Yes. In the example of FIG. 9, the common search condition list (predicateBag) is expressed in the form of a list of OR sets of common search conditions, and the relationship between a plurality of common search conditions is expressed by a logical expression. The common search condition (predicate) making up this common search condition list (predicateBag) is composed of three values: a common search condition attribute name (key), an operation (operation), and a common search condition attribute value (value). A common metadata attribute name is designated as the common search condition attribute name. The operation represents the relationship between the common search condition attribute name and the common search condition attribute value by an inequality sign such as “=”, “! =”, “<”, “<=”, “>”, “> =”, Etc. It is. In the operation, not only an inequality sign but also a reserved word such as “LIKE” representing a partial match like SQL may be defined.

  For example, it is assumed that values as shown in FIG. 10 are set in the common search condition list (predicateBag) and the common search condition (predicate) included in the common search condition list (predicateBag). In this example, the genre “genre” is specified as the common search condition attribute name (key), and the common genre code (“0x01010222”) representing news / reporting is specified as the common search condition attribute value (value). Has been. A genre code whose expression method is unified in the receiving apparatus 100 is referred to as a common genre code. Also, the keyword “keyword” is designated as the common search condition attribute name (key), and “major league” and “Japanese player” are designated as the common search condition attribute value (value). The meaning of such a common search condition is as follows. This means searching for content whose genre is news or sports, and whose keywords include “major league” and “Japanese players”. If such a common search condition is expressed by a logical expression, for example, it is expressed as shown in FIG.

  In this embodiment, the common search condition list (predicateBag) is expressed in the form of a list of OR sets of common search conditions, and each OR set is AND-connected. The configuration is not limited to this configuration, and a configuration in which AND sets and OR sets can be combined in multiple stages, that is, a more flexible logical expression can be adopted as in SQL. Moreover, a common code set may be defined for a common search condition attribute that can take a certain number of data sets that can be expressed as an enumeration as a value, such as the genre code described above.

  Returning to the description of FIG. The selection unit 102 acquires a common search query generated via a GUI (for example, the screen shown in FIG. 8) provided by the content / metadata display unit 101, and obtains service information stored in the service information accumulation management unit 203. When a genre is included as a common search condition attribute represented by the common search query, a service having service information including a corresponding genre corresponding to the common search condition attribute value (here, a common genre code). Select. For example, when the common search query includes “Genre” as the common search condition attribute and “news / report” as the common search condition attribute value of the common search condition attribute, the selection unit 102 selects FIG. If the corresponding genre corresponding to the common search condition attribute value is included in one of the corresponding genres, the service of the service information is set as a search target. If one of the corresponding genres does not include a subdivision of the genre corresponding to the common search condition attribute value, the service of this service information is not selected as a search target. In addition, when the genre is not included as the common search condition attribute represented by the common search query, the selection unit 102 does not select the service to be searched. As described above, there may be a case where the selection unit 102 cannot select any service to be searched.

  In addition, the selection unit 102 extracts a keyword from the metadata of the content for the content displayed on the display unit by the content / metadata display unit 101 and combines common search condition attributes such as the keyword and genre. A search query is generated, and the service information stored in the service information storage management unit 203 is referred to, so that at least one of the common genre codes as the common search condition attribute value for “Genre” among the common search condition attributes. A corresponding service having service information including a subdivision of the genre as a corresponding genre is selected. The generation of the common search query may be triggered by an operation input from the user via the operation input unit, or may be triggered by some timing. Note that there may be a plurality of services selected by the selection unit 102, and the selected service may be weighted and given priority information based on the degree of coincidence with the common search condition attribute value and the service usage frequency. good. The degree of match here is, for example, a plurality of common condition attribute values such as a common genre code, video format, average content length information included in the common search condition attribute value, or price range information in the case of a paid service. It may be determined by the simple number of matches, or it is determined by calculating the degree of match (simply calculating the difference from the above-mentioned average content measure information and price range information). It may be a thing. For calculating the service usage frequency, reproduction history information and skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 are used. In addition, an upper limit may be set for the number of services to be selected, and the number exceeding the upper limit may not be selected. In this case, the service may be selected based on the above priority information. The service information of the selected service may be added as a search condition to the common search query, or may be handled separately from the common search query.

  The second generation unit 103 acquires the common search query output from the content / metadata display unit 101 via the selection unit 102, and uses this to generate a search query for each service to be searched. At this time, the second generation unit 103 expresses the common search query as a logical expression based on the sum product of the common search conditions, and generates the search query for the service associated with the database management system. Expression expressions may be used as they are as constraint phrases in SQL statements. In addition, when the content distribution servers 401 and 402 provide a general simple search function using WebAPI or the like as a service, the second generation unit 103 expands the above logical product expression into a product-sum system, A search query may be generated for each product term. As a search target service, when the selection unit 102 can select a service, the selected service becomes a search target service. However, when the selection unit 102 cannot select a service, or when the common search query is directly acquired from the content / metadata display unit 101, the second generation unit 103 stores the service information in the service information accumulation management unit 203. Search queries may be generated for all the services that are stored, or a predetermined number of services may be selected at random, and a search query may be generated for each selected service. Select a service using the service usage frequency obtained using the playback history information and skip history information stored in the viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202, and generate a search query for each selected service. It is also possible to select a service for which an operation input to be selected as a search target by the user is selected via the operation input unit, and to select each selected service. It may generate a search query against. The second generation unit 103 generates an attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence between the common search condition attribute and the search condition attribute and a search that represents the correspondence between the common search condition attribute value and the search condition attribute value when generating the search query. Using the condition attribute value attribute value conversion table, a search query corresponding to the search query format included in the service information is generated from the common search query, so that the common search query is converted into a search query according to the service search form. To do.

  Here, a conversion method using the attribute conversion table and the attribute value conversion table will be described. FIG. 12 is a diagram illustrating a configuration when the attribute conversion table and the attribute value conversion table are configured in an integrated manner. In the figure, (a) represents an attribute conversion table, and (b) represents an attribute value conversion table. The data structure of the common metadata is as shown in FIG. 2, the data structure of the common search query is as illustrated in FIG. 9, and the data structure of the service information is as illustrated in FIG. . FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating common search conditions shown in the common search condition list (predicateBag). For the common search condition shown in FIG. 13, the second generation unit 103 sets “genre” to “Category” based on the search condition attribute included in the service information and the attribute conversion table shown in FIG. Convert “keyword” to “VQ”. In addition, the second generation unit 103 uses the search condition attribute value included in the service information and the attribute value conversion table shown in FIG. 12B, the common genre code (“0x01010222”) representing news / reporting. Is converted to the string “News”. Then, the second generation unit 103 generates a search query as shown in FIG.

  If the search condition attribute value corresponding to the common genre code specified as the common search condition does not exist in the service, the common genre code is not included as a search condition, or a character string corresponding to the common genre code is displayed. A method of substituting with a keyword to represent can be considered. For example, as an example of searching by genre, there is a common search condition as shown in FIG. 15, and it is assumed that there is no search condition attribute value corresponding to a common genre code (“0x0102333”) representing sports / baseball. In this case, the second generation unit 103 searches the search attribute name and the search attribute corresponding to the common genre code (“0x0102333”) representing sports / baseball based on the attribute value conversion table shown in FIG. The value is obtained and converted into “VQ” and “baseball OR baseball” in this example. That is, the second generation unit 103 generates a search query as shown in FIG. 16 by replacing the search by the common genre code with the search by the keyword.

  Further, there may be a case where the search condition attribute name and the search condition attribute value corresponding to the common genre code do not exist. For example, for the common genre code (“0x01030222”) representing music, there is no keyword to substitute, so in the attribute value conversion table shown in FIG. 12B, the corresponding search condition attribute name and search condition attribute value Is represented by a null value indicating that does not exist. In this case, the second generation unit 103 may notify the user by displaying a message indicating that the search query cannot be generated using the common genre code on the display unit. -A keyword that matches the search condition attribute is searched from the keywords indicated by the keyword information stored in the accumulation management unit 204. If there is a corresponding keyword, a general search using the keyword using the keyword is performed. May be performed. If the search condition attribute corresponding to the common search condition attribute included in the common search query can satisfy the specified original common search condition by dividing it into a plurality of search queries, the second generation unit 103 may generate a plurality of search queries from the common search query.

  The execution control unit 104 determines the execution order of one or more search queries generated by the second generation unit 103. At this time, the execution control unit 104 may determine the execution order based on the number of search conditions applied to the search query, or the reproduction history information and skip history stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202. The execution order may be determined by using the service usage frequency obtained using the information. Alternatively, the execution control unit 104 may determine the execution order based on the response time obtained using the execution history information stored in the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205, or may be stored in the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204. The execution order may be determined using weight information or statistical information added to the keyword information. In addition, the execution control unit 104 determines the actual execution order based on a more static execution order policy such as searching for services associated with the database management system built in the receiving apparatus 100 with the highest priority. May be.

