Non-realtime data transcoding of multimedia content

• US 7,924,913 B2
• Filed: 09/15/2005
• Issued: 04/12/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 09/15/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Sullivan, Gary J., Onders, Timothy E.
• Primary Examiner(s): Lu; Tom Y
• Assistant Examiner(s): Conway; Thomas A
• Application Number:
  US11/227,467
• Publication Number:
  US 20070061490A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,035 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 375/240
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/36 Monitoring, i.e. supervising the progress of recording or reproducing for digital recording G11B20/00 and s.gr.; for monitoring, testing or measuring of TV recorders of the type covered by H04N5/76 and subgroups, see H04N17/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1101 Session protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/70 Media network packetisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/765 intermediate
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/80 Responding to QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/04 Protocols for data compression, e.g. ROHC
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/40 using video transcoding, i.e. partial or full decoding of a coded input stream followed by re-encoding of the decoded output stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2662 Controlling the complexity of the video stream, e.g. by scaling the resolution or bitrate of the video stream based on the client capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4402 involving reformatting operations of video signals for household redistribution, storage or real-time display details of conversion of video standards at pixel level H04N7/01; video transcoding H04N19/40; adapting incoming signals to the display format of the display terminal G09G5/005; media handling at the source in data packet switching networks H04L65/764
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4424 Monitoring of the internal components or processes of the client device, e.g. CPU or memory load, processing speed, timer, counter or percentage of the hard disk space used error monitoring in general G06F11/30; arrangements for monitoring conditions of receiving stations in broadcast systems H04H60/32; diagnosis, testing or measuring for television receivers H04N17/04

Abstract

Described herein are technologies directed towards non-realtime transcoding (e.g., compressing) a formatted multimedia datastream and doing so without consuming additional storage space or without making the data unavailable during the process.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a multimedia datastream capturer to acquire and store a formatted multimedia datastream in a computer-readable storage media;

a transcoder to transcode the formatted multimedia datastream into a transcoded multimedia datastream following the storage of the formatted multimedia datastream in the computer-readable storage media;

a multimedia player to at least playback a portion of the formatted multimedia data stream and a portion of the transcoded multimedia datastream during transcoding; and

a buffer to store at least one frame of the portion of the formatted multimedia data stream around a playback transition point between the portion of the formatted multimedia data stream and the portion of the transcoded multimedia datastream,

wherein the multimedia player is to further playback the at least one frame in the portion of the formatted multimedia datastream in place of at least one corresponding frame in the portion of the transcoded multimedia data stream at the playback transition point.

2. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the transcoding performed by the transcoder is characterized by compressing the formatted multimedia datastream.

3. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the transcoding performed by the transcoder is characterized by changing the format of the formatted multimedia datastream.

4. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the transcoder is to initiate its transcoding while the system is idle or otherwise has low performance demands.

5. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the transcoder is to transcode the formatted multimedia datastream without using additional storage space than used by the formatted multimedia datastream when stored before transcoding.

6. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the formatted multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the remaining IDUs in the datastream.

7. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein:

the formatted multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the other IDUs in the datastream;

the transcoding performed by the transcoder is characterized by transcoding each IDU one at a time, until all of the IDUs of the datastream are transcoded.

8. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein:

the formatted multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the remaining IDUs in the datastream;

the transcoding performed by the transcoder is characterized by;

transcoding each IDU one at a time, until all of the IDUs of the datastream are transcoded; and

replacing each IDU with its corresponding transcoded IDU.

9. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the formatted multimedia datastream is selected from a group consisting of digital multimedia files, digital audio files, and digital video files.

10. A system as recited in claim 1, wherein the formatted multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the remaining IDUs in the datastream and wherein the multimedia player is further to decode multiple differing formats of IDUs of the formatted multimedia datastream and play back the datastream with the decoded IDUs.

11. A system as recited in claim 10, wherein the differing formats of IDUs of the datastream differ in how each IDU of a particular format is compressed from how other IDUs of other formats are compressed.

12. One or more computer-readable memory having computer-executable instructions that, when executed by a computer, perform operations comprising:

acquiring a formatted multimedia datastream;

storing the formatted multimedia datastream on a computer-readable storage medium;

transcoding at least a portion of the formatted multimedia datastream into a portion of transcoded multimedia datastream following the storing of the formatted multimedia datastream;

buffering at least one frame of the formatted multimedia datastream at a transition point between the formatted multimedia datastream and the transcoded multimedia datastream; and

presenting the at least one frame of the formatted multimedia data stream in place of at least one corresponding frame of the transcoded multimedia datastream when a datastream playback switches from the formatted multimedia stream to the transcoded multimedia datastream at the transition point.

13. One or more computer-readable memory of claim 12, wherein the datastream playback begins during the transcoding of the multimedia datastream.

14. One or more computer-readable memory of claim 12, wherein the transcoding operation includes replacing each individually decodable unit (IDU) in the stored multimedia datastream with a corresponding transcoded IDU.

15. One or more computer-readable memory of claim 12, wherein:

the multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the other IDUs in the datastream; and

the transcoding operation is characterized by transcoding one or more individual IDUs so that the transcoding of any particular IDU does not affect playability of the other IDUs in the datastream.

16. One or more computer-readable memory of claim 12, wherein:

the multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the other IDUs in the datastream; and

the transcoding operation is characterized by replacing one or more individual IDUs with its corresponding transcoded IDUs.

17. One or more computer-readable memory of claim 12, wherein the multimedia datastream is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the remaining IDUs in the datastream and wherein the datastream has IDUs of differing formats, the operations further comprise decoding the multiple differing formats of the IDUs before performing the playing operation.

18. A method comprising:

acquiring a formatted multimedia datastream that is partitioned into a sequence of individually decodable units (IDUs), wherein a change in one IDU in the datastream does not affect usability of the other IDUs in the datastream;

storing each of the IDUs into a corresponding data sector of a computer-readable storage medium, each data sector having a pointer to a downstream data sector;

transcoding an IDU of the stored multimedia datastream into a corresponding transcoded IDU that is stored in a new data sector, wherein the corresponding transcoded IDU has a format that differs from a format of the IDU;

changing a pointer of a data sector that stores a preceding transcoded IDU to the corresponding transcoded IDU to point to the new data sector and changing a pointer of the new data sector to point to a data sector storing a subsequent IDU to the IDU; and

playing the preceding transcoded IDU, the corresponding transcoded IDU, and the subsequent IDU in sequence using pointers in the corresponding data sectors.

19. A method as recited in claim 18, wherein the playing includes compensating for a momentary glitch between the corresponding transcoded IDU and the subsequent IDU.

20. A method as recited in claim 18, wherein the playing includes momentarily holding a presentation of the corresponding transcoded IDU for a transition between the corresponding transcoded IDU and the subsequent IDU.