Binding interactive multichannel digital document system

• US 20030192049A1
• Filed: 11/15/2002
• Published: 10/09/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 04/09/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Inventors: Liew, Bee Yian, Yang, Guijun, Schneider, Tina Fay
• Granted Patent: US 7,062,712 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/51
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42204 User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor constructive details of casings for the remote control device H01H9/0235; user interfaces for controlling a tuning device of a television receiver through a remote control H03J9/00; remote control of peripheral devices connected to a television receiver through the remote control device of the television receiver H04B1/205
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4312 involving specific graphical features, e.g. screen layout, special fonts or colors, blinking icons, highlights or animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4314 for fitting data in a restricted space on the screen, e.g. EPG data in a rectangular grid
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4316 for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/854 Content authoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8583 by creating hot-spots
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/165 Centralised control of user terminal subsequent to an upstream request signal H04N7/17345; Registering at central by two-way working H04N7/17309

Abstract

A digital document comprising a multi-channel interface is provided that achieves improved user interaction. The digital document includes a plurality of content channels providing primary content continuously in a looping manner and at least one supplementary channel on a single page. The supplementary channel is configured to provide supplementary content upon the occurrence of an event during playback of the document. Channel content may include video, text, images, web page content and audio. The media content can be managed in a spatial and temporal manner. In addition to media content, a channel may contain interactive regions in the form of hot spots and interactive mapping regions. An authoring tool is also provided for generating a multi-channel interactive digital document.

Claims

1. A digital document comprising:

a plurality of content channels, each of the plurality of content channels configured to provide primary content and be selected by a user during playback of the document, the primary content provided continuously in a looping manner until termination of document playback is initiated by user input;

at least one supplementary channel configured to provide supplementary content upon the selection of a content channel by a user during playback of the document, the plurality of content channels and at least one supplementary channel provided on a single page.

2. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document resides entirely on a single machine

3. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document resides on a client machine

4. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document resides on a server.

5. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document primary and supplementary content is received from a server located over a network.

6. The digital document of claim 1 wherein primary and supplementary content are received from a URL location.

7. The digital document of claim 1 wherein primary content includes one of video, an image, a set of images, web page content and text.

8. The digital document of claim 1 wherein primary content includes audio content.

9. The digital document of claim 7 wherein primary content also includes audio content.

10. The digital document of claim 1 wherein supplementary content includes one of video, an image, a set of images, web page content and text.

11. The digital document of claim 10 wherein supplementary content also includes audio content.

12. The digital document of claim 1 wherein supplementary content includes audio content.

13. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the supplemental content is associated with the primary content contained in one of the plurality of content channels and at a selected time during presentation of the primary content within the content channel, the supplemental content displayed in the supplementary channel only when the content channel containing the primary content is selected at the selected time associated with the supplementary content

14. The digital document of claim 1 wherein each of the plurality of content channels includes a visual highlight, the visual highlight for a channel revealed to the user during user selection of the channel.

15. The digital document of claim 14 wherein the visual highlight includes a highlighted channel border.

16. The digital document of claim 1 further comprising:

a background audio channel configured to provide background audio during playback of the document, the background audio presented regardless of content channel selection by a user.

17. The digital document of claim 1 further comprising:

a hot spot, the hot spot comprising a two-dimensional region within one of said plurality of content channels, the hot spot configured to be selected by a user, an action being initiated upon selection of the hot spot by the user.

18. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the action includes implementing a change to a cursor while the cursor is within the hot spot region.

19. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the hot spot is configured to change location within a channel having time-based content during playback of the time-based content within the channel.

20. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the region is the entire two dimensional region of the channel the hot spot is located in.

21. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the action includes implementing a change to the primary content in a content channel or supplementary content in a supplementary channel.

22. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the action includes implementing a change to the supplementary content in a supplementary channel.