  The acquisition unit 105 transmits the search query whose execution order has been determined by the execution control unit 104 to the content distribution servers 401 and 402 to execute the search query, and the metadata acquired as the execution result of the search query is transmitted to the content distribution server 401. , 402 and appropriately performing analysis processing on the metadata to obtain common metadata. At this time, the acquisition unit 105 stores the above-described execution result information including all or a part of information included in the search query and the number of received metadata (the number of acquisitions) in the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205. Let In addition, the acquisition unit 105 analyzes the received metadata by morphological analysis or the like, extracts keywords, represents the keywords, and refers to the search condition or service information specified when the metadata is acquired. Keyword information including a service identifier of a service to be searched is stored in the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204.

  Content whose attributes are represented by the metadata acquired as described above is content that matches the search condition. That is, a search query is executed in each service and metadata is acquired, so that content that matches the search condition is searched.

  Next, the procedure of the metadata acquisition process performed by the receiving apparatus 100 according to this embodiment will be described with reference to FIG. It is assumed that the receiving apparatus 100 has already been activated and can communicate with the content distribution servers 401 and 402 on the network 301 via the communication unit 106. First, it is assumed that the content / metadata display unit 101 of the receiving apparatus 100 displays some content on the display unit and reproduces the content. Here, for example, when the user performs an operation input for searching for content via the operation input unit, a content search request message corresponding to the operation input is transmitted to the receiving apparatus 100 (step S101). At this time, the content search request message does not include a specific search condition, and may simply indicate that “requests to search for content related to the content being played back”, When an operation input for specifying a search condition such as a genre code is performed, the search condition may be included. Further, the screen shown in FIG. 8 is displayed on the display unit of the receiving apparatus 100, and the user may perform an operation input for specifying a search condition via the operation input unit on this screen.

  When the content / metadata display unit 101 of the receiving apparatus 100 receives the content search request message, the content search request message indicates only that “requests to search for content related to the content being played back”. Metadata corresponding to the content being reproduced is acquired from the metadata accumulation management unit 201 (step S102), and a common search query is generated using the metadata (step S103). Note that if the search condition is explicitly included in the content search request message, the receiving apparatus 100 generates a common search query using the search condition.

Subsequently, the content / metadata display unit 101 outputs the common search query generated in step S103 to the selection unit 102 (step S104). The common search query at this time is, for example, a logical expression such as the following Expression 1, using two genres (G1, G2), two keywords (K1, K2), and two credits (C1, C2) as search conditions. It shall be expressed as A logical expression of the common search query is called a search expression. Here, the credit means information related to performers, directors, staff, and the like.
Search formula: = (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2) ... Formula 1

  This search expression is generated by implicitly ORing those having the same metadata attribute, and ANDing between OR sets having different metadata attributes. However, the search expression generation method is not limited to this. For example, all search condition attributes may be AND-connected, or all search condition attributes may be OR-connected. Furthermore, a plurality of variations of these search expressions may be included. For example, when all search conditions are AND-linked, the search formula is a strict search condition for a search object that is very similar to the content being played back, and the number of hits is expected to be small. . On the other hand, when all search conditions are OR-linked, only one search condition needs to be matched, so the search condition is loose, and therefore there is a high possibility that many contents will be hit. The generation method employed by the above-described search formula is an intermediate position between them.

  Next, the selection unit 102 selects a service to be searched by using the common search query output in step S104. Specifically, for example, when the genre (G1) specified as the search condition specifies “news / report” by the genre code, the selection unit 102 selects a service that provides content related to news. Process. This is realized by the selection unit 102 acquiring service information including the genre code: G1 as a service attribute from the service information accumulation management unit 203. In addition, the selection unit 102 may select a service to be searched using the reproduction history information and skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202. For example, the selection unit 102 provides a frequently used service, that is, among the services that provide the content that has been reproduced by the reproduction history information and the skip history information, the number of provided contents is equal to or greater than a predetermined number. Select a service as a service to be searched.

Here, the selection unit 102 acquires service information including the genre code: G1 as a service attribute from the service information accumulation management unit 203 (step S105), and the content distribution server 401 (hereinafter, referred to as a service specified by the service information). Service S1) as a search target service, and using the playback history information and skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202, the content distribution server 402 (hereinafter, referred to as a search target service). Service S2) is selected (not shown in FIG. 17), and the metadata storage management unit 201 (hereinafter referred to as service S3), which is a local database service, is selected as a search target service. At this time, the selection of the local database service may be implicitly specified, or may be automatically selected by the receiving apparatus 100 in view of the cache state of the metadata. Then, the selection unit 102 adds the selected service as a service condition to the search formula of Formula 1 described above and updates it as Formula 2 below (Step S106). This search expression corresponds to a common search query.
Retrieval formula: = (S1 + S2 + S3) * (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2) ... Formula 2

Next, the selection unit 102 outputs a common search query together with service information of the service selected as the search target to the second generation unit 103 (step S107). The second generation unit 103 expands the search query for each service using the common search query and the service information expressed by the search formula of Formula 2 output in step S107. Here, when the search query format represented by the service information indicates that the description can be expressed by a logical expression, the second generation unit 103 searches the search query expressed by the logical expression that is the search expression of Expression 2. Is generated from a common search query, and the search query format indicates that description in a logical expression is not possible, the logical expression is expanded into product terms, and each product term is used to generate multiple search queries from the common search query. Generate. For example, the content distribution server 401 only allows specification of a search condition using a URL based on a Web API in the REST format, and the content distribution server 402 is a logical expression in an HTTP request body based on the SOAP API in the Web API. For the services S1 and S2, the selection unit 102 expands the search expression of Expression 2 and uses it for generating a search query. On the other hand, for the service S3, the selection unit 102 attempts to generate a search query using the search expression of Expression 2 as it is as a constraint phrase. Examples of expansion results for each service from the common search query are as follows.
Search query for WebAPI-based content distribution server 401 (S1)
(S1 * G1 * K1 * C1)
(S1 * G1 * K1 * C2)
(S1 * G1 * K2 * C1)
(S1 * G1 * K2 * C2)
...
Search query for WebAPI-based content distribution server 402 (S2)
(S2 * G1 * K1 * C1)
(S2 * G1 * K1 * C2)
(S2 * G1 * K2 * C1)
(S2 * G1 * K2 * C2)
...
Search query for SQL-based local database service (metadata storage manager 201) (S3)
(S3) * (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2)

Subsequently, the second generation unit 103 acquires service information corresponding to each of the services S1 and S2 expanded in the product terms from the service information accumulation management unit 203 (step S108), and sets the common search condition related to the services S1 and S2. , Convert to search query for each service. At this time, since the service S1 implicitly has the genre code: G1 as the service attribute, the search condition that is actually applied to the search query is (K1 * C1) in the above example. The second generation unit 103 generates a search query to be transmitted to the corresponding content distribution server 401 using these two search conditions (step S109). When the content distribution server 401, which is the service S1, can specify credit information (C1) as a search condition, the second generation unit 103 generates, for example, the following search query from the above-described expansion result.
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=Keyword 1 & credit = Person 1

When the content distribution server 401 cannot specify the credit information (C1) as a search condition, the credit information is regarded as a keyword, and the second generation unit 103 uses, for example, the following search query from the above-described development result. Generate.
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=”Keyword 1 Person 1 ”

Alternatively, when the content distribution server 401 does not support the AND search, the second generation unit 103 generates, for example, by dividing the search result into the following two search queries from the above expansion result. Also good.
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=”Keyword 1 ”
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=”person name 1 ”

In this embodiment, the description is limited to the genre, keyword, and credit as the search conditions, but the search query is divided in the same manner as in the above example when including the number of acquired metadata as the execution result of the search query. Deployment needs to be carried out. Specifically, when the number of acquisitions of metadata that is the execution result of a search query is implicitly set to 50, depending on the service, there may be cases where only acquisition with less than 50 is supported. is there. At this time, for example, the service S1 provides an interface that specifies the upper limit of the number of acquisitions as 25, specifies the offset of metadata acquired as a result of execution of the search query by from, and specifies the number of cases by count In such a case, the second generation unit 103 generates the data by dividing it into the following two search queries.
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=”Keyword 1 Person 1 ”& from = 1 & count = 25
http://s1.example.com/search_api?keyword=”Keyword 1 Person 1 ”& from = 26 & count = 25

