Technique for effectively providing program material in a cable television system
First Claim
1. Apparatus for use in a cable television network for controllably providing a collection of program materials to a group of terminals, at least one terminal in the group being capable of issuing a request for selected program material, the apparatus comprising:
- an interface for receiving the request;
a processing element responsive to the received request for determining whether the selected program material is included in the collection of program materials; and
if it is determined that the selected program material is not included in the collection of program materials, a control element for causing the selected program material to be added to the collection of program materials provided to the group of terminals.
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0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
In a cable television system in accordance with the invention, program materials are made available to subscribers in a neighborhood on an as needed basis. Specifically, when a subscriber at a set-top terminal selects a program channel to watch, the selection request is transmitted to a headend of the system. In response to such a request, a controller in the headend determines whether the material of the selected program channel has been made available to the neighborhood. If it has been made available, the controller identifies to the set-top terminal the carrier which is carrying the requested program material, and to which the set-top terminal tunes to obtain the requested program material. Otherwise, the controller assigns an unused carrier to carry the requested program material, and informs the set-top terminal of the identity of the newly assigned carrier. The controller also retires those carriers assigned for the program channels which are no longer watched by the subscribers in the neighborhood.
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Citations
39 Claims
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1. Apparatus for use in a cable television network for controllably providing a collection of program materials to a group of terminals, at least one terminal in the group being capable of issuing a request for selected program material, the apparatus comprising:
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an interface for receiving the request;
a processing element responsive to the received request for determining whether the selected program material is included in the collection of program materials; and
if it is determined that the selected program material is not included in the collection of program materials, a control element for causing the selected program material to be added to the collection of program materials provided to the group of terminals. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. Apparatus for providing one or more program materials to a group of terminals, at least one terminal in the group requesting a selected one of the program materials, the apparatus comprising:
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a processor for assigning carriers for carrying the program materials to each terminal in the group, each carrier being assigned to carry a respective one of the program materials; and
an interface for communicating to the at least one terminal information identifying one of the assigned carriers which carries the selected program material. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A system for transmission of signals containing one or more program materials selected by a group of terminals, the system comprising:
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a control unit for associating one or more carriers with the one or more program materials, respectively;
a modulator unit; and
a switching unit for routing data streams, respectively representing the program materials, to the modulator unit such that the modulator unit modulates the carriers with the data streams representing the program materials associated with the carriers, respectively, to generate the signals. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
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22. A method for use in a cable television network for controllably providing a collection of program materials to a group of terminals, at least one terminal in the group being capable of issuing a request for selected program material, the method comprising:
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receiving the request;
in response to the received request, determining whether the selected program material is included in the collection of program materials; and
if it is determined that the selected program material is not included in the collection of program materials, causing the selected program material to be added to the collection of program materials provided to the group of terminals. - View Dependent Claims (23, 24, 25, 26)
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27. A method for providing one or more program materials to a group of terminals, at least one terminal in the group requesting a selected one of the program materials, the method comprising:
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assigning carriers for carrying the program materials to each terminal in the group, each carrier being assigned to carry a respective one of the program materials; and
communicating to the at least one terminal information identifying one of the assigned carriers which carries the selected program material. - View Dependent Claims (28, 29, 30, 31)
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32. A method for use in a system for transmission of signals containing one or more program materials selected by a group of terminals, the system including a modulator unit, the method comprising:
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associating one or more carriers with the one or more program materials, respectively; and
routing data streams, respectively representing the program materials, to the modulator unit such that the modulator unit modulates the carriers with the data streams representing the program materials associated with the carriers, respectively, to generate the signals. - View Dependent Claims (33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39)
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Specification