23. The digital document of claim 17 wherein the hot spot region includes at least one visual highlight.

24. The digital document of claim 23 wherein the at least one visual high light includes:

a first visual highlight comprised of a border around the hot spot region; and

a second visual highlight comprised of a highlighted cursor icon, wherein a cursor is represented by a first cursor icon when the cursor is not placed over the hot spot, the cursor represented by the highlighted cursor icon when the cursor is placed over the hot spot region.

25. The digital document of claim 23 wherein the visual highlight is revealed to the user during hot spot selection.

26. The digital document of claim 1 wherein one of said plurality of content channels is a map channel, the map channel configured to present mapping objects within the map channel, the mapping objects configured to be selected by a user, the map channel associated with at least one mapping data content channel within the digital document, the at least one mapping data content channel configured to include mapping location data and mapping time data used to present the mapping objects at a location and time within the map channel during document playback.

27. The digital document of claim 26 wherein each of the mapping objects are configured to initiate an action upon the selection of the mapping object by a user.

28. The digital document of claim 27 wherein the action includes implementing a change to the primary content in a content channel.

29. The digital document of claim 26 wherein the mapping object changes location within the map channel during playback of the document.

30. The digital document of claim 26 wherein the mapping object includes a visual highlight revealed to the user during mapping object selection.

31. The digital document of claim 1 wherein one of the plurality of content channels includes video content, the content channel configured to repetitively present a first portion of the video content and present a second portion upon receiving input from a user during presentation of the first portion.

32. The digital document of claim 1 further comprising:

a timer configured to count-down a period of time, the timer configured to begin countdown upon the occurrence of a first event, the timer configured to initiate a second event upon completion of the count down.

33. The digital document of claim 32 wherein the first event is user initiated.

34. The digital document of claim 32 wherein the first event occurs automatically.

35. The digital document of claim 32 wherein the second event includes:

configuring a change to the primary content of at least one of the plurality of content channels.

36. The digital document of claim 1 wherein a first primary content associated with the plurality of content channels and a first secondary content associated with the at least one supplementary channels is associated with a first scene, a second primary content associated with the plurality of content channels and a second secondary content associated with the at least one supplementary channels is associated with a second scene, the second primary content and second secondary content associated with the second scene simultaneously replacing the first primary content and first secondary content associated with the first scene upon the occurrence of an event, such that no content from the first scene is presented simultaneously with the content from the second scene.

37. The digital document of claim 36 wherein the second primary content does not include content for all of the plurality of channels, the first primary content associated with the first scene remaining in the channels of the document in the second scene for channels in the second scene not already configured with content.

38. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document includes a spatial depth formed by said plurality of content channels and said at least one supplementary channel.

39. The digital document of claim 1 wherein the digital document includes a temporal boundary formed by the repetitive presentation of the primary content within the primary content channels.

40. The digital document of claim 1 wherein a user may enter annotative content to the primary content associated with one of the content channels during playback of the document, the annotative content having a content data element and a time data element, the annotative content saved as part of the document upon the termination of document playback, such that subsequent playback of the document displays the user annotative content at the time during playback the annotative content was entered by the user.

41. The digital document of claim 1 wherein:

the primary content provided by each of said plurality of content channels being temporally synchronized and providing a unique narration information relating to a narration subject matter, the supplemental content relating to the unique narration information provided in the selected content channel.

42. A method for playback of a multi-channel digital document comprising:

(a) playback of primary content within a plurality of primary channels within the multi-channel document, repeating playback of the primary content once the entire content has been played;

(b) receiving interactive input from a user, the input indicating a portion of the primary content has been selected;

(c) performing a resulting action in response to the user input received; and

(d) repeating steps (a) through (c) until input terminating document playback is received from the user.

43. The method of claim 42 wherein the interactive input is the selection of a hot spot region within a channel, the resulting action including providing resulting primary content in one of the plurality of primary channels.

44. The method of claim 42 wherein the interactive input is the selection of a channel, the resulting action including providing supplemental content in a supplemental channel within the document.

45. The method of claim 44 wherein the resulting action includes providing a visual highlight to indicate the selection of the selected channel.

