Content Interruptions

• US 20110219258A1
• Filed: 03/04/2010
• Published: 09/08/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/04/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Williams, Chad Michael, Cooper, Paul R., Van der Staay, Matt Henry
• Granted Patent: US 9,223,643 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 714/2
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/07 Responding to the occurrence of a fault, e.g. fault tolerance
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 15/16 Combinations of two or more digital computers each having at least an arithmetic unit, a program unit and a register, e.g. for a simultaneous processing of several programs coordinating program control therefor G06F9/52; in regulating and control system G05B
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4147 PVR [Personal Video Recorder] H04N5/76 takes precedence ; arrangements for broadcast with accumulation-type receivers H04H20/40
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4334 Recording operations recording of a television signal H04N5/76; arrangements for recording or accumulating broadcast information or broadcast-related information H04H60/27
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4425 Monitoring of client processing errors or hardware failure
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/76 Television signal recording
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/765 Interface circuits between an apparatus for recording and another apparatus

Abstract

Techniques that address content interruptions are described. In an implementation, an interruption is detected at the client device in receipt of a stream of content from a distribution system that is to be recorded locally in memory at the client device. A stream of content is generated at the client device and the generated stream of content is recorded to fill the interruption in the stream of content from the distribution system in the memory of the client device.

Claims

1. A method implemented by one or more modules of a client device, the method comprising:

detecting an interruption at the client device during receipt of a stream of content from a distribution system that is to be recorded locally in memory at the client device;

generating a stream of content at the client device; and

recording the generated stream of content to fill the interruption in the stream of content from the distribution system in the memory of the client device.

2. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the recording of the generated stream of content is performed in conjunction with the stream of content from the distribution system to form an uninterrupted stream of content recorded to the memory of the client device.

3. A method as described in claim 2, wherein the uninterrupted stream of content is configured in accordance with one or more MPEG2 transport stream protocols.

4. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the generating utilizes content that is pre-cached in the memory of the client device.

5. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the generating includes generating PAT/PMT values for the generated stream of content at the client device.

6. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the generating includes generating program clock reference (PCR) values for the generated stream of content at the client device.

7. A method as described in claim 1, further comprising inserting a flag to indicate that the recordation of the content streamed from the distribution system includes an interruption.

8. A method as described in claim 7, wherein the flag is configured to cause output of a notification of existence of the interruption at an approximate beginning of an output of the content.

9. A method as described in claim 8, wherein the notification includes an option to delete the recordation.

10. A method as described in claim 8, wherein the notification describes an amount of time of the interruption occurred or where in the recordation of the content from the distribution system the interruption is located.

11. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the generated stream of content includes an error message.

12. A method as described in claim 11, wherein the error message describes a likely cause of the interruption.

13. A client device comprising one or more modules implemented at least in part by hardware and configured to:

identify an error condition that exists with respect to reception of a stream of content from a distribution system at the client device;

select from content that is stored locally at the client device that corresponds to the identified error condition; and

stream the selected content in place of the stream of content from the distribution system until the error condition is resolved.

14. A client device as described in claim 13, wherein the error condition includes an interruption in reception of the stream of content from the distribution system at the client device.

15. A client device as described in claim 13, further comprising configuring one or more program clock reference (PCR) values in the selected content to build an audio/visual timeline that is compatible with a timeline of the stream of content from the distribution system.

16. One or more computer-readable media comprising instructions that are stored thereon that, responsive to execution by a client device, cause the client device to perform operations comprising:

responsive to a request to output content that was recorded locally at the client device, determining that an interruption occurred in the streaming of the content to the client device; and

outputting a notification of the existence of the interruption in the recording of the content.

17. One or more computer-readable media as described in claim 16, wherein the determining is performed by detecting a flag in the content.

18. One or more computer-readable media as described in claim 16, wherein the streaming is performed from a distribution system that is remote to the client device and assessable via a network.

19. One or more computer-readable media as described in claim 16, wherein the outputting of the notification is performed before outputting the content.

20. One or more computer-readable media as described in claim 16, wherein the notification describes a likely cause of the interruption and an amount of time consumed by the interruption.