JPH0321146A - Video telephone system with clock function - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To eliminate a caller's trouble to calculate the site time of an opposite country by calculating a time difference between the originating side and the terminating side from a country number and its area code, calculating the site time of the terminating side based upon the time difference and displaying the calculated site time on a television(TV) monitor screen of the originating side. CONSTITUTION:International telephone identification(ID) numbers of various countries in the world, country numbers, the area codes of respective cities, and time differences information among respective area codes in the world are stored in a memory (not shown in the figure) built in a system control part 15. The country number and the area code (city code) included in a dialing number keyed from an operation part 22 are inputted to the control part 15. The control part 15 calculates the time difference between the originating city and the terminating city based upon the current time information obtained from a clock means 16 and calculates the originating country name or city name and its site time from the time difference. The time data are set up in a text memory 14. The data of the memory 14 are inputted to a display device 10 through a display switching circuit 7 and displayed.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] "Industrial Application Field" The present invention relates to a videophone device with a clock function that is capable of transmitting and receiving audio information and video information using a digital line, etc. This makes it easy to confirm the local time of the called party by displaying the local time of the called party on the monitor.

``14 Conventional Techniques'' As is well known, a video telephone device is a device that can send and receive image information and audio information using a public telephone line or a dedicated digital line.

If such a video telephone device is equipped with a time display means, it is very convenient because the local time of the calling party can be known while the video telephone device is in use.

A dedicated display means is used to display the time, and the current time is displayed here.

"Problem to be solved by the invention" When adding a clock function to a videophone device,
As mentioned above, it is common to display the local time of the calling party.

On the other hand, with the development of communication lines in recent years, simultaneous communication with countries around the world has become possible. Videophone devices are no exception.

Considering this situation, it would be more convenient to know the local time of the called party rather than the caller's clock.

This is because there are many opportunities to communicate with people from countries with different time zones.

However, in reality, the current situation is that even the calling party's (home country's) home country is not displayed, and even moreover, the function of displaying the local time of the called party's (recipient's country) is not considered at all.

Therefore, the present invention takes these points into consideration and proposes a video telephone device with a clock function that can automatically display the local time of the called party as soon as a dial number is input. It is.

"Means for Solving the Problem" In order to solve the above-mentioned problem, the present invention provides a clock generator that generates a basic clock of an integral multiple of a predetermined frequency in a videophone device that can simultaneously transmit audio information and video information. This system is characterized by comprising a circuit and clock means for managing time based on this basic clock, and is capable of analyzing the input dial number and displaying the local time of the called party.

``Operation'' When a call is made, the clock means calculates the time difference between the calling party and the called party from the country code (code) and area code (code) from among the key-entered dial numbers.

Based on this, the called party's local time (current time) is calculated, and this is displayed on the calling party's television monitor screen.

In addition to the local time, the local date may also be displayed at the same time.

This allows the calling party (caller) to easily know the local time of the other party.

"Example" Next, an example of the videophone device with a clock function according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a videophone device according to the present invention, which is composed of an audio processing system and a video processing system, each of which processes image information and audio information while being controlled by a system control unit 15. Ru.

Audio information, video information, and control information (dial number) input to and output from the video telephone device are sent to a communication line (digital line) via the communication interface 2. This communication interface 2 performs multiplexing and separation processing of two information channels and one control signal channel. That is, the received information is separated when going from the communication line 1 to the image processing unit 5 and the audio processing unit 17,
When transmitting information from the image processing section 5 and the audio processing section 17 to the communication tube 1, the transmitted information is multiplexed.

The audio signal processing system will be explained first.

A receiver 18 and a transmitter 19 are connected to the audio processing unit 7, and processing of received audio information and transmitted audio information is performed based on commands from the system control unit 15.

That is, at the time of reception, the digital audio information signal from the other party transmitted through the information channel is supplied to the audio processing section 17, where it is processed such as D/A conversion to form an analog audio signal, and then the audio signal is The signal is supplied to the handset 18. Also, at the time of transmission, the transmitter 19 of the audio processing section 17
An analog audio signal is supplied from the input terminal 2, and processed through A/D conversion etc. to form a digital audio information signal.The signal is then supplied to the communication interface 2 as an information channel signal, where it is multiplexed into digital image information. Then, it is sent to communication line 1.

20 is a call control section, and this call control section 20 is connected to the system control section 15. The call control unit 20 performs call origination processing or call reception processing for line connection using a control signal channel.

An operation signal from the operation unit 22 for inputting a dial number when making a call is supplied to the system control unit 15 via the operation interface 21, and various processes for establishing a line are executed.

Next, the video/image signal processing system will be explained.

As shown in FIG. 1, an image memory 6 to which a display (monitor) 10 such as a CRT, a built-in camera 11, and an image processing section 5 are connected is controlled by a system control section 15 during transmission and reception. Image information of the time is temporarily stored.

When receiving image information, the received image information is separated at the communication interface 2, then decoded from serial digital information input to the decoder 3 into parallel digital information, and further compressed at the image processing section 5. After decompression processing is performed on the corrupted received information, it is temporarily stored in the image memory 6.

