KR20070102119A - Three dimensional relative structure setting method for media contents in home network - Google Patents

Abstract

A three dimensional relative structure setting method for the media contents in a home network is provided to move simply the present content to the related content with the present content by connecting each media content retained at a media server in the three dimensional relative structure on a basis of a predetermined property. A three dimensional relative structure setting method for the media contents in a home network comprises the steps of: a first step for procuring a property applied to a specific object from a media server; and a second step for connecting the other object having a before/after association to the specific object in a related structure by the selected property, to select a desired value in the reference value to have the before/after association with the other object among the object properties.

Description

THREE DIMENSIONAL RELATIVE STRUCTURE SETTING METHOD FOR MEDIA CONTENTS IN HOME NETWORK}

1 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of a UPnP AV home network to which a 3D connection structure setting method of media content according to the present invention is applied;

2 is a view showing a two-dimensional connection structure of media content applied to explain the three-dimensional connection structure of media content according to the present invention;

3 is a view showing that an action for determining a characteristic of content in a CDS service of a media server is defined;

4 is a diagram illustrating an acquisition and setting state of an association item for creating an association relationship for characteristics of content according to the action defined in FIG. 3;

5 is a view showing a state in which the media content is made of a three-dimensional group in accordance with the present invention,

FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating a state of metadata in which an association of characteristics of content is set by an action; FIG.

FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating characteristic values of content to which expansion and contraction meanings are given for media content arranged three-dimensionally according to the present invention.

<Description of the symbols for the main parts of the drawings>

10: media server, 20: control point,

30: Media Renderer.

The present invention relates to a method for managing information of media content of a media server in a UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) AV home network.

In general, the UPnP AV network is composed of a control point (CP) for controlling a device and devices for providing a service, and the control point finds and controls various devices through an interface provided, Receive and process the event.

The UPnP network is composed of a media server providing various media data, a control point for controlling a device, and a media renderer for reproducing the media data.

The media server allows the control point to view information about media files (media contents) held by the server through a content directory service (CDS), and the media file for the media file. It contains basic information such as the name, format, file size, presentation time, Uniform Resource Location (URL), and file type.

The Content Directory Service (CDS) is designed to represent objects held by the media server in a tree structure. Each object may have a container and a media file that may have information about other objects. It is classified as an item corresponding to information of.

In the UPnP AV network standard, the root object, the root object, is always represented by a string of "0" in the tree structure provided by the content directory service (CDS). All objects that are subordinate to and within one Content Directory Service (CDS) can be uniquely identified as a specific string.

The items of media content that can be lowered from the root object include an image item according to an image file and the like, an audio item according to a music track or an audio broadcast, a movie or video broadcast, a music video clip, and the like. A video item and a playlist item may be provided.

The control point organizes the contents according to an arbitrary classification method by a user by sorting or searching the media contents held by the media server through a content directory service (CDS) of the media server. It is possible to obtain the desired content.

The Content Directory Service (CDS) is organized into containers or items divided by media content of different formats and formats such as image files, video files, audio files, and the like. It is possible to find and play.

However, in the conventional UPnP AV home network, various media contents held in a media server have containers or items separated by different formats and formats through a content directory service (CDS). Although it is useful to find only the content of the content, there is a disadvantage that it is difficult to easily find other content related to the specific content in a short time because there is no information indicating the association of the content or characteristics between each content.

Accordingly, the present invention has been made in view of the above-described conventional circumstances, and an object thereof is to have a three-dimensional connection structure in consideration of the connection relationship between characteristics of media contents held in a media server in a UPnP AV home network. The present invention provides a method for establishing a 3D connection structure of media content in a home network to be arranged.

Another object of the present invention is to have a vertical and horizontal association in consideration of the characteristics of the connection between the media content possessed by the media server, and to create a three-dimensional connection structure of the front and rear relations with the meaning of expansion and contraction. The present invention provides a method for establishing a 3D connection structure of media content in a home network.

In order to achieve the above object, according to the present invention, in the content information setting method for searching for an object of a media server in a home network, obtaining a property value for a specific object from the media server; And selecting a desired value as a reference value from among the property values of the object so as to have a pre / post association with another object so that another object having a pre / post association by the selected property value is connected to the specific object in an associative structure. It provides a method characterized by consisting of steps.

Hereinafter, the present invention configured as described above will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram schematically illustrating a configuration of a UPnP AV home network to which a 3D connection structure setting method of media content according to the present invention is applied.

As shown in FIG. 1, the UPnP AV home network according to the present invention includes a control point (CP) 20 for controlling each device and devices for providing various services. Various devices are found through the provisioning interface to describe, control, and receive and process events.