Three methods have been described here as methods for generating a search query for the service S1, but the method is not limited to these methods. A method of expanding a search query when there is no search condition corresponding to such a common search condition may also be included in the service information. On the other hand, for the service S2 selected according to the usage frequency, the genre is not implicitly applied as the search condition. In the first example related to the service S2 in the expansion result of the common search query described above, (G1 * K1 * C1 ) Is a search condition that is actually applied to the search query. When the service S2 has a genre as a search condition attribute, the second generation unit 103 expands the common search query into, for example, the following SOAP message.
<soap: Envelope xmlns: soap = "http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/">
<soap: Header>
<!-Omitted->
</ soap: Header>
<soap: Body>
<m: getContentMetadata xmlns: m = "http://s2.example.com/searchAPI/">
<m: genre> G1 </ m: genre>
<m: keyword> Keyword 1 </ m: keyword>
<m: credit> Person 1 </ m: credit>
</ m: ContentMetadata>
</ soap: Body>
</ soap: Envelope>

In the above example, it is assumed that the genre code assignment system can be shared by the service S1 and the common search query. However, when the service S2 has a unique genre code system, the service information of the service S2 includes , Genre codes: conversion table information for converting common genre codes such as G1 and G2 into genre codes in the system of service S2. The second generation unit 103 uses the conversion table information included in the service information stored in the service information storage management unit 203 to convert the genre code in the common system to the genre code of the system unique to the service S2, and converts this. To generate a search query. For example, when the genre code of the service S2 corresponding to G1 (news / report) is expressed by the character string “News”, the search query developed by the second generation unit 103 is as follows (SOAP) (Only the Body element is extracted).
<m: getContentMetadata xmlns: m = "http://s2.example.com/searchAPI/">
<m: genre> News </ m: genre>
<m: keyword> Keyword 1 </ m: keyword>
<m: credit> Person 1 </ m: credit>
</ m: ContentMetadata>

As yet another variation, when the service S2 does not have a genre as a search condition attribute, the second generation unit 103 uses the keyword information stored in the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204 to change the genre code. Expand to keyword group. Specifically, the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204 represents a keyword extracted by morphological analysis or the like from the metadata acquired by the acquisition unit 105, and refers to a search condition or service information specified when the metadata is acquired. The keyword information including the service identifier of the search target service necessary for the search is stored. Thereby, keyword information having a genre as a search condition attribute can be obtained, and the appearance frequency in a certain period can also be obtained. Specifically, keywords that appear in the “news / report” genre that appear frequently (for example, the name of a politician who has recently attracted attention, the name of a recent incident, the name of a suspect, etc.) Can be extracted. The second generation unit 103 stores the keyword information stored in the keyword generation / storage management unit 204 and the service information storage management unit 203 using the genre code as a key when the service S2 cannot specify the genre as a search condition. Using the service information, an alternative keyword list that is a list of keywords that are alternatives to the genre is generated. For example, here, assuming that “news keyword A”, “news keyword B”, and “news keyword C” can be acquired as keywords that are alternatives to the genre, the second generation unit 103 uses this to obtain the following SOAP message. (Only the Body element of SOAP is extracted).
<m: getContentMetadata xmlns: m = "http://s2.example.com/searchAPI/">
<m: keyword> News Keyword A OR News Keyword B OR News Keyword C </ m: keyword>
<m: credit> Personal name </ m: credit>
</ m: getContentMetadata>

  In this example, the OR search of the service S2 can be realized by explicitly specifying the “OR” character string between the keywords. Such search rules are included in a part of service information as a search query format.

  In the present embodiment, a specific example in which the search query information is included in the URL with the service S1 as a general REST Web API and the service S2 as a general SOAP Web API is described. For example, some Web APIs provide a search interface in the SQL format. In the present embodiment, such a service can also be supported in the same manner as the search query generation for the local database service.

For the search query for the service S3 that is the local database service, the second generation unit 103 selects the expansion result ((S3) * (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2)) of the common search query described above. Using the service information, “S3” is replaced with “S1 + S2”, and an SQL sentence is generated from the resulting ((S1 + S2) * (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2)). Most simply, the following SQL statement is generated.
select * from content_metadata_table
where (service = 'S1' or service = 'S2') and
(genre = 'G1' or genre = 'G2') and
(keyword = 'K1' or keyword = 'K2') and
(credit = 'C1' or credit = 'C2')

In the above SQL statement, the keyword and credit are completely matched constraint clauses, but this may be changed to partial match, or the title and summary description columns may be added to the search range by keyword. . This is an expansion method that is necessary because when keywords such as morphological analysis are not applied to metadata, keywords provided from the content distribution server are often insufficient. In this case, for example, the following SQL sentence is obtained.
select * from content_metadata_table
where (service = 'S1' or service = 'S2') and
(genre = 'G1' or genre = 'G2') and
(keyword = 'K1' or keyword = 'K2' or title like '% K1%' or title like '% K2%'
or synopsis like '% K1%' or synopsis like '% K2%') and
(credit = 'C1' or credit = 'C2')

  As described above, when the common search query includes a plurality of variations such as a search expression in which all search conditions are AND-connected, the second generation unit 103 similarly develops each into a search query for each service.

  Subsequently, the second generation unit 103 outputs the generated search query list to the execution control unit 104 (step S110). The execution control unit 104 determines the execution order of the plurality of search queries output in step S110 (step S111). In order to determine the execution order, for example, a method of increasing the execution order by giving priority to a search condition with a large number of applied search conditions can be applied. When all search conditions are AND-connected, when searching for “related to the content being reproduced”, metadata with the highest similarity is obtained although the search results are small. Alternatively, a method may be applied that uses the playback history information and skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 to prioritize searches for frequently used services and increase the execution order. Alternatively, the average response time and the average number of metadata that can be acquired are acquired from the execution result information stored in the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205, and this is used as a priority. The higher the priority, the higher the execution order. A method of determining the execution order may be applied so that In the present embodiment, the execution control unit 104 determines the execution order based on the number of applied search conditions. Then, the execution control unit 104 sequentially outputs the search query to the acquisition unit 105 according to the determined execution order (step S112). Alternatively, the execution control unit 104 may collectively output a list of search queries to which execution order information indicating the determined execution order is added.

  The acquisition unit 105 sequentially executes the search query output in step S112. Specifically, the search query is transmitted to the local database (metadata storage management unit 201) corresponding to the service S3, the content distribution server 401 corresponding to the service S1, and the content distribution server 402 corresponding to the service S2. The search for the service S3 is realized by connecting to the database management system in the metadata accumulation management unit 201 and issuing an SQL sentence generated as a search query (step S113). The search for step S1 is realized by transmitting an HTTP request including a search query in the URL to the content distribution server 401 via the communication unit 106 and the network 301 (step S115). The search for step S2 is realized by transmitting an HTTP request including a search query in the URL to the content distribution server 402 via the communication unit 106 and the network 301 (step S116).

  When the metadata accumulation management unit 201 executes the SQL statement and acquires the corresponding metadata, it returns it to the acquisition unit 105 (step S114). When the content distribution server 401 receives the search query via the network 301, it executes it, acquires the corresponding metadata, and transmits the metadata to the receiving device 100 (step S117). Similarly, when the content distribution server 402 receives a search query via the network 301, the content distribution server 402 executes the search query, acquires the corresponding metadata, and transmits the metadata to the receiving device 100 (step S118).

  When the acquisition unit 105 receives metadata from each of the services S1, S2, and S3, the acquisition unit 105 performs analysis processing on the metadata as necessary. When the metadata storage management unit 201 serving as the service S3 is configured to return metadata to the acquisition unit 105 in a common metadata format, analysis processing for the metadata acquired from the service S3 is not necessary. However, since the services S1 and S2 employ the metadata format of the XML format unique to each service, analysis processing is required for the metadata acquired from these services. The acquisition unit 105 acquires the service information stored in the service information accumulation management unit 203 for each of the services S1 and S2 (step S119), and based on the metadata format included in the service information, the received metadata An analysis process is performed, and the metadata is converted into metadata of a common metadata format, thereby generating common metadata (step S120). Further, the acquiring unit 105 analyzes the received metadata, and at the same time, analyzes specific attributes (title and program description) of the metadata by morphological analysis, etc., extracts a keyword, represents the keyword, and represents the metadata. The keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204 stores the search conditions specified at the time of acquisition and the keyword information including the service identifier of the search target service necessary for referring to the service information. Then, the acquisition unit 105 outputs the generated common metadata to the content / metadata display unit 101 (step S121).

  The content / metadata display unit 101 causes the display unit to display the metadata output in step S121, for example, according to the output order, by limiting the number of displayable items (step S122). At this time, the content / metadata display unit 101 uses the display attribute information stored in the content / metadata display unit attribute information storage management unit 206 to display the metadata on the display unit. If the metadata display format is a ticker format (for example, a format in which a list of search results is automatically scrolled from right to left), there is no need to limit the number of items. -The metadata display part 101 should just display the metadata which the acquisition part 105 output sequentially. As a result, metadata related to the content being reproduced and metadata searched according to an explicit search instruction are displayed on the screen of the display unit.

