Method and system to generate and deliver auto-assembled presentations based on queries of multimedia collections

• US 7,836,110 B1
• Filed: 06/28/2005
• Issued: 11/16/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/28/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Medius Inc
• Original Assignee: Medius Inc
• Inventors: Schoenbach, David, Leddy, Richard
• Primary Examiner(s): Jalil, Neveen Abel
• Assistant Examiner(s): BUCKINGHAM, KELLYE DEE
• Application Number:
  US11/168,955
• Time in Patent Office: 1,967 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/829
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/41 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/4393 Multimedia presentations, e.g. slide shows, multimedia albums
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/48 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking

Abstract

A media query system interprets one or more requests for at least one of media or templates in a framework template based on a user query input, executes one or more search queries based on the one or more requests for media or templates to locate and download candidates comprised of at least one of candidate media elements or candidate template elements, and evaluates the candidates for each of the one or more search queries to select winning media candidates comprised of selected candidate media elements and candidate template elements.

Claims

1. A method for generating a media presentation file containing composite media for display, the method comprising:

generating a hierarchy of templates by at least one parent template receiving at least one child template comprised of a candidate template element received based upon a request and a search query for candidate template elements;

interpreting one or more requests for at least one of media or templates in a framework template based on a user query input, wherein the framework template is comprised of the hierarchy of templates, wherein each template is comprised of corresponding slots for at least one of the candidate media elements and candidate template elements;

executing one or more search queries based on the one or more requests for media or templates to locate and download candidates comprised of at least one of candidate media elements or candidate template elements;

evaluating the candidates received from each of the one or more search queries to select winning media candidates comprised of selected candidate media elements and candidate template elements using design rules to change evaluation parameters associated with the candidates; and

generating a media presentation file based on the defined presentation of composite media.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising generating additional candidates for evaluation by appending one or more operations to one or more of the downloaded candidates.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising changing an evaluation parameter associated with a candidate media element or a candidate template element based on the corresponding appended operation.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the evaluation parameters comprise at least one of a statistical weight, previous use statistics, user ratings, candidate supplier rankings, or developer rankings.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining an order of slot population and slot candidate evaluation within the framework template by using a prioritization algorithm.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the presentation is a time based presentation comprising synchronizing the winning media candidates comprised of at least one or more of static media elements or dynamic media elements.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein prior to evaluating:

receiving and processing the user query input to determine a key term and one or more associated terms, wherein the key term is a query string and the one or more associated terms comprise taxonomic hierarchal relationship nodes related to the key term.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising determining additional associated terms for each node of the taxonomic hierarchal relationship by processing each node'"'"'s associated term.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the key term and associated terms, and the additional associated terms are assigned to variables found within a request.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the evaluating the presentation media to select winning media candidates further comprises using design rules to select one or more candidate template elements as winning media candidates based on a context of at least one of the key term or the one more associated terms.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the selected one or more candidate template elements affect at least one of layout, functionality, duration, or size of the presentation of composite media.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the executing one or more search queries based on the one or more requests for media or templates is further based on interpreting one or more request rules.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the request rule modifies the one or more search queries based on design rules associated with a specific framework template.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising communicating the media presentation file to a user on a client machine.

15. A media query server for automatically generating a presentation of composite media, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory coupled to the processor, the memory to store instructions which when executed by the processor cause the media query server to

generate a hierarchy of templates by at least one parent template receiving at least one child template comprised of a candidate template element received based upon a request and a search query for candidate template elements,

interpret one or more requests for at least one of media or templates in a framework template based on a user query input, wherein the framework template is comprised of the hierarchy of templates, wherein each template is comprised of corresponding slots for at least one of the candidate media elements and candidate template elements,

execute one or more search queries based on the one or more requests for media or templates to locate and download candidates comprised of at least one of candidate media elements or candidate template elements,

evaluate candidates received from each of the one or more search queries to select winning media candidates comprised of selected candidate media elements and candidate template elements using an agenda manager, using design rules to change evaluation parameters associated with the candidates, and

generate a presentation using the selected winning media candidates using a presentation generation module.

16. The media query server of claim 15, wherein prior to the media query server to interpret, the instructions when executed by the processor to cause the media query server to receive and process the user query input to determine a key term and one or more associated terms, wherein the key term is a query string and the one or more associated terms comprise taxonomic hierarchal relationship nodes related to the key term.

17. The media query server of claim 15, wherein the instructions when executed by the processor further cause the media query server to generate additional candidates for evaluation by appending one or more operations to one or more of the downloaded candidates.