Rewind and fast-forward for enhanced television

• US 6,847,779 B2
• Filed: 03/24/2001
• Issued: 01/25/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 03/24/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Pietraszak, Michael E.
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, HUY THANH
• Application Number:
  US09/681,355
• Publication Number:
  US 20020136530A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,403 Days
• Field of Search: 386/68, 386/80, 386/81, 386/95, 386/98, 386/111, 386/112, 386/125, 386/126, 386/70
• US Class Current: 386/346
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/783 Adaptations for reproducing at a rate different from the recording rate
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 9/8045 using predictive coding

Abstract

Fast-forwarding and rewinding within a compressed video stream and a corresponding content stream of pages are disclosed. The compressed video stream is made up of intra frames, predictive frames, and bi-directional frames. The content stream has a number of trigger pages and/or script pages. An intra frame is skipped to within the video stream, and the trigger page closest to this frame is skipped to within the content stream. Alternatively, the script page closest to the frame that is not further ahead of it is skipped to within the content stream. This page is executed until the content stream is aligned with the video stream.

Claims

1. A method operable on a compressed video stream having a number of intra frames, a number of predictive frames, and a number of bi-directional frames, and on a content stream of pages corresponding to the video stream and having at least a number of trigger pages, the method comprising:

skipping within the video stream from a current frame of the video stream to an intra frame; and

,

skipping within the content stream to a trigger page closest to the intra frame.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the intra frame is a previous intra frame.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

skipping back within the video stream to a further previous intra frame; and

,

skipping back within the content stream to a trigger page closest to the further previous intra frame.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising playing the video stream and the content stream as skipped back to.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the intra frame is a subsequent intra frame.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising:

skipping forward within the video stream to a further subsequent intra frame; and

,

skipping forward within the content stream to a trigger page closest to the further subsequent intra frame.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising playing the video stream and the content stream as skipped forward to.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising playing the video stream and the content stream as skipped to.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is performed by execution of a computer program stored on a machine-readable medium by a processor.

10. A method operable on a compressed video stream having a number of intra frames, a number of predictive frames, and a number of bi-directional frames, and on a content stream of pages corresponding to the video stream and having at least a number of script pages, the method comprising:

skipping within the video stream from a current frame of the video stream to an intra frame;

skipping within the content stream to a script page closest to the intra frame that is no further ahead than the intra frame; and

,

executing the script page until the content stream is aligned with the video stream.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the script page is a time-based script page.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page with a new clock faster than a standard clock.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page such that delays within the time-based script page are eliminated.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the intra frame is a previous intra frame.

15. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

skipping back within the video stream to a further previous intra frame;

skipping back within the content stream to a script page closest to the further previous intra frame that is no further ahead than the further previous intra frame; and

,

executing the script page until the content stream is aligned with the video stream.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising playing back the video stream and the content stream as skipped back to.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein the script page is a time-based script page, and executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page with a new clock faster than a standard clock.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the script page is a time-based script page, and executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page such that delays within the time-based script page are eliminated.

19. The method of claim 10, wherein the intra frame is a subsequent intra frame.

20. The method of claim 19, further comprising:

skipping forward within the video stream to a further subsequent intra frame;

skipping forward within the video stream to a script page closest to the further subsequent intra frame that is no further ahead than the further subsequent intra frame; and

,

executing the script page until the content stream is aligned with the video stream.

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising playing back the video stream and the content stream as skipped forward to.

22. The method of claim 20, wherein the script page is a time-based script page, and executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page with a new clock faster than a standard clock.

23. The method of claim 20, wherein the script page is a time-based script page, and executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page such that delays within the time-based script page are eliminated.

24. The method of claim 10, further comprising playing the video stream and the content stream as skipped to.

25. The method of claim 10, wherein the method is performed by execution of a computer program stored on a machine-readable medium by a processor.

26. A method operable on a compressed video stream having a number of intra frames, a number of predictive frames, and a number of bi-directional frames, and on a content stream of pages corresponding to the video stream and having a number of trigger pages and a number of script pages, the method comprising:

skipping within the video stream from a current frame of the video stream to an intra frame; and

,

skipping within the content stream to one of a trigger page and a script page closest to the intra frame.

27. The method of claim 26, wherein skipping within the content stream comprises skipping to the trigger page.

28. The method of claim 26, wherein skipping within the content stream comprises skipping to the script page, and the method further comprises executing the script page until the content stream is aligned with the video stream.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein the script-page is a time-based script page.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page with a new clock faster than a standard clock.

31. The method of claim 29, wherein executing the script page comprises executing the time-based script page such that delays within the time-based script page are eliminated.

32. The method of claim 26, wherein the intra frame is a previous intra frame.

33. The method of claim 26, wherein the intra frame is a subsequent intra frame.

34. The method of claim 26, further comprising playing the video stream and the content stream as skipped to.

35. The method of claim 26, wherein the method is performed by execution of a computer program stored on a machine-readable medium by a processor.