JP3953049B2 - Program selection support apparatus and method - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a program selection support apparatus and method for assisting selection of a program to be received or recorded in a home AV device such as a television or a video.

  Conventionally, TV program broadcast schedules (hereinafter referred to as program schedules) have been provided to general viewers as printed matter such as newspapers and magazines. Especially in magazines that are mainly intended to provide program information that is published at regular intervals, such as weekly publications, not only simply publishing the program guides and contents introduced by each broadcasting station, but also categorizing the programs by field in the program guides. It has been convenient for magazine subscribers, that is, TV program viewers, by color-coding and providing a list of programs in a specific field to be broadcast during a specific period.

  There is also a service in the United States that provides program information through personal computer communication and facilitates the retrieval of information provided in magazines and the like by running a dedicated program on the personal computer.

  In CATV, which provides more channels, a service for providing a program guide using a set-top receiver in each home has started.

  On the other hand, in television broadcasting, programs that introduce programs in specific fields (for example, movie programs and sports program introductions) are broadcast.

  Furthermore, in July 1993, the “television television program recording reservation system standard (BTA T-003)” was established in television text multiplex broadcasting (hereinafter referred to as “text broadcasting”). A service that directly distributes to homes is about to start.

Furthermore, data broadcasting using a satellite broadcasting data channel and ISDB service provision are being studied.
JP-A-4-79053

  In recent years, with the spread of satellite broadcasting and CATV, the number of television channels has been increasing, and viewers have increased the selection range of programs that they want to see, but the effort to search for the programs they want to see has increased.

  In newspapers and magazines, there is a limit to the amount of information (number of channels) that can be listed due to space limitations, and the time and effort of searching has increased. In addition, viewers must refer to other media such as newspapers and magazines to watch TV. It obstructs the convenience of use.

  In the program guide by broadcasting, it is not sufficient that information is provided only for some programs and the broadcasting time is limited.

  Since program information is provided by teletext within the scope of current teletext standards, only very simple information such as program start / end times and program names are provided. For this reason, the viewer needs a considerable amount of time to search for a desired program.

  When provision of program information by multiple media starts in the future, different types of information formats and services may be provided in order to bring out their uniqueness. For example, terrestrial broadcasting may provide only program information of each main broadcast by text broadcasting and BS data broadcasting. In this case, it is troublesome to find a program that the viewer wants to watch without distinguishing between the terrestrial and BS programs even though the viewers watch the same television.

  In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention is a program selection support apparatus for assisting program selection, which includes program information input means for inputting program information for a program, and program information storage for storing the input program information. Means for storing one or more words classified into each field for one or more program fields, and the program information stored in the words stored in the classified word storage means Search means for searching for, a determination means for determining a field of the program corresponding to the program information accumulated based on a search result of the search means, a field specifying means for specifying the field of the program, and the specified program Selecting means for selecting program information matching the field of the information based on the determination result of the determining means; and a presentation means for displaying a program name corresponding to the program information selected by the selecting means, Designation means, when the input field specification is omitted, characterized in that the set for each day of the week and time zone default values specified areas.

  The program selection support apparatus of the present invention can support selection of a program to be selected by the viewer by determining the field from words included in the program name and presenting the program by dividing the field.

(Embodiment 1)
FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the first embodiment of the present invention. This will be described below.

  11 is a program information input means for inputting a TV broadcast program guide transmitted as a teletext program by a TV station, 12 is a program information storage means for storing program information of each channel, and 24 is a program in that field for each program field. Classification word storage means for storing a word indicating that the program information is stored, 25 is a word search means for searching for a word from the program name stored in the program information storage means 12, 26 is a field determination means for determining the field of the program, and 28 is a program This is a program guide presenting means for displaying the name and the field of the program.

  The operation of this embodiment will be described below with reference to FIGS.

  The program information input means 11 sequentially selects channels that provide program information by teletext broadcasting, and from the character multiplex broadcasting program that provides TV program information to be transmitted, for each TV program, its broadcast channel, broadcast date, Extract start / end time and program name.

  The program information storage means 12 stores information for each television program extracted by the program information input means, and erases the program information of the television program that has been broadcast. FIG. 3 is a part of an example of program information stored in the program information storage means 12. For example, this first item indicates that “news and commentary” will be broadcast on 2 channels from 2 pm on July 10 to 15 minutes.

  The classification word storage means 24 stores a word indicating that the program is in that field for each program field. FIG. 4 shows an example of words stored in the classified word storage unit 24. For example, the words “soccer” and “J-League” indicate that the program including the word is a sports program.

