Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Remote data accessing
Patent
1998-04-20
2000-10-03
Flynn, Nathan
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Remote data accessing
348 7, 348 12, G06F 1516, H04N 710
Patent
active
061286508
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to a system for serving video and/or audio data, such as a video-on-demand system.
DESCRIPTION OF THE RELATED ART
Conventional cable tv systems deliver video data from a distribution company through a cable to a number of monitors of viewers. Although nowadays many programs are distributed through many channels by each cable tv company, the user or viewer has to wait until the desired program is started and transmitted through a selected channel.
Recently, also interactive video systems have been proposed. in such interactive video system a viewer can chose a desired movie to be displayed on a monitor. In such video-on-demand system a direct connection to the monitor or end device of a user is established, whereafter a demanded movie can be viewed by the end user.
In this known system it is however virtually impossible to upscale the system after it has been established e.g. at a distribution company. When the number of members for such a system increases ad the number of demanded videos is increased, a new interactive video system has to be built.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a system for serving video and/or audio data, comprising: for storing the video data; for displaying video data from the storage medium unit; managing means receive demand data representing an information of video data selected by the viewer and a demanded play mode, and output distribution control data including channel information of the selected video data, the play mode thereof and routing information to the end device; end devices and the managing means to each other and for routing the video data from the first and second storage medium unit and to distribution control data from the managing means; devices which require a first play mode in a first category and the control of the managing means, wherein said first storage medium unit is assigned to the remaining end device which requires a second play mode in the second category and the control of the managing means, the distribution control data so that the first storage medium unit output the selected video data with routing information to the switching means; and the distribution control data so that the second storage medium unit outputs the selected video data and selected play mode with routing information to the switching means.
The system according to the present invention allows video cassette recorder (VCR) function, such as still mode, fast forward mode etc.
Preferably the routing means comprise at least one ATM switch. The basics and standards of ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) are laid down in recommendations I.150 and I.327 as published on March 1993 by the International Telecommunication Union. ATM is generally used for addressing a specific packet-oriented transfer mode which uses asynchronous time division multiplexing techniques. The multiplexed information flow is organized into blocks of fixed size called cells. A cell consists of an information field and a header. The primary role of the header is to identify cells belonging to the same virtual channel within the asynchronous time division multiplex.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Further details, features and advantages of the present invention will be described in the following referring to the next drawings with shell diagrammatic representations of embodiments of the present invention, and wherein
FIGS. 1, 1A, 1B and 1C are a representation of an entire system for information on demand;
FIGS. 2, 2A, 2B are a representation of a first embodiment of a storage medium unit;
FIGS. 3, 3A, 3B are a representation of a second embodiment of a storage medium unit;
FIGS. 4, 4A, 4B are a schematic representation of control and data flow in the storage medium unit shown in FIG. 2 and 3;
FIGS. 5, 5A, 5B are a representation of a third embodiment of a storage medium unit;
FIGS. 6, 6A, 6B are a representation of a storage medium unit corresponding to the storage medium unit shown in FIG. 2, with a resulting flow of d
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De Vos Johan
Goguey Pascal
Bui Kieu-Oanh
Flynn Nathan
Frommer William S.
Sony Europa B.V.
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