The control point 20 may be mounted together in UPnP devices (for example, personal computers (PCs) or PDAs) that perform different services as one application, and separately mounted in a plurality of devices in the home. It becomes possible.

In addition, the UPnP network includes a media server 10 that provides various media data as a device providing a service, and a media renderer 30 that plays media data. The server 10 and the media renderer 30 are controlled by the control point 20, and media streaming from the media server 10 is based on various known transport protocols.

According to the present invention, the media contents in the media server 10 can be linked to each other and the related contents are arranged by the characteristics or the contents of the contents, so that the user can associate the media contents with the specific media contents. The content can be easily selected, and the two-dimensional connection structure has vertical association (ie, up / down association) and horizontal association (ie, left / right association) in consideration of the characteristic value of each media content. On the other hand, in addition to the two-dimensional connection structure, a three-dimensional connection structure having a front and rear correlation is generated so as to be associated with media content having a meaning of enlargement and reduction for a specific media content.

As shown in FIG. 2, the media server 10 has connectivity so that contents can be arranged in up / down / left / right (ie, vertical and horizontal associations), respectively. If the connection structure of the contents connected to the left / right is continuously connected, it is possible to form a structure that can be connected as a whole.

For example, the media content (object) of "A" is related to each other, and the media content of "A" / AS (AS) / left (AW) / right (AE) is listed. The media content of "B" is associated with each other. In the case of listing media content with the top (BN) / bottom (BS) / left (BW) / right (BE), when the separate list structure of "A" content and "B" content is combined, " The content belonging to the right (AE) connection structure of the "A" content is the "B" content, and the content "A" is the content belonging to the left (BW) connection structure of the "B" content. Such a connection structure may be formed to form a cylindrical structure that can be connected as a whole.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an action for determining a characteristic of content in a CDS service of a media server in the two-dimensional connection structure of FIG. 2.

As shown in FIG. 3, the control point 20 calls an action called "GetSupportedProperty" to examine and find out a property of the contents in the media server 10. Contains an "Object ID" corresponding to a descriptor of the content currently playing (or selected) as an input variable, and as an output variable, a "supportedProperty" corresponding to a list of supported properties of the object. Variables are included.

When the object ID is given as an input variable through the "GetSupportedProperty" action, the media server 10 converts "supportedProperty" as an output variable in the form of CSV (Comma Separated Value) to determine the item or container specified by the corresponding object ID. The control point 20 is notified of the list of the supported properties, and the control point 20 allows the user to select a reference value for setting an association for each property of the content with reference to the list of the property types. The selected reference value is communicated through the action to the media server 10 to establish the interconnectivity for the object. This will be described later.

On the other hand, if there is an attribute (Attribute) in the property (Content) of the content, it is also possible to send the attribute value to the control point 20 so that the user can be a reference for selecting the desired reference value.

On the other hand, the control point 20 shows the user's property values for each type of media content (object) provided from the media server 10 in response to a request of the "GetSupportedProperty" action, and among the property values for each type by the user. When any one value is selected, the action of FIG. 4 requesting to create an association relationship with other content of the content currently played by the content directory service (CDS) of the media server 10 based on the selected characteristic value. You will be asked.

In Figure 4, the "SetRelatedInformation" action is an action that requests to create an association for the content currently being played (or selected), and this "SetRelatedInformation" action is an input variable that describes the descriptor of the content currently being played (or selected) ( It has a "object ID" corresponding to a Descriptor) and a variable of "baseproperty" that specifies a base property value or a property value.

In response to a call to the "SetRelatedInformation" action, the content directory service (CDS) examines the information of other content and configures metadata having information 401 about the correlation of up, down, left, and right with respect to the corresponding media content for the object. do.

Meanwhile, in the present invention, in addition to the two-dimensional vertical / horizontal correlation of FIG. 2, a connection structure of three-dimensional content having a front / rear correlation is generated, as shown in FIG. 5. With the front and back items listed horizontally centered around the reference item (e.g., the content item currently being played through the media renderer 30), the top and bottom items listed vertically listed, The front / rear items with / after associations can be listed.

Items that have a horizontal / vertical association with the reference item are listed with an association relationship by similar property values as the reference item, and the contents of the reference item are played through the media renderer 30. In the state, up / down / left / right by characteristics by up / down / left / right operation by the user interface (eg, keyboard or mouse device) of the user from the control point 20 Allows you to navigate to the associated content in the direction.