  The word search means 25 retrieves the words stored in the classified word storage means 24 one by one, and searches the program name column of the program information stored in the program information storage means 12. For example, in the search when the word “soccer” is extracted from the classified word storage unit 24, the third item in FIG. 3 is searched.

  The field determination means 26 determines the field of each program based on the above search results. For example, the program of the third item is hit by searching for the words “soccer”, “J-League” and “Gamba” in the sports field. Therefore, it is determined that the program is in the sports field. However, since the program of the second item does not hit the search at all (assuming that words such as “TV”, “phone”, “consultation” are not stored in the classified word storage means 24), it belongs to any field. Judge that there is no.

  The program guide presenting means 28 displays program information of a specific plurality of channels in a specific time zone as a list. In this display, the sports field program is displayed in light blue and the movie field program is displayed in pink. When watching sports, the program guide presenting means 28 looks for the light blue part and searches for the movie recording by video, so that the viewer can quickly find the desired program by looking for the pink part. I can search.

  There are various realization methods such as displaying the program list displayed by the program guide presenting means 28 on a dedicated display device and superimposing on the TV screen, but they are omitted because they are beyond the scope of the present invention. The method for specifying the channel and time zone to be displayed in the program list is also beyond the scope of the claims of the present invention, and is therefore omitted.

  In addition, when the channel is changed to the program found by the program selection support apparatus of the present invention or when the recording reservation registration of the program is performed, the program selection is performed in addition to the channel selection / recording reservation registration of the television and video by the conventional method. There is a method of setting a switch in the support device so that channel selection / reservation registration can be performed by pressing a switch corresponding to a program to be selected / reserved registration, but this is also beyond the scope of the present invention, so the details are omitted. .

  In the above embodiment, the configuration for extracting program information from a text broadcast has been described. However, a television broadcast / CATV-related service other than the text broadcast, for example, a data broadcast dedicated to program information may be received. In addition, a modem interface is provided to automatically connect to a PC communication host station to acquire program information, such as a configuration for inputting program information online, and an external storage device such as a floppy (R) disk or IC card. The program information can be input by offline input, such as providing program information via this medium, or reading an existing program information magazine by providing an OCR.

  Further, a configuration having input means for two or more program information is also possible. For example, not all channels are broadcasting texts, and even channel information is being broadcast. There is a case where the teletext program that provides the program is not broadcasted. In this case, the program information input from the teletext and the program information input by personal computer communication may be combined. In this way, when program information is input from a plurality of media, even if the format and contents of the information are different from each other, they can be handled uniformly by converting them into the same form in the program information input means.

(Embodiment 2)
Next, a second embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the block diagram of FIG. 5 and FIGS. Description of the program information input means, the program information storage means 12, the classified word storage means 24, the word search means 25, and the field determination means 26 similar to those of the first embodiment is omitted in the configuration and operation of each part of the present embodiment. To do.

  Reference numeral 13 denotes field input means for inputting a field of a program desired to be selected on the television / video recording reservation registration, and 58 is a field-specific presentation means for presenting program information for each field. The operation of this embodiment will be described below.

  The field input means 13 is provided with a remote control device (remote control), and a button corresponding to each field of words stored in the classified word storage means 24 is arranged, and the field is designated by pressing this button. For example, when a channel for broadcasting a sports program is to be selected, the sports button on the remote control is pressed.

  The word search means 25 searches the program name column of the program information stored in the program information storage means 12 with the words stored in the classified word storage means 24 corresponding to the field designated by the field input means 13, and the field determination means 26 Only programs in the field input from the field input means 13 are selected. For example, when the sports button is pressed by the word search means 25, the words “soccer”, “J-league”, “professional baseball” and the like corresponding to the sports in FIG. 5 are searched from the program name column in FIG. When searching for “soccer”, the third item in FIG. 5 is searched. When searching for “J-League”, the same item can be searched, but when searching for “professional baseball”, there is no item searched. There are items that are searched by a plurality of words “soccer”, “J-League”, and “Gamba” in the search of the word search means 25, but the field determination means 26 eliminates this duplication and the same program is searched only once. To.

  The field-specific presentation means 58 presents the searched program. For example, when the sports button is pressed by the word search means 25, the third item in FIG. 3 is presented.

  This embodiment is more effective than the first embodiment when it is desired to select a specific field such as a sports program or a movie. It is also possible to configure so as to have both functions of the present embodiment and the first embodiment. That is, when the field is specified by the field input means 13, the operation described in the present embodiment is performed, and in other cases, the operation described in the second embodiment is performed.

