Patent Grant
11159746
The present invention relates generally to encoding, transmission and decoding of multimedia files. More specifically, the invention relates to the encoding, transmission and decoding of multimedia files that can include tracks in addition to a single audio track and a single video track.
The development of the internet has prompted the development of file formats for multimedia information to enable standardized generation, distribution and display of the files. Typically, a single multimedia file includes a single video track and a single audio track. When multimedia is written to a high volume and physically transportable medium, such as a CD-R, multiple files can be used to provide a number of video tracks, audio tracks and subtitle tracks. Additional files can be provided containing information that can be used to generate an interactive menu.
Embodiments of the present invention include multimedia files and systems for generating, distributing and decoding multimedia files. In one aspect of the invention, the multimedia files include a plurality of encoded video tracks. In another aspect of the invention, the multimedia files include a plurality of encoded audio tracks. In another aspect of the invention, the multimedia files include at least one subtitle track. In another aspect of the invention, the multimedia files include encoded ‘meta data’. In another aspect of the invention, the multimedia files include encoded menu information.
A multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes a plurality of encoded video tracks. In further embodiments of the invention, the multimedia file comprises a plurality of concatenated ‘RIFF’ chunks and each encoded video track is contained in a separate ‘RIFF’ chunk. In addition, the video is encoded using psychovisual enhancements and each video track has at least one audio track associated with it.
In another embodiment, each video track is encoded as a series of ‘video’ chunks within a ‘RIFF’ chunk and the audio track accompanying each video track is encoded as a series of ‘audio’ chunks interleaved within the ‘RIFF’ chunk containing the ‘video’ chunks of the associated video track. Furthermore, each ‘video’ chunk can contain information that can be used to generate a single frame of video from a video track and each ‘audio’ chunk contains audio information from the portion of the audio track accompanying the frame generated using a ‘video’ chunk. In addition, the ‘audio’ chunk can be interleaved prior to the corresponding ‘video’ chunk within the ‘RIFF’ chunk.
A system for encoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes a processor configured to encode a plurality of video tracks, concatenate the encoded video tracks and write the concatenated encoded video tracks to a single file. In another embodiment, the processor is configured to encode the video tracks such that each video track is contained within a separate ‘RIFF’ chunk and the processor is configured to encode the video using psychovisual enhancements. In addition, each video track can have at least one audio track associated with it.
In another embodiment, the processor is configured to encode each video track as a series of ‘video’ chunks within a ‘RIFF’ chunk and encode the at least one audio track accompanying each video track as a series of ‘audio’ chunks interleaved within the ‘RIFF’ chunk containing the ‘video’ chunks of the associated video track.
In another further embodiment, the processor is configured to encode the video tracks such that each ‘video’ chunk contains information that can be used to generate a single frame of video from a video track and encode the audio tracks associated with a video track such that each ‘audio’ chunk contains audio information from the portion of the audio track accompanying the frame generated using a ‘video’ chunk generated from the video track. In addition, the processor can be configured to interleave each ‘audio’ chunk prior to the corresponding ‘video’ chunk within the ‘RIFF’ chunk.
A system for decoding a multimedia file containing a plurality of encoded video tracks in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes a processor configured to extract information from the multimedia file. The processor is configured to extract information concerning the number of encoded video tracks contained within the multimedia file.
In a further embodiment, the processor is configured to locate an encoded video track within a ‘RIFF’ chunk. In addition, a first encoded video track can be contained in a first ‘RIFF’ chunk having a standard 4cc code, a second video track can be contained in a second ‘RIFF’ chunk having a specialized 4cc code and the specialized 4cc code can have as its last two characters the first two characters of a standard 4cc code.
In an additional embodiment, each encoded video track is contained in a separate ‘RIFF’ chunk.
In another further embodiment, the decoded video track is similar to the original video track that was encoded in the creation of the multimedia file and at least some of the differences between the decoded video track and the original video track are located in dark portions of frames of the video track. Furthermore, some of the differences between the decoded video track and the original video track can be located in high motion scenes of the video track.
In an additional embodiment again, each video track has at least one audio track associated with it.
In a further additional embodiment, the processor is configured to display video from a video track by decoding a series of ‘video’ chunks within a ‘RIFF’ chunk and generate audio from an audio track accompanying the video track by decoding a series of ‘audio’ chunks interleaved within the ‘RIFF’ chunk containing the ‘video’ chunks of the associated video track.
In yet another further embodiment, the processor is configured to use information extracted from each ‘video’ chunk to generate a single frame of the video track and use information extracted from each ‘audio’ chunk to generate the portion of the audio track that accompanies the frame generated using a ‘video’ chunk. In addition, the processor can be configured to locate the ‘audio’ chunk prior to the ‘video’ chunk with which it is associated in the ‘RIFF’ chunk.
A multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes a series of encoded video frames and encoded audio interleaved between the encoded video frames. The encoded audio includes two or more tracks of audio information.
In a further embodiment at least one of the tracks of audio information includes a plurality of audio channels.
Another embodiment further includes header information identifying the number of audio tracks contained in the multimedia file and description information about at least one of the tracks of audio information.
In a further embodiment again, each encoded video frame is preceded by encoded audio information and the encoded audio information preceding the video frame includes the audio information for the portion of each audio track that accompanies the encoded video frame.
In another embodiment again, the video information is stored as chunks within the multimedia file. In addition, each chunk of video information can include a single frame of video. Furthermore, the audio information can be stored as chunks within the multimedia file and audio information from two separate audio tracks is not contained within a single chunk of audio information.
In a yet further embodiment, the ‘video’ chunks are separated by at least one ‘audio’ chunk from each of the audio tracks and the ‘audio’ chunks separating the ‘video’ chunks contain audio information for the portions of the audio tracks accompanying the video information contained within the ‘video’ chunk following the ‘audio’ chunk.
A system for encoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes a processor configured to encode a video track, encode a plurality of audio tracks, interleave information from the video track with information from the plurality of audio tracks and write the interleaved video and audio information to a single file.
In a further embodiment, at least one of the audio tracks includes a plurality of audio channels.
In another embodiment, the processor is further configured to encode header information identifying the number of the encoded audio tracks and to write the header information to the single file.
In a further embodiment again, the processor is further configured to encode header information identifying description information about at least one of the encoded audio tracks and to write the header information to the single file.
In another embodiment again, the processor encodes the video track as chunks of video information. In addition, the processor can encode each audio track as a series of chunks of audio information. Furthermore, each chunk of audio information can contain audio information from a single audio track and the processor can be configured to interleave chunks of audio information between chunks of video information.
In a yet further embodiment, the processor is configured to encode the portion of each audio track that accompanies the video information in a ‘video’ chunk in an ‘audio’ chunk and the processor is configured to interleave the ‘video’ chunks with the ‘audio’ chunks such that each ‘video’ chunk is preceded by ‘audio’ chunks containing the audio information from each of the audio tracks that accompanies the video information contained in the ‘video’ chunk. In addition, the processor can be configured to encode the video track such that a single frame of video is contained within each ‘video’ chunk.
In yet another embodiment again, the processor is a general purpose processor.
In an additional further embodiment, the processor is a dedicated circuit.
A system for decoding a multimedia file containing a plurality of audio tracks in accordance with the present invention includes a processor configured to extract information from the multimedia file. The processor is configured to extract information concerning the number of audio tracks contained within the multimedia file.
In a further embodiment, the processor is configured to select a single audio track from the plurality of audio tracks and the processor is configured to decode the audio information from the selected audio track.
In another embodiment, at least one of the audio tracks includes a plurality of audio channels.
In a still further embodiment, the processor is configured to extract information from a header in the multimedia file including description information about at least one of the audio tracks.
A system for communicating multimedia information in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes a network, a storage device containing a multimedia file and connected to the network via a server and a client connected to the network. The client can request the transfer of the multimedia file from the server and the multimedia file includes at least one video track and a plurality of audio tracks accompanying the video track.
A multimedia file in accordance with the present invention includes a series of encoded video frames and at least one encoded subtitle track interleaved between the encoded video frames.
In a further embodiment, at least one encoded subtitle track comprises a plurality of encoded subtitle tracks.
Another embodiment further includes header information identifying the number of encoded subtitle tracks contained in the multimedia file.
A still further embodiment also includes header information including description information about at least one of the encoded subtitle tracks.
In still another embodiment, each subtitle track includes a series of bit maps and each subtitle track can include a series of compressed bit maps. In addition, each bit map is compressed using run length encoding.
In a yet further embodiment, the series of encoded video frames are encoded as a series of video chunks and each encoded subtitle track is encoded as a series of subtitle chunks. Each subtitle chunk includes information capable of being represented as text on a display. In addition, each subtitle chunk can contain information concerning a single subtitle. Furthermore, each subtitle chunk can include information concerning the portion of the video sequence over which the subtitle should be superimposed.
In yet another embodiment, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning the portion of a display in which the subtitle should be located.
In a further embodiment again, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning the color of the subtitle and the information concerning the color can include a color palette. In addition, the subtitle chunks can comprise a first subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a first color palette and a second subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a second color palette that supersedes the information concerning the first color palette.
A system for encoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the invention can include a processor configured to encode a video track, encode at least one subtitle track, interleave information from the video track with information from the at least one subtitle track and write the interleaved video and subtitle information to a single file.
In a further embodiment, the at least one subtitle track includes a plurality of subtitle tracks.
In another embodiment, the processor is further configured to encode and write to the single file, header information identifying the number of subtitle tracks contained in the multimedia file.
In a further embodiment again, the processor is further configured to encode and write to the single file, description information about at least one of the subtitle tracks.
In another further embodiment, the video track is encoded as video chunks and each of the at least one subtitle tracks is encoded as subtitle chunks. In addition, each of the subtitle chunks can contain a single subtitle that accompanies a portion of the video track and the interleaver can be configured to interleave each subtitle chunk prior to the video chunks containing the portion of the video track that the subtitle within the subtitle chunk accompanies.
In a still further embodiment, the processor is configured to generate a subtitle chunk by encoding the subtitle as a bit map.
In still another embodiment, the subtitle is encoded as a compressed bit map. In addition, the bit map can be compressed using run length encoding. Furthermore, the processor can include in each subtitle chunk information concerning the portion of the video sequence over which the subtitle should be superimposed.
In a yet further embodiment, the processor includes in each subtitle chunk information concerning the portion of a display in which the subtitle should be located.
In yet another embodiment, the processor includes in each subtitle chunk information concerning the color of the subtitle.
In a still further embodiment again, information concerning the color includes a color palette. In addition, the subtitle chunks can include a first subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a first color palette and a second subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a second color palette that supersedes the information concerning the first color palette.
A system for decoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes a processor configured to extract information from the multimedia file. The processor is configured to inspect the multimedia file to determine if there is at least one subtitle track. In addition, the at least one subtitle track can comprise a plurality of subtitle tracks and the processor can be configured to determine the number of subtitle tracks in the multimedia file.
In a further embodiment, the processor is further configured to extract header information identifying the number of subtitle tracks from the multimedia file.
In another embodiment, the processor is further configured to extract description information about at least one of the subtitle tracks from the multimedia file.
In a further embodiment again, the multimedia file includes at least one video track encoded as video chunks and the multimedia file includes at least one subtitle track encoded as subtitle chunks.
In another embodiment again, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning a single subtitle.
In a still further embodiment, each subtitle is encoded in the subtitle chunks as a bit map, the processor is configured to decode the video track and the processor is configured construct a frame of video for display by superimposing the bit map over a portion of the video sequence. In addition, the subtitle can be encoded as a compressed bit map and the processor can be configured to uncompress the bit map. Furthermore, the processor can be configured to uncompress a run length encoded bit map.
In still another embodiment, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning the portion of the video track over which the subtitle should be superimposed and the processor is configured to generate a sequence of video frames for display by superimposing the bit map of the subtitle over each video frame indicated by the information in the subtitle chunk.
In an additional further embodiment, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning the position within a frame in which the subtitle should be located and the processor is configured to superimpose the subtitle in the position within each video frame indicated by the information within the subtitle chunk.
In another additional embodiment, each subtitle chunk includes information concerning the color of the subtitle and the processor is configured to superimpose the subtitle in the color or colors indicated by the color information within the subtitle chunk. In addition, the color information within the subtitle chunk can include a color palette and the processor is configured to superimpose the subtitle using the color palette to obtain color information used in the bit map of the subtitle. Furthermore, the subtitle chunks can comprise a first subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a first color palette and a second subtitle chunk that includes information concerning a second color palette and the processor can be configured to superimpose the subtitle using the first color palette to obtain information concerning the colors used in the bit map of the subtitle after the first chunk is processed and the processor can be configured to superimpose the subtitle using the second color palette to obtain information concerning the colors used in the bit map of the subtitle after the second chunk is processed.
A system for communicating multimedia information in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes a network, a storage device containing a multimedia file and connected to the network via a server and a client connected to the network. The client requests the transfer of the multimedia file from the server and the multimedia file includes at least one video track and at least one subtitle track accompanying the video track.
A multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the invention including a series of encoded video frames and encoded menu information. In addition, the encoded menu information can be stored as a chunk.
A further embodiment also includes at least two separate ‘menu’ chunks of menu information and at least two separate ‘menu’ chunks can be contained in at least two separate ‘RIFF’ chunks.
In another embodiment, the first ‘RIFF’ chunk containing a ‘menu’ chunk includes a standard 4cc code and the second ‘RIFF’ chunk containing a ‘menu’ chunk includes a specialized 4cc code where the first two characters of a standard 4cc code appear as the last two characters of the specialized 4cc code.
In a further embodiment again, at least two separate ‘menu’ chunks are contained in a single ‘RIFF’ chunk.
In another embodiment again, the ‘menu’ chunk includes chunks describing a series of menus and an ‘MRIF’ chunk containing media associated with the series of menus. In addition, the ‘MRIF’ chunk can contain media information including video tracks, audio tracks and overlay tracks.
In a still further embodiment, the chunks describing a series of menus can include a chunk describing the overall menu system, at least one chunk that groups menus by language, at least one chunk that describes an individual menu display and accompanying background audio, at least one chunk that describes a button on a menu, at least one chunk that describes the location of the button on the screen and at least one chunk that describes various actions associated with a button.
Still another embodiment also includes a link to a second file. The encoded menu information is contained within the second file.
A system for encoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the invention includes a processor configured to encode menu information. The processor is also configured to generate a multimedia file including an encoded video track and the encoded menu information. In addition, the processor can be configured to generate an object model of the menus, convert the object model into an configuration file, parse the configuration file into chunks, generate AVI files containing media information, interleave the media in the AVI files into an ‘MRIF’ chunk and concatenate the parsed chunks with the ‘MRIF’ chunk to create a ‘menu’ chunk. Furthermore, the processor can be further configured to use the object model to generate a second smaller ‘menu’ chunk.
In a further embodiment, the processor is configured to encode a second menu and the processor can insert the first encoded menu in a first ‘RIFF’ chunk and insert the second encoded menu in a second ‘RIFF’ chunk.
In another embodiment, the processor includes the first and second encoded menus in a single ‘RIFF’ chunk.
In a further embodiment again, the processor is configured to insert in to the multimedia file a reference to an encoded menu in a second file.
A system for decoding multimedia files in accordance with the present invention includes a processor configured to extract information from the multimedia file. The processor is configured to inspect the multimedia file to determine if it contains encoded menu information. In addition, the processor can be configured to extract menu information from a ‘menu’ chunk within a ‘RIFF’ chunk and the processor can be configured to construct menu displays using video information stored in the ‘menu’ chunk.
In a further embodiment, the processor is configured to generate background audio accompanying a menu display using audio information stored in the ‘menu’ chunk.
In another embodiment, the processor is configured to generate a menu display by overlaying an overlay from the ‘menu’ chunk over video information from the ‘menu’ chunk.
A system for communicating multimedia information in accordance with the present invention includes a network, a storage device containing a multimedia file and connected to the network via a server and a client connected to the network. The client can request the transfer of the multimedia file from the server and the multimedia file includes encoded menu information.
A multimedia file including a series of encoded video frames and encoded meta data about the multimedia file. The encoded meta data includes at least one statement comprising a subject, a predicate, an object and an authority. In addition, the subject can contain information identifying a file, item, person or organization that is described by the meta data, the predicate can contain information indicative of a characteristic of the subject, the object can contain information descriptive of the characteristic of the subject identified by the predicate and the authority can contain information concerning the source of the statement.
In a further embodiment, the subject is a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates whether the chunk is a resource or an anonymous node.
In another embodiment, the predicate is a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates whether the value information is the a predicated URI or an ordinal list entry.
In a further embodiment again, the object is a chunk that includes a type, a language, a data type and a value, where the value contains information, the type indicates whether the value information is a UTF-8 literal, a literal integer or literal XML data, the data type indicates the type of the value information and the language contains information identifying a specific language.
In another embodiment again, the authority is a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates that the value information is the authority of the statement.
In a yet further embodiment, at least a portion of the encoded data is represented as binary data.
In yet another embodiment, at least a portion of the encoded data is represented as 64-bit ASCII data.
In a still further embodiment, at least a first portion of the encoded data is represented as binary data and at least a second portion of the encoded data is represented as additional chunks that contain data represented in a second format. In addition, the additional chunks can each contain a single piece of metadata.
A system for encoding multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes a processor configured to encode a video track. The processor is also configured to encode meta data concerning the multimedia file and the encoded meta data includes at least one statement comprising a subject, a predicate, an object and an authority. In addition, the subject can contain information identifying a file, item, person or organization that is described by the meta data, the predicate can contain information indicative of a characteristic of the subject, the object can contain information descriptive of the characteristic of the subject identified by the predicate and the authority can contain information concerning the source of the statement.
In a further embodiment, the processor is configured to encode the subject as a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates whether the chunk is a resource or an anonymous node.
In another embodiment, the processor is configured to encode the predicate as a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates whether the value information is a predicate URI or an ordinary list entry.
In a further embodiment again, the processor is configured to encode the object as a chunk that includes a type, a language, a data type and a value, where the value contains information, the type indicates whether the value information is a UTF-8 literal, a literal integer or literal XML data, the data type indicates the type of the value information and the language contains information identifying a specific language.
In a another embodiment again, the processor is configured to encode the authority as a chunk that includes a type and a value, where the value contains information and the type indicates the value information is the authority of the statement.
In a still further embodiment, the processor is further configured to encode at least a portion of the meta data concerning the multimedia file as binary data.
In still another embodiment, the processor is further configured to encode at least a portion of the meta data concerning the multimedia file as 64-bit ASCII data. In an additional embodiment, the processor is further configured to encode at least a first portion of the meta data concerning the multimedia file as binary data and to encode at least a second portion of the meta data concerning the multimedia file as additional chunks that contain data represented in a second format. In addition, the processor can be further configured to encode the additional chunks with a single piece of metadata.
A system for decoding multimedia files in accordance with the invention includes a processor configured to extract information from the multimedia file. The processor is configured to extract meta data information concerning the multimedia file and the meta data information includes at least one statement comprising a subject, a predicate, an object and an authority. In addition, the processor can be configured to extract, from the subject, information identifying a file, item, person or organization that is described by the meta data. Furthermore, the processor can be configured to extract information indicative of a characteristic of the subject from the predicate, the processor can be configured to extract information descriptive of the characteristic of the subject identified by the predicate from the object and the processor can be configured to extract information concerning the source of the statement from the authority.
In a further embodiment, the subject is a chunk that includes a type and a value and the processor is configured to identify that the chunk contains subject information by inspecting the type and the processor is configured to extract information from the value.
In another embodiment, the predicate is a chunk that includes a type and a value and the processor is configured to identify that the chunk contains predicate information by inspecting the type and the processor is configured to extract information from the value.
In a further embodiment again, the object is a chunk that includes a type, a language, a data type and a value, the processor is configured to identify that the chunk contains object information by inspecting the type, the processor is configured to inspect the data type to determine the data type of information contained in the value, the processor is configured to extract information of a type indicated by the data type from the value and the processor is configured to extract information identifying a specific language from the language.