  As described above, according to the present embodiment, in an environment where there are a large number of search target services, the receiving device that receives the content performs a content search triggered by an instruction from the user. Several problems that may occur are solved. First, when a receiving device executes a cross-sectional search across a plurality of services in real time, the number of search queries that must be issued because there are many services to be searched, and reception processing There has been a problem that the total number of metadata to be processed becomes enormous and it is practically difficult to perform a cross-sectional search itself. When the content distribution server side, not the receiving device side, executes a cross-sectional search for a plurality of services, the Web pages provided by each service are acquired in a round trip, stored once in a database, and then structured (SQL) It is common to use metadata in a unified manner. However, it is very difficult to apply such a configuration to the receiving device side. This is because it is not practical to secure a storage area on the receiving device for storing all the metadata of a large number of cyclically acquired services. On the other hand, in the present embodiment, the selection unit 102 can solve the first problem by narrowing down the search target service to an appropriate search range in which the search can be realized. That is, in consideration of the diversification and ubiquity of future content distribution services, by narrowing down the services themselves in the receiving device as in this embodiment, within the range of the processing capability of the receiving device, It is possible to perform a cross-sectional search across services.

  Second, to accurately project an original search expression representing a search condition for searching for a desired content with respect to a plurality of services having different search forms such as a search query format and an acceptable search condition. There is a problem that it is difficult to maintain the search intention in the original search formula. In contrast, the second problem can be solved by using the common search query so that the second generation unit 103 expands the search query for each service as close to the original search formula as possible. That is, in the past, when converting to a search query in a search form allowed by each service, the search intention in the original search formula may be degenerated, and it may be difficult to find the intended content. Can be reduced.

  Third, when issuing a search query to a plurality of services from a receiving device, the time required to present content compared to receiving metadata from a single service and displaying it There was a problem that became very large. On the other hand, by controlling the execution order of the search query for each service developed from the original search expression, the content desired by the user can be presented more efficiently, and the third problem can be solved. .

[Second Embodiment]
Next, a second embodiment of the receiving device will be described. In addition, about the part which is common in the above-mentioned 1st Embodiment, it demonstrates using the same code | symbol or abbreviate | omits description.

(1) Configuration FIG. 18 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of a receiving device 100 ′ according to the present embodiment. 100 ′ according to the present embodiment includes a content / metadata display unit 101, a selection unit 102, a second generation unit 103, an execution control unit 104, an acquisition unit 105, a communication unit 106, a metadata accumulation management unit 201, and a content viewing / listening unit. In addition to the skip history storage management unit 202, the service information storage management unit 203, the keyword generation / storage management unit 204, the search query execution history storage management unit 205, and the content / metadata display unit attribute information storage management unit 206, the detection unit 109 Have Further, the metadata storage management unit 201b is connected to the communication unit 106 of the receiving device 100 ′, the metadata storage management unit 201c is connected via the network 302, and the content distribution servers 401 and 402 are connected via the network 301. Connected with other content distribution server 403. The metadata accumulation management unit 201b is constructed on an external storage device connected to the receiving device 100 ′ with some communication cable, and is, for example, an external hard disk drive connected with a USB cable. The metadata accumulation management unit 201c is constructed on another device that exists on the network 302, and is, for example, a NAS (Network Access Storage) device. The network 302 is, for example, a LAN (Local Area Network) that constitutes a home network. However, the metadata storage management units 201b and 201c may take any form as long as they can be accessed as a database management system from the receiving apparatus 100. These, like the metadata accumulation management unit 201, manage metadata and are local database services that are one of the services.

  The detection unit 109 causes the service information storage management unit 203 to store a use availability flag indicating service availability in association with service information. The availability of the service is detected by the detection unit 109 by, for example, regular connection to the service via the communication unit 106 or by asynchronous notification of the availability information indicating the availability from the service. To do. In the present embodiment, the procedure for detecting the situation where the use of the service is “impossible” is not mentioned, but the processing procedure from the detection of service connection to the reflection to the service information storage management unit 203 is described below. This can be realized by following the same processing procedure. However, regarding the determination that the use of the service is “impossible”, a method of setting a certain threshold on the communication timeout or the number of trials at the time of failure is used.

  The service information accumulation management unit 203 stores the above service information in association with the availability flag and manages them. Note that the service information of the metadata accumulation management unit 201 and the service information of the metadata accumulation management units 201b and 201c have a parent-child relationship. The service identifier of the management unit 201 is set.

  Next, the procedure of the metadata acquisition process performed by the receiving device 100 ′ according to this embodiment will be described. FIG. 19 is a flowchart illustrating a procedure of service detection processing for detecting an available service in the metadata acquisition processing. It is assumed that the receiving device 100 ′ has already been activated and can communicate with the content distribution servers 401 to 403 on the network 301 via the communication unit 106. However, as an initial state of the present embodiment, the content distribution servers 401 to 403 are accessible from the receiving device 100 ′, but are on an external storage device connected to the receiving device 100 ′ with a USB cable. It is assumed that the metadata accumulation management unit 201b and the metadata accumulation management unit 201c on the NAS device are not yet connected to the receiving device 100 ′.

  First, when the external storage device in which the metadata accumulation management unit 201b is constructed is connected to the receiving device 100 ′ (step S201), the communication unit 106 detects the connection of the USB cable, and a new external device is detected. The detection unit 109 is notified of the connection (step S202). The detection unit 109 checks whether or not the metadata accumulation management unit 201b exists on the connected external storage device (step S203). This is based on the premise that the metadata accumulation management unit 201b is always constructed in a specific path on the external storage device, and confirms whether or not the metadata accumulation management unit 201b as a database management system exists. The device identifier for identifying the newly constructed metadata accumulation management unit 201b without fixing the path and the database path generated at that time may be stored in the service information accumulation management unit 203. You may implement | achieve by memorize | storing and referring this information. In the present embodiment, when the detection unit 109 detects that the metadata accumulation management unit 201b exists, the detection unit 109 associates with the service information of the metadata accumulation management unit 201b and stores it in the service information accumulation management unit 203. The availability flag is updated to indicate that the service is available (step S204). Thereby, in the receiving apparatus 100 ′, the metadata accumulation management unit 201b is validated as an available service. Similarly, the detection unit 109 also detects that the NAS device is connected to the network 302 and the metadata accumulation management unit 201c can be used in the same procedure (steps S205 to S208). As described above, the service information corresponding to each of the metadata accumulation management units 201b and 201c stored in the service information accumulation management unit 203 has the service identifier of the metadata accumulation management unit 201a as the parent service identifier. Includes each.

  Subsequently, in the same manner as steps S101 to S103 in FIG. 17 described in the first embodiment, the user performs an operation input for searching for content via the operation input unit, and the content / metadata of the receiving device 100 is displayed. When the data display unit 101 receives the content search request message, the data display unit 101 generates a common search query. As in the first embodiment, the common search query generated here includes two genres (G1, G2), two keywords (K1, K2), and two credits (C1, C2) as search conditions. It is assumed that it is expressed by a search expression represented by the logical expression of Expression 1 above.

Subsequently, as in step S104 of FIG. 17, the selection unit 102 selects a service to be searched by using the common search query as an input. Here, the selection unit 102 selects the local database service (the metadata storage management unit 201). As in the first embodiment, only service S3 is selected. Then, the selection unit 102 acquires the service information of the metadata accumulation management unit 201 from the service information accumulation management unit 203, and displays the service information in which the service identifier of the metadata accumulation management unit 201 is set as the parent service identifier. get. Here, each service information of the metadata accumulation management units 201b and 201c, which are subordinate services having the metadata accumulation management unit 201 as a parent service, is acquired. Then, the selection unit 102 adds the selected service as a service condition to the search formula of Formula 1 and updates it as Formula 3 below in the same manner as Step S106 of FIG. This search expression corresponds to a common search query.
Search formula: = S3 * (G1 + G2) * (K1 + K2) * (C1 + C2)... Formula 3
Further, the selection unit 102 adds the service information of the dependent service to the common search query, adds the service information to the common search query, and outputs the service information to the second generation unit 103.