(Embodiment 3)
Next, a third embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the block diagram of FIG. 6, FIG. 3, and FIG.

  Description of the same parts as those in the first to second embodiments is omitted.

  14 is a classification word storage means for storing a word indicating that the program is in that field and its classification weight for each program field, and 15 is a word stored in the classification word storage means 14 and stored in the program information storage means 12. A word search means for searching a program name column of information, a field determination means for determining a program category by obtaining a program classification weight, and a program guide presentation means for displaying a program name and field.

  The operation of this embodiment will be described below.

  FIG. 7 shows an example of the stored contents of the classified word storage means 14. For example, the first item indicates that the word “soccer” is a word indicating a sports field and the classification weight is 100. The larger the classification weight value, the higher the possibility that a program including the word of the item in the program name is a program in the field. That is, the program name including the word “soccer” is more likely to be a sports program than the program name including the word “Gamba”.

  The word search means 15 searches the program name column of the program information stored in the program information storage means 12 with the words stored in the classified word storage means 14. The search results are summarized for each program by the field determination means 16 and the sum of the classification weights for each field is calculated and used as the classification weight for the program.

  The program field is designated by the field input means 13 and displayed on the program guide presenting means 18 in the order of programs having a large classification weight in this field.

  Although the category determination means 16 calculates the classification weight of the program, the sum of the classification weights of the words included in the program name is calculated, but the present invention is not limited to this. In the above method, a program name with a longer program name includes more words and the program classification weight tends to be larger. To correct this, for example, the maximum value of the word classification weight is set as the program classification weight. However, the correction method is not limited to this.

  Note that the input of the field in the field input means 13 is omitted, the program is colored according to the classification weight for each field, and the program of this embodiment is the same as the program guide presenting means 28 of the first embodiment. You may comprise so that it may display on the table | surface presentation means 18. FIG. For example, a program with a sports category weight of 200 or more is displayed in blue and a program with a weight less than 200 is displayed in light blue, a program with a movie category weight of 200 or more is red, and a program with a weight less than 200 is more than pink. Is displayed. In this case, when recording reservation registration of a sports program is performed, first, a desired program is searched by paying attention to a blue portion, and when a desired program is not found, a light blue portion is searched. In addition, means for changing the color-coding threshold can be provided.

  If the field input by the field input means 13 is omitted, a default field may be provided for each day of the week / time period and the field may be input. For example, if the default field is set to sports during the daytime on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and movies after 11:00 pm on all days, the field input means 13 can be used to make a recording reservation for J-League soccer or late-night movies. Can be omitted. In addition, in the apparatus incorporating the apparatus of the present invention in a television receiver or video, the field of the program in which the channel is matched or the program in which the reserved recording is performed is automatically collected, and the most frequently viewed / reserved recording is performed for each day / time. It is also possible to set the field in which the process is performed as the default field.

(Embodiment 4)
Next, a fourth embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the block diagram of FIG. 1 and FIGS. 3, 7, and 8. FIG. Description of the same parts as those of the third embodiment is omitted.

  Reference numeral 17 denotes classification weight updating means for decomposing this program name into words for a program whose classification weight obtained by the field determination means 16 is a predetermined value or more, and for each word, only that word. If a program name that does not contain the program name is found, the classification weight of the program is obtained and the one minute (the value rounded off to one hundredth) is stored in the classification word storage means 14 as the classification weight. In addition, if the word is not stored, it is additionally stored.

  For example, the sports classification of the program of the third item in FIG. 3 will be described in detail. The classification words of the sports field included in this program are “soccer”, “J-League” and “Gamba” from FIG. 7, and the classification weights are 100, 90 and 60, respectively. It becomes. First, the classification weight of the program name “J League“ Gamba x Jubilo ”” that does not include only this word for “soccer” is 150, and 1/100 of this (rounded to the nearest decimal place) is the word “soccer”. In addition to the classification weight 100, the classification weight is 102. As for the word “Jubilo”, the classification weight of the program name “Soccer J League“ Gamba × ”” not including only this word is 250, and this one-third is added to the classification word storage means 14 as the classification weight of the word “Jubilo”. Remember. The same operation is performed for other words. The stored contents of the classified word storage means 14 when these operations are completed are as shown in FIG.

  Here, the classification word storage unit 14 may be updated at regular intervals, for example, for one day at a time in the middle of the night. Further, the classification word storage means 14 may not be updated by classification weighting calculation of all programs, but only the programs for which channel selection / recording reservation has actually been performed may be updated. Further, the classification weight update is not limited to the method described in the above example.

