×

System and method for time synchronization between multimedia content and segment metadata

  • US 7,428,696 B2
  • Filed: 06/30/2004
  • Issued: 09/23/2008
  • Est. Priority Date: 06/30/2003
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
Patent Images

1. A time synchronization system, comprising:

  • a content processor receiving and storing multimedia content containing first segment time information as received content;

    a metadata processor receiving and storing segment metadata for the received content containing second segment time information as received metadata;

    a synchronizer extracting the first segment time information from the received content and the second segment time information from the received metadata in response to a content segment request signal of a user as first extracted segment time information and as second extracted segment time information, determining a first reference time point and a second reference time point from the first and the second extracted segment time information, respectively, correcting a relative time point of the received content using a difference between the first and the second reference time points as a corrected relative time point, and synchronizing the received content and metadata using the corrected relative time point; and

    a content segment browser for forwarding the content segment request signal to the synchronizer and reproducing a plurality of segments of the received content synchronized by the synchronizer,wherein the first segment time information comprises a first Global Positioning System (GPS) time information and a first decoding time stamp (DTS) time information, the second segment time information comprises a second GPS time information and a second DTS time information, and the first and the second reference time points are the first and the second DTS time information, respectively, and wherein;

    if the first GPS time information of the received content is ahead of the second GPS time information of the received metadata,the synchronizer causes a difference between the first and the second DTS time information (Δ

    TDTS) to be changed to Δ

    TDTS

    233 as a new Δ

    TDTS when the Δ

    TDTS>

    0 or the Δ

    TDTS to remain unchanged when the Δ

    TDTS<

    0 and then corrects the relative time point of the received content by adding an absolute value of the Δ

    TDTS to a relative time value in the received metadata, where the Δ

    TDTS is a value obtained by subtracting the second DTS time information of the received metadata from the first DTS time information of the received content;

    orif the first GPS time information of the received content is behind the second GPS time information of the received metadata,the synchronizer causes the Δ

    TDTS to be changed to Δ

    TDTS+233 as the new Δ

    TDTS when the Δ

    TDTS<

    0 or the Δ

    TDTS to remain unchanged when the Δ

    TDTS>

    0 and then corrects the relative time point of the received content by subtracting an absolute value of the Δ

    TDTS from the relative time value in the received metadata, where the Δ

    TDTS is a value obtained by subtracting the second DTS time information value of the received metadata from the first DTS time information value of the received content.

View all claims
  • 1 Assignment
Timeline View
Assignment View
    ×
    ×