FIG. 20 is a diagram illustrating a search query generation process procedure for generating a search query after the service detection process in the metadata acquisition process. When the second generation unit 103 generates a search query corresponding to the service S3 included in the common search query, the second generation unit 103 acquires service information of the metadata accumulation management unit 201 that is a parent service (step S211), and the common search query The service information of the subordinate services (here, the metadata accumulation management units 201b and 201c) added to is acquired (steps S212 to S213). Specifically, the second generation unit 103 first attaches the database management systems of the metadata accumulation management units 201b and 201c to the database management system of the metadata accumulation management unit 201, and is in an accessible state (Steps S214 to S215). Subsequently, for example, the second generation unit 103 generates an SQL statement for integrated search in which the database management systems are connected by UNION as follows (step S216). In this example, the metadata storage managers 201b and 201c have database names 'SUB_B' and 'SUB_C' as service information of subordinate services, respectively, and are attached using this information.
select * from content_metadata_table
where (service = 'S1' or service = 'S2') and
(genre = 'G1' or genre = 'G2') and
(keyword = 'K1' or keyword = 'K2') and
(credit = 'C1' or credit = 'C2')
union
select * from 'SUB_B'.content_metadata_table
where (service = 'S1' or service = 'S2') and
(genre = 'G1' or genre = 'G2') and
(keyword = 'K1' or keyword = 'K2') and
(credit = 'C1' or credit = 'C2')
union
select * from 'SUB_C'.content_metadata_table
where (service = 'S1' or service = 'S2') and
(genre = 'G1' or genre = 'G2') and
(keyword = 'K1' or keyword = 'K2') and
(credit = 'C1' or credit = 'C2')

  Note that step S213 described above is not performed when the detection unit 109, not the second generation unit 103, detects that the NAS device is connected to the network 302 and the metadata accumulation management unit 201c is available. It may be performed at the same time as updating the availability flag stored in the service information storage manager 203 in association with the service information of the data storage manager 201c.

  The second generation unit 103 generates an SQL sentence as a search query as described above. Thereafter, the second generation unit 103 outputs the generated SQL statement to the execution control unit 104 (step S217). When there are a plurality of SQL statements, the execution control unit 104 determines the execution order of the plurality of SQL statements in the same manner as steps S111 to S112 in FIG. 17, and executes the SQL statement according to the determined execution order. The data are sequentially output to the acquisition unit 105. Here, assuming that the SQL sentence is 1, this is output to the acquisition unit 105. The acquisition unit 105 executes the SQL statement output from the second generation unit 103 and appropriately receives metadata from the metadata accumulation management units 201, 201b, and 201c. In the same manner as Step S120 in FIG. Analysis processing is performed on the metadata as necessary to generate common metadata. Then, the acquisition unit 105 outputs the generated common metadata to the content / metadata display unit 101 in the same manner as in step S121 of FIG. The content / metadata display unit 101 displays the output metadata on the display unit according to, for example, the output order in the same manner as in step S122 of FIG.

  As described above, even when a plurality of services to be searched have a hierarchical relationship, the detection unit 109 dynamically adds and activates the service to be searched, and the second generation unit By generating a search query according to the hierarchical relationship between services 103, a cross-sectional search across a plurality of services can be realized by limiting to available services.

[Third embodiment]
Next, a third embodiment of the receiving device will be described. In addition, about the part which is common in the above-mentioned 1st Embodiment or 2nd Embodiment, it demonstrates using the same code | symbol or abbreviate | omits description.

  FIG. 21 is a diagram showing a configuration of a receiving apparatus 100 ″ according to the present embodiment. 100 ″ according to the present embodiment includes a content / metadata display unit 101, a selection unit 102, a second generation unit 103, Execution control unit 104, acquisition unit 105, communication unit 106, metadata storage management unit 201, content viewing / skip history storage management unit 202, service information storage management unit 203, keyword generation / storage management unit 204, search query execution history storage In addition to the management unit 205 and the content / metadata display unit attribute information accumulation management unit 206, a filter unit 107 and a display control unit 108 are included. In addition, the communication unit 106 of the receiving device 100 ″ is connected to the content distribution servers 401 and 402 and the other content distribution servers 403 and 404 via the network 301.

  The second generation unit 103 generates a search query for each service to be searched and outputs it to the execution control unit 104 in the same manner as in the first embodiment described above. Furthermore, in the present embodiment, the second generation unit 103 outputs an unapplied search condition list representing search conditions that could not be applied to the search query for the search target service to the acquisition unit 105. When a service does not have a search condition attribute that matches the common search condition but has a metadata attribute that matches the common search condition, the common search condition corresponds to a search condition that could not be applied in the search query. Information representing this search condition becomes an unapplied search condition list.

  As in the first embodiment, the acquisition unit 105 sequentially executes the search query output from the execution control unit 104 to acquire metadata, and appropriately performs analysis processing on the metadata. Go and get common metadata. Further, the acquisition unit 105 outputs the unapplied search condition list output from the second generation unit 103 to the filter unit 107.

  The filter unit 107 applies the search condition that cannot be applied by the search query, which is indicated by the unapplied search condition list output by the acquisition unit 105, to the common metadata output by the acquisition unit 105. Filter. That is, the filter unit 107 searches the common metadata output by the acquisition unit 105 for metadata that matches the search condition that could not be applied by the search query, and deletes metadata that does not match the search condition. Filter common metadata. As a result, the corresponding content is narrowed down.

  As a specific example, in a certain service, age restriction information cannot be specified as a search query, but when received metadata includes age restriction information and the common search condition includes age restriction information, the acquisition unit 105 , Execute a search query excluding age restriction information on the service, and appropriately analyze the metadata, and an unapplied search condition list representing age restriction information as a search condition that could not be applied. Output to the filter unit 107. The filter unit 107 searches the corresponding common metadata with reference to the age restriction information indicated by the unapplied search condition list and the age restriction information included as an attribute in the output common metadata, and results of the search The obtained common metadata is the result of filtering. In this way, the filter unit 107 filters the metadata output from the acquisition unit 105. Then, the filter unit 107 outputs common metadata obtained as a result of filtering to the display control unit 108.

  The display control unit 108 is common metadata output from the filter unit 107, merges a set of common metadata received from each of a plurality of services, and merges the common search conditions included in the common search query. The metadata to be displayed on the content / metadata display unit 101 is selected using a search condition applicable only to the set of common metadata. For example, if the common search condition includes an alignment condition, the display control unit 108 performs an alignment process for aligning the merged metadata according to the alignment condition, and the metadata after the alignment process is displayed on the display unit. Display. Here, for example, the display control unit 108 performs alignment processing for each fixed number at a time, and at this time, caches a fixed number of metadata to be subjected to the alignment processing in the metadata accumulation management unit 201. For example, the display control unit 108 has an on-memory database (not shown) having the same table configuration as the metadata accumulation management unit 201, and sequentially stores the metadata output from the filter unit 107 in this on-memory database. Let

Next, a procedure of metadata acquisition processing performed by the receiving apparatus 100 ″ according to the present embodiment will be described with reference to FIGS. 22 to 23. Steps S101 and S103 to S104 are substantially the same as those in the first embodiment described above. In step S104, the common search query includes one genre (G1), one title (T1), one content scale (D1), one release date (release / broadcast start date or release / broadcast). It is assumed that an alignment condition (O1) based on (end date and time) is expressed as a search condition by a search expression expressed by a logical expression of Expression 4.
Search formula: = (G1) * (T1) * (D1) * (O1)... Formula 4

  Specifically, G1 represents a genre code = “movie”, and T1 represents some keyword (eg, “ABC”) included in the movie title. D1 prescribes an upper limit of the content scale such as “within 60 minutes”. The content scale may specify other ranges such as “60 minutes to 120 minutes” or may specify a lower limit such as “30 minutes or more”. The common search condition may include a search condition based on such an inequality sign. For example, O1 is generally “new arrival order”, and it is assumed here that “new arrival order” is designated by the alignment condition.

Next, the selection unit 102 receives the common search query output in step S104 and performs the processing in steps S105 to S106 in the same manner as in the first embodiment described above to select a service to be searched. . Specifically, in the present embodiment, since the genre code = “movie”, a service that stores only the movie content and its metadata so as to be searchable may be selected. It may be a service that stores a large amount of the metadata. This selection criterion is realized by the service information storage management unit 203 managing search condition attributes such as a genre targeted by the service as service information. This is described in the first embodiment. Since it overlaps, I will omit it. Here, as a result, it is assumed that the content distribution server 403 (service S4) and the content distribution server 404 (service S5) are selected as the search target services. As a result, the search of Expression 4 is updated as shown in Expression 5 below. With this as a common search query, in step S107, the selection unit 102 outputs the service information of the service selected as the search target to the second generation unit 103.
(S4 + S5) * (G1) * (T1) * (D1) * (O1)...

The second generation unit 103 expands the search query for each service using the common search query and the service information expressed by the search formula of Formula 5 output in step S107. Here, it is assumed that both the content distribution servers 403 and 404 permit only search condition specification using a URL based on the REST-format Web API, and a structural search (allowing logical expression) like SQL. It is assumed that it does not support the description of conditions. In this case, the second generation unit 103 performs product term expansion of the search expression of Expression 5 to obtain Expressions 6 and 7 below.
(S4) * (G1) * (T1) * (D1) * (O1)...
(S5) * (G1) * (T1) * (D1) * (O1)...

