Method and apparatus for providing and receiving user interface

• US 9,084,020 B2
• Filed: 04/15/2009
• Issued: 07/14/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 04/17/2008
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: Park, Kyung-mo, Ryu, Young-sun, Cho, Seong-ho, Park, Ho-yeon
• Primary Examiner(s): Hussain, Imad
• Application Number:
  US12/423,992
• Publication Number:
  US 20090265422A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,281 Days
• Field of Search: 709/227, 709/203, 715/234, 715/762, 725/37, 345/204, 345/853, 345/744, 370/254, 717/106, 714/38, 714/742, 710/8
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/957 Browsing optimisation, e.g. caching or content distillation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/452 Remote windowing, e.g. X-Window System, desktop virtualisation protocols for virtual reality H04L67/131
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23412 for generating or manipulating the scene composition of objects, e.g. MPEG-4 objects
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/41265 having a remote control device for bidirectional communication between the remote control device and client device unidirectional remote control device H04N21/42204
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/43615 Interfacing a Home Network, e.g. for connecting the client to a plurality of peripherals home Audio Video Interoperability [HAVI] data switching networks H04L12/2805
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44012 involving rendering scenes according to scene graphs, e.g. MPEG-4 scene graphs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4431 characterized by the use of Application Program Interface [API] libraries
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/478 Supplemental services, e.g. displaying phone caller identification, shopping application

Abstract

In a method of providing/receiving a user interface between a user interface client and a user interface server, when the user interface server encodes information on a plurality of user interface scenes in a multimedia data format and transmits the encoded information to the user interface client. The user interface client receives and reproduces the multimedia data so that a user interface may be displayed to which a variety of effect are applied considering individual characteristics of the user interface client such as performance of the user interface client and user preference.

Claims

1. A method of providing a user interface to a plurality of user interface clients from a user interface server, the method comprising:

encoding information on a plurality of user interface scenes in a multimedia data format;

forming a package comprising the encoded plurality of user interface scenes; and

transmitting the package to one or more user interface clients of the plurality of user interface clients,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities corresponding to at least one of the clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein encoding the information in the multimedia data format uses a scene description method of MPEG.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the encoding information on a plurality of user interface scenes comprises encoding the information on the at least one of the user interface scenes to display a user interface according to the at least one of the user interface clients.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein encoding the information on the plurality of user interface scenes further comprises:

encoding presentation information to present the objects included in the user interface scene in a scene; and

encoding function information on functions called to process the events.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein encoding the presentation information comprises encoding at least one or more of:

information on description of a structure of the scene, information on description of a method of presenting the objects, or information needed to dynamically configure the scene.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein encoding the information on description of a structure of the scene comprises encoding at least one or more of layout, form, template, positions of the objects, or presentation time of each object forming the scene.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein encoding the information on description of a method of presenting the objects comprises encoding at least one or more of type of media or a presentation method of the media to present each of the objects.

8. The method of claim 5, wherein encoding the information to dynamically configure the scene comprises encoding at least one or more of hardware source of the user interface client, preference, or network environment.

9. The method of claim 4, wherein encoding the event information further comprises encoding at least one or more of information on description of events generated by the objects and information on description of a method of processing the events.

10. The method of claim 4, wherein encoding the function information comprises encoding at least one or more of information on description of operations of device APIs to process the events or information on calling of the device APIs to process the events.

11. The method of claim 2, further comprising receiving a control signal transmitted by at least one of the plurality of user interface clients based on the transmitted multimedia data and performing a control operation according to the received control signal.

12. A non-transitory computer readable recording medium recording a program controlling a computer for executing the method of claim 1.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the transmitting the package comprises sequentially transmitting a plurality of user interface elements.

14. A method of receiving a user interface from a user interface server in a user interface client, the method comprising:

receiving a package comprising a plurality of user interface scenes encoded in a multimedia data format and decoding the multimedia data; and

displaying the plurality of user interface scenes by reproducing the decoded multimedia data,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the plurality of user interface scenes encoded in a multimedia data format are encoded using a scene description method of MPEG.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein information on the encoded plurality of user interface scenes comprises information to display a user interface according to the at least one of the user interface clients.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein information on the encoded plurality of user interface scene further comprises:

presentation information to present the objects included in the user interface scene in a scene; and

function information on functions called to process the events.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the presentation information comprises at least one or more of information on description of a structure of the scene, information on description of a method of presenting the objects, or information needed to dynamically configure the scene.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the information on description of a structure of the scene comprises at least one or more of layout, form, template, positions of the objects, or presentation time of each object forming the scene.

20. The method of claim 18, wherein the information on description of a method of presenting the objects comprises at least one or more of type of media or a presentation method of the media to present each of the objects.

21. The method of claim 18, wherein the information to dynamically configure the scene comprises at least one or more of hardware source of the user interface client, preference, or network environment.

22. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

displaying one of the plurality of user interface scenes based on the information needed to dynamically configure the scene; and

transmitting a predetermined control signal to the user interface server according to the selection of a user based on the displayed user interface.

23. The method of claim 17, wherein the event information comprises at least one or more of information on description of events generated by the objects and information on description of a method of processing the events.

24. The method of claim 17, wherein the function information comprises at least one or more of information on description of operations of device APIs to process the events or information on calling of the device APIs to process the events.