In another embodiment again, the authority is a chunk that includes a type and a value and the processor is configured to identify that the chunk contains authority information by inspecting the type and the processor is configured to extract information from the value.
In a still further embodiment, the processor is configured to extract information from the meta data statement and display at least a portion of the information.
In still another embodiment, the processor is configured to construct data structures indicative of a directed-labeled graph in memory using the meta data.
In a yet further embodiment, the processor is configured to search through the meta data for information by inspecting at least one of the subject, predicate, object and authority for a plurality of statements.
In yet another embodiment, the processor is configured to display the results of the search as part of a graphical user interface. In addition, the processor can be configured to perform a search in response to a request from an external device.
In an additional further embodiment, at least a portion of the meta data information concerning the multimedia file is represented as binary data.
In another additional embodiment, at least a portion of the meta data information concerning the multimedia file is represented as 64-bit ASCII data.
In another further embodiment, at least a first portion of the meta data information concerning the multimedia file is represented as binary data and at least a second portion of the meta data information concerning the multimedia file is represented as additional chunks that contain data represented in a second format. In addition, the additional chunks can contain a single piece of metadata.
A system for communicating multimedia information in accordance with the present invention including a network, a storage device containing a multimedia file and that is connected to the network via a server and a client connected to the network. The client can request the transfer of the multimedia file from the server and the multimedia file includes meta data concerning the multimedia file and the meta data includes at least one statement comprising a subject, a predicate, an object and an authority.
A multimedia file in accordance with the present invention including at least one encoded video track, at least one encoded audio track and a plurality of encoded text strings. The encoded text strings describe characteristics of the at least one video track and at least one audio track.
In a further embodiment, a plurality of the text strings describe the same characteristic of a video track or audio track using different languages.
Another embodiment also includes at least one encoded subtitle track. The plurality of encoded text strings include strings describing characteristics of the subtitle track.
A system for creating a multimedia file in accordance with the present invention including a processor configured to encode at least one video track, encode at least one audio track, interleave at least one of the encoded audio tracks with a video track and insert text strings describing each of a number of characteristics of the at least one video track and the at least one audio track in a plurality of languages.
A system for displaying a multimedia file including encoded audio, video and text strings in accordance with the present invention including a processor configured to extract the encoded text strings from the file and generate a pull down menu display using the text strings.
FIG.2.4. is a conceptual diagram of the ‘DMNU’ chunk in accordance with an embodiment of the invention.
Referring to the drawings, embodiments of the present invention are capable of encoding, transmitting and decoding multimedia files. Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can contain multiple video tracks, multiple audio tracks, multiple subtitle tracks, data that can be used to generate a menu interface to access the contents of the file and ‘meta data’ concerning the contents of the file. Multimedia files in accordance with several embodiments of the present invention also include references to video tracks, audio tracks, subtitle tracks and ‘meta data’ external to the file.
1. Description of System
Turning now to
In operation, the computer 12 can be used to encode multimedia files in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. The computer 12 can also be used to decode multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention and distribute multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention. The computer can distribute files using any of a variety of file transfer protocols including via a peer-to-peer network. In addition, the computer 12 can transfer multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention to a server 18, where the files can be accessed by other devices. The other devices can include any variety of computing device or even a dedicated decoder device. In the illustrated embodiment, a lap-top computer and a PDA are shown. In other embodiments, digital set-top boxes, desk-top computers, game machines, consumer electronics devices and other devices can be connected to the network, download the multimedia files and decode them.
In one embodiment, the devices access the multimedia files from the server via the network. In other embodiments, the devices access the multimedia files from a number of computers via a peer-to-peer network. In several embodiments, multimedia files can be written to a portable storage device such as a disk drive, CD-ROM or DVD. In many embodiments, electronic devices can access multimedia files written to portable storage devices.
2. Description of File Structure
Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be structured to be compliant with the Resource Interchange File Format (‘RIFF file format’), defined by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash. and International Business Machines Corporation of Armonk, N.Y. RIFF is a file format for storing multimedia data and associated information. A RIFF file typically has an 8-byte RIFF header, which identifies the file and provides the residual length of the file after the header (i.e. file_length—8). The entire remainder of the RIFF file comprises “chunks” and “lists.” Each chunk has an 8-byte chunk header identifying the type of chunk, and giving the length in bytes of the data following the chunk header. Each list has an 8-byte list header identifying the type of list and giving the length in bytes of the data following the list header. The data in a list comprises chunks and/or other lists (which in turn may comprise chunks and/or other lists). RIFF lists are also sometimes referred to as “list chunks.”
An AVI file is a special form of RIFF file that follow the format of a RIFF file, but include various chunks and lists with defined identifiers that contain multimedia data in particular formats. The AVI format was developed and defined by Microsoft Corporation. AVI files are typically created using a encoder that can output multimedia data in the AVI format. AVI files are typically decoded by any of a group of software collectively known as AVI decoders.
The RIFF and AVI formats are flexible in that they only define chunks and lists that are part of the defined file format, but allow files to also include lists and/or chunks that are outside the RIFF and/or AVI file format definitions without rendering the file unreadable by a RIFF and/or AVI decoder. In practice, AVI (and similarly RIFF) decoders are implemented so that they simply ignore lists and chunks that contain header information not found in the AVI file format definition. The AVI decoder must still read through these non-AVI chunks and lists and so the operation of the AVI decoder may be slowed, but otherwise, they generally have no effect on and are ignored by an AVI decoder.
A multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
Another multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is shown in
In the illustrated embodiment, the multimedia includes multiple concatenated ‘RIFF’ chunks, where the first ‘RIFF’ chunk 50 includes a character set chunk (‘CSET’ chunk) 32′, an information list chunk (‘INFO’ list chunk) 34′, a file header chunk (‘hdrl’ list chunk) 36′, a meta data chunk (‘DXDT’ chunk) 38′, a menu chunk (‘DMNU’ chunk) 40′, a junk chunk (‘junk’ chunk) 41′, the movie list chunk (‘movi’ list chunk) 42′ and an optional index chunk (‘idx1’ chunk) 44′. The second ‘RIFF’ chunk 52 contains a second menu chunk (‘DMNU’ chunk) 46′. Additional ‘RIFF’ chunks 54 containing additional titles can be included after the ‘RIFF’ menu chunk 52. The additional ‘RIFF’ chunks can contain independent media in compliant AVI file format. In one embodiment, the second menu chunk 46′ and the additional ‘RIFF’ chunks have specialized 4 character codes (defined in the AVI format and discussed below) such that the first two characters of the 4 character codes appear as the second two characters and the second two characters of the 4 character codes appear as the first two characters.
2.1. The ‘CSET’ Chunk
The ‘CSET’ chunk 32 is a chunk defined in the Audio Video Interleave file format (AVI file format), created by Microsoft Corporation. The ‘CSET’ chunk defines the character set and language information of the multimedia file. Inclusion of a ‘CSET’ chunk in accordance with embodiments of the present invention is optional.
A multimedia file in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention does not use the ‘CSET’ chunk and uses UTF-8, which is defined by the Unicode Consortium, for the character set by default combined with RFC 3066 Language Specification, which is defined by Internet Engineering Task Force for the language information.
2.2. The ‘INFO’ List Chunk
The ‘INFO’ list chunk 34 can store information that helps identify the contents of the multimedia file. The ‘INFO’ list is defined in the AVI file format and its inclusion in a multimedia file in accordance with embodiments of the present invention is optional. Many embodiments that include a ‘DXDT’ chunk do not include an ‘INFO’ list chunk.
2.3. The ‘hdrl’ List Chunk The ‘hdrl’ list chunk 38 is defined in the AVI file format and provides information concerning the format of the data in the multimedia file. Inclusion of a ‘hdrl’ list chunk or a chunk containing similar description information is generally required. The ‘hdrl’ list chunk includes a chunk for each video track, each audio track and each subtitle track.
A conceptual diagram of a ‘hdrl’ list chunk 38 in accordance with one embodiment of the invention that includes a single video track 62, two audio tracks 64, an external audio track 66, two subtitle tracks 68 and an external subtitle track 70 is illustrated in
In addition to the ‘avih’ chunk, the ‘hdrl’ list includes a stream descriptor list for each audio, video and subtitle track. In one embodiment, the stream descriptor list is implemented using ‘strl’ chunks. A ‘strl’ chunk in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can contain references to external files holding multimedia information such as an additional audio track or an additional subtitle track. The references to these tracks can either be contained in the ‘hdrl’ chunk or in the ‘junk’ chunk 41. In either case, the reference can be contained in the ‘strh’ chunk 92 of a ‘strl’ chunk 90, which references either a local file or a file stored remotely. The referenced file can be a standard AVI file or a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention containing the additional track.
In additional embodiments, the referenced file can contain any of the chunks that can be present in the referencing file including ‘DMNU’ chunks, ‘DXDT’ chunks and chunks associated with audio, video and/or subtitle tracks for a multimedia presentation. For example, a first multimedia file could include a ‘DMNU’ chunk (discussed in more detail below) that references a first multimedia presentation located within the ‘movi’ list chunk of the first multimedia file and a second multimedia presentation within the ‘movi’ list chunk of a second multimedia file. Alternatively, both ‘movi’ list chunks can be included in the same multimedia file, which need not be the same file as the file in which the ‘DMNU’ chunk is located.
2.4. The ‘DXDT’ Chunk
The ‘DXDT’ chunk 38 contains so called ‘meta data’. ‘Meta data’ is a term used to describe data that provides information about the contents of a file, document or broadcast. The ‘meta data’ stored within the ‘DXDT’ chunk of multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be used to store such content specific information as title, author, copyright holder and cast. In addition, technical details about the codec used to encode the multimedia file can be provided such as the CLI options used and the quantizer distribution after each pass.
In one embodiment, the meta data is represented within the ‘DXDT’ chunk as a series of statements, where each statement includes a subject, a predicate, an object and an authority. The subject is a reference to what is being described. The subject can reference a file, item, person or organization. The subject can reference anything having characteristics capable of description. The predicate identifies a characteristic of the subject that is being described. The object is a description of the identified characteristic of the subject and the authority identifies the source of the information.
The following is a table showing an example of how various pieces of ‘meta data’, can be represented as an object, a predicate, a subject and an authority:
In one embodiment, the expression of the subject, predicate, object and authority is implemented using binary representations of the data, which can be considered to form Directed-Labeled Graphs (DLGs). A DLG consists of nodes that are either resources or literals. Resources are identifiers, which can either be conformant to a naming convention such as a Universal Resource Identifier (“URI”) as defined in RFC 2396 by the Internet Engineering Taskforce (http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2396.txt) or refer to data specific to the system itself. Literals are representations of an actual value, rather than a reference.
An advantage of DLGs is that they allow the inclusion of a flexible number of items of data that are of the same type, such as cast members of a movie. In the example shown in Table 1, three cast members are included. However, any number of cast members can be included. DLGs also allow relational connections to other data types. In Table 1, there is a ‘meta data’ item that has a subject “_:file281,” a predicate “Series,” and an object “_:file321.” The subject “_:file281” indicates that the ‘meta data’ refers to the content of the file referenced as “_:file321” (in this case, a movie—“Movie Title 1”). The predicate is “Series,” indicating that the object will have information about another movie in the series to which the first movie belongs. However, “_:file321” is not the title or any other specific information about the series, but rather a reference to another entry that provides more information about “_:file321”. The next ‘meta data’ entry, with the subject “_:file321”, however, includes data about “_:file321,” namely that the Title as specified by the Dublin Core Vocabulary as indicated by “http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/title” of this sequel is “Movie Title 2.”
Additional ‘meta data’ statements in Table 1 specify that “Actor 1” was a member of the cast playing the role of “Character Name 1” and that there are two directors. Technical information is also expressed in the ‘meta data.’ The ‘meta data’ statements identify that “_:file281” includes track “_:track #dc00.” The ‘meta data’ provides information including the resolution of the video track, the certification level of the video track and the codec settings. Although not shown in Table 1, the ‘meta data’ can also include a unique identifier assigned to a track at the time of encoding. When unique identifiers are used, encoding the same content multiple times will result in a different identifier for each encoded version of the content. However, a copy of the encoded video track would retain the identifier of the track from which it was copied.
The entries shown in Table 1 can be substituted with other vocabularies such as the UPnP vocabulary, which is defined by the UPnP forum (see http://www.upnpforum.org). Another alternative would be the Digital Item Declaration Language (DIDL) or DIDL-Lite vocabularies developed by the International Standards Organization as part of work towards the MPEG-21 standard. The following are examples of predicates within the UPnP vocabulary:
The authority for all of the ‘meta data’ is ‘_:auth42.’‘Meta data’ statements show that ‘_:auth42’ is ‘Studio Name.’ The authority enables the evaluation of both the quality of the file and the ‘meta data’ statements associated with the file.
Nodes into a graph are connected via named resource nodes. A statement of ‘meta data’ consist of a subject node, a predicate node and an object node. Optionally, an authority node can be connected to the DLG as part of the ‘meta data’ statement.
For each node, there are certain characteristics that help further explain the functionality of the node. The possible types can be represented as follows using the ANSI C programming language:
The ‘RDFData’ chunk includes a chunk referred to as an ‘RDFHeader’ chunk, a value ‘numOfStatements’ and a list of ‘RDFStatement’ chunks.
The ‘RDFHeader’ chunk contains information about the manner in which the ‘meta data’ is formatted in the chunk. In one embodiment, the data in the ‘RDFHeader’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
typedef struct RDFHeaderStruct
The ‘RDFHeader’ chunk includes a number ‘version’ that indicates the version of the resource description format to enable forward compatibility. The header includes a second number ‘numOfSchemas’ that represents the number of ‘RDFSchema’ chunks in the list ‘schemas’, which also forms part of the ‘RDFHeader’ chunk. In several embodiments, the ‘RDFSchema’ chunks are used to enable complex resources to be represented more efficiently. In one embodiment, the data contained in a ‘RDFSchema’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
typedef struct RDFSchemaStruct
The ‘RDFSchema’ chunk includes a first string of text such as ‘dc’ identified as ‘prefix’ and a second string of text such as ‘http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/’ identified as cuff. The ‘prefix’ defines a term that can be used in the ‘meta data’ in place of the ‘uri’. The cuff is a Universal Resource Identifier, which can conform to a specified standardized vocabulary or be a specific vocabulary to a particular system.
Returning to the discussion of the ‘RDFData’ chunk. In addition to a ‘RDFHeader’ chunk, the ‘RDFData’ chunk also includes a value ‘numOfStatements’ and a list ‘statement’ of ‘RDFStatement’ chunks. The value ‘numOfStatements’ indicates the actual number of ‘RDFStatement’ chunks in the list ‘statements’ that contain information. In one embodiment, the data contained in the ‘RDFStatement’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
Each ‘RDFStatement’ chunk contains a piece of ‘meta data’ concerning the multimedia file. The chunks ‘subject’, ‘predicate’, ‘object’ and ‘authority’ are used to contain the various components of the ‘meta data’ described above.
The ‘subject’ is a ‘RDFSubject’ chunk, which represents the subject portion of the ‘meta data’ described above. In one embodiment the data contained within the ‘RDFSubject’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
The ‘RDFSubject’ chunk shown above includes a value ‘type’ that indicates that the data is either a Resource or an anonymous node of a piece of ‘meta data’ and a unicode text string ‘value’, which contains data representing the subject of the piece of ‘meta data’. In embodiments where an ‘RDFSchema’ chunk has been defined the value can be a defined term instead of a direct reference to a resource.
The ‘predicate’ in a ‘RDFStatement’ chunk is a ‘RDFPredicate’ chunk, which represents the predicate portion of a piece of ‘meta data’. In one embodiment the data contained within a ‘RDFPredicate’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
typedef struct RDFPredicateStruct
The ‘RDFPredicate’ chunk shown above includes a value ‘type’ that indicates that the data is the predicate URI or an ordinal list entry of a piece of ‘meta data’ and a text string ‘value,’ which contains data representing the predicate of a piece of ‘meta data.’ In embodiments where an ‘RDFSchema’ chunk has been defined the value can be a defined term instead of a direct reference to a resource.
The ‘object’ in a ‘RDFStatement’ chunk is a ‘RDFObject’ chunk, which represents the object portion of a piece of ‘meta data.’ In one embodiment, the data contained in the ‘RDFObject’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
The ‘RDFObject’ chunk shown above includes a value ‘type’ that indicates that the piece of data is a UTF-8 literal string, a literal integer or literal XML data of a piece of ‘meta data.’ The chunk also includes three values. The first value ‘language’ is used to represent the language in which the piece of ‘meta data’ is expressed (e.g. a film's title may vary in different languages). In several embodiments, a standard representation can be used to identify the language (such as RFC 3066—Tags for the Identification of Languages specified by the Internet Engineering Task Force, see http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3066.txt). The second value ‘dataTypeURI’ is used to indicate the type of data that is contained within the ‘value’ field if it can not be explicitly indicated by the ‘type’ field. The URI specified by the dataTypeURI points to general RDF URI Vocabulary used to describe the particular type of the Data is used. Different formats in which the URI can be expressed are described at http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf-concepts/#section-Datatypes. In one embodiment, the ‘value’ is a ‘wide character.’ In other embodiments, the ‘value’ can be any of a variety of types of data from a single bit, to an image or a video sequence. The ‘value’ contains the object piece of the ‘meta data.’
The ‘authority’ in a ‘RDFStatement’ chunk is a ‘RDFAuthority’ chunk, which represents the authority portion of a piece of ‘meta data.’ In one embodiment the data contained within the ‘RDFAuthority’ chunk can be represented as follows (represented in ANSI C):
The ‘RDFAuthority’ data structure shown above includes a value ‘type’ that indicates the data is a Resource or an anonymous node of a piece of ‘meta data.’ The ‘value’ contains the data representing the authority for the ‘meta data.’ In embodiments where an ‘RDFSchema’ chunk has been defined the value can be a defined term instead of a direct reference to a resource.
A conceptual representation of the storage of a ‘DXDT’ chunk of a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is shown in
As is discussed below, multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be continuously modified and updated. Determining in advance the ‘meta data’ to associate with the file itself and the ‘meta data’ to access remotely (e.g. via the internet) can be difficult. Typically, sufficient ‘meta data’ is contained within a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention in order to describe the contents of the file. Additional information can be obtained if the device reviewing the file is capable of accessing via a network other devices containing ‘meta data’ referenced from within the file.
The methods of representing ‘meta data’ described above can be extendable and can provide the ability to add and remove different ‘meta data’ fields stored within the file as the need for it changes over time. In addition, the representation of ‘meta data’ can be forward compatible between revisions.
The structured manner in which ‘meta data’ is represented in accordance with embodiments of the present invention enables devices to query the multimedia file to better determine its contents. The query could then be used to update the contents of the multimedia file, to obtain additional ‘meta data’ concerning the multimedia file, generate a menu relating to the contents of the file or perform any other function involving the automatic processing of data represented in a standard format. In addition, defining the length of each parseable element of the ‘meta data’ can increase the ease with which devices with limited amounts of memory, such as consumer electronics devices, can access the ‘meta data’.
In other embodiments, the ‘meta data’ is represented using individual chunks for each piece of ‘meta data.’ Several ‘DXDT’ chunks in accordance with the present invention include a binary chunk containing ‘meta data’ encoded as described above and additional chunks containing individual pieces of ‘meta data’ formatted either as described above or in another format. In embodiments where binary ‘meta data’ is included in the ‘DXDT’ chunk, the binary ‘meta data’ can be represented using 64-bit encoded ASCII. In other embodiments, other binary representations can be used.