The image data stored in the image memory 6 is supplied to the D/A converter 8 via the display switching circuit 7 for output to the display 10, where it is converted into an analog video signal.
Furthermore, after being adjusted to an appropriate level in the video output section 9,
An image of the other party is displayed on the display 10.

When transmitting image information, the Ana 1 Cog video signal (image of the operator) received by the built-in camera 11 is sent to the video input section]
2, the A/D converter 1
After being converted into digital information in step 3, it is temporarily stored in the image memory 6.

The image data stored in the image memory 6 is sent to the display 9 via the display switching circuit 7, the D/A converter 8, and the video output section 9.
710, which allows the caller to monitor his or her own image.

The image data is further supplied to the image processing unit 5, and is processed by image compression etc. under the control of the system control unit 15.
The encoder 4 performs high-efficiency encoding processing to form a digital image information W1 code. This is then supplied to the communication interface 2 as an information channel signal, multiplexed, and transmitted to the other party using the communication line 1 (digital line).

16 indicates clock means. This clock means 16 includes means for generating a basic clock having an integral multiple of a predetermined frequency, for example, a basic clock having an integral multiple of IHz, and at least a means for calculating the base clock 1 = total count 1, counting In addition to containing means for holding the value of the basic clock, it also has a clock function that can manage the time (date, time, minutes, seconds) from this basic clock. The lesson function is the system control unit 15
managed by.

- On the other hand, the built-in memory (not shown) of the system control unit 15 stores international telephone identification numbers, country codes, and area codes of each city, as well as time difference information between area codes of each country around the world. Stored. L to system control section 15, operation section 2
2) The country code and area code (city code) of the entered dial number are imported.

The system control unit 5 uses the country code, area code, and current time information obtained from the clock 16 to
(hereinafter referred to as the calling party) and the called party (hereinafter referred to as the destination)
The time difference of the city is calculated, and from this time difference, the name of the country or city of the destination, the local time (including the date, the same applies hereinafter), etc. are calculated. This time data is read into the text memory 171.

As shown in the figure, memory 1/4 is a pattern memory section controlled by the system control section 15, and in addition to C118 clock data, in this example,
The phone number of the destination, the city of the source, the city of the destination,
It is assumed that world map data has been stored. These data in the text 1/memory 1/'I can be input to the ζ display field 10 via the display switching circuit 'lj87. The time data includes the current time of the source and the local time of the destination.

Therefore, the display switching circuit 7 or the text 1/memory 14
When the screen is switched to {lIII, as shown in No. 21\I, the text 1 memory 14 is read out, and the city name and map pattern data are uploaded and displayed. Ru.

The display switching circuit 7 is controlled by mixing with the image data from the image memory 6. In such a case, if the image data is mixed with the image data from the image memory 6, it becomes possible to superimpose the image ( See Figure 3.
! 7),, 10 FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing an example of time display, and will be explained with reference to FIGS. 2 and 3.

It is assumed that the source is Tokyo and the destination is New York.

First, when making a call, when the handset is raised and the international telephone identification number is entered, a world map is displayed on the display 1o, and the location of the city of the caller (Tokyo) 202 is displayed.
Both the current time display position 201 of the source is flashed (steps 31 and 32).

Next, a dial number is input. This input is
International telephone prefix: ○o1, country code: l1, area code: 2
12. Subscription telephone number: Dial in the order of 123-4567. Therefore, the country code input is checked first, and
When a country code is input, it is determined whether there is a time difference within the country (steps 33 and 34). If it is determined that there is no time difference within the country, the process immediately moves to step 36; otherwise, the process waits for input of the area code (step 35), and then moves to step 11 to step 36.

This is because in a large country like the United States, there are time differences even within the same country, so it is not possible to determine the time difference just by looking at the country code.

In step 36, the name of the destination city and its location 205 are displayed in flashing from the input country code and area code. Then, the time difference between the caller and the sender is calculated from these data, and based on the calculation results, the name of the city of the caller and the local time are displayed at a predetermined position 204, respectively.

Therefore, the caller can easily check the local time of the call destination while monitoring the screen of the display 10, and can immediately judge whether the call time is good or bad.

Of course, when displaying the time on the monitor screen in the super inborn mode, it is possible to display the time as shown in FIG. 3. In that case, the display of time etc. is simplified as shown in the figure.

The display on the monitor screen only needs to include at least the local time, so the above is just one display example.

``Effects of the Invention'' As described above, according to the present invention, the time of the destination can be automatically displayed on the monitor screen. Easy and simple to know.

Therefore, there is a practical benefit in that the caller can save the trouble of calculating the local time by considering the time difference of the destination country in advance.

１　１　・ １　４　・ 1　6　・ 1　8　・ １　9　・ ·camera ・Text memory ・Clock means ・Telephone receiver ・Telephone

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an example of a video telephone device with a clock function according to the present invention, FIGS. 2 and 3 are diagrams showing examples of time display, and FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing an example of time display.

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) A video telephone device capable of simultaneously transmitting audio information and video information, comprising a clock generation circuit that generates a basic clock that is an integral multiple of a predetermined frequency, and a clock means that performs time management based on this basic clock, A video telephone device with a clock function is characterized in that it can analyze a dialed number and display the local time of the called party.