Multimedia distribution system

• US 10,032,485 B2
• Filed: 07/22/2016
• Issued: 07/24/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 12/08/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sonic IP Incorporated (Endeavor Group Holdings Inc.)
• Original Assignee: DivX, LLC (f/k/a DivX CF Holdings LLC) (SoftBank Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Ahsan, Abou Ul Aala, Bramwell, Stephen R., Fudge, Brian T.
• Primary Examiner(s): Tran, Thai
• Assistant Examiner(s): Hasan, Syed
• Application Number:
  US15/217,894
• Publication Number:
  US 20170025157A1
• Time in Patent Office: 732 Days
• Field of Search: 37524001, 710 36, 715201, 348564, 707999104, G9B 20009, G9B 27002, G9B 27033, G9B 27043
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/10 Digital recording or reproducing
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/3027 used signal is digitally coded
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/322 used signal is digitally coded
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/107 between spatial and temporal predictive coding, e.g. picture refresh
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/117 Filters, e.g. for pre-processing or post-processing sub-band filter banks H04N19/635
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/126 Details of normalisation or weighting functions, e.g. normalisation matrices or variable uniform quantisers
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/149 by estimating the code amount by means of a model, e.g. mathematical model or statistical model
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/152 by measuring the fullness of the transmission buffer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/154 Measured or subjectively estimated visual quality after decoding, e.g. measurement of distortion use of rate-distortion criteria H04N19/147
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/159 Prediction type, e.g. intra-frame, inter-frame or bidirectional frame prediction
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/176 the region being a block, e.g. a macroblock
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/18 the unit being a set of transform coefficients
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/186 the unit being a colour or a chrominance component
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/192 the adaptation method, adaptation tool or adaptation type being iterative or recursive
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/196 being specially adapted for the computation of encoding parameters, e.g. by averaging previously computed encoding parameters processing of motion vectors H04N19/513
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/198 including smoothing of a sequence of encoding parameters, e.g. by averaging, by choice of the maximum, minimum or median value
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/48 using compressed domain processing techniques other than decoding, e.g. modification of transform coefficients, variable length coding [VLC] data or run-length data motion estimation in a transform domain H04N19/547; processing of decoded motion vectors H04N19/513
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/577 Motion compensation with bidirectional frame interpolation, i.e. using B-pictures
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/61 in combination with predictive coding
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/625 using discrete cosine transform [DCT]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/80 : Details of filtering operations specially adapted for video compression, e.g. for pixel interpolation H04N19/635, H04N19/86 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/85 : using pre-processing or post-processing specially adapted for video compression
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42646 : for reading from or writing on a non-volatile solid state storage medium, e.g. DVD, CD-ROM
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8106 : involving special audio data, e.g. different tracks for different languages
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8133 : specifically related to the content, e.g. biography of the actors in a movie, detailed information about an article seen in a video program
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 : Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8455 : involving pointers to the content, e.g. pointers to the I-frames of the video stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8456 : by decomposing the content in the time domain, e.g. in time segments
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/85406 : involving a specific file format, e.g. MP4 format
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8543 : using a description language, e.g. Multimedia and Hypermedia information coding Expert Group [MHEG], eXtensible Markup Language [XML] information retrieval of semistructured data, the underlying structure being taken into account, e.g. mark-up language structure data G06F16/80
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8586 : by using a URL processing chained hypermedia data for information retrieval G06F16/94; information retrieval from the Internet by using URLs G06F16/955; URL in broadcast information H04H20/93; Web-based protocols H04L67/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/17318 : Direct or substantially direct transmission and handling of requests

Abstract

A multimedia file and methods of generating, distributing and using the multimedia file are described. Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can contain multiple video tracks, multiple audio tracks, multiple subtitle tracks, a complete index that can be used to locate each data chunk in each of these tracks and an abridged index that can enable the location of a subset of the data chunks in each track, data that can be used to generate a menu interface to access the contents of the file and ‘meta data’ concerning the contents of the file. Multimedia files in accordance with several embodiments of the present invention also include references to video tracks, audio tracks, subtitle tracks and ‘meta data’ external to the file. One embodiment of a multimedia file in accordance with the present invention includes a series of encoded video frames, a first index that includes information indicative of the location within the file and characteristics of each encoded video frame and a separate second index that includes information indicative of the location within the file of a subset of the encoded video frames.