An item having a front / rear association with respect to the reference item may be connected to an item of content having an enlarged meaning and a reduced meaning with respect to the reference item, separately from an item having the up / down / left / right association. For example, in a DVD movie content, when a movie with a specific title is stored as a separate movie produced by different directors, and movies with a title similar to that of the title are stored, the movie is enlarged from one movie serving as a reference item. Movie content having a title similar to the specific title may be set as a front item having a predetermined meaning, and movie content of the same name produced by another director may be set as a rear item having a reduced meaning.

In addition, for example, when reproducing a three-dimensionally produced map image, not only the up / down / left / right movement of the three-dimensional map image by a user manipulation through the control point 20, but also the front surface. Or it can be moved to the image enlarged or reduced to the rear. Moving to the front or rear associated object is not possible to select the front item or back item from the three-dimensionally listed object via the user interface, but rather to select a specific request, for example the front or rear request button, from the two-dimensionally listed list. Depending on the input, it can also be changed to the item connected to the front or rear.

Here, the correlation between the media content by the enlarged and reduced meaning of the front and rear items is determined by the characteristic value recorded in the metadata of the media content associated with the media content as a reference, and the control point ( 20) by calling the action of "GetSupportedProperty" of FIG. 3, it is possible to find out by examining the supportable characteristics of contents having connectivity by extension and contraction as well as up and down, left and right, and up and down, right and left In addition, by requesting the "SetRelatedInformation" action of FIG. 4 to create an association relationship with the media content meaning expansion and contraction, three-dimensionally connected characteristic values are configured in the metadata as shown in FIG. 6. do.

The table of FIG. 7 shows property values that can be used for the front-rear connection relationship by expansion and contraction in each item or container in the content directory service (CDS) of the media server 10. As defined, the Enlargement value corresponding to the Forward direction has information that can be moved to an item having an expanded meaning centering on the currently played content, and a reduction corresponding to the Backward direction. (Reduction) The characteristic value has information that can move from the currently played content to an item having a reduced meaning. The correspondence of expansion and contraction for front and rear connections may be interchangeable.

On the other hand, the value that can be included in the property (Unique) may be a unique value that can represent the object of the connected content, or may be URI information indicating the resource (Resource) of the actual content data.

The media server 10 may record characteristic values representing the meaning of enlargement and reduction of media content in metadata of each content, thereby controlling characteristics of metadata at the control point 20. If the user controls the movement to the front or the rear based on the value, it is possible to move to the item of the enlarged meaning or the item of the reduced meaning as well as up, down, left, and right from the currently reproduced reference item.

Here, the characteristic value having the enlarged and reduced meaning is to be selected by the user's setting through the control point 20, but the expansion and contraction that the media server 10 may have in the media content. It is also possible to automatically assign meaning to add property values to metadata.

On the other hand, the present invention is not limited to the above-described typical preferred embodiments, but can be carried out in various ways without departing from the gist of the present invention, various modifications, alterations, substitutions or additions are common in the art Those who have knowledge will easily understand. If the implementation by such improvement, change, replacement or addition falls within the scope of the appended claims, the technical idea should also be regarded as belonging to the present invention.

As described above, according to the present invention, in the UPnP AV home network, the media contents held by the media server are assigned to the two-dimensional structure having the vertical / horizontal relations of the contents related to each characteristic by using the predetermined characteristic value as a reference value. In addition, by connecting to the three-dimensional structure having a front and rear correlation, the content that is related to the currently played content can be easily changed according to the user's up / down / left / right operation and front / rear operation. By moving, the content can be easily moved to the content that is related to the content currently being played without browsing or searching, and according to the three-dimensional association structure Freely searchable content that can be linked in a more expanded or reduced sense Will have an effect.

Claims (6)

A method of setting content information for searching an object of a media server in a home network, the method comprising: A first step of obtaining a property value for a specific object from the media server; A second step of selecting a desired value as a reference value from among the feature values of the object to have a pre / post association with another object such that another object having a pre / post association by the selected feature value is connected to the specific object in an association structure; Method consisting of. The method of claim 1, The first step may include generating characteristic values of each type by examining characteristic values of the object itself in the media server; Invoking an action to determine the characteristic value of a specific object at a control point, And sending the investigated characteristic value of each type to the control point. The method of claim 2, In the first step, the action for finding the characteristic value of the specific object may include an object ID of the specific object as an input argument and a list for each type of characteristic values provided by the specific object as an output variable. How to feature. The method of claim 1, And the specific object is media content being played through a media renderer. The method of claim 1, In the second step, the reference value having a pre- and post-association association with another object in the specific object includes information moving to an object having an enlarged meaning with respect to the specific object, and has a reduced meaning. And each having information moving to the object. The method of claim 5, In the second step, index information of a property value of an item or a container of an object having a pre / post association with the specific object is defined in a content directory service (CDS) of the media server. How to characterized.

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