Then, the second generation unit 103 acquires the service information of the content distribution server 403 that is the service S4 and the service information of the content distribution servers 403 and 405 that are the services S5 from the service information accumulation management unit 203 from the respective expressions. (Step S108), an actual search query (URL) is generated (Step S109). In the content distribution server 403, the title and genre can be specified as search conditions, but the alignment condition based on the content scale and release date cannot be specified as the search conditions. The second generation unit 103 determines supported search condition attributes using the service information stored in the service information accumulation management unit 203. At the same time, the second generation unit 103 refers to the supported metadata attribute from the service information, and the metadata obtained as the execution result of the search query includes information on the content scale and the publication date / time. Recognize that Here, the 2nd production | generation part 103 produces | generates the following search queries using the genre: G1 and title: T1 which can be designated as a search condition. At this time, the genre of G1 = “movie” is converted to “Movie” in accordance with the genre notation format of the content distribution server 403.
http://s4.example.com/search_api?genre=Movie&title = ABC & from = 1 & count = 50

On the other hand, the content distribution server 404 can specify the sort condition based on the genre, but cannot specify the sort condition based on the title, the content scale, and the release date as the search condition. The second generation unit 103 can specify that a keyword can be specified as a search condition from the service information on the service information storage management unit 203, and the metadata obtained as a result of executing the search query includes a content scale, a title, and a disclosure. Recognize that each date and time information is included. Here, the 2nd production | generation part 103 substitutes a title with a keyword as a search condition, and produces | generates the following search queries using G1 and T1.
http://s4.example.com/search_api?genre=MOVIE&keyword=ABC
& from = 1 & count = 50

  Subsequently, the second generation unit 103 outputs the search query list generated in step S109 to the execution control unit 104 (step S110). Furthermore, the second generation unit 103 outputs an unapplied search condition list representing search conditions that could not be applied to the search query for the search target service to the acquisition unit 105. If there is no search condition that could not be applied to the search query for the search target service, the second generation unit 103 may not output the unapplied search condition list to the acquisition unit 105. An unapplied search condition list in which a null value is set may be output to the acquisition unit 105. The execution control unit 104 performs the processing of steps S111 to S112 in the same manner as in the first embodiment described above, determines the execution order of the search queries, and sequentially outputs the search query to the acquisition unit 105 according to the determined execution order. I will do it.

  The acquisition unit 105 sequentially executes the output search queries. Here, the acquisition unit 105 transmits a search query to each of the content distribution server 403 corresponding to the service S4 and the content distribution server 404 corresponding to the service S5 (steps S130 to S131). This is realized by transmitting an HTTP request including a search query in the URL via the communication unit 106.

  When the content distribution server 403 receives the search query via the network 301, the content distribution server 403 executes the search query, acquires the corresponding metadata, and transmits the metadata to the receiving device 100 ″ (step S132). In addition, when the content distribution server 404 receives the search query via the network 301, the content distribution server 404 executes the search query, acquires the corresponding metadata, and transmits the metadata to the receiving device 100 ″ (step S133).

  Turning to the description of FIG. When the acquisition unit 105 receives metadata from the content distribution server 403 that is the service S4 and the content distribution server 404 that is the service S5, the acquisition unit 105 appropriately performs analysis processing on the metadata and collects a set of common metadata from the metadata. These are sequentially output to the filter unit 107, and the unapplied search condition list output from the second generation unit 103 is output to the filter unit 107 (step S301).

  When the filter unit 107 acquires the set of common metadata output in step S301 and appropriately acquires the unapplied search condition list, the filter unit 107 performs filtering using these sets (steps S302 to S311). FIG. 24 is a flowchart illustrating a detailed procedure of the filtering process performed by the filter unit 107. Subsequent to step S301 in FIG. 23, the metadata output from the acquisition unit 105 may be input to the filter unit 107, and an unapplied search condition list may be input (step S11). Here, the filter unit 107 analyzes the information input in step S11 (step S12), and determines whether an unapplied search condition list is input (step S13). As described above, if there is no search condition that could not be applied to the search query for the search target service, the unapplied search condition list may not be output from the second generation unit 103, or the second generation An unapplied search condition list is output from the section 103, but a null value may be set for this. In these cases, the filter unit 107 determines that an unapplied search condition list is not input. In this case (step S13: NO), the filter unit 107 outputs the metadata input in step S11 to the display control unit 108 without performing the filtering process (step S17). On the other hand, when the unapplied search condition list is input (step S13: YES), the filter unit 107 applies the search condition indicated by the unapplied search condition list to the metadata input in step S11. The metadata is filtered (step S14). Specifically, for example, for the content distribution server 403, the search conditions that could not be applied are the alignment conditions based on the content scale and release date. For the content distribution server 404, search conditions that could not be applied are alignment conditions based on the title, content scale, and release date.

  Of these search conditions that could not be applied, the filter unit 107 performs filtering by searching common metadata that matches the search conditions excluding the alignment condition from the set of common metadata (step S14). The reason for removing the alignment condition is that it can be applied only after a set of individually input common metadata is merged. As an example of the search here, for example, since the content distribution server 404 is searched by substituting the title as a search condition as a keyword, the content distribution server 404 executes the search query based on the result of the implicit full-text search. It returns as a result. For this reason, in the set of metadata received by the receiving device 100 ″, not only the specified keyword “ABC” is included in the metadata attribute “title”, but also the metadata attributes “Overview” and “Keyword”. In addition, those including the designated keyword “ABC” are also mixed. The filter unit 107 extracts the content including “ABC” only in the “title” from the list. Further, filtering is performed by narrowing the content scale to “within 60 minutes”. In this way, the filter unit 107 searches for common metadata that matches the search condition with reference to the value of each common metadata attribute included in the common metadata.

  Then, the filter unit 107 determines whether or not the number of common metadata obtained as a result of the search has reached a predetermined number (step S15). If the predetermined number is not reached, the filter unit 107 requests the acquisition unit 105 to further acquire metadata (step S16). For example, even if the acquisition unit 105 acquires 50 pieces of metadata from the content distribution server 404, the result of filtering may be narrowed down to, for example, less than 10. When a predetermined number of metadata is necessary for the alignment processing in the display control unit 108 in the subsequent stage and the display processing in the content / metadata display unit 101, the filter unit 107 performs filtering to the acquisition unit 105 in step S16. The result is fed back, and further acquisition of metadata is requested. In the specific example of the search query described above, acquisition of 50 metadata items from the first item is requested. However, the acquisition unit 105 receives the feedback and specifies 50 items from the 51st item. Send again. When a total of 100 metadata is requested, for example, if 50 results are acquired and the result of filtering is 10, the acquisition unit assumes that the number of cases is narrowed down to 20%. A plurality of search queries may be issued simultaneously so that there are 250 cases. In the content distribution server 403, search conditions that could not be applied to the search query are used for filtering in the filter unit 107, but the description is omitted because it is the same as in the case of the content distribution server 404. Then, the filter unit 107 outputs the common metadata obtained as a result of the search in step S14 or the common metadata obtained as a result of the search in steps S14 and S16 to the display control unit 108 (step S17).

  Returning to the description of FIG. Step S303 corresponds to step S14 described above, step S304 corresponds to step S17 described above, and steps S305 to S306 correspond to step S16 described above. Steps S308 to S311 are substantially the same as steps S302 to S305. As described above, the alignment condition based on the release date is not applied until this stage.

  On the other hand, the display control unit 108 merges the common metadata individually output from the filter unit 107 (step S312), and performs an alignment process for aligning the merged metadata according to the above-described alignment condition (step S313). . Specifically, for example, the display control unit 108 divides the metadata sequentially output from the filter unit 107 at a predetermined time, and the metadata output from the filter unit 107 during that time is in descending order according to the release date, that is, new arrivals. Alignment processing is performed in a batch so as to align them in order (collective processing).

  Here, a detailed procedure of the alignment process performed by the display control unit 108 will be described with reference to FIG. When the display control unit 108 detects that an operation input requesting to search for content has been made through the operation input unit (step S21), a timer (search start trigger) timer for batch processing of metadata Is reset and the timer is counted (step S22). Until the timer count reaches a preset threshold value (step S23: YES), the display control unit 108 sequentially stores the metadata output from the filter unit 107 in the cache area for batch processing. Go (step S25). The entity of the cache area for batch processing is assumed to be an on-memory database, but this is not restrictive. When the timer count reaches the threshold value, the display control unit 108 performs batch alignment processing so that the metadata stored in the batch processing cache area is arranged in descending order according to the release date, that is, in order of arrival. .