Examples of individual chunks that can be included in the ‘DXDT’ chunk in accordance with the present invention are illustrated in
The PixelAspectRatioMetaData′ chunk 152a includes information concerning the pixel aspect ratio of the encoded video. The EncoderURIMetaData′ chunk 152b includes information concerning the encoder. The ‘CodecSettingsMetaData’ chunk 152c includes information concerning the settings of the codec used to encode the video. The ‘FrameTypeMetaData’ chunk 152d includes information concerning the video frames. The VideoResolutionMetaData′ chunk 152e includes information concerning the video resolution of the encoded video. The PublisherMetaData′ chunk 152f includes information concerning the person or organization that published the media. The ‘CreatorMetaData’ chunk 152g includes information concerning the creator of the content. The ‘GenreMetaData’ chunk 152h includes information concerning the genre of the media. The ‘CreatorToolMetaData’ chunk 152i includes information concerning the tool used to create the file. The ‘RightsMetaData’ chunk 152j includes information concerning DRM. The RunTimeMetaData′ chunk 152k includes information concerning the run time of the media. The ‘QuantizerMetaData’ chunk 152l includes information concerning the quantizer used to encode the video. The ‘CodecInfoMetaData’ chunk 152m includes information concerning the codec. The EncoderNameMetaData′ chunk 152n includes information concerning the name of the encoder. The FrameRateMetaData′ chunk 152o includes information concerning the frame rate of the media. The ‘InputSourceMetaData’ chunk 152p includes information concerning the input source. The ‘FileIDMetaData’ chunk 152q includes a unique identifier for the file. The TypeMetaData′ chunk 152r includes information concerning the type of the multimedia file. The TitleMetaData′ chunk 152s includes the title of the media and the ‘CertLevelMetaData’ chunk 152t includes information concerning the certification level of the media. In other embodiments, additional chunks can be included that contain additional ‘meta data.’ In several embodiments, a chunk containing ‘meta data’ in a binary format as described above can be included within the ‘MetaData’ chunk. In one embodiment, the chunk of binary ‘meta data’ is encoded as 64-bit ASCII.
2.5. The ‘DMNU’ Chunks
Referring to
The ability to provide a so-called ‘lite’ menu can be useful for consumer electronics devices that cannot process the amounts of data required for more sophisticated menu systems. Providing a menu (whether ‘lite’ or otherwise) prior to the ‘movi’ list chunk 42 can reduce delays when playing embodiments of multimedia files in accordance with the present invention in streaming or progressive download applications. In several embodiments, providing a simple and a complex menu can enable a device to choose the menu that it wishes to display. Placing the smaller of the two menus before the ‘movi’ list chunk 42 enables devices in accordance with embodiments of the present invention that cannot display menus to rapidly skip over information that cannot be displayed.
In other embodiments, the data required to create a single menu is split between the first and second ‘DMNU’ chunks. Alternatively, the ‘DMNU’ chunk can be a single chunk before the ‘movi’ chunk containing data for a single set of menus or multiple sets of menus. In other embodiments, the ‘DMNU’ chunk can be a single or multiple chunks located in other locations throughout the multimedia file.
In several multimedia files in accordance with the present invention, the first ‘DMNU’ chunk 40 (40′) can be automatically generated based on a ‘richer’ menu in the second ‘DMNU’ chunk 46 (46′). The automatic generation of menus is discussed in greater detail below.
The structure of a ‘DMNU’ chunk in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is shown in
In one embodiment, the ‘WowMenu’ chunk 160 contains the hierarchy of menu chunk objects that are conceptually illustrated in
Use of ‘LanguageMenus’ chunks 172 enables the ‘DMNU’ chunk 158 to contain menu information in different languages. Each ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk 172 contains the information used to generate a complete set of menus in a specified language. Therefore, the ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk includes an identifier that identifies the language of the information associated with the ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk. The ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk also includes a list of ‘WowMenu’ chunks 175.
Each ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175 contains all of the information to be displayed on the screen for a particular menu. This information can include background video and audio. The information can also include data concerning button actions that can be used to access other menus or to exit the menu and commence displaying a portion of the multimedia file. In one embodiment, the ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175 includes a list of references to media. These references refer to information contained in the ‘Media’ chunk 174, which will be discussed further below. The references to media can define the background video and background audio for a menu. The ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175 also defines an overlay that can be used to highlight a specific button, when a menu is first accessed.
In addition, each ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175 includes a number of ‘ButtonMenu’ chunks 176. Each ‘ButtonMenu’ chunk defines the properties of an onscreen button. The ‘ButtonMenu’ chunk can describe such things as the overlay to use when the button is highlighted by the user, the name of the button and what to do in response to various actions performed by a user navigating through the menu. The responses to actions are defined by referencing an ‘Action’ chunk 178. A single action, e.g. selecting a button, can result in several ‘Action’ chunks being accessed. In embodiments where the user is capable of interacting with the menu using a device such as a mouse that enables an on-screen pointer to move around the display in an unconstrained manner, the on-screen location of the buttons can be defined using a ‘MenuRectangle’ chunk 180. Knowledge of the on-screen location of the button enables a system to determine whether a user is selecting a button, when using a free ranging input device.
Each ‘Action’ chunk identifies one or more of a number of different varieties of action related chunks, which can include a ‘PlayAction’ chunk 182, a ‘MenuTransitionAction’ chunk 184, a ‘ReturnToPlayAction’ chunk 186, an ‘AudioSelectAction’ chunk 188, a ‘SubtitileSelectAction’ chunk 190 and a ‘ButtonTransitionAction’ chunk 191. A ‘PlayAction’ chunk 182 identifies a portion of each of the video, audio and subtitle tracks within a multimedia file. The ‘PlayAction’ chunk references a portion of the video track using a reference to a ‘MediaTrack’ chunk (see discussion below). The ‘PlayAction’ chunk identifies audio and subtitle tracks using ‘SubtitleTrack’ 192 and ‘AudioTrack’ 194 chunks. The ‘SubtitleTrack’ and ‘AudioTrack’ chunks both contain references to a ‘MediaTrack’ chunk 198. When a ‘PlayAction’ chunk forms the basis of an action in accordance with embodiments of the present invention, the audio and subtitle tracks that are selected are determined by the values of variables set initially as defaults and then potentially modified by a user's interactions with the menu.
Each ‘MenuTransitionAction’ chunk 184 contains a reference to a ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175. This reference can be used to obtain information to transition to and display another menu.
Each ‘ReturnToPlayAction’ chunk 186 contains information enabling a player to return to a portion of the multimedia file that was being accessed prior to the user bringing up a menu.
Each ‘AudioSelectAction’ chunk 188 contains information that can be used to select a particular audio track. In one embodiment, the audio track is selected from audio tracks contained within a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In other embodiments, the audio track can be located in an externally referenced file.
Each ‘SubtitleSelectAction’ chunk 190 contains information that can be used to select a particular subtitle track. In one embodiment, the subtitle track is selected from a subtitle contained within a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In other embodiments, the subtitle track can be located in an externally referenced file.
Each ‘ButtonTransitionAction’ chunk 191 contains information that can be used to transition to another button in the same menu. This is performed after other actions associated with a button have been performed.
The ‘Media’ chunk 174 includes a number of ‘MediaSource’ chunks 166 and ‘MediaTrack’ chunks 198. The ‘Media’ chunk defines all of the multimedia tracks (e.g., audio, video, subtitle) used by the feature and the menu system. Each ‘MediaSource’ chunk 196 identifies a RIFF chunk within the multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, which, in turn, can include multiple RIFF chunks. Each ‘MediaTrack’ chunk 198 identifies a portion of a multimedia track within a RIFF chunk specified by a ‘MediaSource’ chunk.
The ‘MRIF’ chunk 162 is, essentially, its own small multimedia file that complies with the RIFF format. The ‘MRIF’ chunk contains audio, video and subtitle tracks that can be used to provide background audio and video and overlays for menus. The ‘MRIF’ chunk can also contain video to be used as overlays to indicate highlighted menu buttons. In embodiments where less menu data is required, the background video can be a still frame (a variation of the AVI format) or a small sequence of identical frames. In other embodiments, more elaborate sequences of video can be used to provide the background video.
As discussed above, the various chunks that form part of a ‘WowMenu’ chunk 175 and the ‘WowMenu’ chunk itself contain references to actual media tracks. Each of these references is typically to a media track defined in the ‘hdrl’ LIST chunk of a RIFF chunk.
Other chunks that can be used to create a ‘DMNU’ chunk in accordance with the present invention are shown in
The contents of the ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk 172′ is largely similar to that of the ‘LanguageMenus’ chunk 172 illustrated in
The ‘Media’ chunk 174′ is significantly different from the ‘Media’ chunk 174 shown in
The ‘Title’ chunk can contain at least one ‘Chapter’ chunk 206. The ‘Chapter’ chunk 206 references a scene within a particular title. The ‘Chapter’ chunk 206 contains references to the portions of the video track, each audio track and each subtitle track that correspond to the scene indicated by the ‘Chapter’ chunk. In one embodiment, the references are implemented using ‘MediaSource’ chunks 196′ and ‘MediaTrack’ chunks 198′ similar to those described above in relation to
As described above, the ‘MenuTracks’ chunks 204 contain references to the media that are used to generate the audio, video and overlay media of the menus. In one embodiment, the references to the media information are made using ‘MediaSource’ chunks 196′ and ‘MediaTrack’ chunks 198′ contained within the ‘MenuTracks’ chunk. In one embodiment, the ‘MediaSource’ chunks 196′ and ‘MediaTrack’ chunks 198′ are implemented in the manner described above in relation to
The ‘TranslationTable’ chunk 200 can be used to contain text strings describing each title and chapter in a variety of languages. In one embodiment, the ‘TranslationTable’ chunk 200 includes at least one ‘TranslationLookup’ chunk 208. Each ‘TranslationLookup’ chunk 208 is associated with a ‘Title’ chunk 202, a ‘Chapter’ chunk 206 or a ‘MediaTrack’ chunk 196′ and contains a number of ‘Translation’ chunks 210. Each of the ‘Translation’ chunks in a ‘TranslationLookup’ chunk contains a text string that describes the chunk associated with the ‘TranslationLookup’ chunk in a language indicated by the ‘Translation’ chunk.
A diagram conceptually illustrating the relationships between the various chunks contained within a ‘DMNU’ chunk is illustrated in
2.6. The ‘junk’ Chunk
The ‘junk’ chunk 41 is an optional chunk that can be included in multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention. The nature of the ‘junk’ chunk is specified in the AVI file format.
2.7. The ‘movi’ List Chunk
The ‘movi’ list chunk 42 contains a number of ‘data’ chunks. Examples of information that ‘data’ chunks can contain are audio, video or subtitle data. In one embodiment, the ‘movi’ list chunk includes data for at least one video track, multiple audio tracks and multiple subtitle tracks.
The interleaving of ‘data’ chunks in the ‘movi’ list chunk 42 of a multimedia file containing a video track, three audio tracks and three subtitle tracks is illustrated in
Adjacent ‘video’ chunks may also be separated by one or more ‘subtitle’ chunks 266 from one of the subtitle tracks. In one embodiment, the ‘subtitle’ chunk 266 includes a subtitle and a start time and a stop time. In several embodiments, the ‘subtitle’ chunk is interleaved in the ‘movi’ list chunk such that the ‘video’ chunk following the ‘subtitle’ chunk includes the portion of video that occurs at the start time of the subtitle. In other embodiments, the start time of all ‘subtitle’ and ‘audio’ chunks is ahead of the equivalent start time of the video. In one embodiment, the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks can be placed within 5 seconds of the corresponding ‘video’ chunk and in other embodiments the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks can be placed within a time related to the amount of video capable of being buffered by a device capable of displaying the audio and video within the file.
In one embodiment, the ‘data’ chunks include a ‘FOURCC’ code to identify the stream to which the ‘data’ chunk belongs. The ‘FOURCC’ code consists of a two-digit stream number followed by a two-character code that defines the type of information in the chunk. An alternate ‘FOURCC’ code consists of a two-character code that defines the type of information in the chunk followed by the two-digit stream number. Examples of the two-character code are shown in the following table:
In one embodiment, the structure of the ‘video’ chunks 262 and ‘audio’ chunks 264 complies with the AVI file format. In other embodiments, other formats for the chunks can be used that specify the nature of the media and contain the encoded media.
In several embodiments, the data contained within a ‘subtitle’ chunk 266 can be represented as follows:
The value ‘fcc’ is the FOURCC code that indicates the subtitle track and nature of the subtitle track (text or bitmap mode). The value ‘cb’ specifies the size of the structure. The value ‘duration’ specifies the time at the starting and ending point of the subtitle. In one embodiment, it can be in the form hh:mm:ss.xxx-hh:mm:ss.xxx. The hh represent the hours, mm the minutes, ss the seconds and xxx the milliseconds. The value ‘subtitle’ contains either the Unicode text of the subtitle in text mode or a bitmap image of the subtitle in the bitmap mode. Several embodiments of the present invention use compressed bitmap images to represent the subtitle information. In one embodiment, the ‘subtitle’ field contains information concerning the width, height and onscreen position of the subtitle. In addition, the ‘subtitle’ field can also contain color information and the actual pixels of the bit map. In several embodiments, run length coding is used to reduce the amount of pixel information required to represent the bitmap.
Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can include digital rights management. This information can be used in video on demand applications. Multimedia files that are protected by digital rights management can only be played back correctly on a player that has been granted the specific right of playback. In one embodiment, the fact that a track is protected by digital rights management can be indicated in the information about the track in the ‘hdrl’ list chunk (see description above). A multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention that includes a track protected by digital rights management can also contain information about the digital rights management in the ‘movi’ list chunk.
A ‘movi’ list chunk of a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention that includes a video track, multiple audio tracks, at least one subtitle track and information enabling digital rights management is illustrated in
In an encryption system in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, the video chunks are only partially encrypted. Where partial encryption is used, the DRM′ chunks contain a reference to the portion of a ‘video’ chunk that is encrypted and a reference to the key that can be used to decrypt the encrypted portion. The decryption keys can be located in a DRM′ header, which is part of the ‘strd’ chunk (see description above). The decryption keys are scrambled and encrypted with a master key. The DRM′ header also contains information identifying the master key.
A conceptual representation of the information in a DRM′ chunk is shown in
2.8. The ‘idx1’ chunk
The ‘idx1’ chunk 44 is an optional chunk that can be used to index the ‘data’ chunks in the ‘movi’ list chunk 42. In one embodiment, the ‘idx1’ chunk can be implemented as specified in the AVI format. In other embodiments, the ‘idx1’ chunk can be implemented using data structures that reference the location within the file of each of the ‘data’ chunks in the ‘movi’ list chunk. In several embodiments, the ‘idx1’ chunk identifies each ‘data’ chunk by the track number of the data and the type of the data. The FOURCC codes referred to above can be used for this purpose.
3. Encoding a Multimedia File
Embodiments of the present invention can be used to generate multimedia files in a number of ways. In one instance, systems in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can generate multimedia files from files containing separate video tracks, audio tracks and subtitle tracks. In such instances, other information such as menu information and ‘meta data’ can be authored and inserted into the file.
Other systems in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be used to extract information from a number of files and author a single multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. Where a CD-R is the initial source of the information, systems in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can use a codec to obtain greater compression and can re-chunk the audio so that the audio chunks correspond to the video chunks in the newly created multimedia file. In addition, any menu information in the CD-R can be parsed and used to generate menu information included in the multimedia file.
Other embodiments can generate a new multimedia file by adding additional content to an existing multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. An example of adding additional content would be to add an additional audio track to the file such as an audio track containing commentary (e.g. director's comments, after-created narrative of a vacation video). The additional audio track information interleaved into the multimedia file could also be accompanied by a modification of the menu information in the multimedia file to enable the playing of the new audio track.
3.1. Generation Using Stored Data Tracks
A system in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention for generating a multimedia file is illustrated in
Typically the chunks provided to the interleaver are stored on a storage device. In several embodiments, all of the chunks are stored on the same storage device. In other embodiments, the chunks may be provided to the interleaver from a variety of storage devices or generated and provided to the interleaver in real time.
In the embodiment illustrated in
In one embodiment, the interfaces between the various encoders, decoder and transcoders conform with Direct Show standards specified by Microsoft Corporation. In other embodiments, the software used to perform the encoding, decoding and transcoding need not comply with such standards.
In the illustrated embodiment, separate processing components are shown for each media source. In other embodiments resources can be shared. For example, a single audio decoder and audio encoder could be used to generate audio chunks from all of the sources. Typically, the entire system can be implemented on a computer using software and connected to a storage device such as a hard disk drive.
In order to utilize the interleaver in the manner described above, the ‘DMNU’ chunk, the ‘DXDT’ chunk, the ‘video’ chunks, the ‘audio’ chunks and the ‘subtitle’ chunks in accordance with embodiments of the present invention must be generated and provided to the interleaver. The process of generating each of the various chunks in a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is discussed in greater detail below.
3.2. Generating a ‘DXDT’ Chunk
The ‘DXDT’ chunk can be generated in any of a number of ways. In one embodiment, ‘meta data’ is entered into data structures via a graphical user interface and then parsed into a ‘DXDT’ chunk. In one embodiment, the ‘meta data’ is expressed as series of subject, predicate, object and authority statements. In another embodiment, the ‘meta data’ statements are expressed in any of a variety of formats. In several embodiments, each ‘meta data’ statement is parsed into a separate chunk. In other embodiments, several ‘meta data’ statements in a first format (such as subject, predicate, object, authority expressions) are parsed into a first chunk and other ‘meta data’ statements in other formats are parsed into separate chunks. In one embodiment, the ‘meta data’ statements are written into an XML configuration file and the XML configuration file is parsed to create the chunks within a ‘DXDT’ chunk.
An embodiment of a system for generating a ‘DXDT’ chunk from a series of ‘meta data’ statements contained within an XML configuration file is shown in
3.3. Generating a ‘DMNU’ Chunk
A system that can be used to generate a ‘DMNU’ chunk in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
The generation of a ‘DMNU’ chunk using the inputs to the menu chunk generating system involves the creation of a number of intermediate files. The media model 422 is used to create an XML configuration file 430 and the media information is used to create a number of AVI files 432. The XML configuration file is created by a model transcoder 434. The AVI files 432 are created by interleaving the video, audio and overlay information using an interleaver 436. The video information is obtained by using a video decoder 438 and a video encoder 440 to decode the video source 424 and recode it in the manner discussed below. The audio information is obtained by using an audio decoder 442 and an audio encoder 444 to decode the audio and encode it in the manner described below. The overlay information is generated using a first transcoder 446 and a second transcoder 448. The first transcoder 446 converts the overlay into a graphical representation such as a standard bitmap and the second transcoder takes the graphical information and formats it as is required for inclusion in the multimedia file. Once the XML file and the AVI files containing the information required to build the menus have been generated, the menu generator 450 can use the information to generate a ‘DMNU’ chunk 358′.
3.3.1. The Menu Model
In one embodiment, the media model is an object-oriented model representing all of the menus and their subcomponents. The media model organizes the menus into a hierarchical structure, which allows the menus to be organized by language selection. A media model in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
The LanguageMenus' objects organize information for various menus by language selection. All of the ‘Menu’ objects 466 for a given language are associated with the LanguageMenus' object 463 for that language. Each ‘Menu’ object is associated with a number of ‘Button’ objects 468 and references a number of ‘MediaTrack’ objects 488. The referenced ‘MediaTrack’ objects 488 indicated the background video and background audio for the ‘Menu’ object 466.
Each ‘Button’ object 468 is associated with an ‘Action’ object 470 and a ‘Rectangle’ object 484. The ‘Button’ object 468 also contains a reference to a ‘MediaTrack’ object 488 that indicates the overlay to be used when the button is highlighted on a display. Each ‘Action’ object 470 is associated with a number of objects that can include a ‘MenuTransition’ object 472, a ‘ButtonTransition’ object 474, a ‘ReturnToPlay’ object 476, a ‘Subtitle Selection’ object 478, an ‘AudioSelection’ object 480 and a ‘PlayAction’ object 482. Each of these objects define the response of the menu system to various inputs from a user. The ‘MenuTransition’ object contains a reference to a ‘Menu’ object that indicates a menu that should be transitioned to in response to an action. The ‘ButtonTransition’ object indicates a button that should be highlighted in response to an action. The ReturnToPlay′ object can cause a player to resume playing a feature. The ‘SubtitleSelection’ and ‘AudioSelection’ objects contain references to ‘Title’ objects 487 (discussed below). The ‘PlayAction’ object contains a reference to a ‘Chapter’ object 492 (discussed below). The ‘Rectangle’ object 484 indicates the portion of the screen occupied by the button.