  In addition, when the capacity of the classified word storage means 14 is insufficient, the classification weights may be reduced by the same amount all at once, and words that are 0 or less may be deleted.

  Further, means for inputting the contents of the classified word storage means 14 from the outside can be provided so as to cope with the transition of the word used in the program name, and conversely, means for outputting the contents is also provided in another apparatus of the present invention. By inputting, the operation of a plurality of devices can be made the same.

  Compared with the third embodiment, this embodiment is updated based not only on pre-registered words but also on the names of programs actually viewed and reserved and recorded, so that it can be expected to improve the performance of program field classification.

  In all the embodiments described above, the field is not limited to general fields such as “sports” and “movies”. For example, fields such as “programs often seen by specific viewers” and fields such as “specific persons” are provided. You can also.

  In addition, when a program whose channel is matched or scheduled recording is input to the apparatus of the fourth embodiment and the classification weight is updated as a program in a field such as “frequently viewed programs”, the viewing / reserved recording is actually often performed. Is displayed on the program guide presenting means 18 as the field of “frequently viewed programs”. This is the one in which the channel selection method according to the invention of Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 7-135621 is applied to the apparatus of the present invention, and the present invention and the invention of the above application can also be realized by the same apparatus.

  The present invention relates to a program selection support apparatus for assisting selection of a program to be received or recorded in a home AV device such as a television or a video.

The block diagram which shows the structure of 4th embodiment of this invention. The block diagram which shows the structure of 1st embodiment of this invention. The figure for demonstrating the content of a program information storage means The figure which shows an example of the memory content of the classification word memory | storage means in 1st and 3rd embodiment The block diagram which shows the structure of 2nd embodiment of this invention. The block diagram which shows the structure of 3rd embodiment of this invention. The figure which shows an example of the memory content of the classification word memory | storage means in 3rd and 4th embodiment The figure for demonstrating operation | movement of the classification | category weight update means in 4th embodiment.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 11 Program information input means 12 Program information storage means 13 Field input means 14, 24 Classification word storage means 15, 25 Word search means 16, 26 Field determination means 17 Classification weight update means 18, 28 Program table presentation means 58 Field presentation means 58

Claims (6)

A program selection support device for assisting selection of a program,
Program information input means for inputting program information for a program;
Program information storage means for storing the input program information;
Classification word storage means for storing one or more words classified into each field for one or more program fields;
Search means for searching for the program information stored with the words stored in the classified word storage means;
Confirming means for confirming the field of the program corresponding to the program information accumulated based on the search result of the search means;
A field specifying means for specifying the field of the program;
Screening means for selecting program information that matches the field of the designated program based on a determination result of the determination means;
Display means for displaying a program name corresponding to the program information selected by the selecting means,
The field selection means, when input of field specification is omitted, sets a default value set for each day of the week / time zone as a specified field. The field specifying means further includes a field log unit for collecting fields corresponding to the selected program based on the channel selection result of the program,
2. The program selection support apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a default field value for each day of the week and time zone set when field designation is omitted is set based on a collection result of the field log unit. Program selection support apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a presenting unit configured to perform in a different display mode for different display of the program name corresponding to the previous SL accumulated program information field of the program. The classified word storage means further has a word classification weight value in the field for words classified in each field,
The determination means further obtains a program classification weight value that is a classification weight value for the program based on a word classification weight value in the field of the word included in the program information of the program,
The display mode of the program name by the presenting means includes a common partial element when the program fields are the same, and also includes a different partial element corresponding to a difference in the program classification weight value. The program selection support apparatus according to claim 1. The presenting means displays the display of the program name corresponding to the stored program information in a similar color display mode if the program fields are the same, and the color shade of the display mode is the program classification weight 5. The program selection support apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the program selection support apparatus differs depending on the value. A program selection support method for a program selection support device for assisting selection of a program, comprising:
A program information input step for inputting program information for the program;
A program information storage step for storing the input program information;
A classified word storage step for storing one or more words classified into each field for one or more program fields;
A search step for searching for the program information accumulated with the words stored in the classified word storage step;
A confirmation step for confirming a field of a program corresponding to the program information accumulated based on the search result of the search step;
A field specifying step for specifying the field of the program;
A selection step for selecting program information that matches the field of the designated program based on a determination result of the determination step;
A display step of displaying a program name corresponding to the program information selected by the selection step,
In the field designation step, when the field designation input is omitted, a default value set for each day of the week / time zone is designated as the designated field.

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