Interface and related methods for dynamically generating a filter graph in a development system

• US 20020099732A1
• Filed: 12/06/2000
• Published: 07/25/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 12/06/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Rudolph, Eric H., Miller, Daniel J.
• Granted Patent: US 6,959,438 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/201
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/00 Arrangements for software engineering testing or debugging G06F11/36; administrative, planning or organisation aspects of software project management G06Q10/06
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/20 Software design

Abstract

A system is presented including a plurality of sources, and an interface, selectively coupled to the plurality of sources, to generate and implement a development project of processing chains, wherein the interface dynamically loads a processing chain for each of the plurality of media sources at a point during the execution of the project when the chain is required, and wherein the interface is configured to unload at least a subset of the chains when they are not required.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a plurality of sources; and

an interface, selectively coupled to the plurality of sources, to generate and implement a development project of processing chains, wherein the interface loads a processing chain for each of the plurality of media sources at a point during the execution of the project when the chain is required, and wherein the interface is configured to unload at least a subset of the chains when they are not required.

2. A system according to claim 1, wherein the interface is a render engine, exposed to a media processing system implemented on a computing system.

3. A system according to claim 1, further comprising an application program, coupled to the interface, to enable a user to define a media processing project.

4. A system according to claim 1, wherein the interface only loads those processing chains required during the next M seconds of project execution and, if the currently loaded chain-count does not exceed a threshold, T.

5. A system according to claim 4, wherein M is less than a time required to load a processing chain.

6. A system according to claim 4, wherein if the currently loaded chain-count has reached a threshold, T, the interface identifies one or more currently loaded chains that can be unloaded.

7. A system according to claim 6, wherein the interface identifies one or more currently loaded chains that will not be used during the next N seconds to unload.

8. A system according to claim 7, wherein M is less than N.

9. A system according to claim 7, wherein the interface determines whether the identified one or more chains will be required during subsequent execution of the project, or in a future project and, if so, caches the identified chain(s).

10. A system according to claim 7, wherein the interface determines whether unloading of the identified one or more chains reduces the chain-count below a maximum allowable threshold, V, and, if so, loads the chains required in the next M seconds.

11. A system according to claim 9, whereupon determining that the chain-count is not below V, the interface identifies one or more lowest priority chains and unloads the identified chain(s).

12. A system according to claim 10, wherein the interface removes the identified chains from the active project and caches the removed chains.

13. A system according to claim 10, wherein the interface loads the chains required during the next M seconds.

14. A system according to claim 6, wherein the interface unloads a chain when all matrix switch filter(s) of the filter graph provide an indication that the chain is no longer required.

15. A system according to claim 4, wherein T is set to one (1).

16. A system according to claim 15, whereby setting T equal to one (1), the interface will be required to search for and potentially unload chains which are not required to support execution of the project for the next N seconds.

18. A method according to claim 17, further comprising:

identifying currently loaded chains that will not be used during the next N seconds; and

removing the identified chains from the development project.

19. A method according to claim 18, further comprising:

determining whether the chain-count has dropped below a maximum allowable chain-count, V, after removing the identified chains from the development project;

identifying one or more low priority chains and removing them from the development project; and

loading the chains required in the next M seconds.

20. A method according to claim 18, wherein removing the identified chains comprises:

determining whether the identified chains will be required during subsequent execution of the development project or future development projects; and

caching the identified chains if they will be used during subsequent execution of the development project and/or future projects.

21. A method according to claim 17, wherein T is set to one (1) such that an implementing media processing system always attempts to unload unused chains prior to loading chains.

17. A method for generating and managing a development project, the method comprising:

identifying processing chains required to support execution of the development project over the next M seconds; and

loading the identified processing chains as long as a currently loaded chain-count does not exceed an initial threshold, T.

22. A method for managing a media processing project, the method comprising:

identifying each of a plurality of sources required to satisfy the media processing project;

determining when one or more chain(s) associated with each of the plurality of sources is required to support execution of the media processing project; and

selectively loading and unloading each of the chains during execution of the filter graph based, at least in part, on when each of the chains are required to support execution of the media processing project.

23. A method according to claim 22, wherein loading and unloading chains comprises:

identifying which processing chain(s) will be required within the next M seconds of project execution; and

loading the identified processing chain(s) if a currently loaded chain-count does not exceed a threshold, T.

24. A method according to claim 23, further comprising:

identifying one or more processing chains that will not be required in the next N seconds if the chain-count threshold T has been reached; and

removing the identified one or more processing chains from the processing project.

25. A method according to claim 24, wherein removing the identified one or ore processing chains comprises:

determining whether the identified processing chains will be required during subsequent execution of the media processing project, or a future processing project; and

caching at least a subset of the processing chains if they will be required during subsequent execution of the media processing project, or future processing project(s).

26. A method according to claim 24, further comprising:

determining whether removing one or more of the identified processing chains reduces the chain-count below a maximum allowable threshold, V; and

identifying one or more low priority processing chains to remove to reduce the chain-count below the maximum allowable threshold if it is determined that the chain-count exceeds the maximum allowable threshold V.

27. A method according to claim 26, wherein V is greater than T.

28. A method according to claim 23, wherein T is set to one (1).

29. A storage medium comprising a plurality of executable instructions which, when executed, implement a method according to claim 22.

30. A computing system comprising:

a storage medium having stored therein a plurality of executable instructions; and

an execution unit, coupled to the storage medium, to execute at least a subset of the plurality of executable instructions to implement a method according to claim 22.

31. A storage medium comprising a plurality of executable instructions which, when executed, implements an interface to manage development and execution of a development project, wherein the interface identifies processing chains required to support execution of the development project over the next M seconds, and loads the identified processing chains as long as a currently loaded chain-count does not exceed an initial threshold, T.

32. A storage medium according to claim 31, wherein the interface identifies one or more processing chains that will not be required to support execution of the development project over the next N seconds, and removes such chains from the development project.

33. A storage medium according to claim 32, wherein T is set equal to one (1) to force the interface to identify chains to unload before loading each chain required to support processing of the development project over the next M seconds.

34. A storage medium according to claim 32, wherein the interface determines whether removed processing chains will be required in support of subsequent processing of the development project and/or a future development project and, if so, caches the removed processing chains for subsequent use.