Transmission announcement system and method for announcing upcoming data transmissions over a broadcast network

• US 6,628,625 B1
• Filed: 07/19/2000
• Issued: 09/30/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 06/09/1997
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Moran, Brian, Byrne, David S., Birdwell, Kenneth J., Witty, Carl R., Sargent, James Randall
• Primary Examiner(s): Kizou, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Elallam, Ahmed
• Application Number:
  US09/620,173
• Time in Patent Office: 1,168 Days
• Field of Search: 370/270, 370/312, 370/345, 370/431, 370/432, 370/442, 370/498, 386/35, 709/229, 709/203, 709/230, 709/231, 709/232, 340/825.22, 348/729
• US Class Current: 370/270
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/18 for broadcast or conference , e.g. multicast
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1813 for computer conferences, e.g. chat rooms instant messaging H04L51/04; protocols for multimedia communication H04L65/1101; arrangements for multi-party communication H04L65/403; telephonic conference arrangements H04M3/56; television conference systems H04N7/15
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1818 Conference organisation arrangements, e.g. handling schedules, setting up parameters needed by nodes to attend a conference, booking network resources, notifying involved parties
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/189 in combination with wireless systems selective distribution or broadcast in wireless communication networks H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/611 for multicast or broadcast systems for broadcast or conference H04L12/18; arrangements for broadcast or distribution combined with broadcast H04H20/00; arrangements for broadcast applications with a direct linkage to broadcast information or to broadcast space-time H04H60/00; selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS], H04W4/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 Push-based network services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/18 Multiprotocol handlers, e.g. single devices capable of handling multiple protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

In a broadcast system in which computer data and other content are delivered from multiple content servers to multiple clients at least partly over a broadcast network, a transmission announcement system announces upcoming broadcast transmissions and instructs the clients on how to receive the broadcast transmissions. Announcement servers (which may or may not be the same as the content servers which serve the data for the broadcast transmissions) generate announcements containing information specifying how associated upcoming transmissions are to be delivered over the broadcast network. The announcement server makes the announcements available to the clients over the broadcast network or over a secondary link other than the broadcast network. As possible examples of the secondary link, the announcement servers might send the announcements to a multicast address over a public network, such as the Internet, or post the announcements at a publicly accessible site on a data network, such as a Web site on the Internet. The clients receive the announcements via the broadcast network or the secondary link. The clients filter the announcements according to predetermined criteria, keeping the announcements satisfying the criteria and discarding the rest. The client searches the announcements that are kept to extract information pertaining to retrieval of the broadcast transmission (e.g., a broadcast protocol, a broadcast locator, a transmission time, etc.). The client then tunes a broadcast receiver to the broadcast locator and launches a receiving application to receive the transmission according to the broadcast protocol.

Claims

1. A transmission announcement system for announcing upcoming multimedia transmissions to be delivered over a broadcast network, comprising:

a server and a client;

the server being configured to create announcements containing information pertaining to upcoming multimedia transmissions to be delivered over the broadcast network and to make the announcements over a secondary link to the client that is separate from the broadcast network; and

the client being configured to;

(a) automatically receive the announcements from the secondary link; and

(b) responsive to receiving the announcements, automatically filtering the announcements using at least one filter, the filter parsing the announcements to determine whether the announcements match predefined expressions or satisfy a predefined rule.

2. A transmission announcement system as recited in claim 1, wherein the filter is created according to a user profile.

3. A transmission announcement system as recited in claim 1, wherein the filter is automatically created at the client from user behavior patterns.

4. A transmission announcement system as recited in claim 1, wherein the filter is created using parameters selected by a user.

5. A transmission announcement system as recited in claim 1, wherein the announcements comprise information which enable the client to locate corresponding multimedia broadcast transmissions.

6. A transmission announcement system as recited in claim 1, wherein the multimedia transmissions are broadcast over the broadcast network according to the information contained in the announcements, the client being configured to receive the multimedia transmission from the broadcast network using the information contained in the announcements.

7. In a system having a broadcast network over which data transmissions served by a server are broadcast to multiple clients, each client and server having a computer-readable medium, the computer-readable media on the server and at least one client having computer-executable instructions for performing steps comprising:

generating announcements, at the server, containing information specifying how associated upcoming transmissions are to be delivered over the broadcast network, the announcements being made available to the clients via means other than the broadcast network;

automatically creating a filter by calling an application program interface (API);

responsive to automatically receiving the announcements;

automatically filtering, at the client, the announcements received from the server using the filter; and

automatically preparing the client to receive at least one of the transmissions based on the announcements.