The ‘Media’ object 464 indicates the media information referenced in the menu system. The ‘Media’ object has a ‘MenuTracks’ object 486 and a number of ‘Title’ objects 487 associated with it. The ‘MenuTracks’ object 486 references ‘MediaTrack’ objects 488 that are indicative of the media used to construct the menus (i.e. background audio, background video and overlays).
The ‘Title’ objects 487 are indicative of a multimedia presentation and have a number of ‘Chapter’ objects 492 and ‘MediaSource’ objects 490 associated with them. The ‘Title’ objects also contain a reference to a ‘TranslationLookup’ object 494. The ‘Chapter’ objects are indicative of a certain point in a multimedia presentation and have a number of ‘MediaTrack’ objects 488 associated with them. The ‘Chapter’ objects also contain a reference a ‘TranslationLookup’ object 494. Each ‘MediaTrack’ object associated with a ‘Chapter’ object is indicative of a point in either an audio, video or subtitle track of the multimedia presentation and references a ‘MediaSource’ object 490 and a ‘TransalationLookup’ object 494 (discussed below).
The ‘TranslationTable’ object 465 groups a number of text strings that describe the various parts of multimedia presentations indicated by the ‘Title’ objects, the ‘Chapter’ objects and the ‘MediaTrack’ objects. The ‘TranslationTable’ object 465 has a number of ‘TranslationLookup’ objects 494 associated with it. Each ‘TranslationLookup’ object is indicative of a particular object and has a number of ‘Translation’ objects 496 associated with it. The ‘Translation’ objects are each indicative of a text string that describes the object indicated by the ‘TranslationLookup’ object in a particular language.
A media object model can be constructed using software configured to generate the various objects described above and to establish the required associations and references between the objects.
3.3.2. Generating an XML File
An XML configuration file is generated from the menu model, which represents all of the menus and their sub-components. The XML configuration file also identifies all the media files used by the menus. The XML can be generated by implementing an appropriate parser application that parses the object model into XML code.
In other embodiments, a video editing application can provide a user with a user interface enabling the direct generation of an XML configuration file without creating a menu model.
In embodiments where another menu system is the basis of the menu model, such as a DVD menu, the menus can be pruned by the user to eliminate menu options relating to content not included in the multimedia file generated in accordance with the practice of the present invention. In one embodiment, this can be done by providing a graphical user interface enabling the elimination of objects from the menu model. In another embodiment, the pruning of menus can be achieved by providing a graphical user interface or a text interface that can edit the XML configuration file.
3.3.3. The Media Information
When the ‘DMNU’ chunk is generated, the media information provided to the menu generator 450 includes the data required to provide the background video, background audio and foreground overlays for the buttons specified in the menu model (see description above). In one embodiment, a video editing application such as VideoWave distributed by Roxio, Inc. of Santa Clara, Calif. is used to provide the source media tracks that represent the video, audio and button selection overlays for each individual menu.
3.3.4. Generating Intermediate AVI Files
As discussed above, the media tracks that are used as the background video, background audio and foreground button overlays are stored in a single AVI file for one or more menus. The chunks that contain the media tracks in a menu AVI file can be created by using software designed to interleave video, audio and button overlay tracks. The ‘audio’, ‘video’ and ‘overlay’ chunks (i.e. ‘subtitle’ chunks containing overlay information) are interleaved into an AVI format compliant file using an interleaver.
As mentioned above, a separate AVI file can be created for each menu. In other embodiments, other file formats or a single file could be used to contain the media information used to provide the background audio, background video and foreground overlay information.
3.3.5. Combining the XML Configuration File and the AVI Files
In one embodiment, a computer is configured to parse information from the XML configuration file to create a ‘WowMenu’ chunk (described above). In addition, the computer can create the ‘MRIF’ chunk (described above) using the AVI files that contain the media for each menu. The computer can then complete the generation of the ‘DMNU’ chunk by creating the necessary references between the ‘WowMenu’ chunk and the media chunks in the ‘MRIF’ chunk. In several embodiments, the menu information can be encrypted. Encryption can be achieved by encrypting the media information contained in the ‘MRIF’ chunk in a similar manner to that described below in relation to ‘video’ chunks. In other embodiments, various alternative encryption techniques are used.
3.3.6. Automatic Generation of Menus from the Object Model
Referring back to
3.3.7. Generating ‘DXDT’ and ‘DMNU’ Chunks Using a Single Configuration File
Systems in accordance with several embodiments of the present invention are capable of generating a single XML configuration file containing both ‘meta data’ and menu information and using the XML file to generate the ‘DXDT’ and ‘DMNU’ chunks. These systems derive the XML configuration file using the ‘meta data’ information and the menu object model. In other embodiments, the configuration file need not be in XML.
3.4. Generating ‘audio’ Chunks
The ‘audio’ chunks in the ‘movi’ list chunk of multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be generated by decoding an audio source and then encoding the source into ‘audio’ chunks in accordance with the practice of the present invention. In one embodiment, the ‘audio’ chunks can be encoded using an mp3 codec.
3.4.1. Re-Chunking Audio
Where the audio source is provided in chunks that don't contain audio information corresponding to the contents of a corresponding ‘video’ chunk, then embodiments of the present invention can re-chunk the audio. A process that can be used to re-chunk audio is illustrated in
3.5. Generating ‘video’ Chunks
As described above the process of creating video chunks can involve decoding the video source and encoding the decoded video into ‘video’ chunks. In one embodiment, each ‘video’ chunk contains information for a single frame of video. The decoding process simply involves taking video in a particular format and decoding the video from that format into a standard video format, which may be uncompressed. The encoding process involves taking the standard video, encoding the video and generating ‘video’ chunks using the encoded video.
A video encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is conceptually illustrated in
In order to perform motion estimation 506, the system must have knowledge of how the previously processed frame of video will be decoded by a decoding device (e.g. when the compressed video is uncompressed for viewing by a player). This information can be obtained by inverse quantizing 522 the output of the quantizer 512. An inverse DCT 524 can then be performed on the output of the inverse quantizer and the result placed in a frame store 526 for access during the motion estimation process.
Multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can also include a number of psychovisual enhancements 528. The psychovisual enhancements can be methods of compressing video based upon human perceptions of vision. These techniques are discussed further below and generally involve modifying the number of bits used by the quantizer to represent various aspects of video. Other aspects of the encoding process can also include psychovisual enhancements.
In one embodiment, the entire encoding system 500 can be implemented using a computer configured to perform the various functions described above. Examples of detailed implementations of these functions are provided below.
3.5.1. Preprocessing
The preprocessing operations 502 that are optionally performed by an encoder 500 in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can use a number of signal processing techniques to improve the quality of the encoded video. In one embodiment, the preprocessing 502 can involve one or all of deinterlacing, temporal/spatial noise reduction and resizing. In embodiments where all three of these preprocessing techniques are used, the deinterlacing is typically performed first followed by the temporal/spatial noise reduction and the resizing.
3.5.2. Motion Estimation and Compensation
A video encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can reduce the number of pixels required to represent a video track by searching for pixels that are repeated in multiple frames. Essentially, each frame in a video typically contains many of the same pixels as the one before it. The encoder can conduct several types of searches for matches in pixels between each frame (as macroblocks, pixels, half-pixels and quarter-pixels) and eliminates these redundancies whenever possible without reducing image quality. Using motion estimation, the encoder can represent most of the picture simply by recording the changes that have occurred since the last frame instead of storing the entire picture for every frame. During motion estimation, the encoder divides the frame it is analyzing into an even grid of blocks, often referred to as ‘macroblocks’. For each ‘macroblock’ in the frame, the encoder can try to find a matching block in the previous frame. The process of trying to find matching blocks is called a ‘motion search’. The motion of the ‘macroblock’ can be represented as a two dimensional vector, i.e. an (x,y) representation. The motion search algorithm can be performed with various degrees of accuracy. A whole-pel search is one where the encoder will try to locate matching blocks by stepping through the reference frame in either dimension one pixel at a time. Ina half-pixel search, the encoder searches for a matching block by stepping through the reference frame in either dimension by half of a pixel at a time. The encoder can use quarter-pixels, other pixel fractions or searches involving a granularity of greater than a pixel.
The encoder embodiment illustrated in
Motion compensation is performed by taking the blocks and vectors generated as a result of motion estimation. The result is an approximation of the encoded image that can be matched to the actual image by providing additional texture information.
3.5.3. Discrete Cosine Transform
The DCT and inverse DCT performed by the encoder illustrated in
3.5.3.1. Description of Transform
The DCT is a method of transforming a set of spatial-domain data points to a frequency domain representation. In the case of video compression, a 2-dimensional DCT converts image blocks into a form where redundancies are more readily exploitable. A frequency domain block can be a sparse matrix that is easily compressed by entropy coding.
3.5.3.2. Psychovisual Enhancements to Transform
The DCT coefficients can be modified to improve the quality of the quantized image by reducing quantization noise in areas where it is readily apparent to a human viewer. In addition, file size can be reduced by increasing quantization noise in portions of the image where it is not readily discernable by a human viewer.
Encoders in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can perform what is referred to as a ‘slow’ psychovisual enhancement. The ‘slow’ psychovisual enhancement analyzes blocks of the video image and decides whether allowing some noise there can save some bits without degrading the video's appearance. The process uses one metric per block. The process is referred to as a ‘slow’ process, because it performs a considerable amount of computation to avoid blocking or ringing artifacts.
Other embodiments of encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention implement a ‘fast’ psychovisual enhancement. The ‘fast’ psychovisual enhancement is capable of controlling where noise appears within a block and can shape quantization noise.
Both the ‘slow’ and ‘fast’ psychovisual enhancements are discussed in greater detail below. Other psychovisual enhancements can be performed in accordance with embodiments of the present invention including enhancements that control noise at image edges and that seek to concentrate higher levels of quantization noise in areas of the image where it is not readily apparent to human vision.
3.5.3.3. ‘Slow’ Psychovisual Enhancement
The ‘slow’ psychovisual enhancement analyzes blocks of the video image and determines whether allowing some noise can save bits without degrading the video's appearance. In one embodiment, the algorithm includes two stages. The first involves generation of a differentiated image for the input luminance pixels. The differentiated image is generated in the manner described below. The second stage involves modifying the DCT coefficients prior to quantization.
3.5.3.3.1. Generation of Differentiated Image
Each pixel p′xy of the differentiated image is computed from the uncompressed source pixels, pxy, according to the following:
p′xy=max(|px+1y−pxy|,|px−1y−pxy|,|pxy+1−pxy|,|pxy−1−pxy|)
where
p′xy will be in the range 0 to 255 (assuming 8 bit video).
3.5.3.3.2. Modification of DCT Coefficients
The modification of the DCT coefficients can involve computation of a block ringing factor, computation of block energy and the actual modification of the coefficient values.
3.5.3.3.3. Computation of Block Ringing Factor
For each block of the image, a “ringing factor” is calculated based on the local region of the differentiated image. In embodiments where the block is defined as an 8×8 block, the ringing factor can be determined using the following method.
Initially, a threshold is determined based on the maximum and minimum luminance pixels values within the 8×8 block:
thresholdblock=floor((maxblock−minblock)/8)+2
The differentiated image and the threshold are used to generate a map of the “flat” pixels in the block's neighborhood. The potential for each block to have a different threshold prevents the creation of a map of flat pixels for the entire frame. The map is generated as follows:
flatxy=1 when p′xy<thresholdblock
flatxy=0 otherwise
The map of flat pixels is filtered according to a simple logical operation:
flat′xy=1 when flatxy=1 and flatx−1y=1 and flatxy−1=1 and flatx−1y−1=1 flat′xy otherwise
The flat pixels in the filtered map are then counted over the 9×9 region that covers the 8×8 block.
flatcountblock=Σflat′xy for 0=x=8 and 0=y=8
The risk of visible ringing artifacts can be evaluated using the following expression:
ringingbriskblock=((flatcountblock−10)×256+20)/40
The 8×8 block's ringing factor can then be derived using the following expression:
Ringingfactor=0 when ringingrisk>255=255 when ringingrisk<0=255−ringingrisk otherwise
3.5.3.3.4. Computation of Block Energy
The energy for blocks of the image can be calculated using the following procedure. In several embodiments, 8×8 blocks of the image are used.
A forward DCT is performed on the source image:
T=fDCT(S)
where S is the 64 source-image luminance values of the 8×8 block in question and T is the transformed version of the same portion of the source image.
The energy at a particular coefficient position is defined as the square of that coefficient's value:
ek=tk2 for 0=k=63
where tk is the kth coefficient of transformed block T.
3.5.3.3.5. Coefficient Modification
The modification of the DCT coefficients can be performed in accordance with the following process. In several embodiments, the process is performed for every non-zero AC DCT coefficient before quantization. The magnitude of each coefficient is changed by a small delta, the value of the delta being determined according to psychovisual techniques.
The DCT coefficient modification of each non-zero AC coefficient ck is performed by calculating an energy based on local and block energies using the following formula:
energyk=max(ak×ek,0.12×totalenergy)
where ak is a constant whose value depends on the coefficient position as described in the following table:
The energy can be modified according to the block's ringing factor using the following relationship:
energy′k=ringingfactor×energyk
The resulting value is shifted and clipped before being used as an input to a look-up table (LUT).
e=min(1023,4×energy′k)
dk=LUTi where i=ek
The look-up table is computed as follows:
LUTi=min(floor(ktexture×((i+0.5)/4)½+kflat×offset)2×Qp)
The value ‘offset’ depends on quantizer, Qp, as described in the following table:
The variable ktexture and kflat control the strength of the of the psychovisual effect in flat and textured regions respectively. In one embodiment, they take values in the range 0 to 1, with 0 signifying no effect and 1 meaning full effect. In one embodiment, the values for ktexture and kflat are established as follows:
Luminance:
ktexture=1.0
kflat=1.0
Chrominance:
ktexture=1.0
kflat=0.0
The output from the look-up table (dk) is used to modify the magnitude of the DCT coefficient by an additive process:
c′k=ck−min(dk,|ck|)×sgn(ck)
Finally, the DCT coefficient ck is substituted by the modified coefficient c′k and passed onwards for quantization.
3.5.3.4. ‘Fast’ Psychovisual Enhancement
A ‘fast’ psychovisual enhancement can be performed on the DCT coefficients by computing an ‘importance’ map for the input luminance pixels and then modifying the DCT coefficients.
3.5.3.4.1. Computing an ‘importance’ Map
An ‘importance’ map can be generated by calculating an ‘importance’ value for each pixel in the luminance place of the input video frame. In several embodiments, the ‘importance’ value approximates the sensitivity of the human eye to any distortion located at that particular pixel. The ‘importance’ map is an array of pixel ‘importance’ values.
The ‘importance’ of a pixel can be determined by first calculating the dynamic range of a block of pixels surrounding the pixel (dxy). In several embodiments the dynamic range of a 3×3 block of pixels centered on the pixel location (x, y) is computed by subtracting the value of the darkest pixel in the area from the value of the lightest pixel in the area.
The ‘importance’ of a pixel (mxy) can be derived from the pixel's dynamic range as follows:
mxy=0.08/max(dxy,3)+0.001
3.5.3.4.2. Modifying DCT Coefficients
In one embodiment, the modification of the DCT coefficients involves the generation of basis-function energy matrices and delta look up tables.
3.5.3.4.3. Generation of Basis-Function Energy Matrices
A set of basis-function energy matrices can be used in modifying the DCT coefficients. These matrices contain constant values that may be computed prior to encoding. An 8×8 matrix is used for each of the 64 DCT basis functions. Each matrix describes how every pixel in an 8×8 block will be impacted by modification of its corresponding coefficient. The kth basis-function energy matrix is derived by taking an 8×8 matrix Ak with the corresponding coefficient set to 100 and the other coefficients set to 0.
akn=100 if n=k=0 otherwise
where
n represents the coefficient position within the 8×8 matrix; 0=n=63
An inverse DCT is performed on the matrix to yield a further 8×8 matrix A′k. The elements of the matrix (a′kn) represent the kth DCT basis function.
A′k=iDCT(Ak)
Each value in the transformed matrix is then squared:
bkn=a′kn2 for 0=n=63
The process is carried out 64 times to produce the basis function energy matrices Bk, 0=k=63, each comprising 64 natural values. Each matrix value is a measure of how much a pixel at the nth position in the 8×8 block will be impacted by any error or modification of the coefficient k.
3.5.3.4.4. Generation of Delta Look-Up Table
A look-up table (LUT) can be used to expedite the computation of the coefficient modification delta. The contents of the table can be generated in a manner that is dependent upon the desired strength of the ‘fast’ psychovisual enhancement and the quantizer parameter (Qp).
The values of the look-up table can be generated according to the following relationship:
LUTi=min(floor(128×ktexture×strength/(i+0.5)+kflat×offset+0.5),2×Qp)
where
i is the position within the table, 0=i=1023.
strength and offset depend on the quantizer, Qp, as described in the following table:
The variable ktexture and kflat control the strength of the of the psychovisual effect in flat and textured regions respectively. In one embodiment, they take values in the range 0 to 1, with 0 signifying no effect and 1 meaning full effect. In one embodiment, the values for ktexture and kflat are established as follows:
Luminance:
ktexture=1.0
kflat=1.0
Chrominance:
ktexture=1.0
kflat=0.0
3.5.3.4.5. Modification of DCT Coefficients
The DCT coefficients can be modified using the values calculated above. In one embodiment, each non-zero AC DCT coefficient is modified in accordance with the following procedure prior to quantization.
Initially, an ‘energy’ value (ek) is computed by taking the dot product of the corresponding basis function energy matrix and the appropriate 8×8 block from the importance map. This ‘energy’ is a measure of how quantization errors at the particular coefficient would be perceived by a human viewer. It is the sum of the product of pixel importance and pixel basis-function energy:
ek=M·Bk
where
M contains the 8×8 block's importance map values; and
Bk is the kth basis function energy matrix.
The resulting ‘energy’ value is shifted and clipped before being used as an index (dk) into the delta look-up table.
e′k=min[1023,floor(ek/32768)]
dk=LUTi
where
i=e′k
The output of the delta look-up table is used to modify the magnitude of the DCT coefficient by an additive process:
c′k=ck−min(dk,|ck|)×sign(ck)
The DCT coefficient ck is substituted with the modified c′k and passed onwards for quantization.
3.5.4. Quantization
Encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can use a standard quantizer such as a the quantizer defined by the International Telecommunication Union as Video Coding for Low Bitrate Communication, ITU-T Recommendation H.263, 1996.
3.5.4.1. Psychovisual Enhancements to Quantization
Some encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention, use a psychovisual enhancement that exploits the psychological effects of human vision to achieve more efficient compression. The psychovisual effect can be applied at a frame level and a macroblock level.
3.5.4.2. Frame Level Psychovisual Enhancements
When applied at a frame level, the enhancement is part of the rate control algorithm and its goal is to adjust the encoding so that a given amount of bit rate is best used to ensure the maximum visual quality as perceived by human eyes. The frame rate psychovisual enhancement is motivated by the theory that human vision tends to ignore the details when the action is high and that human vision tends to notice detail when an image is static. In one embodiment, the amount of motion is determined by looking at the sum of absolute difference (SAD) for a frame. In one embodiment, the SAD value is determined by summing the absolute differences of collocated luminance pixels of two blocks. In several embodiments, the absolute differences of 16×16 pixel blocks is used. In embodiments that deal with fractional pixel offsets, interpolation is performed as specified in the MPEG-4 standard (an ISO/IEC standard developed by the Moving Picture Experts Group of the ISO/IEC), before the sum of absolute differences is calculated.
The frame-level psychovisual enhancement applies only to the P frames of the video track and is based on SAD value of the frame. During the encoding, the psychovisual module keeps a record of the average SAD (i.e.
For each P frame of the video track encoded, the frame quantizer Q (obtained from the rate control module) will have a psychovisual correction applied to it. In one embodiment, the process involves calculating a ratio R using the following formula:
where
I is a constant and is currently set to 0.5. The R is clipped to within the bound of [−1, 1].