46. The method of claim 42 wherein the interactive input includes selecting a mapping object within a map channel, the resulting action including providing resulting primary content in one of the plurality of primary channels.

47. The method of claim 42 wherein the interactive input includes providing annotation content at a user selected time during playback into an annotation enabled channel, the resulting action including saving the annotation as part of the primary content associated with the annotation enabled channel.

48. A method for authoring a digital document comprising:

configuring a multi-channel layout for the document;

receiving channel content; and

configuring document settings.

49. The method of claim 48 wherein configuring a multi-channel layout includes:

receiving input from a user selecting a one of a plurality of pre-configured multi-channel layouts.

50. The method of claim 48 wherein receiving channel content includes:

configuring the document to receive channel content from a specified location over a network.

51. The method of claim 48 wherein receiving channel content includes:

configuring the document to receive channel content from a specified URL location.

52. The method of claim 48 wherein receiving channel content includes:

receiving channel content for a first channel

determining the type of the channel content; and

configuring the first channel to present the type of content.

53. The method of claim 52 wherein the type of content is one of text, audio, video, web page and image.

54. The method of claim 48 wherein configuring document settings includes:

configuring a background audio channel, the background audio channel providing background audio throughout playback of the document

55. The method of claim 54 wherein providing background audio throughout playback includes:

providing background audio throughout playback of the document independent of user interaction with the document.

56. The method of claim 54 wherein providing background audio throughout playback includes:

determining if an event occurs that triggers audio to be presented in a content channel or supplementary channel; and

reducing a level of the background audio if audio is to be presented in a content channel or supplementary channel.

57. The method of claim 48 wherein configuring a document setting includes:

configuring a timer, the timer configured to;

begin counting a period of time upon the occurrence of a first event;

trigger the occurrence of a second event upon the expiration of the period of time.

58. The method of claim 57 wherein the first event is configured to be an event initiated by a user.

59. The method of claim 58 wherein the first event is configured to be an automatically occurring event.

60. The method of claim 48 wherein configuring a document setting includes:

configuring a plurality of scenes, wherein a first scene is associated with a first primary content to display in the multichannel layout, a second scene is associated with a second primary content to display in the multichannel layout, the first primary content and the second primary content not displayed simultaneously.

61. The method of claim 48 further including:

configuring a channel setting for a channel of the document.

62. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring narration data for a channel, the narration data including narration content associated with a user selected time during channel content playback.

63. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring narration data for a channel, the narration data including narration content associated with a user selected event that occurs during channel content playback.

64. The method of claim 62 wherein narration data is entered directly into the document.

65. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring looping data for a channel, the looping data including a start loop time, end loop time, and a target time.

66. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring one of the plurality of channels to be a map channel.

67. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring a channel not configured as a map channel to contain mapping data, the mapping data including a location data and a time data, the mapping data used to configure a mapping object associated with the map channel.

68. The method of claim 67 wherein the mapping object is configured to trigger an action upon being selected by a user.

69. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes configuring a hot spot, the hot spot associated with hot spot data that includes dimensional data representing a region within the channel and a corresponding action, the action triggered during document playback upon user selection of the region within the channel.

70. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes enabling a channel to accept user annotation content during document playback.

71. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes:

configuring channel content to be pre-loaded into memory before document playback.

72. The method of claim 61 wherein configuring a channel setting includes:

configuring channel content to be loaded from a data stream as requested by the document during document playback.

73. A method for storing data for a digital document having multiple channels, the method comprising:

saving a file configured with the data for the digital document, the data including;

multi-channel layout data;

channel content data;

document settings data; and

channel settings data

74. The method of claim 73 wherein saving the file includes:

saving the file in read-only format, the read-only format preventing the user from changing, adding, or removing data in the digital document.

75. The method of claim 73 wherein saving the file includes:

saving the file in an annotation format, the annotation format allowing a user to add data to the digital document but preventing the user from overwriting or erasing existing data in the digital document.

76. The method of claim 73 wherein saving the file includes:

saving the file a read/write format, the read/write format allowing a user to add or delete data in the digital document.