JPS60236591A - Program reservation system in catv - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To reserve program contents from a program list by storing the program list segmented by keywords at the terminal side and inputting the keywords through a keyboard. CONSTITUTION:A program list transmitted from a broadcasting station is constituted of keywords for discriminating programs, dates and categories or contents of programs for a certain period. The matching of keywords to programs is preset. A memory 6 of a CATV terminal stores the program list transmitted from the broadcasting station. A video printer 7 hard-copies pictures with the aid of commands from a control unit 4. A video tape recorder 8 records the reserved programs in video, etc. A keyboard 9 inputs said keywords at the time of reserving programs. When dates and keywords are inputted, the program contents at the inputted date, which are added by the keyword coincident with the inputted one, are retrieved from the memory 6, and the retrieved program contents are displayed on a CRT5.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention (a) Technical field This invention is a CAT technology that can easily select arbitrary program information from a large amount of image information sent from broadcasting stations.
This relates to a program reservation system in V.

(b) Prior Art and Its Disadvantages In the CATV system, a large amount of image information is sent to the CATV terminal from the broadcasting station, so the terminal side needs to select what it wants to view from that information.

However, with conventional systems, it is impossible for the terminal side to easily select and reserve a desired program from among a large amount of information (program contents).

(C) Purpose of the Invention The purpose of this invention is to store a program list divided by keywords in advance on the terminal side as a memory fortress, and to easily reserve program contents by inputting keywords from the program list from the keyboard. The purpose of the present invention is to provide a program reservation system for CATV.

(d) Structure and effect of the invention This invention transmits program contents added with keywords encoded by genre or content from a broadcasting station as a program guide to a terminal side, and the terminal side temporarily stores the program guide in a memory. Then, when you want to reserve a program, you can input a keyword from the keyboard from the stored program reservation table to display only the programs that match that keyword, and then reserve the desired program from among the displayed programs. This allows users to easily reserve programs from among a large number of programs.

According to this invention, necessary program information can be easily retrieved from a large amount of image information and reserved, so even if the number of channels increases significantly in the future, it will not take time to select a program to reserve. There isn't.

TELE EMBODIMENT FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a CATV system in which the present invention is implemented. A plurality of terminals are connected to the broadcasting station 1 by cables, and a plurality of programs are sent from the broadcasting station 1 to each terminal. In this embodiment, a bidirectional j-stream CATV system is configured. When a program guide transmission request is sent from any terminal to the broadcast station 1, the broadcast station 1 sends a program guide 3 to the terminal that made the transmission request. This program table 3 is composed of keywords that distinguish the dates and times of two programs within a predetermined period of time for one day or one week, and the genre or content of the programs. The correspondence between keywords and programs is predefined. For example, the keyword is “01”
In the case of , the program content is defined as a movie, if the keyword is "11" it is a historical drama, if the keyword is "12" it is a Western movie, and if the keyword is "13" it is defined as a Western. - The terminal side that receives the program guide for 8 minutes or one week stores the program guide in its memory.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of a CATV terminal. A CATv cable is connected to a control unit 4 including a CPU, which receives and processes information sent from a broadcasting station, and also issues a request to the broadcasting station to send a program list. C'
RT5 displays image information sent from broadcasting station 1. The memory 6 stores the program schedule sent from the broadcasting station 1. The video printer 7 hard copies images according to commands from the control unit 4. In this embodiment, a control signal for hard copying can be transmitted from the broadcasting station 1 to the terminal. When the CPU receives this control signal, the CPU 4 generates a command to make a hard copy of the image being received at the time the signal is received. By doing so, the video printer 7 can automatically print images displayed on cooking programs, educational programs, etc., without the user having to take the trouble to record them. Video 8 records reserved programs and the like.

Further, when making a program reservation, the keyboard 9 is used to input keywords for specifying date and time and program content by genre or content. When a date and time and a keyword are input, the program contents at the input date and time to which the keyword matching the keyword is added are searched from the memory 6, and all the searched program contents are displayed on the CRT 5. If there are a plurality of program contents displayed on the CRT 5, an arbitrary one is selected from them using the keyboard 9. This makes it possible to easily reserve desired program content.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing frequency allocation in the CATV system. Audio signals are assigned to band A,
Video signals are assigned to band C. Band B is assigned a sub-audio signal for bilingual broadcasting or stereo broadcasting, or the above-mentioned control signal.

FIGS. 4(A) and 4(B) are flowcharts showing the general operation on the terminal side.

Steps 7'nl to n5 wait for the control unit 4 to generate a command. When a function key for program reservation is operated from the keyboard 9, a program reservation command is generated and the sequence advances from nl to ``n6.'' When a function key for program selection is operated, the sequence from n2 to ''n1 is generated.
Proceed to 2. When a program guide is received and a registration command for the program guide is generated, the process proceeds from n3 to n20. When a control signal from the broadcasting station 1 is received and a hard copy command is issued to the video printer 7, the process proceeds from n4 to n21. Also, when other mode execution commands occur, n
Proceed to 5-n25.

When a program reservation command is issued, it is first determined in n6 whether or not a keyword table needs to be displayed. When a display function code is input from the keyboard 9, a keyword table is displayed on the CRT 5 at nl. Next, at step n8, input of a keyword and date/time for searching for a program to be reserved is awaited. When such information is input, a keyword matching the input keyword is added in step n9, and the program contents at the input date and time are searched from the memory 6 (n9), and the search results are displayed on the CRT 5 (n9). n10). Then, at nil, the mode is specified using the keyboard 9. That is, when the date and time of a reserved program arrives, a mode is specified, such as whether the program is to be recorded or the channel is automatically switched. The program reservation is completed by the above operations.

, when a program selection command occurs in n2, n
2 to n12, and the same processes as n6 to n11 described above are performed in n12 to n17.

When a program guide registration command occurs at n3, n3
Proceed as 3→n20. n20 creates a program guide data file from the program guide sent from transmitting station 1, and stores it in memory 6.
to be memorized. When a hard copy command is generated at n4, the process proceeds from n4 to n21. First, the video printer 7 is set on-line with respect to the control unit 4, and an image at the timing when the control signal is sent from the transmitting station is hard-copied.

If another mode execution command is generated at n5, the process proceeds to n25 to execute other processing.

When the program progresses to nl-+n5 through the above operation, programs searched by keyword from the program guide registered in advance in the memory 6 are displayed on the CRT 5 in the program reservation mode, and a desired program can be selected from among them. can.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 shows a configuration diagram of a CATV system according to the present invention. FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of a CATV terminal, FIG. 3 is a diagram showing frequency allocation, and FIG. 4 (A). (B) is a flowchart showing a schematic operation on the ATV terminal side. Applicant Tateishi Electric Co., Ltd. Agent Patent Attorney Hisao Komori Figure 1 Figure 2

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) CAT transmits a large amount of image information from a broadcasting station via a cable to a CATV terminal, and the CATV terminal selects desired information from the received image information and displays it on a CRT.
In the V system, program content is coded by genre or content and keywords are added to the program content.
The broadcasting station is equipped with means for transmitting a program guide to be transmitted to an ATV terminal, and also includes a memory for storing the program guide, a keyboard for inputting keywords for specifying date and time and program contents by genre or content, and when inputting date and time and keywords. A program reservation system for CATV, comprising means for searching the memory for program contents to which a keyword matching the keyword at the input date and time is added, and means for displaying and reserving the searched program contents.