Database navigation system for a home entertainment system

• US 5,995,155 A
• Filed: 06/27/1997
• Issued: 11/30/1999
• Est. Priority Date: 07/17/1995
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Gateway Incorporated (Acer, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Gateway 2000, Inc. (Acer, Inc.)
• Inventors: Zyzda, David W., Schindler, Jeffrey
• Primary Examiner(s): LEE, MICHAEL
• Application Number:
  US08/883,816
• Time in Patent Office: 886 Days
• Field of Search: 348/552, 348/468, 348/473, 348/476, 348/478, 348/569, 348/570, 348/731, 348/732, 348/734, 348/906, 348/461, 348/465, 348/6, 348/410, 348/1, 348/5, 348/7, 348/13, 348/12, 395/600, 455/18, 360/14.1
• US Class Current: 348/461
• 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 21/4143 embedded in a Personal Computer [PC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42203 sound input device, e.g. microphone
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42204 User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor constructive details of casings for the remote control device H01H9/0235; user interfaces for controlling a tuning device of a television receiver through a remote control H03J9/00; remote control of peripheral devices connected to a television receiver through the remote control device of the television receiver H04B1/205
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42222 Additional components integrated in the remote control device, e.g. timer, speaker, sensors for detecting position, direction or movement of the remote control, microphone or battery charging device
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42224 Touch pad or touch panel provided on the remote control
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4312 involving specific graphical features, e.g. screen layout, special fonts or colors, blinking icons, highlights or animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4334 Recording operations recording of a television signal H04N5/76; arrangements for recording or accumulating broadcast information or broadcast-related information H04H60/27
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/435 Processing of additional data, e.g. decrypting of additional data, reconstructing software from modules extracted from the transport stream
• 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 21/4394 involving operations for analysing the audio stream, e.g. detecting features or characteristics in audio streams arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of audio in broadcast systems H04H60/58
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/440236 by media transcoding, e.g. video is transformed into a slideshow of still pictures, audio is converted into text
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4438 Window management, e.g. event handling following interaction with the user interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47214 for content reservation or setting reminders; for requesting event notification, e.g. of sport results or stock market stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; notification of incoming messages in packet switching networks H04L51/224
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/478 Supplemental services, e.g. displaying phone caller identification, shopping application
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4828 for searching program descriptors retrieval of video data G06F16/739
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/485 End-user interface for client configuration
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4884 for displaying subtitles
• 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 5/765 : Interface circuits between an apparatus for recording and another apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 : Query processing, i.e. searching

Abstract

An entertainment system has a personal computer as the heart of the system with a large screen VGA quality monitor as the display of choice. The system has digital satellite broadcast reception, decompression and display capability with multiple radio frequency remote control devices which transmit self identifying signals and have power adjustment capabilities. These capabilities are used to provide context sensitive groups of keys which may be defined to affect only selected applications running in a windowing environment. In addition, the remote control devices combine television and VCR controls with standard personal computer keyboard controls. A keyboard remote also integrates a touchpad which is food contamination resistant and may also be used for user verification. Included in the system is the ability to recognize verbal communications in video signals and maintain a database of such text which is searchable to help identify desired programming in real time.

Claims

1. A personal computer based entertainment system, comprising:

a receiver for receiving video signals and separating textual information from said video signals wherein the textual information comprises program information identifying future video signals to be received, said textual information having a start time component;

a personal computer coupled to said receiver for storing the textual information;

a clock coupled to the personal computer for maintaining a current time;

a memory coupled to the personal computer;

a query generator for generating standard database queries to search the stored textual information; and

a search engine for searching the stored textual information in accordance with the query and retrieving text that matches the query for presentation of program information identifying future video signals to a user;

whereby the future video signals are stored into the memory starting when the current time equals the start time.

2. The entertainment system of claim 1 wherein the personal computer stores a predetermined amount of textual information as received from said video signals in a fifo buffer, and stores new information over the oldest information such that a user may query the stored textual information for video programming related to a current event.

3. The entertainment system of claim 1 wherein the textual information comprises closed caption text.

4. The entertainment system of claim 1 wherein the textual information comprises program information contained in the vertical blanking interval of the video information.

7. The personal computer based entertainment system of claim 1, wherein the standard database queries comprise queries selected from the group consisting of:

proximity searches, queries by example, and wildcard letters.

8. The personal computer based entertainment system of claim 1, wherein the query generator comprises a keyboard operatively coupled to the personal computer.

5. A personal computer based entertainment system for presenting video programming information to a user, comprising:

a displays;

a receiver for receiving video signals and separating textual information from said video signals wherein the textual information comprises program information identifying future video programming information to be received;

a personal computer having a processor, a main memory, a bus, and a secondary storage device, coupled to said receiver and the display for storing the textual information in at least one of the main memory and secondary storage device;

a query generator for generating standard database queries to search the stored textual information for future video programming;

a search engine for searching the stored textual information in accordance with the query and retrieving text that matches the query for presentation to a user; and

a record controller that records future video programming matching the query.

6. The personal computer based entertainment system of claim 5 wherein the record controller is responsive to a generated query to record each episode of a series of programs having identifying programming information matching a query only once.