KR100348242B1 - Automatic channel switching method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: An automatic channel switching method is provided to view a program of a channel without cutting the head part of the program when a channel is switched into the channel. CONSTITUTION: Channel information changed according to a user's choice and the time at which the channel information is changed are stored for a predetermined period of time(S102). A preference channel is set based on the channel information stored for the predetermined period of time, and switching time of the preference channel is set from an average time of the stored channel change time. A channel is switched on the basis of the set preference channel and switching time.

Description

Channel auto switching method

The present invention relates to a channel automatic switching method, and more particularly, to a channel on which a TV signal is broadcasted by a viewer at a certain time zone, based on a time zone channel setting table automatically set from data watched by a viewer for a certain period of time. The present invention relates to a method for automatically switching channels so that a truncation of a program does not occur when automatically changing.

1 is a block diagram of a conventional channel automatic switching device. The key input unit 1 for selecting a channel, the ROM 2 storing voltage values corresponding to each channel, and the overall control of the system are shown. The control unit 3, the clock unit 4 which informs the control unit 3 of the current time, a RAM 5 storing a sampling time and a voltage value corresponding to the channel at that time, and the RAM 5 taken out from the RAM 5. It consists of a priority processor (6) which determines the channel most frequently selected at the present time, and a digital / analog converter (7) for converting the digital data corresponding to the voltage value into analog to the tuning unit (8).

In the conventional channel automatic switching device having such a configuration, as shown in FIG. 2 (a), the control unit 3 receives time data from the clock unit 4 (S1) and transmits to the channel selected at the time in the ROM 2. Read the corresponding voltage value (S2) and save the current time and channel value in RAM (S3) for about 4 weeks at 15 minute intervals. .

TABLE 1

After that, when the TV is turned on at any time as shown in FIG. 2 (B) (S11), the TV itself searches the RAM 5 at every sampling time (15 minute period) (S12) at the current time for each cycle. Read all corresponding channel data (S13).

Then, the priority processing section 6 finds the channels most frequently selected at the time each week, such as these (S14).

In this case, FIG. 3 shows a state in which the current channel is determined by using the time channel data stored for four weeks in the priority processor 6.

However, as shown in FIG. 4, the sampling time is 7:15 PM even though the main program 11P of channel 11 starts at 7:00 PM as shown in FIG. It can be seen that it continues to channel 6 until 10PM and then changes to channel 11 until 7:10 PM. And the arrow in FIG. 4 is a sampling pulse.

Therefore, there is a problem that the viewer does not see the front part of the program to watch because the channel is fixed to the wrong channel for 4 minutes from 7:00 PM to 7:10 PM.

The present invention solves this problem, and an object of the present invention is to add a time changed from a sampling point of a sampling time zone to a current channel to a channel setting table set through a period of time, thereby cutting the program head of the channel during channel switching. It is to provide a channel automatic switching method that can be viewed without a phenomenon.

Automatic channel switching method according to the present invention for achieving this object comprises the steps of storing the channel information changed by the user's selection and the change time for a certain period of time; Setting a preferred channel based on the stored channel information for the predetermined period and setting a switching time of the preferred channel from an average time of the stored channel change time; The method may include switching the channel based on the set priority channel and the switching time.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

5 is a block diagram of the automatic channel switching apparatus according to the present invention. The channel change detection unit 19 detects a channel change in the conventional configuration of FIG. 1 and checks the duration of the channel change. The timer 20 is further provided is configured.

According to the present invention having such a configuration, the control unit 13 receives the time data from the clock unit 14 and reads the voltage value corresponding to the channel selected at the time in the ROM 12, and then the time and channel value at that time. It is the same as the conventional system to continue the operation of storing the time in the RAM 15 for about 10 weeks.

However, in the flowchart of FIG. 6, when the channel change detection unit 19 detects that the channel has been changed (S101), the control unit 13 detects the time at that time and stores it in a temporary buffer in the control unit 13 (S102). At this time, the timer 20 operates to count how long the channel is maintained.

When the holding time exceeds, for example, 1 minute, the above-described channel data and channel change time are added to the sampling time data immediately following the channel change and stored in the RAM 15 (S103 and S104). ). Here, one minute can be arbitrarily determined, and this channel is discarded since it cannot be regarded as a signal channel for less than one minute.

The memory type, that is, the channel setting table according to the storage method, is shown in Table 2 below.

TABLE 2

On the other hand, based on the data stored in the RAM 15 as described above, the automatic channel switching operation of the TV with the flow chart of FIG. 7 shows that the control unit 13 accesses the RAM 15 as soon as the TV is turned on and approaches the current time. The data at the sampling time and the data at the next sampling time are read out and processed by the priority processing unit 16 (S201 to S204).

If the channel is changed at the next sampling time, the time data stored in the third column is sent to the control unit 13 (S205 to S206).

After that, when the time data input to the control unit 13 in the clock unit 14 matches the time data transmitted from the RAM 15, the digital-to-analog converter 17 converts the voltage value corresponding to the channel data of the second column. It is sent to the tuning unit 18 through (S207 ~ S208).

In other words, when the channel setting table for each time zone of Table 2 according to the present invention is applied to FIG. 4, when the channel data for each time zone is accessed from the RAM 15, only the current sampling time data is accessed, but the next sampling time is accessed. Data is also accessed. At this time, since the time at which the channel 11 detected when the channel is changed is started at 7:06 PM, the accessed data does not elapse until the next sampling time of 7:10 PM. At: 06PM, the channel is switched to channel 11 regardless of the sampling time.

At this time, the channel switching is performed at an average time of channel change time data stored for a predetermined period (about 4 weeks).

As described above, according to the present invention, the channel switching is performed at the program start time by adding the channel change time to the channel setting table set in the memory, thereby controlling the program truncation phenomenon when the channel is automatically switched. It is possible to prevent other channels from being watched at the beginning of the program.

1 is a block diagram of a conventional channel automatic switching device

2 (a) and (b) are flowcharts for performing a conventional channel automatic switching operation.

3 is a diagram illustrating a current channel selection process according to the priorities.

4 is a diagram for explaining a conventional channel automatic switching operation.

5 is a block diagram of a channel automatic switching device according to the present invention

6 is a flow chart showing a process of creating a timetable channel setting table according to the present invention

7 is a flow chart for performing a channel automatic switching method according to the present invention

Explanation of symbols on the main parts of the drawings

11: key input 12: ROM

13: control unit 14: clock unit

15: RAM 16: Priority Processing Unit

17: digital / analog converter 18: tuning unit

19: channel change detection unit 20: timer

Claims (1)

Storing channel information changed by the user's selection and the change time for a predetermined period of time; Setting a preferred channel based on the stored channel information for the predetermined period and setting a switching time of the preferred channel from an average time of the stored channel change time; And, And switching the channel based on the set priority channel and the switching time .