  Returning to the description of FIG. After step S313, the display control unit 108 selects a predetermined upper number of metadata among the metadata obtained as a result and outputs it to the content / metadata display unit 101 (step S314).

  As described above, the filter unit 107 performs a search based on the excluded search condition on the metadata that is the execution result of the search query from which some of the search conditions are excluded, each received from a plurality of services. Filtering is performed, and the display control unit 108 performs alignment processing. According to such a configuration, when there are a plurality of services to be searched and each service has a variety of search interfaces, the search query for searching for desired content corresponds to the search interface of each service. Even if the search cannot be performed, it is possible to realize a search that maintains the search intention in the original search formula for searching for desired content as much as possible.

[Modification]
Note that the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment as it is, and can be embodied by modifying the constituent elements without departing from the scope of the invention in the implementation stage. Moreover, various inventions can be formed by appropriately combining a plurality of constituent elements disclosed in the embodiment. For example, you may delete some components from all the components shown by embodiment. Furthermore, constituent elements over different embodiments may be appropriately combined. Further, various modifications as exemplified below are possible.

  In each of the above-described embodiments, various programs executed by the receiving devices 100, 100 ′, and 100 ″ are stored on a computer connected to a network such as the Internet, and are provided by being downloaded via the network. In addition, the various programs may be read in a computer such as a CD-ROM, a flexible disk (FD), a CD-R, and a DVD (Digital Versatile Disk) in a file in an installable or executable format. The program may be recorded on a possible recording medium and provided as a computer program product.

  In each of the embodiments described above, the service information may be stored in advance as a preset in the service information storage management unit 203, or provided from the corresponding content distribution servers 401 and 402, and the service information storage management unit 203 may be stored as appropriate. Further, as will be described later, the service information accumulation management unit 203 may automatically generate based on the execution result information stored in the search query execution history accumulation management unit 205. This is, for example, a subdivision of a genre, even though the metadata attribute representing the genre included in the metadata acquired from a certain content distribution server 401, 402 does not specify a genre code as a search condition. This is realized by reflecting this information obtained as a rule of thumb in the service information when only the content related to “news” is obtained.

  In each of the above-described embodiments, in step S106 in FIGS. 17 and 22, the service selected as the search target is added to the search formula as a common search condition. However, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the selected service information may be separately input to the second generation unit 103 at the subsequent stage.

  Further, in each of the above-described embodiments, the search condition generated by the content / metadata display unit 101 or specified by the user without using the selection unit 102 is directly connected to the second generation unit 103 in the subsequent stage. May be output. In this case, the services to be searched may be fixed, for example, all services whose service information is stored in the service information storage management unit 203. Further, the content / metadata display unit 101 may be provided with an interface for the user to select a service to be searched, and the service selected through this interface may be set as the service to be searched.

  Moreover, in each embodiment mentioned above, the upper limit of the service selected as a search object may be provided or may not be provided. When an upper limit is provided, a fixed value may be defined internally as the upper limit value, or the receiving apparatus 100 may include an interface that allows the user to set the upper limit value.

  In each of the embodiments described above, the receiving device acquires the metadata from the content distribution server storing the content and the metadata of the content in a searchable state by executing a search query. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and the metadata may be acquired via an information processing apparatus that stores at least the content metadata in a searchable state.

  Further, in each of the above-described embodiments, the receiving device may separately acquire content whose attributes are represented by the metadata from the service after acquiring the metadata from the service.

  In the first embodiment described above, the execution control unit 104 determines the execution order of the search queries generated by the second generation unit 103, and the acquisition unit 105 executes the search queries according to the execution order. However, the receiving device 100 may not include the execution control unit 104, and the acquisition unit 105 may execute the search queries generated by the second generation unit 103 in the order of generation.

  In the first embodiment described above, the services S1 and S2 are both present on the network 301, but they may be present on different networks. For example, one may exist on the Internet and the other may exist on the NGN (Next Generation Network), or may exist on the Home Network. As described above, even if the search target service is ubiquitous on different networks, each service can be set as a search target if the communication unit 106 has accessibility to each network. The same applies to the second and third embodiments described above.

  In the second embodiment described above, the receiving device 100 ′ uses a single search query (including a hierarchical relationship information as a search condition attribute) based on a search query format included in the service information for a service having a hierarchical relationship. In the above example, a determination unit may be further included that determines whether to generate a single SQL statement) or to generate a search query for each service whose hierarchical relationship is identified by the hierarchical relationship information. In this case, the second generation unit 103 may generate a search query using the common search query generated by the content / metadata display unit 101 according to the determination of the determination unit.

  In the third embodiment described above, the acquisition unit 105 outputs the result of analyzing the metadata to the filter unit 107. However, the acquisition unit 105 outputs the result to the display control unit 108 without passing through the filter unit 107. Anyway.

  Alternatively, the second generation unit 103 determines that the common search condition attribute included in the metadata attribute in the corresponding service is a search condition attribute that can be applied as a filter to the received metadata. The common search condition attribute may be output to the filter unit 107.

  In the third embodiment described above, the method in which the display control unit 108 determines a set of common metadata to be collectively processed as an alignment process target (batch processing) is divided at regular intervals. In addition to this method, a predetermined number of cases may be divided, or a predetermined number may be divided for each service to be searched. Various methods can be applied to determine the unit for batch processing. Furthermore, the display control unit 108 does not select a predetermined number of common metadata higher than the common metadata after the alignment process in order to narrow down the metadata to be displayed on the content / metadata display unit 101. For example, Based on the playback history information and skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 and the keyword information stored in the keyword generation / accumulation management unit 204, priority is given to content of services with a high frequency of reproduction. Then, the common metadata corresponding to the content may be selected in order. Alternatively, the receiving device 100 ″ further has a function of analyzing the user's preference using the reproduction history information and the skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202, and the display control unit 108 The user's preference may be used to give priority to the content having a high user preference, and the common metadata corresponding to the content may be selected in order, or content related to the content being played back may be searched. In this case, the receiving apparatus 100 ″ has a function of calculating the similarity between the metadata attribute of the metadata of the content being reproduced and the metadata attribute of the metadata stored in the metadata accumulation management unit 201. In addition, the content with high similarity is given priority, and the common metadata corresponding to the content is selected in order. It may be.

  In the third embodiment described above, the display control unit 108 displays, for example, 20 cases on the display unit, and at the same time, a predetermined number of pieces of common metadata from the 21st case that can be referred to. You may cache on the on-memory database which the data storage management part 201 or the display control part 108 itself has. In this case, the display control unit 108 uses the reproduction history information and the skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 as in the above-described selection of the metadata to be displayed. The number of data items may be stored, and the number of items to be cached may be determined using this number of items.

  In the third embodiment described above, the display control unit 108 performs an alignment process on the common metadata output from the filter unit 107 according to a specified alignment condition such as an alignment condition based on a release date and the like. Went. However, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the similarity with the content being reproduced, the user's preference analyzed using the reproduction history information and the skip history information stored in the content viewing / skip history accumulation management unit 202 are used. Thus, the alignment process may be performed on the common metadata output from the filter unit 107.

  In the third embodiment described above, the unapplied search condition list is input to the filter unit 107 via the acquisition unit 105, but is directly input to the filter unit 107 from the second generation unit 103. You may be made to do.

100, 100 ′, 100 ″ Receiving device 101 Content / metadata display unit 101a First generation unit 102 Selection unit 103 Second generation unit 104 Execution control unit 105 Acquisition unit 106 Communication unit 107 Filter unit 108 Display control unit 109 Detection unit 201 , 201b, 201c Metadata storage management unit 202 Content viewing / skip history storage management unit 203 Service information storage management unit 204 Keyword generation / storage management unit 205 Search query execution history storage management unit 206 Content / metadata display unit attribute information storage management Unit 301, 302 Network 401, 402, 403, 404 Content distribution server

Claims (10)

