HIERARCHICAL AND REDUCED INDEX STRUCTURES FOR MULTIMEDIA FILES

• US 20090132599A1
• Filed: 11/17/2008
• Published: 05/21/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 11/16/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sonic IP Incorporated (Endeavor Group Holdings Inc.)
• Original Assignee: DivX, LLC (f/k/a DivX CF Holdings LLC) (FIG LLC (d/b/a Fortress Investment Group LLC))
• Inventors: Braness, Jason, Soroushian, Kourosh, Osborne, Roland, Priyadarshi, Shaiwal
• Granted Patent: US 8,233,768 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2228 Indexing structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/40 of multimedia data, e.g. slideshows comprising image and additional audio data retrieval of still image data G06F16/50; retrieval of audio data G06F16/60; retrieval of video data G06F16/70
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/41 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/71 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/745 the internal structure of a single video sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/10 Indexing; Addressing; Timing or synchronising; Measuring tape travel

Abstract

Playback and distribution systems and methods for multimedia files are provided. The multimedia files are encoded with indexes associated with the content data of the multimedia files. Through the use of the indexes, playback of the content is enhanced without significantly increasing the file size of the multimedia file.

Claims

1. A method of playing back content by a playback device stored in a media file, the method comprising:

providing a media file to a playback device, the media file having content data, cue data and a hierarchical index, the content data having a plurality of media frames, the cue data being associated with each frame of the plurality of frames and the hierarchical index being associated with a subset of the cue data;

decoding the content data by a playback device;

displaying content on a display screen from the decoded content data;

receiving a user request;

locating the index based on the user request; and

decoding one or more media frames from the subset of the cue data based on the located index.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the index has reference values that point directly to particular media frames of the plurality of media frames.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the hierarchical index includes pointers to the cue data within the media file and further comprising accessing the cue data through the pointers to locate a frame to be decoded.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the hierarchical index is associated with a subset of the plurality of media frames through a second hierarchical index and further comprising locating a subset of the second hierarchical index based on the hierarchical index relative to the user request.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein decoding one or more media frames from the subset of the plurality of media frames is based on the located subset of the second hierarchical index.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the media file has an upper hierarchical index associated with the hierarchical index and the hierarchical index associated with one or more media frames from the subset of the plurality of media frames and wherein the upper hierarchical index has a greater number of associations with one or more media frames than the hierarchical index.

7. A method of encoding a media file for playing back by a playback device, comprising:

incorporating seek locations with content data, the content data having audio, video and subtitle tracks, the seek locations identifying particular timestamps for particular frames within the audio, video or subtitle tracks;

incorporating an index referencing the incorporated seek locations; and

creating a media file having the content data, the incorporated seek locations, and the incorporated index.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein incorporating the index further comprises interleaving an index between audio and video tracks.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the index points only to key frames within the audio, video or subtitle tracks.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the index contains locations and timestamps to key frames.

11. A system for playback of a media file, comprising:

a media server configured to transmit a media file having at least one index having pointers that reference at least one frame of media content within the media file; and

a client processor in network communication with the media server and configured to send requests for the media file to the media server, the media server configured to transmit the media file requested, the client processor comprises a playback engine configured to locate a pointer from the at least one index to locate and decode the portions of the media file based on the located pointer to comply with user playback instructions.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein the at least one index contains pointers to key frames only.

13. The system of claim 11 wherein the at least one index contains pointers to another index that contains pointers that reference at least one frame of media content within the media file.

14. The system of claim 11 wherein the at least one index comprises a plurality of pointers, each pointer referencing a frame of media content and the plurality of pointers in its entirety referencing each frame of media content.

15. The system of claim 11 wherein the at least one index comprises a coarse index having pointers referencing frames of media content and a fine index having pointers referencing frame of the media content, the fine index having more pointers than the coarse index.

16. The system of claim 11 wherein the at least one index comprises a reduced index having pointers only to access frames of the media content.

17. A method of decoding a multimedia file having an index included with the multimedia file, the method comprising:

locating an index within a multimedia file, the index having a plurality of index data-points and the multimedia file having a plurality of frames and a plurality of cue data-points having a time stamp and a location of a specific frame of the plurality of frames;

loading the located index into storage;

locating an index data-point from the plurality of index data-points based on a timestamp; and

locating a cue data-point from the plurality of cue-data points based on the located index data-point.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising displaying a video frame on a display screen, the displayed video frame being a frame that corresponds to a frame referenced in the located cue data-point.

19. The method of claim 18 further comprising playing audio through a speaker system in a synchronized manner relative to the displayed frame and the played audio being based on audio information that corresponds to a beginning of audio data for the displayed frame.

20. The method of claim 18 further comprising displaying subtitles in a synchronized manner relative to the displayed frame and the displayed subtitles being based on subtitle information that corresponds to subtitle data for the displayed frame.

21. The method of claim 18 further comprising displaying metadata information relative to the displayed frame and the displayed metadata information being based on metadata information that corresponds to metadata data for the displayed frame.

22. The method of claim 17 further comprising locating a cluster referenced by the located cue data-point.

23. The method of claim 19 further comprising locating a block within the located cluster and referenced by the located cue data-point.