Method and apparatus for grouping content items

• US 20060206495A1
• Filed: 03/29/2004
• Published: 09/14/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/07/2003
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: Jochemsen, Robert, Van Gageldonk, Johan Sebastiaan Henri
• Application Number:
  US10/551,969
• Publication Number:
  US 20060206495A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/48 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/105 of operating discs
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/28 by using information signals recorded by the same method as the main recording G11B27/22 takes precedence

Abstract

The invention relates to a system for grouping content items. A consumer equipment or computer (100) comprises a grouping principle processor (109) that determines a content item grouping principle used by a user to group content items such as music files, video files or email. The content item grouping principle is determined in response to a grouping category scheme, such as a folder structure used to store content items. The apparatus (100) further comprises a classification characteristic processor (113) for determining a classification characteristic of a new content item. For example the classification characteristic may relate to an artist of a music file and the content item grouping principle may comprise a list of folders which comprise music files associated with specific artists. The apparatus (100) additionally comprises a grouping processor (115) for grouping the first content item with other content items by comparing the determined classification characteristic with the information of the content item grouping principle.

Claims

1. A method of grouping content items for at least one user comprising the steps of:

determining (200) a grouping category scheme used by the at least one user in response to a grouping by the at least one user of content items;

determining (201) a content item grouping principle used by the at least one user in response to the grouping by the at least one user of content items and the grouping category scheme;

determining (205) a classification characteristic of a first content item; and

grouping (207, 209) the first content item with other content items in response to the content item grouping principle and the content classification characteristic.

2. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of determining (201) the content item grouping principle comprises determining group content item characteristics and the step of grouping comprises comparing the content classification characteristic with the group content item characteristics.

3. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the classification characteristic comprises meta data associated with the content item.

4. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the classification characteristic is determined in response to a content analysis of the content item.

5. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the classification characteristic comprises a keyword characteristic.

6. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the classification characteristic comprises a classification characteristic determined by a second user.

7. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the first content item is received from a source and the classification characteristic comprises a source characteristic.

8. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the first content item is an email content item.

9. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the first content item is an audio content item.

10. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the first content item is a video content item.

11. A method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the step of grouping (207, 209) further comprises receiving a user input and the grouping of the first content item is further in response to the user input.

12. A method as claimed in claim 1 further comprising the step of updating the content item grouping principle in response to the grouping of the first content item

13. A computer program product for enabling the carrying out of a method according to claim 1.

14. An apparatus (100) for grouping content items for at least one user comprising:

means (108) for determining a grouping category scheme used by the at least one user in response to a grouping by the at least one user of content items;

means (109) for determining a content item grouping principle used by the at least one user in response to the grouping by the at least one user of content items and the grouping category scheme;

means (113) for determining a classification characteristic of a first content item; and

means (115) for grouping the first content item with other content items in response to the content item grouping principle and the content classification characteristic.