The quantizer is then adjusted according to the ration R, via the calculation shown below:
Qadj=Q└Q·(1+R·Sframe)┘
where
Sframe is a strength constant for the frame level psychovisual enhancements.
The Sframe constant determines how strong an adjustment can be for the frame level psychovisual. In one embodiment of the codec, the option of setting Sframe to 0.2, 0.3 or 0.4 is available.
3.5.4.3. Macroblock Level Psychovisual Enhancements
Encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention that utilize a psychovisual enhancement at the macroblock level attempt to identify the macroblocks that are prominent to the visual quality of the video for a human viewer and attempt to code those macroblocks with higher quality. The effect of the macroblock level psychovisual enhancements it to take bits away from the less important parts of a frame and apply them to more important parts of the frame. In several embodiments, enhancements are achieved using three technologies, which are based on smoothness, brightness and the macroblock SAD. In other embodiments any of the techniques alone or in combination with another of the techniques or another technique entirely can be used.
In one embodiment, all three of the macroblock level psychovisual enhancements described above share a common parameter, SMB, which controls the strength of the macroblock level psychovisual enhancement. The maximum and minimum quantizer for the macroblocks are then derived from the strength parameter and the frame quantizer Qframe via the calculations shown below:
and
QMBMin=Qframe·(1−SMB)
where
QMBMax is the maximum quantizer
QMBMax is the minimum quantizer
The values QMBMax and QMBMax define the upper and lower bounds to the macroblock quantizers for the entire frame. In one embodiment, the option of setting the value SMB to any of the values 0.2, 0.3 and 0.4 is provided. In other embodiments, other values for SMB can be utilized.
3.5.4.3.1. Brightness Enhancement
In embodiments where psychovisual enhancement is performed based on the brightness of the macroblocks, the encoder attempts to encode brighter macroblocks with greater quality. The theoretical basis of this enhancement is that relatively dark parts of the frame are more or less ignored by human viewers. This macroblock psychovisual enhancement is applied to I frames and P frames of the video track. For each frame, the encoder looks through the whole frame first. The average brightness (
TBRLower =
TBRUpper
The brightness enhancement is then applied based on the two thresholds using the conditions stated below to generate an intended quantizer (QMB) for the macroblock:
QMB=QMBMin when BR>TBRUpper
QMB=Qframe when TBRLower≤BR≤TBRUpper, and
QMB=QMBMax when BR<TBRLower
where
BR is the brightness value for that particular macroblock
In embodiments where the encoder is compliant with the MPEG-4 standard, the macroblock level psychovisual brightness enhancement technique cannot change the quantizer by more than ±2 from one macroblock to the next one. Therefore, the calculated QMB may require modification based upon the quantizer used in the previous macroblock.
3.5.4.3.2. Smoothness Enhancement
Encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention that include a smoothness psychovisual enhancement, modify the quantizer based on the spatial variation of the image being encoded. Use of a smoothness psychovisual enhancement can be motivated by the theory that human vision has an increased sensitivity to quantization artifacts in smooth parts of an image. Smoothness psychovisual enhancement can, therefore, involve increasing the number of bits to represent smoother portions of the image and decreasing the number of bits where there is a high degree of spatial variation in the image.
In one embodiment, the smoothness of a portion of an image is measured as the average difference in the luminance of pixels in a macroblock to the brightness of the macroblock (
The following smoothness enhancement is performed (546) based on the threshold.
QMB=Qframe when DR≥TDR, and
QMB=QMBMin when DR<TDR
where
QMB is the intended quantizer for the macroblock
DR is the deviation value for the macroblock (i.e. mean luminance−mean brightness)
Embodiments that encode files in accordance with the MPEG-4 standard are limited as described above in that the macroblock level quantizer change can be at most ±2 from one macroblock to the next.
3.5.4.3.3. Macroblock SAD Enhancement
Encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can utilize a macroblock SAD psychovisual enhancement. A macroblock SAD psychovisual enhancement can be used to increase the detail for static macroblocks and allow decreased detail in portions of a frame that are used in a high action scene.
A process for performing a macroblock SAD psychovisual enhancement in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
TMBSADLower=
TMBSADUpper=
where
TMBSADLower is the lower threshold
TMBSADUpper is the upper threshold, which may be bounded by 1024 if necessary
The macroblock SAD enhancement is then applied (576) based on these two thresholds according to the following conditions:
QMB=QMBMax when MBSAD>TMBSADUpper,
QMB=Qframe when TMADLower≤MBSAD≤TMBSADUpper
QMB=QMBMin when MBSAD<TMBSADLower
where
QMB is the intended quantizer for the macroblock
MBSAD is the SAD value for that particular macroblock
Embodiments that encode files in accordance with the MPEG-4 specification are limited as described above in that the macroblock level quantizer change can be at most ±2 from one macroblock to the next.
3.5.5. Rate Control
The rate control technique used by an encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can determine how the encoder uses the allocated bit rate to encode a video sequence. An encoder will typically seek to encode to a predetermined bit rate and the rate control technique is responsible for matching the bit rate generated by the encoder as closely as possible to the predetermined bit rate. The rate control technique can also seek to allocate the bit rate in a manner that will ensure the highest visual quality of the video sequence when it is decoded. Much of rate control is performed by adjusting the quantizer. The quantizer determines how finely the encoder codes the video sequence. A smaller quantizer will result in higher quality and higher bit consumption. Therefore, the rate control algorithm seeks to modify the quantizer in a manner that balances the competing interests of video quality and bit consumption.
Encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can utilize any of a variety of different rate control techniques. In one embodiment, a single pass rate control technique is used. In other embodiments a dual (or multiple) pass rate control technique is used. In addition, a ‘video buffer verified’ rate control can be performed as required. Specific examples of these techniques are discussed below. However, any rate control technique can be used in an encoder in accordance with the practice of the present inventions.
3.5.5.1. One Pass Rate Control
An embodiment of a one pass rate control technique in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention seeks to allow high bit rate peaks for high motion scenes. In several embodiments, the one pass rate control technique seeks to increase the bit rate slowly in response to an increase in the amount of motion in a scene and to rapidly decrease the bit rate in response to a reduction in the motion in a scene.
In one embodiment, the one pass rate control algorithm uses two averaging periods to track the bit rate. A long-term average to ensure overall bit rate convergence and a short-term average to enable response to variations in the amount of action in a scene.
A one pass rate control technique in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
As discussed above, the encoder is initialized (584) with a variety of parameters. These parameters are the ‘bit rate’, the ‘frame rate’, the ‘Max Key Frame Interval’, the ‘Maximum Quantizer’, the ‘Minimum Quantizer’, the ‘averaging period’, the ‘reaction period’ and the ‘down/up ratio’. The following is a discussion of each of these parameters.
3.5.5.1.1. The ‘bit rate’
The ‘bit rate’ parameter sets the target bit rate of the encoding.
3.5.5.1.2. The ‘frame rate’
The ‘frame rate’ defines the period between frames of video.
3.5.5.1.3. The ‘Max Key Frame Interval’
The ‘Max Key Frame Interval’ specifies the maximum interval between the key frames. The key frames are normally automatically inserted in the encoded video when the codec detects a scene change. In circumstances where a scene continues for a long interval without a single cut, key frames can be inserted in insure that the interval between key frames is always less or equal to the ‘Max Key Frame Interval’. In one embodiment, the ‘Max Key Frame Interval’ parameter can be set to a value of 300 frames. In other embodiments, other values can be used.
3.5.5.1.4. The ‘Maximum Quantizer’ and the ‘Minimum Quantizer’
The ‘Maximum Quantizer’ and the ‘Minimum Quantizer’ parameters set the upper and lower bound of the quantizer used in the encoding. In one embodiment, the quantizer bounds are set at values between 1 and 31.
3.5.5.1.5. The ‘averaging period’ The ‘averaging period’ parameter controls the amount of video that is considered when modifying the quantizer. A longer averaging period will typically result in the encoded video having a more accurate overall rate. In one embodiment, an ‘averaging period’ of 2000 is used. Although in other embodiments other values can be used.
3.5.5.1.6. The ‘reaction period’
The ‘reaction period’ parameter determines how fast the encoder adapts to changes in the motion in recent scenes. A longer ‘reaction period’ value can result in better quality high motion scenes and worse quality low motion scenes. In one embodiment, a ‘reaction period’ of 10 is used. Although in other embodiments other values can be used.
3.5.5.1.7. The ‘down/up ratio’
The ‘down/up ratio’ parameter controls the relative sensitivity for the quantizer adjustment in reaction to the high or low motion scenes. A larger value typically results in higher quality high motion scenes and increased bit consumption. In one embodiment, a ‘down/up ratio’ of 20 is used. Although in other embodiments, other values can be used.
3.5.5.1.8. Calculating the Quantizer Value
As discussed above, the one pass rate control technique involves the calculation of a quantizer value after the encoding of each frame. The following is a description of a technique in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention that can be used to update the quantizer value.
The encoder maintains two exponential moving averages having periods equal to the ‘averaging period’ (Paverage) and the ‘reaction period’ (Preaction) a moving average of the bit rate. The two exponential moving averages can be calculated according to the relationship:
where
At is the average at instance t;
At−i is the average at instance t-T (usually the average in the previous frame);
T represents the interval period (usually the frame time); and
P is the average period, which can be either Paverage and or Preaction.
The above calculated moving average is then adjusted into bit rate by dividing by the time interval between the current instance and the last instance in the video, using the following calculation:
where
Rt is the bitrate;
At is either of the moving averages; and
T is the time interval between the current instance and last instance (it is usually the inverse of the frame rate).
The encoder can calculate the target bit rate (Rtarget) of the next frame as follows:
Rtarget=Roverall+(Roverall−Raverage)
where
Roverall is the overall bit rate set for the whole video; and
Raverage is the average bit rate using the long averaging period.
In several embodiments, the target bit rate is lower bounded by 75% of the overall bit rate. If the target bit rate drops below that bound, then it will be forced up to the bound to ensure the quality of the video.
The encoder then updates the internal quantizer based on the difference between Rtarget and Rreaction. If Rreaction is less than Rtarget, then there is a likelihood that the previous frame was of relatively low complexity. Therefore, the quantizer can be decreased by performing the following calculation:
When Rreaction is greater than Rtarget, there is a significant likelihood that previous frame possessed a relatively high level of complexity. Therefore, the quantizer can be increased by performing the following calculation:
where
S is the ‘up/down ratio’.
3.5.5.1.9. B-VOP Encoding
The algorithm described above can also be applied to B-VOP encoding. When B-VOP is enabled in the encoding, the quantizer for the B-VOP (QB) is chosen based on the quantizer of the P-VOP (QP) following the B-VOP. The value can be obtained in accordance with the following relationships:
QB=2·QP for QP≤4
QB=5+¾·QP for 4<QP≤20
QB=QP for QP≥20
3.5.5.2. Two Pass Rate Control
Encoders in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention that use a two (or multiple) pass rate control technique can determine the properties of a video sequence in a first pass and then encode the video sequence with knowledge of the properties of the entire sequence. Therefore, the encoder can adjust the quantization level for each frame based upon its relative complexity compared to other frames in the video sequence.
A two pass rate control technique in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, the encoder performs a first pass in which the video is encoded in accordance with the one pass rate control technique described above and the complexity of each frame is recorded (any of a variety of different metrics for measuring complexity can be used). The average complexity and, therefore, the average quantizer (Qref) can be determined based on the first. In the second pass, the bit stream is encoded with quantizers determined based on the complexity values calculated during the first pass.
3.5.5.2.1. Quantizers for 1-VOPs
The quantizer Q for 1-VOPs is set to 0.75×Qref, provided the next frame is not an I-VOP. If the next frame is also an I-VOP, the Q (for the current frame) is set to 1.25×Qref.
3.5.5.2.2. Quantizers for P-VOPs
The quantizer for the P-VOPs can be determined using the following expression.
where
Ccomplexity is the complexity of the frame;
F(x) is a function that provides the number which the complexity of the frame must be multiplied to give the number of bits required to encode the frame using a quantizer with a quantization value x;
F−1(x) is the inverse function of F(x); and
k is the strength parameter.
The following table defines an embodiment of a function F(Q) that can be used to generator the factor that the complexity of a frame must be multiplied by in order to determine the number of bits required to encode the frame using an encoder with a quantizer Q.
If the strength parameter k is chosen to be 0, then the result is a constant quantizer. When the strength parameter is chosen to be 1, the quantizer is proportional to Ccomplexity Several encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention have a strength parameter k equal to 0.5.
3.5.5.2.3. Quantizers for B-VOPs
The quantizer Q for the B-VOPs can be chosen using the same technique for choosing the quantizer for B-VOPs in the one pass technique described above.
3.5.5.3. Video Buffer Verified Rate Control
The number of bits required to represent a frame can vary depending on the characteristics of the video sequence. Most communication systems operate at a constant bit rate. A problem that can be encountered with variable bit rate communications is allocating sufficient resources to handle peaks in resource usage. Several encoders in accordance with embodiments of the present invention encode video with a view to preventing overflow of a decoder video buffer, when the bit rate of the variable bit rate communication spikes.
The objectives of video buffer verifier (VBV) rate control can include generating video that will not exceed a decoder's buffer when transmitted. In addition, it can be desirable that the encoded video match a target bit rate and that the rate control produces high quality video.
Encoders in accordance with several embodiments of the present invention provide a choice of at least two VBV rate control techniques. One of the VBV rate control techniques is referred to as causal rate control and the other technique is referred to as Nth pass rate control.
3.5.5.3.1. Causal Rate Control
Causal VBV rate control can be used in conjunction with a one pass rate control technique and generates outputs simply based on the current and previous quantizer values.
An encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention includes causal rate control involving setting the quantizer for frame n (i.e. Qn) according to the following relationship.
where
Q′n is the quantizer estimated by the single pass rate control;
Xbitrate is calculated by determining a target bit rate based on the drift from the desired bit rate;
Xvelocity is calculated based on the estimated time until the VBV buffer over- or under-flows;
Xsize is applied on the result of P-VOPs only and is calculated based on the rate at which the size of compressed P-VOPs is changing over time;
Xdrift is the drift from the desired bit rate.
In several embodiments, the causal VBV rate control may be forced to drop frames and insert stuffing to respect the VBV model. If a compressed frame unexpectedly contains too many or two few bits, then it can be dropped or stuffed.
3.5.5.3.2. Nth Pass VBV Rate Control
Nth pass VBV rate control can be used in conjunction with a multiple pass rate control technique and it uses information garnered during previous analysis of the video sequence. Encoders in accordance with several embodiments of the present invention perform Nth pass VBV rate control according to the process illustrated in
3.5.5.3.3. Analysis
In one embodiment, the first pass uses some form of causal rate control and data is recorded for each frame concerning such things as the duration of the frame, the coding type of the frame, the quantizer used, the motion bits produced and the texture bits produced. In addition, global information such as the timescale, resolution and codec settings can also be recorded.
3.5.5.3.4. Map Generation
Information from the analysis is used to generate a map of the video sequence. The map can specify the coding type used for each frame (I/B/P) and can include data for each frame concerning the duration of the frame, the motion complexity and the texture complexity. In other embodiments, the map may also contain information enabling better prediction of the influence of quantizer and other parameters on compressed frame size and perceptual distortion. In several embodiments, map generation is performed after the N−1th pass is completed.
3.5.5.3.5. Strategy Generation
The map can be used to plan a strategy as to how the Nth pass rate control will operate. The ideal level of the VBV buffer after every frame is encoded can be planned. In one embodiment, the strategy generation results in information for each frame including the desired compressed frame size, an estimated frame quantizer. In several embodiments, strategy generation is performed after map generation and prior to the Nth pass.
In one embodiment, the strategy generation process involves use of an iterative process to simulate the encoder and determine desired quantizer values for each frame by trying to keep the quantizer as close as possible to the median quantizer value. A binary search can be used to generate a base quantizer for the whole video sequence. The base quantizer is the constant value that causes the simulator to achieve the desired target bit rate. Once the base quantizer is found, the strategy generation process involves consideration of the VBV constrains. In one embodiment, a constant quantizer is used if this will not modify the VBV constrains. In other embodiments, the quantizer is modulated based on the complexity of motion in the video frames. This can be further extended to incorporate masking from scene changes and other temporal effects.
3.5.5.3.6. In-Loop Nth Pass Rate Control
In one embodiment, the in-loop Nth pass rate control uses the strategy and uses the map to make the best possible prediction of the influence of quantizer and other parameters on compressed frame size and perceptual distortion. There can be a limited discretion to deviate from the strategy to take short-term corrective strategy. Typically, following the strategy will prevent violation of the VBV model. In one embodiment, the in-loop Nth pass rate control uses a PID control loop. The feedback in the control loop is the accumulated drift from the ideal bitrate.
Although the strategy generation does not involve dropping frames, the in-loop Nth rate control may drop frames if the VBV buffer would otherwise underflow. Likewise, the in-loop Nth pass rate control can request video stuffing to be inserted to prevent VBV overflow.
3.5.6. Predictions
In one embodiment, AD/DC prediction is performed in a manner that is compliant with the standard referred to as ISO/IEC 14496-2:2001(E), section 7.4.3. (DC and AC prediction) and 7.7.1. (field DC and AC prediction).
3.5.7. Texture Coding
An encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can perform texture coding in a manner that is compliant with the standard referred to as ISO/IEC 14496-2:2001(E), annex B (variable length codes) and 7.4.1. (variable length decoding).
3.5.8. Motion Coding
An encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can perform motion coding in a manner that is compliant with the standard referred to as ISO/IEC 14496-2:2001(E), annex B (variable length codes) and 7.6.3. (motion vector decoding).
3.5.9. Generating ‘Video’ Chunks
The video track can be considered a sequence of frames 1 to N. Systems in accordance with embodiments of the present invention are capable of encoding the sequence to generate a compressed bitstream. The bitstream is formatted by segmenting it into chunks 1 to N. Each video frame n has a corresponding chunk n.
The chunks are generated by appending bits from the bitstream to chunk n until it, together with the chunks 1 through n−1 contain sufficient information for a decoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention to decode the video frame n. In instances where sufficient information is contained in chunks 1 through n−1 to generate video frame n, an encoder in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can include a marker chunk. In one embodiment, the marker chunk is a not-coded P-frame with identical timing information as the previous frame.
3.6. Generating ‘subtitle’ Chunks
An encoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can take subtitles in one of a series of standard formats and then converts the subtitles to bit maps. The information in the bit maps is then compressed using run length encoding. The run length encoded bit maps are the formatted into a chunk, which also includes information concerning the start time and the stop time for the particular subtitle contained within the chunk. In several embodiments, information concerning the color, size and position of the subtitle on the screen can also be included in the chunk. Chunks can be included into the subtitle track that set the palette for the subtitles and that indicate that the palette has changed. Any application capable of generating a subtitle in a standard subtitle format can be used to generate the text of the subtitles. Alternatively, software can be used to convert text entered by a user directly into subtitle information.
3.7. Interleaving
Once the interleaver has received all of the chunks described above, the interleaver builds a multimedia file. Building the multimedia file can involve creating a ‘CSET’ chunk, an ‘INFO’ list chunk, a ‘hdrl’ chunk, a ‘movi’ list chunk and an idx1 chunk. Methods in accordance with embodiments of the present invention for creating these chunks and for generating multimedia files are described below.
3.7.1. Generating a ‘CSET’ Chunk
As described above, the ‘CSET’ chunk is optional and can generated by the interleaver in accordance with the AVI Container Format Specification.
3.7.2. Generating a ‘INFO’ List Chunk
As described above, the ‘INFO’ list chunk is optional and can be generated by the interleaver in accordance with the AVI Container Format Specification.
3.7.3. Generating the ‘hdrl’ List Chunk
The ‘hdrl’ list chunk is generated by the interleaver based on the information in the various chunks provided to the interleaver. The ‘hdrl’ list chunk references the location within the file of the referenced chunks. In one embodiment, the ‘hdrl’ list chunk uses file offsets in order to establish references.