25. A non-transitory computer readable recording medium recording a program controlling a computer for executing the method of claim 14.

26. The method of claim 14, wherein the receiving the package comprises sequentially receiving a plurality of user interface elements.

27. A user interface server for providing a user interface to a plurality of user interface clients, the user interface server comprising:

an encoding unit to form a package comprising a plurality of user interface scenes and to encode information on the plurality of user interface scenes in a multimedia data format using at least one processor; and

a transmission unit to transmit the multimedia data to one or more user interface clients of the plurality of user interface clients,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

28. The user interface server of claim 27, wherein the multimedia data format comprises a scene description method of MPEG.

29. The user interface server of claim 28, wherein the information on at least one of the plurality of user interface scenes is to display a user interface according to the at least one of the user interface clients.

30. The user interface server of claim 27, further comprising a control performing unit to receive a control signal transmitted by the user interface client based on the transmitted multimedia data and to perform a control operation according to the received control signal.

31. The user interface server of claim 27, wherein the transmission unit sequentially transmits a plurality of user interface elements.

32. A user interface client for receiving a user interface from a user interface server, the user interface client comprising:

a decoding unit to receive a package comprising a plurality of user interface scenes encoded in a multimedia data format and to decode the multimedia data using at least one processor; and

a reproduction unit to display the plurality of user interface scenes by reproducing the decoded multimedia data,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of one or more user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

33. The user interface client of claim 32, wherein the format of the multimedia data is a multimedia data format comprising a scene description method of MPEG.

34. The user interface client of claim 33, wherein the encoded information on the at least one of the plurality of user interface scenes is to display a user interface according to the at least one of the user interface clients.

35. The user interface client of claim 32, wherein the decoding unit sequentially receives a plurality of user interface elements.

36. The user interface client of claim 32, wherein the user interface client selects a scene from the plurality of user interface scenes included in the package which corresponds to the capabilities of the user interface client, and displays the selected user interface scene.

37. The user interface client of claim 32, further comprising a control performing unit to display one of the plurality of user interface scenes based on information to dynamically configure the user interface scene and to transmit a predetermined control signal to the user interface server according to the selection of a user based on the displayed user interface.

38. A method of providing a user interface to a user interface client from a user interface server, the method comprising:

encoding a plurality of user interface scenes in a multimedia data format;

forming a package comprising the encoded plurality of user interface scenes; and

transmitting the package to the user interface client,

wherein the multimedia data includes information on a protocol of a control message transmitted to the user interface server when the user interface client performs a control operation according to the user interface,

wherein least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

39. The method of claim 38, wherein the multimedia data format comprises a scene description method of MPEG.

40. The method of claim 39, wherein the user interface is a widget.

41. A non-transitory computer readable recording medium recording a program controlling a computer for executing the method of claim 38.

42. The method of claim 38, wherein the transmitting the package comprises sequentially transmitting a plurality of user interface elements.

43. A method of receiving a user interface from a user interface server in a user interface client, the method comprising:

receiving a package comprising a plurality of user interface scenes encoded in a multimedia data format, and decoding the multimedia data;

receiving information on a content provided to a user via the plurality of user interface scenes;

generating a first user interface from at least one of the plurality of user interface scenes received in the package; and

generating a second user interface by coupling the first user interface and the information on the content,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

44. The method of claim 43, wherein the format of the multimedia data is a multimedia data format comprising a scene description method of MPEG.

45. The method of claim 44, wherein the first and second user interfaces are widgets.

46. A non-transitory computer readable recording medium recording a program controlling a computer for executing the method of claim 43.

47. The method of claim 43, wherein the receiving the package comprises sequentially receiving a plurality of user interface elements.

48. A user interface server providing a user interface to a user interface client, the user interface server comprising:

a user interface generation unit to generate the user interface using at least one processor;

a user interface encoding unit to encode a plurality of user interface scenes in a multimedia data format and to form a package comprising the encoded plurality of user interface scenes; and

a user interface providing unit to transmit the package to the user interface client,

wherein the multimedia data includes information on a protocol of a control message transmitted to the user interface server when the user interface client performs a control operation according to the user interface,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from the package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein the package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

49. The user interface server of claim 48, wherein the multimedia data format comprises a scene description method of MPEG and the user interface is a widget.

50. The user interface server of claim 48, wherein the user interface providing unit sequentially transmits a plurality of user interface elements.

51. A user interface client receiving a user interface from a user interface server, the user interface client comprising:

a user interface decoding unit to receive a plurality of packages comprising a plurality of user interface scenes encoded in a multimedia data format, and to decode the plurality of packages, using at least one processor, wherein a first user interface is generated as a result of the decoding; and

a user interface coupling unit to generate a second user interface by coupling the first user interface and information on a content provided to a user,

wherein at least one of the user interface scenes from at least one package include information about capabilities of at least one of the user interface clients,

wherein at least one package further comprises event information on events generated by objects included in a user interface scene, and wherein the event information comprises information on mapping between the events and device API (application programming interface) to process the events.

52. The user interface client of claim 51, wherein the multimedia data format is obtained by using a scene description method of MPEG and the first and second user interfaces are widgets.

53. The user interface client of claim 51, wherein the user interface decoding unit sequentially receives a plurality of user interface elements.