Claims

1. An encoder comprising:

a processor; and

a memory including a file containing a sequence of encoded video frames;

wherein the processor is configured to;

generate an abridged index that includes references to a subset of the encoded video frames in the sequence of encoded video frames, the subset including more than one of the encoded video frames, and the references including information indicative of the locations of the subset of encoded video frames within the file; and

encode a multimedia file including the sequence of encoded video frames and the abridged index, such that the abridged index is located prior to the sequence of encoded video frames within the multimedia file.

2. The encoder of claim 1, wherein each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes the sequence number of the encoded video frame.

3. The encoder of claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to include in each reference to an encoded video frame a reference to a location within at least one sound track.

4. The encoder of claim 1, wherein the multimedia file includes multiplexed encoded streams.

5. The encoder of claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to include in each reference to an encoded video frame a reference to a location within at least one subtitle track.

6. A decoder, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory;

wherein the processor is configured to;

request a multimedia file from a server;

download the multimedia file from the server into the memory, wherein the multimedia file includes;

a sequence of encoded video frames; and

an abridged index including references to a subset of the encoded video frames in the sequence of encoded video frames, the subset including more than one of the encoded video frames, and the references including information indicative of the locations of the subset of encoded video frames within the multimedia file, wherein the abridged index is located prior to the sequence of encoded video frames within the multimedia file;

locate a particular encoded video frame within the multimedia file using the abridged index;

decode the particular encoded video frame into a particular decoded video frame; and

display the particular decoded video frame.

7. The decoder of claim 6, wherein:

the multimedia file includes at least one audio track accompanying the sequence of encoded video frames; and

each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one audio track.

8. The decoder of claim 6, wherein the multimedia file includes multiplexed encoded streams.

9. The decoder of claim 6, wherein:

the multimedia file includes at least one subtitle track accompanying the sequence of encoded video frames; and

each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one subtitle track.

10. A decoder, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory;

wherein the processor is configured to;

request at least a first portion of a multimedia file from a server, the first portion containing an abridged index, wherein the multimedia file includes;

a sequence of encoded video frames; and

the abridged index including references to a subset of the encoded video frames in the sequence of encoded video frames, the subset including more than one of the encoded video frames, and the references including information indicative of the locations of the subset of encoded video frames within the multimedia file, wherein the abridged index is located prior to the sequence of encoded video frames within the multimedia file;

download the abridged index from the server into the memory;

locate a particular encoded video frame within the multimedia file using the abridged index; and

request at least a second portion of the multimedia file, the second portion containing the particular encoded video frame.

11. The decoder of claim 10, wherein:

the multimedia file includes at least one audio track accompanying the sequence of encoded video frames; and

each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one audio track.

12. The decoder of claim 10, wherein the multimedia file includes multiplexed encoded streams.

13. The decoder of claim 10, wherein:

the multimedia file includes at least one subtitle track accompanying the sequence of encoded video frames; and

each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one subtitle track.

14. A decoder, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory;

wherein the processor is configured to;

request a multimedia file from a server;

download the multimedia file from the server into the memory, wherein the multimedia file includes;

a sequence of encoded video frames;

an abridged index including references to a subset of the encoded video frames in the sequence of encoded video frames, the subset including more than one of the encoded video frames, and the references including information indicative of the locations of the subset of encoded video frames within the multimedia file, wherein the abridged index is located prior to the sequence of encoded video frames within the multimedia file;

at least one audio track multiplexed with the sequence of encoded video frames, wherein each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one audio track; and

at least one subtitle track multiplexed with the sequence of encoded video frames, wherein each reference to an encoded video frame in the abridged index includes a reference to a portion of the at least one subtitle track;

locate a particular encoded video frame within the multimedia file using the abridged index;

decode the particular encoded video frame into a particular decoded video frame; and

display the particular decoded video frame.