8. Computer-readable media having computer-executable instructions as recited in claim 7, further comprising computer-executable instructions to create the announcements to include a broadcast protocol specifying a data format in which associated multimedia transmissions are to be broadcast.

9. A system as recited in claim 7, wherein the announcements are made available to the clients over the Internet.

10. A system as recited in claim 7, wherein the announcements are made available to the client via a Web site on the Internet.

11. A system as recited in claim 7, wherein filtering the announcement is performed using Regular Expression Parsing.

12. A method for announcing delivery of upcoming multimedia data transmissions over a broadcast network, comprising the following steps:

posting announcements to a Web site on a data network, the announcements containing information pertaining to the upcoming multimedia data transmissions;

automatically receiving the announcements; and

responsive to receiving the announcements;

automatically filtering each announcement;

automatically preparing to receive at least one of the upcoming multimedia data transmissions from the broadcast network based upon the information contained in an announcement that survives the filtering; and

wherein

at least one posted announcement can be received over a secondary link separate from the broadcast network.

13. A method as recited in claim 12, further comprising the following steps:

automatically creating an announcement filter based upon user behavior patterns; and

filtering the announcements using the announcement filter.

14. A method as recited in claim 12, further comprising the following steps:

creating an announcement filter using parameters entered by a user; and

filtering the announcements using the announcement filter.

15. A method as recited in claim 12, wherein the step of preparing comprises the step of launching a software application to receive said at least one transmission from the broadcast network.

16. A method as recited in claim 12, further comprising the step of transmitting said at least one transmission over the broadcast network and receiving said at least one transmission from the broadcast network.

17. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing the steps of the method as recited in claim 12.

18. A computer programmed to perform the steps of the method as recited in claim 12.

19. A method as recited in claim 12, wherein each announcement is automatically filtered using Regular Expression Parsing.

20. A method for announcing delivery of upcoming multimedia data transmissions over a broadcast network, comprising the following steps:

forming, at a server, announcements comprising information pertaining to upcoming data transmissions, the information including a broadcast protocol for broadcasting the transmissions;

sending the announcements from the server in multicast packets to a predetermined multicast address;

monitoring the multicast address from a client to automatically receive the multicast packets containing the announcements; and

responsive to receiving the announcements, automatically;

filtering the announcements at the client to retain certain announcements that satisfy a list of acceptable transmissions or a set of predefined rules;

searching the certain announcements to extract the broadcast protocol; and

using the broadcast protocol to prepare to receive upcoming transmissions associated with the certain announcements from the broadcast network.

21. A method as recited in claim 20, further comprising the step of automatically defining a filter for use in the filtering step based upon user behavior.

22. A method as recited in claim 20, further comprising the step of defining a filter for use in the filtering step according to parameters entered by a user.

23. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing the steps of the method as recited in claim 20.

24. A computer programmed to perform the steps of the method as recited in claim 20.

25. A method as recited in claim 20, wherein the broadcast protocol comprises a protocol used to format data on a data network.

26. A device comprising:

a first receiver to receive transmissions delivered over a multimedia broadcast network;

a second receiver to automatically receive an announcement from a secondary link that is separate from the broadcast network, the announcement corresponding to an upcoming transmission to be delivered over the broadcast network; and

at least one filter to automatically filter the announcement responsive to reception of the announcement, the filter parsing the announcement to determine whether the announcement matches a predefined expression or satisfies a predefined rule.

27. A device as recited in claim 26, the at least one filter is created according to a user profile.

28. A device as recited in claim 26, wherein the at least one filter is automatically created at the client from user behavior patterns.

29. A device as recited in claim 26, wherein the at least one filter is created using parameters selected by a user.

30. A device as recited in claim 26, wherein the announcement comprises information that enables the client to locate the upcoming transmission.

31. A device as recited in claim 30, wherein the announcement comprises a Universal Resource Locator (URL) that identifies a content server, the URL enabling the client to locate the upcoming transmission.

32. A device as recited in claim 26, wherein the transmission is broadcast over the broadcast network according to a set of information contained in the announcement, the first receiver being configured to receive the upcoming transmission from the broadcast network using the set of information.