User interface for creating, viewing and temporally positioning annotations for media content

• US 6,956,593 B1
• Filed: 09/15/1999
• Issued: 10/18/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 09/15/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Gupta, Anoop, Bargeron, David M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Luu, Sy D.
• Application Number:
  US09/396,706
• Time in Patent Office: 2,225 Days
• Field of Search: 345/704, 345719-723, 345/733, 345751-753, 345/760, 345/968, 707101-102, 707/3, 707/500.1, 707/501.1, 709204-205
• US Class Current: 715/751
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/4393 Multimedia presentations, e.g. slide shows, multimedia albums
• 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: G06F 16/748 Hypervideo linking data to content, e.g. by linking an URL to a video object in the context of video distribution systems H04N21/858
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7867 using information manually generated, e.g. tags, keywords, comments, title and artist information, manually generated time, location and usage information, user ratings
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/12 Use of codes for handling textual entities
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/169 Annotation, e.g. comment data or footnotes

Abstract

In a networked client/server system, media content as well as annotations corresponding to the media content can be transmitted from a server(s) to a client. A user interface is presented to the user to facilitate creating new annotations and viewing annotations. According to one embodiment, the client further assists the user in identifying a temporal range of the media content to which the new annotation is to correspond.

Claims

1. A networked client/server system, comprising:

a network annotation server;

a network media server;

a client that communicates with both the annotation server and the media server over a data communications network;

multimedia content available from the media server;

a plurality of annotations, corresponding to the multimedia content, available from the annotation server, each of the plurality of annotations including annotation content and a temporal range identifier that identifies a segment of the multimedia content to which the annotation corresponds; and

wherein the client supports a graphical user interface that presents a plurality of annotation identifiers corresponding to the multimedia content and that enables a user to request selected ones of the plurality of annotations, based on the plurality of annotation identifiers, and to render the requested annotations.

2. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the graphical user interface further includes a plurality of user-configurable buttons, whereupon selection of one of the plurality of user-configurable buttons a user-defined action corresponding to the selected button is taken.

3. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein each annotation identifier of the plurality of annotation identifiers comprises an annotation subject line of an annotation corresponding to the multimedia content.

4. A graphical user interface for adding annotations to an annotation database from a network client, the graphical user interface comprising:

an annotation content field via which a user can enter content for a new annotation to the network client; and

an annotation type selector presenting a plurality of annotation media types, whereupon selection of one of the plurality of annotation types causes the network client to change presentation of the annotation content field based on the selected annotation type.

5. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, wherein the plurality of annotation types include a text option, an audio option, and a uniform resource locator (URL) option.

6. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, wherein the annotation content field comprises a uniform resource locator (URL) field when an URL type is selected.

7. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, wherein the annotation content field comprises a text entry field when a text type is selected.

8. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, wherein the annotation content field comprises, when an audio type is selected, a plurality of audio controls including one or more of:

record, stop, pause, play, fast forward, and rewind.

9. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, wherein the plurality of annotation type selector comprises a radio button for each of the plurality of annotation types.

10. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, further comprising an email field to identify a recipient to receive an email notification of the new annotation.

11. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, further comprising an add button, whereupon selection of the add button causes the network client to forward the content from the annotation content field to an annotation server to be added to an annotation database.

12. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, further comprising temporal range information identifying a segment of media content to which the annotation corresponds.

13. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 4, further comprising an input option that allows the user adding the new annotation to remain anonymous.

14. A graphical user interface at a network client to search for annotations corresponding to media content in an annotation database, the graphical user interface comprising:

an annotation set selector via which a user can identify one or more of a plurality of annotation sets to be searched;

a search criteria portion via which a user can identify search criteria; and

a query button, wherein actuation of the query button causes the network client to forward identifiers of the identified one or more annotation sets and the identified search criteria to an annotation server to search the annotation database.

15. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 14, wherein the search criteria portion includes an annotation creation date entry field.

16. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 14, further comprising a detail level selector via which a user can indicate an amount of data to be displayed for each annotation that matches the search criteria.

17. A graphical user interface at a network client to search for annotations corresponding to media content in an annotation database, the graphical user interface comprising:

an annotation set selector via which a user can identify one or more of a plurality of annotation sets to be searched;

a search criteria portion via which a user can identify search criteria;

a target check box, whereupon selection of the target check box causes the network client to add, as an additional search criteria, a media content identifier; and

a query button, wherein actuation of the query button causes the network client to forward the identified one or more annotation sets and the identified search criteria to an annotation server to search the annotation database.

18. A graphical user interface for viewing, at a network client, annotations corresponding to media content, the graphical user interface comprising:

an annotation identifier list via which an identifier for each of a plurality of annotations corresponding to the media content is displayed, the identifier including an indication of a type of content included in the annotation;

an actuation mechanism to enable a user to select one of the annotation identifiers, wherein selection of one of the annotation identifiers causes the network client to highlight the annotation identifier.

19. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 18, wherein the type of content includes one or more of:

audio content, text content, video content, and uniform resource locator (URL) content.

20. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 18, wherein the identifier for an annotation includes one or more of:

an indication of an author of the annotation, an indication of an annotation set that the annotation belongs to, an indication of a date the annotation was created, and a summary of the annotation.

21. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 18, further comprising a mechanism to identify a particular identifier that corresponds to an annotation of the plurality of annotations with a temporal range having a beginning time closest to a current presentation time of the media content.

22. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 21, wherein the mechanism comprises an arrow.

23. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 18, further comprising a preview portion via which annotation content for a selected one of the plurality of annotations is displayed.

24. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 18, further comprising a menu including a plurality of options identifying criteria to be used to order the annotation identifiers in the annotation identifier portion, whereupon selection of one of the plurality of options by a user causes the network client to arrange the annotation identifiers in the annotation identifier list in accordance with the criteria of the selected option.

25. A graphical user interface presented by an interface module, the graphical user interface comprising:

an annotation content portion via which annotations corresponding to video content are presented to a user;

an annotation identifier portion that identifies a plurality of annotations corresponding to the video content, wherein the annotation identifier portion identifies each of the plurality of annotations by an annotation subject line; and

an input button, wherein user selection of the input button causes the interface module to create a new annotation.

26. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 25, wherein the annotation identifier portion further includes a visual identification of a current one or more annotations of the plurality of annotations that are temporally closest to a current playback position of the video content.

27. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 25, further comprising a plurality of user-configurable buttons, whereupon selection of one of the plurality of user-configurable buttons a user-defined action corresponding to the selected button is taken.

28. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 25, further comprising a media portion via which video content is displayed to a user.

29. A graphical user interface as recited in claim 25, wherein the interface module creates the new annotation by forwarding content for the new annotation to an annotation server.

30. A method comprising:

presenting a user interface at a client computer the user interface enabling a user to add a new annotation corresponding to media content;

receiving a user request to add the new annotation;

forwarding information for the new annotation to an annotation server, the information including data associated with the user interface;

analyzing at least a portion of the media content to identify a likely temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with; and

presenting the likely temporal location to the user via the user interface.

31. A method as recited in claim 30, wherein the data associated with the user interface comprises an annotation set identifier.

32. One or more computer-readable memories containing a computer program that is executable by a processor to perform the method recited in claim 30.

33. A method comprising:

presenting a user interface at a client computer, the user interface enabling a user to add a new annotation corresponding to media content;

receiving a user request to add the new annotation;

analyzing at least a portion of the media content to identify a likely temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with; and

presenting the likely temporal location to the user via the user interface.

34. A method as recited in claim 33, wherein the likely temporal location comprises a likely beginning temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with.

35. A method as recited in claim 33, further comprising:

receiving an acceptance or rejection of the likely temporal location from the user via the user interface;

using, in response to receiving an acceptance from the user, the likely temporal location as the temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with; and

analyzing, in response to receiving a rejection from the user, at least another portion of the media content to identify another likely temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with, and presenting the other likely temporal location to the user via the user interface.

36. A method as recited in claim 35, wherein the portion of the media content and the other portion of the media content are two different portions of the media content.

37. A method as recited in claim 33, further comprising using the likely temporal location as the temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with.

38. A method as recited in claim 33, wherein the presenting comprises displaying a video frame of the media content corresponding to the likely temporal location.

39. A method as recited in claim 33, wherein the presenting comprises displaying a presentation time of the media content that corresponds to the likely temporal location.

40. A method as recited in claim 33, wherein the analyzing comprises analyzing audio content.

41. A method as recited in claim 33 wherein the analyzing comprises analyzing video content.

42. One or more computer-readable memories containing a computer program that is executable by a processor to perform the method recited in claim 33.

43. A method comprising:

presenting a graphical user interface at a client computer, the graphical user interface enabling a user to add a new annotation corresponding to media content;

receiving a user request to add the new annotation;

presenting, to the user via the graphical user interface, a plurality of likely temporal locations of the media content to associate the new annotation with; and

receiving a user selection of one of the plurality of likely temporal locations to be the temporal location of the media content to associate the new annotation with.

44. A method as recited in claim 43, wherein the presenting the plurality of likely temporal locations comprises identifying a different one of the plurality of likely temporal locations to the user each time the user actuates a rewind button of the user interface.

45. A method as recited in claim 43, wherein the presenting comprises, for each of the plurality of likely temporal locations, displaying a visual indication of the likely temporal location.

46. A method as recited in claim 45, wherein the visual indication includes one or more of a video frame of the media content, a numerical presentation time of the media content, and an indicator on a graphical time bar.

47. One or more computer-readable memories containing a computer program that is executable by a processor to perform the method recited in claim 43.

48. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon a computer program that, when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to perform functions including:

presenting a graphical user interface at a client computer, the graphical user interface enabling a user to add a new annotation corresponding to media content;

receiving a user request to add the new annotation;

identifying a user request time that is a time, with reference to the presentation time of the media content, that the user request is received; and

selecting, based on the user request time, a presentation time of the media content to associate the new annotation with, wherein the presentation time is a different time than the user request time.

49. One or more computer-readable media as recited in claim 48, wherein the selecting comprises selecting a begin time and an end time of the media content to define a segment of the media content to associate the new annotation with, and wherein the begin time is prior to the user request time and the end time is subsequent to the user request time.

50. One or more computer readable media having stored thereon a plurality of instructions that, when executed by a processor, causes the processor to:

present a plurality of annotation identifiers corresponding to multimedia content that enable a user to request selected ones of the plurality of annotations, based on the plurality of annotation identifiers, each of the plurality of annotations including annotation content and a temporal range identifier that identifies a segment of the multimedia content to which the annotation corresponds, and each of the plurality of annotations being available from an annotation server; and

render the requested annotations.