A receiving device,
A device storing attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state, and a search form in a plurality of storage devices connectable via a network and each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device A storage unit for storing service information indicating a corresponding connection method;
A search query that represents a search condition for searching for content, and a search condition attribute that represents one of the attributes can be taken as a common search condition attribute and a common search condition attribute that have a uniform representation method in the receiving device. A first generation unit that generates a common search query including at least one pair of common search condition attribute values that are values;
A second generation unit that generates a search query according to a search form indicated by the service information using the generated common search query;
A transmission unit that transmits the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information;
A receiving unit that receives the attribute information obtained as a result of execution of the search query from the storage device;
The attribute information is metadata,
The service information includes a metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of execution of the search query, a metadata description format that is a description format of the metadata, and a search condition in the search query. A search condition attribute representing the metadata attribute that can be specified as, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, the search condition attribute, and the common search A metadata attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence with the condition attribute;
The second generation unit includes the search query attribute including the search condition attribute converted from the common search condition attribute included in the common search query using the metadata attribute conversion table, and the search query described in the search query description format. Produces
The common search query includes a service identifier for identifying the service information in a common search condition attribute, and when a plurality of the storage devices have a hierarchical relationship, the hierarchical relationship information for identifying the hierarchical relationship is used as the common search condition. Included in the attribute,
One search query including the hierarchical relationship information as the search condition attribute is generated based on the search query description format represented by the service information, or the hierarchical relationship is identified by the hierarchical relationship information. A decision unit for deciding whether to generate the search query for each storage device;
The second generation unit generates the search query by using the generated common search query according to the determination of the determination unit. The service information further represents attribute value conversion table information representing a correspondence relationship between a search condition attribute value that is a value that can be taken by the search condition attribute defined for each storage device and the common search condition attribute value,
The second generating unit, by using the metadata attribute conversion table and the attribute value conversion table information, with including the search condition attribute by converting the common search attributes contained in the common search query, before Symbol Common The receiving apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the search query includes the search condition attribute value obtained by converting the common search condition attribute value included in the search query and is described in the search query description format. The service information, before Symbol Common search attribute values, corresponding to all content the metadata stored in the storage device to which the connection method by the service information is represented is represented is the attribute The receiving apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a pair of the common search condition attribute and the common search condition attribute value. In the common search query, a relationship between a plurality of search conditions is expressed by a logical expression,
The service information further represents a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device,
When the search query description format represented by the service information indicates that a description with a logical expression is possible, the second generation unit converts the search query expressed with the logical expression to the common search query. And when the search query description format indicates that description in a logical expression is not possible, the logical expression is expanded into product terms, and a plurality of the search queries are converted into the common search query using each product term. The reception device according to claim 1, wherein the reception device is generated from the reception device. The service information is selected based on the degree of coincidence between the common search condition attribute included in the common search query and the common search condition attribute indicated by the service information, and the connection method is selected based on the service information. Further comprising a selection unit for selecting the storage device represented by
The second generation unit generates the search query according to a search form represented by the service information of the selected storage device, using the generated common search query. The receiving device according to 1. The receiving apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising an execution control unit that controls an execution order of the plurality of generated search queries. A receiving device,
A device storing attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state, and a search form in a plurality of storage devices connectable via a network and each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device A storage unit for storing service information indicating a corresponding connection method;
A search query that represents a search condition for searching for content, and a search condition attribute that represents one of the attributes can be taken as a common search condition attribute and a common search condition attribute that have a uniform representation method in the receiving device. A first generation unit that generates a common search query including at least one pair of common search condition attribute values that are values;
A second generation unit that generates a search query according to a search form indicated by the service information using the generated common search query;
A transmission unit that transmits the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information;
A receiving unit that receives the attribute information obtained as a result of execution of the search query from the storage device;
The attribute information is metadata,
The service information includes a metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of execution of the search query, a metadata description format that is a description format of the metadata, and a search condition in the search query. A search condition attribute representing the metadata attribute that can be specified as, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, the search condition attribute, and the common search A metadata attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence with the condition attribute;
The second generation unit includes the search query attribute including the search condition attribute converted from the common search condition attribute included in the common search query using the metadata attribute conversion table, and the search query described in the search query description format. Produces
The second generation unit, when the first common search condition attribute included in the metadata attribute that can be provided but not included in the search condition attribute in the service information is included in the common search query, Generating the search query from the common search query excluding the first common search condition attribute and a first common search condition attribute value that is a value that can be taken by the first common search condition attribute;
The receiving apparatus, further comprising: a filter unit that filters the received metadata using the first common search attribute and the first common search condition attribute value. A receiving device,
A device storing attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state, and a search form in a plurality of storage devices connectable via a network and each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device A storage unit for storing service information indicating a corresponding connection method;
A search query that represents a search condition for searching for content, and a search condition attribute that represents one of the attributes can be taken as a common search condition attribute and a common search condition attribute that have a uniform representation method in the receiving device. A first generation unit that generates a common search query including at least one pair of common search condition attribute values that are values;
A second generation unit that generates a search query according to a search form indicated by the service information using the generated common search query;
A transmission unit that transmits the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information;
A receiving unit that receives the attribute information obtained as a result of execution of the search query from the storage device;
The attribute information is metadata,
The service information includes a metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of execution of the search query, a metadata description format that is a description format of the metadata, and a search condition in the search query. A search condition attribute representing the metadata attribute that can be specified as, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, the search condition attribute, and the common search A metadata attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence with the condition attribute;
The second generation unit includes the search query attribute including the search condition attribute converted from the common search condition attribute included in the common search query using the metadata attribute conversion table, and the search query described in the search query description format. Produces
A display control unit for displaying the received metadata on a display unit, wherein the service information includes a first common search condition that is not included in the search condition attribute but is included in the metadata attribute that can be provided Processing conditions applicable when an attribute is included in the common search query and the search condition attribute is integrated after a plurality of the metadata respectively acquired from a plurality of the storage devices before the metadata is displayed. In the case of representing the metadata, all or part of the received metadata is integrated, and the processing condition represented by the search condition attribute is applied to the integrated metadata to display the metadata. A receiving apparatus, further comprising: a display control unit for displaying on the display. A query generation method executed by a receiving device,
A device storing attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state, and a search form in a plurality of storage devices connectable via a network and each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device A storage step for storing service information representing a corresponding connection method;
A search query that represents a search condition for searching for content, and a search condition attribute that represents one of the attributes can be taken as a common search condition attribute and a common search condition attribute that have a uniform representation method in the receiving device. A first generation step of generating a common search query including at least one pair of common search condition attribute values that are values;
A second generation step of generating a search query according to a search form indicated by the service information using the generated common search query;
A transmission step of transmitting the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information;
Receiving the attribute information obtained as a result of execution of the search query from the storage device,
The attribute information is metadata,
The service information includes a metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of execution of the search query, a metadata description format that is a description format of the metadata, and a search condition in the search query. A search condition attribute representing the metadata attribute that can be specified as, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, the search condition attribute, and the common search A metadata attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence with the condition attribute;
The second generation step includes the search query described in the search query description format including the search condition attribute obtained by converting the common search condition attribute included in the common search query using the metadata attribute conversion table. Produces
The common search query includes a service identifier for identifying the service information in a common search condition attribute, and when a plurality of the storage devices have a hierarchical relationship, the hierarchical relationship information for identifying the hierarchical relationship is used as the common search condition. Included in the attribute,
One search query including the hierarchical relationship information as the search condition attribute is generated based on the search query description format represented by the service information, or the hierarchical relationship is identified by the hierarchical relationship information. A decision step of deciding whether to generate the search query for each storage device;
The second generation step generates the search query using the generated common search query according to the determination in the determination step. A device storing attribute information representing content attributes in a searchable state, and a search form in a plurality of storage devices connectable via a network and each of the storage devices for connecting to the storage device A computer of a receiving device comprising a storage unit for storing service information representing a corresponding connection method;
A search query that represents a search condition for searching for content, and a search condition attribute that represents one of the attributes can be taken as a common search condition attribute and a common search condition attribute that have a uniform representation method in the receiving device. A first generation unit that generates a common search query including at least one pair of common search condition attribute values that are values;
A second generation unit that generates a search query according to a search form indicated by the service information using the generated common search query;
A transmission unit that transmits the generated search query to the storage device based on a connection method corresponding to the storage device of the connection destination indicated by the service information;
Causing the attribute information obtained as a result of the execution of the search query to function as a receiving unit that receives from the storage device;
The attribute information is metadata,
The service information includes a metadata attribute that is an attribute represented by the metadata that can be provided as a result of execution of the search query, a metadata description format that is a description format of the metadata, and a search condition in the search query. A search condition attribute representing the metadata attribute that can be specified as, a search query description format that is a description format of the search query that can be processed by the storage device, the metadata attribute, the search condition attribute, and the common search A metadata attribute conversion table that represents the correspondence with the condition attribute;
The second generation unit includes the search query attribute including the search condition attribute converted from the common search condition attribute included in the common search query using the metadata attribute conversion table, and the search query described in the search query description format. Produces
The common search query includes a service identifier for identifying the service information in a common search condition attribute, and when a plurality of the storage devices have a hierarchical relationship, the hierarchical relationship information for identifying the hierarchical relationship is used as the common search condition. Included in the attribute,
The computer generates one search query including the hierarchical relationship information as the search condition attribute based on the search query description format represented by the service information, or the hierarchical relationship based on the hierarchical relationship information Further functioning as a determination unit that determines whether to generate the search query for each storage device that is identified,
The second generation unit generates the search query using the generated common search query according to the determination by the determination unit.

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