3.7.4. Generating the ‘movi’ List Chunk
As described above, ‘movi’ list chunk is created by encoding audio, video and subtitle tracks to create ‘audio’, ‘video’ and ‘subtitle chunks and then interleaving these chunks. In several embodiments, the ‘movi’ list chunk can also include digital rights management information.
3.7.4.1. Interleaving the Video/Audio/Subtitles
A variety of rules can be used to interleave the audio, video and subtitle chunks. Typically, the interleaver establishes a number of queues for each of the video and audio tracks. The interleaver determines which queue should be written to the output file. The queue selection can be based on the interleave period by writing from the queue that has the lowest number of interleave periods written. The interleaver may have to wait for an entire interleave period to be present in the queue before the chunk can be written to the file.
In one embodiment, the generated ‘audio,’ ‘video’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks are interleaved so that the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks are located within the file prior to the ‘video’ chunks containing information concerning the video frames to which they correspond. In other embodiments, the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks can be located after the ‘video’ chunks to which they correspond. The time differences between the location of the ‘audio,’ ‘video’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks is largely dependent upon the buffering capabilities of players that are used to play the devices. In embodiments where buffering is limited or unknown, the interleaver interleaves the ‘audio,’ ‘video’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks such that the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunks are located between ‘video’ chunks, where the ‘video’ chunk immediately following the ‘audio’ and ‘subtitle’ chunk contains the first video frame corresponding to the audio or subtitle.
3.7.4.2. Generating DRM Information
In embodiments where DRM is used to protect the video content of a multimedia file, the DRM information can be generated concurrently with the encoding of the video chunks. As each chunk is generated, the chunk can be encrypted and a DRM chunk generated containing information concerning the encryption of the video chunk.
3.7.4.3. Interleaving the DRM Information
An interleaver in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention interleaves a DRM chunk containing information concerning the encryption of a video chunk prior to the video chunk. In one embodiment, the DRM chunk for video chunk n is located between video chunk n−1 and video chunk n. In other embodiments, the spacing of the DRM before and after the video chunk n is dependent upon the amount of buffering provided within device decoding the multimedia file.
3.7.5. Generating the ‘idx1’ Chunk
Once the ‘movi’ list chunk has been generated, the generation of the ‘idx1’ chunk is a simple process. The ‘idx1’ chunk is created by reading the location within the ‘movi’ list chunk of each ‘data’ chunk. This information is combined with information read from the ‘data’ chunk concerning the track to which the ‘data’ chunk belongs and the content of the ‘data’ chunk. All of this information is then inserted into the ‘idx1’ chunk in a manner appropriate to whichever of the formats described above is being used to represent the information.
4. Transmission and Distribution of Multimedia File
Once a multimedia file is generated, the file can be distributed over any of a variety of networks. The fact that in many embodiments the elements required to generate a multimedia presentation and menus, amongst other things, are contained within a single file simplifies transfer of the information. In several embodiments, the multimedia file can be distributed separately from the information required to decrypt the contents of the multimedia file.
In one embodiment, multimedia content is provided to a first server and encoded to create a multimedia file in accordance with the present invention. The multimedia file can then be located either at the first server or at a second server. In other embodiments, DRM information can be located at the first server, the second server or a third server. In one embodiment, the first server can be queried to ascertain the location of the encoded multimedia file and/or to ascertain the location of the DRM information.
Information from a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can be accessed by a computer configured using appropriate software, a dedicated player that is hardwired to access information from the multimedia file or any other device capable of parsing an AVI file. In several embodiments, devices can access all of the information in the multimedia file. In other embodiments, a device may be incapable of accessing all of the information in a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. In a particular embodiment, a device is not capable of accessing any of the information described above that is stored in chunks that are not specified in the AVI file format. In embodiments where not all of the information can be accessed, the device will typically discard those chunks that are not recognized by the device.
Typically, a device that is capable of accessing the information contained in a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is capable of performing a number of functions. The device can display a multimedia presentation involving display of video on a visual display, generate audio from one of potentially a number of audio tracks on an audio system and display subtitles from potentially one of a number of subtitle tracks. Several embodiments can also display menus on a visual display while playing accompanying audio and/or video. These display menus are interactive, with features such as selectable buttons, pull down menus and sub-menus. In some embodiments, menu items can point to audio/video content outside the multimedia file presently being accessed. The outside content may be either located local to the device accessing the multimedia file or it may be located remotely, such as over a local area, wide are or public network. Many embodiments can also search one or more multimedia files according to ‘meta data’ included within the multimedia file(s) or ‘meta data’ referenced by one or more of the multimedia files.
5.1. Display of Multimedia Presentation
Given the ability of multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention to support multiple audio tracks, multiple video tracks and multiple subtitle tracks, the display of a multimedia presentation using such a multimedia file that combines video, audio and/or subtitles can require selection of a particular audio track, video track and/or subtitle track either through a visual menu system or a pull down menu system (the operation of which are discussed below) or via the default settings of the device used to generate the multimedia presentation. Once an audio track, video track and potentially a subtitle track are selected, the display of the multimedia presentation can proceed.
A process for locating the required multimedia information from a multimedia file including DRM and displaying the multimedia information in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
In several embodiments the chosen audio track can include multiple channels to provide stereo or surround sound audio. When a subtitle track is chosen to be displayed, a determination can be made as to whether the previous video frame included a subtitle (this determination may be made in any of a variety of ways that achieves the outcome of identifying a previous ‘subtitle’ chunk that contained subtitle information that should be displayed over the currently decoded video frame). If the previous subtitle included a subtitle and the timing information for the subtitle indicates that the subtitle should be displayed with the current frame, then the subtitle is superimposed on the decoded video frame. If the previous frame did not include a subtitle or the timing information for the subtitle on the previous frame indicates that the subtitle should not be displayed in conjunction with the currently decoded frame, then a ‘subtitle’ chunk for the selected subtitle track is sought. If a ‘subtitle’ chunk is located, then the subtitle is superimposed on the decoded video. The video (including any superimposed subtitles) is then displayed with the accompanying audio.
Returning to the discussion of
In several embodiments, a device can seek to a particular portion of the multimedia information (e.g. a particular scene of a movie with a particular accompanying audio track and optionally a particular accompanying subtitle track) using information contained within the ‘hdrl’ chunk of a multimedia file in accordance with the present invention. In many embodiments, the decoding of the ‘video’ chunk, ‘audio’ chunk and/or ‘subtitle’ chunk can be performed in parallel with other tasks.
An example of a device capable of accessing information from the multimedia file and displaying video in conjunction with a particular audio track and/or a particular subtitle track is a computer configured in the manner described above using software. Another example is a DVD player equipped with a codec that includes these capabilities. In other embodiments, any device configured to locate or select (whether intentionally or arbitrarily) ‘data’ chunks corresponding to particular media tracks and decode those tracks for presentation is capable of generating a multimedia presentation using a multimedia file in accordance with the practice of the present invention.
In several embodiments, a device can play multimedia information from a multimedia file in combination with multimedia information from an external file. Typically, such a device would do so by sourcing an audio track or subtitle track from a local file referenced in a multimedia file of the type described above. If the referenced file is not stored locally and the device is networked to the location where the device is stored, then the device can obtain a local copy of the file. The device would then access both files, establishing a video, an audio and a subtitle (if required) pipeline into which the various tracks of multimedia are fed from the different file sources.
5.2. Generation of Menus
A decoder in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
An example of a menu in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in
As the user enters commands using the input device, the display may be updated not only in response to the selection of button areas but also simply due to the pointer being located within a button area. As discussed above, typically all of the media information used to generate the menus is located within the multimedia file and more specifically within a ‘DMNU’ chunk. Although in other embodiments, the information can be located elsewhere within the file and/or in other files.
5.3. Access the Meta Data
‘Meta data’ is a standardized method of representing information. The standardized nature of ‘Meta data’ enables the data to be accessed and understood by automatic processes. In one embodiment, the ‘meta data’ is extracted and provided to a user for viewing. Several embodiments enable multimedia files on a server to be inspected to provide information concerning a users viewing habits and viewing preferences. Such information could be used by software applications to recommend other multimedia files that a user may enjoy viewing. In one embodiment, the recommendations can be based on the multimedia files contained on servers of other users. In other embodiments, a user can request a multimedia file and the file can be located by a search engine and/or intelligent agents that inspect the ‘meta data’ of multimedia files in a variety of locations. In addition, the user can chose between various multimedia files containing a particular multimedia presentation based on ‘meta data’ concerning the manner in which each of the different versions of the presentation were encoded.
In several embodiments, the ‘meta data’ of multimedia files in accordance with embodiments of the present invention can be accessed for purposes of cataloging or for creating a simple menu to access the content of the file.
While the above description contains many specific embodiments of the invention, these should not be construed as limitations on the scope of the invention, but rather as an example of one embodiment thereof. For example, a multimedia file in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention can include a single multimedia presentation or multiple multimedia presentations. In addition, such a file can include one or more menus and any variety of different types of ‘meta data’. Accordingly, the scope of the invention should be determined not by the embodiments illustrated, but by the appended claims and their equivalents.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/US2004/041667 | Dec 2004 | WO | international |
The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/882,328, filed on May 22, 2020, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/373,513, filed on Apr. 2, 2019 and issued on Jul. 7, 2020 as U.S. Pat. No. 10,708,521, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/144,776, filed on May 2, 2016 and issued on Apr. 9, 2019 as U.S. Pat. No. 10,257,443, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/281,791, filed on May 19, 2014 and issued on Jun. 14, 2016 as U.S. Pat. No. 9,369,687, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/016,184, filed on Dec. 17, 2004 and issued on May 20, 2014 as U.S. Pat. No. 8,731,369, which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/731,809, filed on Dec. 8, 2003 and issued on Apr. 14, 2009 as U.S. Pat. No. 7,519,274, and also claims priority from Patent Cooperation Treaty Patent Application No. PCT/US04/41667 filed on Dec. 8, 2004 and entitled Multimedia Distribution System, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3609227 | Kuljian | Sep 1971 | A |
| 4009331 | Goldmark et al. | Feb 1977 | A |
| 4694357 | Rahman et al. | Sep 1987 | A |
| 4694491 | Horne et al. | Sep 1987 | A |
| 4802170 | Trottier | Jan 1989 | A |
| 4964069 | Ely | Oct 1990 | A |
| 5119474 | Beitel et al. | Jun 1992 | A |
| 5132992 | Yurt et al. | Jul 1992 | A |
| 5274758 | Beitel et al. | Dec 1993 | A |
| 5341474 | Gelman et al. | Aug 1994 | A |
| 5361332 | Yoshida et al. | Nov 1994 | A |
| 5396497 | Veltman | Mar 1995 | A |
| 5400401 | Wasilewski et al. | Mar 1995 | A |
| 5404436 | Hamilton | Apr 1995 | A |
| 5412773 | Carlucci et al. | May 1995 | A |
| 5420801 | Dockter et al. | May 1995 | A |
| 5420974 | Morris et al. | May 1995 | A |
| 5428529 | Hartrick et al. | Jun 1995 | A |
| 5471576 | Yee | Nov 1995 | A |
| 5477263 | Ocallaghan et al. | Dec 1995 | A |
| 5485611 | Astle | Jan 1996 | A |
| 5487167 | Dinallo et al. | Jan 1996 | A |
| 5533021 | Branstad et al. | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5537408 | Branstad et al. | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5539908 | Chen et al. | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5541662 | Adams et al. | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5544318 | Schmitz et al. | Aug 1996 | A |
| 5550863 | Yurt et al. | Aug 1996 | A |
| 5574785 | Ueno et al. | Nov 1996 | A |
| 5583652 | Ware | Dec 1996 | A |
| 5600721 | Kitazato | Feb 1997 | A |
| 5614940 | Cobbley et al. | Mar 1997 | A |
| 5619338 | Nakai et al. | Apr 1997 | A |
| 5621794 | Matsuda et al. | Apr 1997 | A |
| 5627936 | Prasad et al. | May 1997 | A |
| 5630005 | Ort | May 1997 | A |
| 5633472 | DeWitt et al. | May 1997 | A |
| 5642171 | Baumgartner et al. | Jun 1997 | A |
| 5642338 | Fukushima et al. | Jun 1997 | A |
| 5655117 | Goldberg et al. | Aug 1997 | A |
| 5664044 | Ware | Sep 1997 | A |
| 5675382 | Bauchspies | Oct 1997 | A |
| 5675511 | Prasad et al. | Oct 1997 | A |
| 5684542 | Tsukagoshi | Nov 1997 | A |
| 5715356 | Hirayama et al. | Feb 1998 | A |
| 5719786 | Nelson et al. | Feb 1998 | A |
| 5745643 | Mishina | Apr 1998 | A |
| 5751280 | Abbott | May 1998 | A |
| 5761417 | Henley et al. | Jun 1998 | A |
| 5763800 | Rossum et al. | Jun 1998 | A |
| 5765164 | Prasad et al. | Jun 1998 | A |
| 5794018 | Vrvilo et al. | Aug 1998 | A |
| 5805700 | Nardone et al. | Sep 1998 | A |
| 5809173 | Liu et al. | Sep 1998 | A |
| 5813010 | Kurano et al. | Sep 1998 | A |
| 5822524 | Chen et al. | Oct 1998 | A |
| 5828370 | Moeller et al. | Oct 1998 | A |
| 5838791 | Torii et al. | Nov 1998 | A |
| 5844575 | Reid | Dec 1998 | A |
| 5848217 | Tsukagoshi et al. | Dec 1998 | A |
| 5852664 | Iverson et al. | Dec 1998 | A |
| 5854873 | Mori et al. | Dec 1998 | A |
| 5874986 | Gibbon et al. | Feb 1999 | A |
| 5878135 | Blatter et al. | Mar 1999 | A |
| 5892915 | Duso et al. | Apr 1999 | A |
| 5903261 | Walsh et al. | May 1999 | A |
| 5907597 | Mark | May 1999 | A |
| 5907658 | Murase et al. | May 1999 | A |
| 5915066 | Katayama | Jun 1999 | A |
| 5923869 | Kashiwagi et al. | Jul 1999 | A |
| 5956729 | Goetz et al. | Sep 1999 | A |
| 5959690 | Toebes, VIII et al. | Sep 1999 | A |
| 5970147 | Davis | Oct 1999 | A |
| 5973679 | Abbott et al. | Oct 1999 | A |
| 6002834 | Hirabayashi et al. | Dec 1999 | A |
