User interface unit for fetching only active regions of a frame

• US 8,669,993 B2
• Filed: 01/11/2010
• Issued: 03/11/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/11/2010
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Bratt, Joseph P., Choo, Shing, Holland, Peter F., Millet, Timothy J.
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, HAU H
• Application Number:
  US12/685,152
• Publication Number:
  US 20110169847A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,520 Days
• Field of Search: 345/545, 345/537, 345/538
• US Class Current: 345/545
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/14 Digital output to display device ; Cooperation and interconnection of the display device with other functional units
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2340/10 Mixing of images, i.e. displayed pixel being the result of an operation, e.g. adding, on the corresponding input pixels
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2360/12 Frame memory handling
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/14 Display of multiple viewports
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/397 Arrangements specially adapted for transferring the contents of two or more bit-mapped memories to the screen simultaneously, e.g. for mixing or overlay G09G5/02 takes precedence

Abstract

A user interface unit in a graphics processing display pipe may include registers programmable with information that defines active regions of an image frame. Pixels within the active regions of the image frame are meant to be displayed, while pixels outside of the active regions of the image frame are not to be displayed. Fetch circuitry within the user interface unit may fetch frames from memory, fetching only the pixels within the active regions of the image frames as defined by the programmed contents of the registers. The user interface unit may then provide the fetched pixels to a blend unit to blend the fetched pixels with pixels from other frames or pixels of a video stream to produce output frames. When blended with pixels of a video stream, the fetched pixels may be displayed as a graphics overlay on top of the video stream.

Claims

1. A user interface unit comprising:

one or more registers programmable to define at least one active region of a frame, wherein pixels within the at least one active region of the frame are to be displayed and pixels outside of the at least one active region of the frame are not to be displayed; and

fetch circuitry configured to fetch a frame from memory, wherein the fetch circuitry is configured to fetch only the pixels within the at least one active region of the frame defined by programmed contents of the one or more registers;

wherein the user interface unit is configured to provide the fetched pixels to a blend unit configured to blend the fetched pixels with pixels from other frames to produce an output frame.

2. The user interface unit as recited in claim 1, further comprising one or more buffers coupled to the fetch circuitry;

wherein the fetch circuitry is further configured to store the fetched pixels in the one or more buffers;

wherein the user interface unit is configured to provide the fetched pixels to the blend unit from the one or more buffers.

3. The user interface unit as recited in claim 1, wherein the fetch circuitry is further configured to fill non-active regions of the frame with pixels identified as being transparent;

wherein the user interface unit is configured to provide the frame comprising the fetched pixels and the pixels identified as being transparent to the blend unit.

4. The interface unit as recited claim 1, wherein the one or more registers are further programmable to define a base address and size of the frame.

5. A display pipe comprising:

a host interface unit configured to interface with system memory;

a plurality of user interface units coupled to the host interface unit and configured to hold frame information defining respective active regions within a plurality of frames, wherein pixels within the respective active regions of the plurality of frames are to be displayed and pixels outside of the respective active regions of the plurality of frames are not to be displayed;

wherein the plurality of user interface units are configured to fetch from the system memory through the host interface unit the pixels within the respective active regions of the plurality of frames as defined by the frame information, for displaying the fetched pixels in corresponding output frames.

6. The display pipe as recited in claim 5, further comprising:

a blend unit coupled to the plurality of user interface units;

wherein the plurality of user interface units are configured to provide the fetched pixels to the blend unit; and

wherein the blend unit is configured to blend the fetched pixels with a video stream to produce the corresponding output frames for display.

7. The display pipe as recited in claim 6, further comprising a video pipe coupled to the host interface unit and to the blend unit, and configured to fetch video information from the system memory through the host interface unit, and produce the video stream from the fetched video information.

8. A method comprising:

defining an active region of a frame, wherein pixels within the defined active region of the frame are to be displayed and pixels outside the defined active region of the frame are not to be displayed;

fetching the frame from system memory, comprising fetching only the pixels within the defined active region of the frame; and

producing an output frame, comprising blending the fetched pixels with pixels from one or more other frames.

9. The method as recited in claim 8, wherein producing the output frame further comprises treating non-active regions of the frame outside the defined active region of the frame as containing pixels having a blending value of zero.

10. The method as recited in claim 8, wherein producing the output frame further comprises filling all non-active regions of the frame outside the defined active region of the frame with pixels having a blending value of zero.

11. The method as recited in claim 8, further comprising:

fetching video information from the system memory;

creating a video stream from the fetched video information;

wherein producing the output frame further comprises blending the fetched pixels with the video stream.

12. The method as recited in claim 11, further comprising displaying the fetched pixels as static overlay atop the video stream.

13. The method as recited in claim 8, further comprising relocating the defined active region within the frame.

14. A method comprising:

writing image information comprising one or more image frames into one or more frame buffers;

writing active region information into one or more registers, wherein the active region information defines active regions of the one or more image frames, wherein pixels within the one or more image frames within the active regions of the one or more image frames are to be displayed, and pixels within the one or more image frames outside the active regions of the one or more image frames are not to be displayed; and

providing the one or more image frames from the frame buffers to a blend circuit, comprising providing only the pixels within the active regions of the one or more image frames as defined by the active region information.

15. The method as recited in claim 14, further comprising producing an output frame, comprising blending the provided pixels with one or more of:

pixels of one or more other image frames;

or

pixels of a video stream.

16. The method as recited in claim 15, further comprising providing the output frame to a display controller for displaying the output frame on a display.

17. The method as recited in claim 14, wherein the frame buffers are comprised in system memory, and the one or more registers are comprised in a display pipe.

18. The method as recited in claim 14, wherein the writing of the active region information and the writing of the image information are performed by software executing on one of:

a processing unit in a system comprising the frame buffers and the one or more registers;

a processing unit in a system coupled to the frame buffers and to the one or more registers;

or

a processing unit in a system comprising the frame buffers and coupled to the one or more registers.

19. A system comprising:

system memory comprising;

at least one frame buffer configured to store image frame information that defines corresponding image frames; and

a video buffer configured to store video frame information defining corresponding video frames;

at least one register configured to store active region information that defines respective active regions of the image frames, wherein pixels within the respective active regions of the image frames are to be displayed and pixels outside of the respective active regions of the image frames are not to be displayed;

a first fetch unit configured to fetch the image frame information from the at least one frame buffer, wherein in fetching the image frame information the first fetch unit is configured to fetch only the image frame information defining the pixels of the image frames within the respective active regions of the image frames, responsive to the active region information stored in the at least one register;

a second fetch unit configure to fetch the video frame information from the video buffer; and

a blend unit configured to blend the fetched image frame information with the fetched video frame information to produce output frames.

20. The system as recited in claim 19, wherein the blend unit further comprises an output buffer configured to provide the output frames to a display at a rate commensurate with a refresh rate of the display.

21. The system as recited in claim 20, wherein the system memory is configured to store programming information executable to perform one or more of:

write the active region information into the at least one register;

write the image frame information into the at least one frame buffer; and

write the video frame information into the at least one video buffer.

22. The system as recited in claim 19, wherein the blend unit is configured to treat the pixels outside of the respective active regions of the image frames as having an alpha value of zero for blending.

23. The system of claim 19, wherein the active region information comprises coordinate information for a pair of pixels, wherein the pair of pixels are situated at diagonally opposite corners of the active region.