| 6009237 | Hirabayashi et al. | Dec 1999 | A |
| 6016381 | Taira et al. | Jan 2000 | A |
| 6021199 | Ishibashi | Feb 2000 | A |
| 6031622 | Ristow et al. | Feb 2000 | A |
| 6038000 | Hurst, Jr. | Mar 2000 | A |
| 6038316 | Dwork et al. | Mar 2000 | A |
| 6044175 | Taira et al. | Mar 2000 | A |
| 6046778 | Nonomura et al. | Apr 2000 | A |
| 6057832 | Lev et al. | May 2000 | A |
| 6065050 | DeMoney | May 2000 | A |
| 6079566 | Eleftheriadis et al. | Jun 2000 | A |
| 6108422 | Newby et al. | Aug 2000 | A |
| 6151634 | Glaser et al. | Nov 2000 | A |
| 6169242 | Fay et al. | Jan 2001 | B1 |
| 6195388 | Choi et al. | Feb 2001 | B1 |
| 6199107 | Dujari | Mar 2001 | B1 |
| 6204883 | Tsukagoshi | Mar 2001 | B1 |
| 6219043 | Yogeshwar et al. | Apr 2001 | B1 |
| 6253025 | Kitamura et al. | Jun 2001 | B1 |
| 6266483 | Okada et al. | Jul 2001 | B1 |
| 6269063 | Fujinami et al. | Jul 2001 | B1 |
| 6282320 | Hasegawa et al. | Aug 2001 | B1 |
| 6308005 | Ando et al. | Oct 2001 | B1 |
| 6320905 | Konstantinides | Nov 2001 | B1 |
| 6330286 | Lyons et al. | Dec 2001 | B1 |
| 6347145 | Kato et al. | Feb 2002 | B2 |
| 6351538 | Uz | Feb 2002 | B1 |
| 6373803 | Ando et al. | Apr 2002 | B2 |
| 6374144 | Viviani et al. | Apr 2002 | B1 |
| 6389473 | Carmel et al. | May 2002 | B1 |
| 6395969 | Fuhrer | May 2002 | B1 |
| 6415031 | Colligan et al. | Jul 2002 | B1 |
| 6445877 | Okada et al. | Sep 2002 | B1 |
| 6453115 | Boyle | Sep 2002 | B1 |
| 6453116 | Ando et al. | Sep 2002 | B1 |
| 6498865 | Brailean et al. | Dec 2002 | B1 |
| 6504873 | Vehvilaeinen | Jan 2003 | B1 |
| 6512883 | Shim et al. | Jan 2003 | B2 |
| 6516064 | Osawa et al. | Feb 2003 | B1 |
| 6535920 | Parry et al. | Mar 2003 | B1 |
| 6573907 | Madrane | Jun 2003 | B1 |
| 6578200 | Takao et al. | Jun 2003 | B1 |
| 6594699 | Sahai et al. | Jul 2003 | B1 |
| 6611537 | Edens et al. | Aug 2003 | B1 |
| 6654933 | Abbott et al. | Nov 2003 | B1 |
| 6658056 | Duruöz et al. | Dec 2003 | B1 |
| 6665835 | Gutfreund et al. | Dec 2003 | B1 |
| 6671408 | Kaku | Dec 2003 | B1 |
| 6690838 | Zhou | Feb 2004 | B2 |
| 6693959 | Eckart et al. | Feb 2004 | B1 |
| 6697568 | Kaku | Feb 2004 | B1 |
| 6721794 | Taylor et al. | Apr 2004 | B2 |
| 6724944 | Kalevo et al. | Apr 2004 | B1 |
| 6725281 | Zintel et al. | Apr 2004 | B1 |
| 6751623 | Basso et al. | Jun 2004 | B1 |
| 6807306 | Girgensohn et al. | Oct 2004 | B1 |
| 6810131 | Nakagawa et al. | Oct 2004 | B2 |
| 6813437 | Ando et al. | Nov 2004 | B2 |
| 6819394 | Nomura et al. | Nov 2004 | B1 |
| 6856997 | Lee et al. | Feb 2005 | B2 |
| 6859496 | Boroczky et al. | Feb 2005 | B1 |
| 6865747 | Mercier | Mar 2005 | B1 |
| 6871006 | Oguz et al. | Mar 2005 | B1 |
| 6912513 | Candelore | Jun 2005 | B1 |
| 6917652 | Lyu | Jul 2005 | B2 |
| 6931531 | Takahashi | Aug 2005 | B1 |
| 6931534 | Jandel et al. | Aug 2005 | B1 |
| 6931543 | Pang et al. | Aug 2005 | B1 |
| 6944621 | Collart | Sep 2005 | B1 |
| 6944629 | Shioi et al. | Sep 2005 | B1 |
| 6956901 | Boroczky et al. | Oct 2005 | B2 |
| 6957350 | Demos | Oct 2005 | B1 |
| 6965646 | Firestone | Nov 2005 | B1 |
| 6970564 | Kubota et al. | Nov 2005 | B1 |
| 6983079 | Kim | Jan 2006 | B2 |
| 6985588 | Glick et al. | Jan 2006 | B1 |
| 6988144 | Luken et al. | Jan 2006 | B1 |
| 7006757 | Ando et al. | Feb 2006 | B2 |
| 7007170 | Morten | Feb 2006 | B2 |
| 7020287 | Unger | Mar 2006 | B2 |
| 7023992 | Kubota et al. | Apr 2006 | B1 |
| 7035335 | Iacobelli et al. | Apr 2006 | B1 |
| 7043021 | Graunke et al. | May 2006 | B2 |
| 7051110 | Hagai et al. | May 2006 | B2 |
| 7058177 | Trimberger et al. | Jun 2006 | B1 |
| 7073191 | Srikantan et al. | Jul 2006 | B2 |
| 7103906 | Katz et al. | Sep 2006 | B1 |
| 7110542 | Tripathy | Sep 2006 | B1 |
| 7120250 | Candelore | Oct 2006 | B2 |
| 7124303 | Candelore et al. | Oct 2006 | B2 |
| 7127155 | Ando et al. | Oct 2006 | B2 |
| 7139470 | Lopez-estrada et al. | Nov 2006 | B2 |
| 7139868 | Parry et al. | Nov 2006 | B2 |
| 7143289 | Denning et al. | Nov 2006 | B2 |
| 7151832 | Fetkovich et al. | Dec 2006 | B1 |
| 7167560 | Yu | Jan 2007 | B2 |
| 7188183 | Paul et al. | Mar 2007 | B1 |
| 7203313 | England et al. | Apr 2007 | B2 |
| 7206940 | Evans et al. | Apr 2007 | B2 |
| 7209892 | Galuten et al. | Apr 2007 | B1 |
| 7212726 | Zetts | May 2007 | B2 |
| 7231516 | Sparrell et al. | Jun 2007 | B1 |
| 7233669 | Candelore | Jun 2007 | B2 |
| 7233948 | Shamoon et al. | Jun 2007 | B1 |
| 7237061 | Boic | Jun 2007 | B1 |
| 7242772 | Tehranchi | Jul 2007 | B1 |
| 7243346 | Seth et al. | Jul 2007 | B1 |
| 7246127 | Murakami et al. | Jul 2007 | B2 |
| 7274861 | Yahata et al. | Sep 2007 | B2 |
| 7292691 | Candelore et al. | Nov 2007 | B2 |
| 7295673 | Grab et al. | Nov 2007 | B2 |
| 7302059 | Candelore et al. | Nov 2007 | B2 |
| 7302490 | Gupta et al. | Nov 2007 | B1 |
| 7315829 | Tagawa et al. | Jan 2008 | B1 |
| 7330875 | Parasnis et al. | Feb 2008 | B1 |
| 7340528 | Noblecourt et al. | Mar 2008 | B2 |
| 7346163 | Pedlow, Jr. et al. | Mar 2008 | B2 |
| 7349886 | Morten et al. | Mar 2008 | B2 |
| 7349976 | Glaser et al. | Mar 2008 | B1 |
| 7352956 | Winter et al. | Apr 2008 | B1 |
| 7356245 | Belknap et al. | Apr 2008 | B2 |
| 7363647 | Fakharzadeh | Apr 2008 | B1 |
| 7366788 | Jones et al. | Apr 2008 | B2 |
| 7376233 | Candelore et al. | May 2008 | B2 |
| 7380120 | Garcia | May 2008 | B1 |
| 7382879 | Miller | Jun 2008 | B1 |
| 7397853 | Kwon et al. | Jul 2008 | B2 |
| 7400679 | Kwon et al. | Jul 2008 | B2 |
| 7406176 | Zhu et al. | Jul 2008 | B2 |
| 7418132 | Hoshuyama | Aug 2008 | B2 |
| 7443449 | Momosaki et al. | Oct 2008 | B2 |
| 7454780 | Katsube et al. | Nov 2008 | B2 |
| 7457359 | Mabey et al. | Nov 2008 | B2 |
| 7457415 | Reitmeier et al. | Nov 2008 | B2 |
| 7478325 | Foehr | Jan 2009 | B2 |
| 7484103 | Woo et al. | Jan 2009 | B2 |
| 7493018 | Kim | Feb 2009 | B2 |
| 7499930 | Naka et al. | Mar 2009 | B2 |
| 7499938 | Collart | Mar 2009 | B2 |
| 7519274 | Li | Apr 2009 | B2 |
| 7539213 | Guillemot et al. | May 2009 | B2 |
| 7546641 | Robert et al. | Jun 2009 | B2 |
| 7548565 | Sull et al. | Jun 2009 | B2 |
| 7577980 | Kienzle et al. | Aug 2009 | B2 |
| 7623759 | Shimoda | Nov 2009 | B2 |
| 7624337 | Sull et al. | Nov 2009 | B2 |
| 7627750 | Chan | Dec 2009 | B1 |
| 7627888 | Ganesan et al. | Dec 2009 | B2 |
| 7639921 | Seo et al. | Dec 2009 | B2 |
| 7640435 | Morten | Dec 2009 | B2 |
| 7644172 | Stewart et al. | Jan 2010 | B2 |
| 7653686 | Yoneda | Jan 2010 | B2 |
| 7664872 | Osborne et al. | Feb 2010 | B2 |
| 7681035 | Ayars et al. | Mar 2010 | B1 |
| 7702925 | Hanko et al. | Apr 2010 | B2 |
| 7711052 | Hannuksela et al. | May 2010 | B2 |
| 7747853 | Candelore | Jun 2010 | B2 |
| 7756270 | Shimosato et al. | Jul 2010 | B2 |
| 7756271 | Zhu et al. | Jul 2010 | B2 |
| 7787622 | Sprunk | Aug 2010 | B2 |
| 7788271 | Soma et al. | Aug 2010 | B2 |
| 7797720 | Gopalakrishnan et al. | Sep 2010 | B2 |
| 7853980 | Pedlow, Jr. et al. | Dec 2010 | B2 |
| 7864186 | Robotham et al. | Jan 2011 | B2 |
| 7869691 | Kelly et al. | Jan 2011 | B2 |
| 7877002 | Ikeda et al. | Jan 2011 | B2 |
| 7881478 | Derouet | Feb 2011 | B2 |
| 7882034 | Hug et al. | Feb 2011 | B2 |
| 7885405 | Bong | Feb 2011 | B1 |
| 7895616 | Unger | Feb 2011 | B2 |
| 7907833 | Lee | Mar 2011 | B2 |
| 7945143 | Yahata et al. | May 2011 | B2 |
| 7949703 | Matsuzaki et al. | May 2011 | B2 |
| 7974714 | Hoffberg | Jul 2011 | B2 |
| 8023562 | Zheludkov et al. | Sep 2011 | B2 |
| 8046453 | Olaiya | Oct 2011 | B2 |
| 8054880 | Yu et al. | Nov 2011 | B2 |
| 8073900 | Guedalia et al. | Dec 2011 | B2 |
| 8082442 | Keljo et al. | Dec 2011 | B2 |
| 8131875 | Chen | Mar 2012 | B1 |
| 8135041 | Ramaswamy | Mar 2012 | B2 |
| 8160157 | Lamy-Bergot et al. | Apr 2012 | B2 |
| 8169916 | Pai et al. | May 2012 | B1 |
| 8170210 | Manders et al. | May 2012 | B2 |
| 8195714 | Mckibben et al. | Jun 2012 | B2 |
| 8218439 | Deshpande | Jul 2012 | B2 |
| 8225061 | Greenebaum | Jul 2012 | B2 |
| 8233768 | Soroushian et al. | Jul 2012 | B2 |
| 8243924 | Chen et al. | Aug 2012 | B2 |
| 8249168 | Graves | Aug 2012 | B2 |
| 8270473 | Chen et al. | Sep 2012 | B2 |
| 8270819 | Vannier | Sep 2012 | B2 |
| 8286213 | Seo | Oct 2012 | B2 |
| 8289338 | Priyadarshi et al. | Oct 2012 | B2 |
| 8311094 | Kamariotis et al. | Nov 2012 | B2 |
| 8311115 | Gu et al. | Nov 2012 | B2 |
| 8312079 | Newsome et al. | Nov 2012 | B2 |
| 8321556 | Chatterjee et al. | Nov 2012 | B1 |
| 8341715 | Sherkin et al. | Dec 2012 | B2 |
| 8369421 | Kadono et al. | Feb 2013 | B2 |
| 8380041 | Barton et al. | Feb 2013 | B2 |
| 8386621 | Park | Feb 2013 | B2 |
| 8396114 | Gu et al. | Mar 2013 | B2 |
| 8397265 | Henocq et al. | Mar 2013 | B2 |
| 8407753 | Kuo | Mar 2013 | B2 |
| 8423889 | Zagorie et al. | Apr 2013 | B1 |
| 8456380 | Pagan | Jun 2013 | B2 |
| 8526610 | Shamoon et al. | Sep 2013 | B2 |
| 8543842 | Ginter et al. | Sep 2013 | B2 |
| 8555329 | Fröjdh et al. | Oct 2013 | B2 |
| 8571993 | Kocher et al. | Oct 2013 | B2 |
| 8649669 | Braness et al. | Feb 2014 | B2 |
| 8650599 | Shindo et al. | Feb 2014 | B2 |
| 8677428 | Lewis et al. | Mar 2014 | B2 |
| 8683066 | Hurst et al. | Mar 2014 | B2 |
| 8731369 | Li et al. | May 2014 | B2 |
| RE45052 | Li | Jul 2014 | E |
| 8767825 | Wang et al. | Jul 2014 | B1 |
| 8782268 | Pyle et al. | Jul 2014 | B2 |
| 8818896 | Candelore | Aug 2014 | B2 |
| 8819116 | Tomay et al. | Aug 2014 | B1 |
| 8832434 | Apostolopoulos et al. | Sep 2014 | B2 |
| 8849950 | Stockhammer et al. | Sep 2014 | B2 |
| 8856218 | Inskip | Oct 2014 | B1 |
| 8914534 | Braness et al. | Dec 2014 | B2 |
| 8918535 | Ma et al. | Dec 2014 | B2 |
| 8948249 | Sun et al. | Feb 2015 | B2 |
| 9025659 | Soroushian et al. | May 2015 | B2 |
| 9038116 | Knox et al. | May 2015 | B1 |
| 9203816 | Brueck et al. | Dec 2015 | B2 |
| 9215466 | Zhai et al. | Dec 2015 | B2 |
| 9253178 | Blom et al. | Feb 2016 | B2 |
| 9344721 | Dikvall | May 2016 | B2 |
| 9369687 | Braness et al. | Jun 2016 | B2 |
| 9420287 | Butt et al. | Aug 2016 | B2 |
| 9479805 | Rothschild et al. | Oct 2016 | B2 |
| 9485469 | Kahn et al. | Nov 2016 | B2 |
| 9485546 | Chen et al. | Nov 2016 | B2 |
| 9584557 | Panje et al. | Feb 2017 | B2 |
| 9584847 | Ma et al. | Feb 2017 | B2 |
| 9615061 | Carney et al. | Apr 2017 | B2 |
| 9674254 | Pare et al. | Jun 2017 | B2 |
| 9761274 | Delpuch et al. | Sep 2017 | B2 |
| 9813740 | Panje et al. | Nov 2017 | B2 |
| 9967521 | Kahn et al. | May 2018 | B2 |
| 10032485 | Ahsan et al. | Jul 2018 | B2 |
| 10141024 | Soroushian et al. | Nov 2018 | B2 |
| 10171873 | Krebs | Jan 2019 | B2 |
| 10257443 | Braness et al. | Apr 2019 | B2 |
| 10708521 | Braness et al. | Jul 2020 | B2 |
| 10902883 | Soroushian et al. | Jan 2021 | B2 |
| 11012641 | Braness et al. | May 2021 | B2 |
| 11017816 | Ahsan et al. | May 2021 | B2 |
| 20010021276 | Zhou | Sep 2001 | A1 |
| 20010030710 | Werner | Oct 2001 | A1 |
| 20010052077 | Fung et al. | Dec 2001 | A1 |
| 20010052127 | Seo et al. | Dec 2001 | A1 |
| 20010053222 | Wakao et al. | Dec 2001 | A1 |
| 20020018475 | Ofek et al. | Feb 2002 | A1 |
| 20020034252 | Owen et al. | Mar 2002 | A1 |
| 20020048450 | Zetts | Apr 2002 | A1 |
| 20020051494 | Yamaguchi et al. | May 2002 | A1 |
| 20020062313 | Lee et al. | May 2002 | A1 |
| 20020067432 | Kondo et al. | Jun 2002 | A1 |
| 20020075572 | Boreczky et al. | Jun 2002 | A1 |
| 20020076112 | Devara | Jun 2002 | A1 |
| 20020087569 | Fischer et al. | Jul 2002 | A1 |
| 20020091665 | Beek et al. | Jul 2002 | A1 |
| 20020093571 | Hyodo | Jul 2002 | A1 |
| 20020107802 | Philips | Aug 2002 | A1 |
| 20020110193 | Yoo et al. | Aug 2002 | A1 |
| 20020114330 | Cheung et al. | Aug 2002 | A1 |
| 20020118953 | Kim | Aug 2002 | A1 |
| 20020135607 | Kato et al. | Sep 2002 | A1 |
| 20020141503 | Kobayashi et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020143413 | Fay et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020143547 | Fay et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020147980 | Satoda | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020154779 | Asano et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020161462 | Fay et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020161797 | Gallo et al. | Oct 2002 | A1 |
| 20020164024 | Arakawa et al. | Nov 2002 | A1 |
| 20020169926 | Pinckney et al. | Nov 2002 | A1 |
| 20020169971 | Asano et al. | Nov 2002 | A1 |
| 20020180929 | Tseng et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020184129 | Arena et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020184159 | Tadayon et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020184515 | Oho et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020186842 | Sabet-Sharghi et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020191112 | Akiyoshi et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020191960 | Fujinami et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020194606 | Tucker et al. | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20020198846 | Lao | Dec 2002 | A1 |
| 20030001964 | Masukura et al. | Jan 2003 | A1 |
| 20030002577 | Pinder | Jan 2003 | A1 |
| 20030002578 | Tsukagoshi et al. | Jan 2003 | A1 |
| 20030005442 | Brodersen et al. | Jan 2003 | A1 |
| 20030031128 | Kim et al. | Feb 2003 | A1 |
| 20030035488 | Barrau | Feb 2003 | A1 |
| 20030043847 | Haddad | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030044080 | Frishman et al. | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030051149 | Robert | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030051237 | Sako et al. | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030053541 | Sun et al. | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030061369 | Aksu et al. | Mar 2003 | A1 |
| 20030063675 | Kang et al. | Apr 2003 | A1 |
| 20030077071 | Lin et al. | Apr 2003 | A1 |
| 20030078930 | Surcouf et al. | Apr 2003 | A1 |
| 20030079222 | Boykin et al. | Apr 2003 | A1 |
| 20030080980 | Riek et al. | May 2003 | A1 |
| 20030081776 | Candelore | May 2003 | A1 |
| 20030093799 | Kauffman et al. | May 2003 | A1 |
| 20030123855 | Okada et al. | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030128296 | Lee | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030131117 | Jones et al. | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030133506 | Haneda | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030135633 | Dror et al. | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030135742 | Evans | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030142594 | Tsumagari et al. | Jul 2003 | A1 |
| 20030152224 | Candelore et al. | Aug 2003 | A1 |
| 20030152370 | Otomo et al. | Aug 2003 | A1 |
| 20030159139 | Candelore et al. | Aug 2003 | A1 |
| 20030165328 | Grecia | Sep 2003 | A1 |
| 20030182297 | Murakami et al. | Sep 2003 | A1 |
| 20030185302 | Abrams | Oct 2003 | A1 |
| 20030185542 | McVeigh et al. | Oct 2003 | A1 |
| 20030188182 | Sato et al. | Oct 2003 | A1 |
| 20030202773 | Dow et al. | Oct 2003 | A1 |
| 20030206558 | Parkkinen et al. | Nov 2003 | A1 |
| 20030206717 | Yogeshwar et al. | Nov 2003 | A1 |
| 20030212993 | Obrador | Nov 2003 | A1 |
| 20030216922 | Gonzales et al. | Nov 2003 | A1 |
| 20030231863 | Eerenberg et al. | Dec 2003 | A1 |
| 20030231867 | Gates et al. | Dec 2003 | A1 |
| 20030236836 | Borthwick | Dec 2003 | A1 |
| 20030236907 | Stewart et al. | Dec 2003 | A1 |
| 20040001594 | Krishnaswamy et al. | Jan 2004 | A1 |
| 20040003008 | Wasilewski et al. | Jan 2004 | A1 |
| 20040006701 | Kresina | Jan 2004 | A1 |
| 20040021684 | Millner | Feb 2004 | A1 |
| 20040022391 | Obrien | Feb 2004 | A1 |
| 20040025180 | Begeja et al. | Feb 2004 | A1 |
| 20040028227 | Yu | Feb 2004 | A1 |
| 20040037421 | Truman | Feb 2004 | A1 |
| 20040047592 | Seo et al. | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040047607 | Seo et al. | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040047614 | Green | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040049690 | Candelore et al. | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040049694 | Candelore | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040052501 | Tam | Mar 2004 | A1 |
| 20040071453 | Valderas | Apr 2004 | A1 |
| 20040073917 | Pedlow et al. | Apr 2004 | A1 |
| 20040076237 | Kadono et al. | Apr 2004 | A1 |
| 20040081333 | Grab et al. | Apr 2004 | A1 |
| 20040088557 | Malcolm et al. | May 2004 | A1 |
| 20040091247 | Shimomura | May 2004 | A1 |
| 20040093494 | Nishimoto et al. | May 2004 | A1 |
| 20040101059 | Joch et al. | May 2004 | A1 |
| 20040101142 | Nasypny | May 2004 | A1 |
| 20040107356 | Shamoon et al. | Jun 2004 | A1 |
| 20040114687 | Ferris et al. | Jun 2004 | A1 |
| 20040117347 | Seo et al. | Jun 2004 | A1 |
| 20040123094 | Sprunk | Jun 2004 | A1 |
| 20040136698 | Mock | Jul 2004 | A1 |
| 20040143760 | Alkove et al. | Jul 2004 | A1 |
| 20040146276 | Ogawa | Jul 2004 | A1 |
| 20040196975 | Zhu et al. | Oct 2004 | A1 |
| 20040202322 | Chavanne et al. | Oct 2004 | A1 |
| 20040213094 | Suzuki | Oct 2004 | A1 |
| 20040217971 | Kim | Nov 2004 | A1 |
| 20040243714 | Wynn et al. | Dec 2004 | A1 |
| 20040255236 | Collart | Dec 2004 | A1 |
| 20040267952 | He et al. | Dec 2004 | A1 |
| 20050005025 | Harville et al. | Jan 2005 | A1 |
| 20050005143 | Lang et al. | Jan 2005 | A1 |
| 20050013494 | Srinivasan et al. | Jan 2005 | A1 |
| 20050015797 | Noblecourt et al. | Jan 2005 | A1 |
| 20050019014 | Yoo et al. | Jan 2005 | A1 |
| 20050038826 | Bae et al. | Feb 2005 | A1 |
| 20050055399 | Savchuk | Mar 2005 | A1 |
| 20050063541 | Candelore | Mar 2005 | A1 |
| 20050066063 | Grigorovitch et al. | Mar 2005 | A1 |
| 20050076232 | Kawaguchi | Apr 2005 | A1 |
| 20050078948 | Yoo et al. | Apr 2005 | A1 |
| 20050086501 | Woo et al. | Apr 2005 | A1 |
| 20050102371 | Aksu | May 2005 | A1 |
| 20050114534 | Lee | May 2005 | A1 |
| 20050120132 | Hutter | Jun 2005 | A1 |
| 20050123136 | Shin et al. | Jun 2005 | A1 |
| 20050123283 | Li et al. | Jun 2005 | A1 |
| 20050138655 | Zimler et al. | Jun 2005 | A1 |
| 20050144468 | Northcutt | Jun 2005 | A1 |
| 20050177741 | Chen et al. | Aug 2005 | A1 |
| 20050180641 | Clark | Aug 2005 | A1 |
| 20050180733 | Yatomi | Aug 2005 | A1 |
| 20050190911 | Pare et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050192904 | Candelore | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050193070 | Brown et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050193322 | Lamkin et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050196147 | Seo et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050198364 | Val et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050207442 | Zoest et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050207578 | Matsuyama et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050216752 | Hofmeyr et al. | Sep 2005 | A1 |
| 20050227773 | Lu et al. | Oct 2005 | A1 |
| 20050243912 | Kwon et al. | Nov 2005 | A1 |
| 20050262257 | Major et al. | Nov 2005 | A1 |
| 20050265555 | Pippuri | Dec 2005 | A1 |
| 20050271353 | Kelly et al. | Dec 2005 | A1 |
| 20050273695 | Schnurr | Dec 2005 | A1 |
| 20050275656 | Corbin et al. | Dec 2005 | A1 |
| 20060013568 | Rodriguez | Jan 2006 | A1 |
| 20060026302 | Bennett et al. | Feb 2006 | A1 |
| 20060026654 | An et al. | Feb 2006 | A1 |
| 20060037057 | Xu | Feb 2006 | A1 |
| 20060072509 | Lindoff et al. | Apr 2006 | A1 |
| 20060078301 | Ikeda et al. | Apr 2006 | A1 |
| 20060093318 | Cohen et al. | May 2006 | A1 |
| 20060093320 | Hallberg et al. | May 2006 | A1 |
| 20060095472 | Krikorian et al. | May 2006 | A1 |
| 20060109856 | Deshpande | May 2006 | A1 |
| 20060129909 | Butt et al. | Jun 2006 | A1 |
| 20060165163 | Burazerovic et al. | Jul 2006 | A1 |
| 20060168298 | Aoki et al. | Jul 2006 | A1 |
| 20060168639 | Gan et al. | Jul 2006 | A1 |
| 20060173887 | Breitfeld et al. | Aug 2006 | A1 |
| 20060181965 | Collart | Aug 2006 | A1 |
| 20060210245 | Mccrossan et al. | Sep 2006 | A1 |
| 20060212370 | Shear et al. | Sep 2006 | A1 |
| 20060218251 | Tanabe | Sep 2006 | A1 |
| 20060235880 | Qian | Oct 2006 | A1 |
| 20060235883 | Krebs | Oct 2006 | A1 |
| 20060245727 | Nakano et al. | Nov 2006 | A1 |
| 20060259588 | Lerman et al. | Nov 2006 | A1 |
| 20060263056 | Lin et al. | Nov 2006 | A1 |
| 20060267986 | Bae | Nov 2006 | A1 |
| 20060274835 | Hamilton et al. | Dec 2006 | A1 |
| 20070005333 | Setiohardjo et al. | Jan 2007 | A1 |
| 20070031110 | Rijckaert | Feb 2007 | A1 |
| 20070044010 | Sull et al. | Feb 2007 | A1 |
| 20070047645 | Takashima | Mar 2007 | A1 |
| 20070047901 | Ando et al. | Mar 2007 | A1 |
| 20070055982 | Spilo | Mar 2007 | A1 |
| 20070067472 | Maertens et al. | Mar 2007 | A1 |
| 20070083467 | Lindahl et al. | Apr 2007 | A1 |
| 20070083617 | Chakrabarti et al. | Apr 2007 | A1 |
| 20070086528 | Mauchly et al. | Apr 2007 | A1 |
| 20070140647 | Kusunoki et al. | Jun 2007 | A1 |
| 20070154165 | Hemmeryckz-Deleersnijder et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070162981 | Morioka et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070166000 | Nallur et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070168287 | Mccarthy et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070168541 | Gupta et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070168542 | Gupta et al. | Jul 2007 | A1 |
| 20070180051 | Kelly et al. | Aug 2007 | A1 |
| 20070180125 | Knowles et al. | Aug 2007 | A1 |
| 20070239839 | Buday et al. | Oct 2007 | A1 |
| 20070250536 | Tanaka et al. | Oct 2007 | A1 |
| 20070292107 | Yahata et al. | Dec 2007 | A1 |
| 20080008455 | De Lange et al. | Jan 2008 | A1 |
| 20080022005 | Feng et al. | Jan 2008 | A1 |
| 20080077592 | Brodie et al. | Mar 2008 | A1 |
| 20080086570 | Dey et al. | Apr 2008 | A1 |
| 20080101466 | Swenson et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080101718 | Yang et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080104633 | Noblecourt et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080120330 | Reed et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080120342 | Reed et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080126248 | Lee et al. | May 2008 | A1 |
| 20080137736 | Richardson et al. | Jun 2008 | A1 |
| 20080137847 | Candelore et al. | Jun 2008 | A1 |
| 20080137848 | Kocher et al. | Jun 2008 | A1 |
| 20080177775 | Kawate et al. | Jul 2008 | A1 |
| 20080192818 | DiPietro et al. | Aug 2008 | A1 |
| 20080201705 | Wookey | Aug 2008 | A1 |
| 20080256105 | Nogawa et al. | Oct 2008 | A1 |
| 20080263354 | Beuque et al. | Oct 2008 | A1 |
| 20080279535 | Haque et al. | Nov 2008 | A1 |
| 20080294691 | Chang et al. | Nov 2008 | A1 |
| 20080310496 | Fang | Dec 2008 | A1 |
| 20090010622 | Yahata et al. | Jan 2009 | A1 |
| 20090013195 | Ochi et al. | Jan 2009 | A1 |
| 20090031220 | Tranchant et al. | Jan 2009 | A1 |
| 20090037959 | Suh et al. | Feb 2009 | A1 |
| 20090060452 | Chaudhri | Mar 2009 | A1 |
| 20090064341 | Hartung et al. | Mar 2009 | A1 |
| 20090066839 | Jung et al. | Mar 2009 | A1 |
| 20090067367 | Buracchini et al. | Mar 2009 | A1 |
| 20090077143 | Macy, Jr. | Mar 2009 | A1 |
| 20090106082 | Senti et al. | Apr 2009 | A1 |
| 20090132599 | Soroushian et al. | May 2009 | A1 |
| 20090132721 | Soroushian et al. | May 2009 | A1 |
| 20090150557 | Wormley et al. | Jun 2009 | A1 |
| 20090165148 | Frey et al. | Jun 2009 | A1 |
| 20090169181 | Priyadarshi et al. | Jul 2009 | A1 |
| 20090178090 | Oztaskent | Jul 2009 | A1 |
| 20090201988 | Gazier et al. | Aug 2009 | A1 |
| 20090226148 | Nesvadba et al. | Sep 2009 | A1 |
| 20090249081 | Zayas | Oct 2009 | A1 |
| 20090282162 | Mehrotra et al. | Nov 2009 | A1 |
| 20090293116 | DeMello | Nov 2009 | A1 |
| 20090303241 | Priyadarshi et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090307258 | Priyadarshi et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090307267 | Chen et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090310819 | Hatano | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090313544 | Wood et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090313564 | Rottler et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090319563 | Schnell | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20090328124 | Khouzam et al. | Dec 2009 | A1 |
| 20100040351 | Toma et al. | Feb 2010 | A1 |
| 20100094969 | Zuckerman et al. | Apr 2010 | A1 |
| 20100095121 | Shetty et al. | Apr 2010 | A1 |
| 20100111192 | Graves | May 2010 | A1 |
| 20100142915 | Mcdermott et al. | Jun 2010 | A1 |
| 20100158109 | Dahlby et al. | Jun 2010 | A1 |
| 20100189183 | Gu et al. | Jul 2010 | A1 |
| 20100218208 | Holden | Aug 2010 | A1 |
| 20100228795 | Hahn | Sep 2010 | A1 |
| 20110010466 | Fan et al. | Jan 2011 | A1 |
| 20110055585 | Lee | Mar 2011 | A1 |
| 20110058675 | Brueck et al. | Mar 2011 | A1 |
| 20110080940 | Bocharov | Apr 2011 | A1 |
| 20110083009 | Shamoon et al. | Apr 2011 | A1 |
| 20110096828 | Chen et al. | Apr 2011 | A1 |
| 20110103374 | Lajoie et al. | May 2011 | A1 |
| 20110126191 | Hughes et al. | May 2011 | A1 |
| 20110129011 | Cilli et al. | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110135090 | Chan et al. | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110142415 | Rhyu | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110145858 | Philpott et al. | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110150100 | Abadir | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110153785 | Minborg et al. | Jun 2011 | A1 |
| 20110173345 | Knox et al. | Jul 2011 | A1 |
| 20110179185 | Wang et al. | Jul 2011 | A1 |
| 20110197261 | Dong et al. | Aug 2011 | A1 |
| 20110197267 | Gravel et al. | Aug 2011 | A1 |
| 20110239078 | Luby et al. | Sep 2011 | A1 |
| 20110246659 | Bouazizi | Oct 2011 | A1 |
| 20110246661 | Manzari et al. | Oct 2011 | A1 |
| 20110268178 | Park et al. | Nov 2011 | A1 |
| 20110296048 | Knox et al. | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20110302319 | Ha et al. | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20110305273 | He et al. | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20110314130 | Strasman | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20110314176 | Frojdh et al. | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20110314500 | Gordon | Dec 2011 | A1 |
| 20120005312 | Mcgowan et al. | Jan 2012 | A1 |
| 20120017282 | Kang et al. | Jan 2012 | A1 |
| 20120023251 | Pyle et al. | Jan 2012 | A1 |
| 20120042090 | Chen et al. | Feb 2012 | A1 |
| 20120047542 | Lewis et al. | Feb 2012 | A1 |
| 20120093214 | Urbach | Apr 2012 | A1 |
| 20120110120 | Willig et al. | May 2012 | A1 |
| 20120167132 | Mathews et al. | Jun 2012 | A1 |
| 20120170642 | Braness et al. | Jul 2012 | A1 |
| 20120170643 | Soroushian et al. | Jul 2012 | A1 |
| 20120170906 | Soroushian et al. | Jul 2012 | A1 |
| 20120170915 | Braness et al. | Jul 2012 | A1 |
| 20120173751 | Braness et al. | Jul 2012 | A1 |
| 20120278496 | Hsu | Nov 2012 | A1 |
| 20120307883 | Graves | Dec 2012 | A1 |
| 20120311174 | Bichot et al. | Dec 2012 | A1 |
| 20120331167 | Hunt | Dec 2012 | A1 |
| 20130013803 | Bichot et al. | Jan 2013 | A1 |
| 20130044821 | Braness et al. | Feb 2013 | A1 |
| 20130046902 | Villegas Nuñez et al. | Feb 2013 | A1 |
| 20130055084 | Soroushian et al. | Feb 2013 | A1 |
| 20130080267 | McGowan | Mar 2013 | A1 |
| 20130196292 | Brennen et al. | Aug 2013 | A1 |
| 20140140253 | Lohmar et al. | May 2014 | A1 |
| 20140149557 | Lohmar et al. | May 2014 | A1 |
| 20140211840 | Butt et al. | Jul 2014 | A1 |
| 20140250473 | Braness et al. | Sep 2014 | A1 |
| 20150104153 | Braness et al. | Apr 2015 | A1 |
| 20150288530 | Oyman | Oct 2015 | A1 |
| 20160360123 | Braness et al. | Dec 2016 | A1 |
| 20170004862 | Soroushian et al. | Jan 2017 | A1 |
| 20170011055 | Pitts | Jan 2017 | A1 |
| 20170025157 | Ahsan et al. | Jan 2017 | A1 |
| 20180046949 | Kahn et al. | Feb 2018 | A1 |
| 20180255366 | Lockett et al. | Sep 2018 | A1 |
| 20190080723 | Ahsan et al. | Mar 2019 | A1 |
| 20190096440 | Soroushian et al. | Mar 2019 | A1 |
| 20190289226 | Braness et al. | Sep 2019 | A1 |
| 20200288069 | Braness et al. | Sep 2020 | A1 |
| Number | Date | Country |
|---|---|---|
| PI0416738 | Jan 2007 | BR |
| PI0416738-4 | Dec 2018 | BR |
| 2237293 | Jul 1997 | CA |
| 1221284 | Jun 1999 | CN |
| 1723696 | Jan 2006 | CN |
| 1873820 | Dec 2006 | CN |
| 101124561 | Feb 2008 | CN |
| 101861583 | Oct 2010 | CN |
| 101861583 | Jun 2014 | CN |
| 0637172 | Feb 1995 | EP |
| 644692 | Mar 1995 | EP |
| 0677961 | Oct 1995 | EP |
| 757484 | Feb 1997 | EP |
| 813167 | Dec 1997 | EP |
| 1158799 | Nov 2001 | EP |
| 1187483 | Mar 2002 | EP |
| 1420580 | May 2004 | EP |
| 1453319 | Sep 2004 | EP |
| 1536646 | Jun 2005 | EP |
| 1692859 | Aug 2006 | EP |
| 1283640 | Oct 2006 | EP |
| 1718074 | Nov 2006 | EP |
| 2180664 | Apr 2010 | EP |
| 2223232 | Sep 2010 | EP |
| 2360923 | Aug 2011 | EP |
| 2927816 | Oct 2015 | EP |
| 2927816 | Jan 2020 | EP |
| 3641317 | Apr 2020 | EP |
| 2398210 | Aug 2004 | GB |
| 1112988 | Sep 2008 | HK |
| 1147813 | Aug 2011 | HK |
| 1215889 | Jan 2021 | HK |
| 07334938 | Dec 1995 | JP |
| 08163488 | Jun 1996 | JP |
| 08287613 | Nov 1996 | JP |
| H1175178 | Mar 1999 | JP |
| 11328929 | Nov 1999 | JP |
| 02001043668 | Feb 2001 | JP |
| 2002170363 | Jun 2002 | JP |
| 2002218384 | Aug 2002 | JP |
| 2003023607 | Jan 2003 | JP |
| 2003250113 | Sep 2003 | JP |
| 2005027153 | Jan 2005 | JP |
| 2005173241 | Jun 2005 | JP |
| 2005284041 | Oct 2005 | JP |
| 2007532044 | Nov 2007 | JP |
| 4516082 | May 2010 | JP |
| 2011505648 | Feb 2011 | JP |
| 2012019548 | Jan 2012 | JP |
| 2013013146 | Jan 2013 | JP |
| 5513400 | Jun 2014 | JP |
| 5589043 | Aug 2014 | JP |
| 2014233086 | Dec 2014 | JP |
| 100221423 | Sep 1999 | KR |
| 2002013664 | Feb 2002 | KR |
| 1020020064888 | Aug 2002 | KR |
| 20040039852 | May 2004 | KR |
| 20060030164 | Apr 2006 | KR |
| 20060106250 | Oct 2006 | KR |
| 20060116967 | Nov 2006 | KR |
| 20060122893 | Nov 2006 | KR |
| 20070020727 | Feb 2007 | KR |
| 20110124325 | Nov 2011 | KR |
| 101127407 | Mar 2012 | KR |
| 20130006717 | Jan 2013 | KR |
| 101380262 | Apr 2014 | KR |
| 101380265 | Apr 2014 | KR |
| 2328040 | Jun 2008 | RU |
| 123104 | Jul 2006 | SG |
| 161354 | Dec 2012 | SG |
| 201508443 | Aug 2015 | TR |
| 1995015660 | Jun 1995 | WO |
| 199800973 | Jan 1998 | WO |
| 199834405 | Aug 1998 | WO |
| 1998046005 | Oct 1998 | WO |
| 1998047290 | Oct 1998 | WO |
| 1999037072 | Jul 1999 | WO |
| 2000049762 | Aug 2000 | WO |
| 2000049763 | Aug 2000 | WO |
| 0104892 | Jan 2001 | WO |
| 0126377 | Apr 2001 | WO |
| 2001031497 | May 2001 | WO |
| 2001050732 | Jul 2001 | WO |
| 2002001880 | Jan 2002 | WO |
| 200223315 | Mar 2002 | WO |
| 2003028293 | Apr 2002 | WO |
| 2002035832 | May 2002 | WO |
| 2002054776 | Jul 2002 | WO |
| 2002073437 | Sep 2002 | WO |
| 2002087241 | Oct 2002 | WO |
| 2003046750 | Jun 2003 | WO |
| 2003047262 | Jun 2003 | WO |
| 2003061173 | Jul 2003 | WO |
| 03098475 | Nov 2003 | WO |
| 2004012378 | Feb 2004 | WO |
| 2004054247 | Jun 2004 | WO |
| 2004097811 | Nov 2004 | WO |
| 2004100158 | Nov 2004 | WO |
| 2004102571 | Nov 2004 | WO |
| 2005008385 | Jan 2005 | WO |
| 2005015935 | Feb 2005 | WO |
| 2005057906 | Jun 2005 | WO |
| WO 2005057906 | Jun 2005 | WO |
| 2005125214 | Dec 2005 | WO |
| 2007026837 | Mar 2007 | WO |
| 2009006302 | Jan 2009 | WO |
| 2009065137 | May 2009 | WO |
| 2009109976 | Sep 2009 | WO |
| 2010060106 | May 2010 | WO |
| 2010108053 | Sep 2010 | WO |
| 2010111261 | Sep 2010 | WO |
| 2010122447 | Oct 2010 | WO |
| 2011087449 | Jul 2011 | WO |
| 2011101371 | Aug 2011 | WO |
| 2011103364 | Aug 2011 | WO |
| 2012094171 | Jul 2012 | WO |
| 2012094181 | Jul 2012 | WO |
| 2012094189 | Jul 2012 | WO |
| 20120094181 | Jul 2012 | WO |
| 20120094189 | Jul 2012 | WO |
| Entry |
|---|
| Bochicchio et al, “X-Presenter: a tool for video-based hypermedia application”, May 28, 2004, pp. 437-440 (Year: 2004). |
| “Order” Conduct of the Proceeding, Case No. IPR2020-00614, U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673 B2 and Case No. IPR2020-00646, U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792 B2, filed Jun. 30, 2020, 4 pgs. |
| Broadq—The Ultimate Home Entertainment Software, printed May 11, 2009 from ittp://web.srchive.org/web/20030401122010/www.broadq.com/qcasttuner/, 1 pg. |
| Decision Denying Institution of Inter Partes Review for U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Case No. IPR2020-00614, Sep. 11, 2020, 22 pgs. |
| Decision Granting Institution of Inter Partes Review for U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, Case No. IPR2020-00646, Sep. 15, 2020, 57 pgs. |
| Decision Granting Petitioner's Request on Rehearing 37 C.F.R. § 42.71(d) Granting Institution of Inter Partes Review 35 U.S.C. § 314, IPR2020-00614 U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, 29 pgs. |
| Declaration of Dr. Clifford Reader, Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, 205 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| Declaration of Dr. Sylvia D. Hall-Ellis, Case No. IPR2020-00646, U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, 33 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| Declaration of Patrick McDaniel, Ph.D., Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Case No. IPR2020-00614, IPR filed Feb. 28, 2020, 218 pgs. |
| Defendant Hulu, LLC's Invalidity Contentions for U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,295,673; 8,139,651; 8,472,792; 9,270,720; 9,998,515; 10,212,486; 10,225,588, DIVX, LLC v. Hulu, LLC, Case No. 2:19-cv-1606-PSG-DFMx, C.D. Cal., Apr. 2, 2020, 136 pgs. |
| Defendant Netflix, Inc.'s Invalidity Contentions for U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,295,673; 8,139,651; 8,472,792; 9,270,720; 9,998,515; 10,212,486; 10,225,588; 9,184,920, DIVX, LLC v. Netflix, Inc., Case No. 2:19-cv-1602-PSG-DFM, C.D. Cal., Apr. 2, 2020, 148 pgs. |
| European Search Report for Application 11855103.5, search completed Jun. 26, 2014, 9 pgs. |
| European Search Report for Application 11855237.1, search completed Jun. 12, 2014, 9 pgs. |
| European Supplementary Search Report for Application EP09759600, completed Jan. 25, 2011, 11 pgs. |
| Extended European Search Report for European Application EP15162562.1,Report Completed Jul. 21, 2015, dated Jul. 29, 2015, 4 Pgs. |
| Extended European Search Report for European Application No. 19214057.2, Search completed Mar. 10, 2020, dated Mar. 20, 2020, 8 Pgs. |
| Federal Computer Week, “Tool Speeds Info to Vehicles”, Jul. 25, 1999, 5 pages. |
| First Amended Complaint for Patent Infringement, DivX, LLC v. Netflix, Inc., No. 2:19-cv-1602-PSG, Am. Compl. (C.D. Cal Aug. 21, 2019), 229 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| HTTP Live Streaming Overview, Networking & Internet, Apple, Inc., Apr. 1, 2011, 38 pages. |
| Hulu Invalidity Chart for U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Case No. IPR2020-00614, IPR filed Feb. 29, 2020, 17 pgs. |
| IBM Corporation and Microsoft Corporation, “Multimedia Programming Interface and Data Specifications 1.0”, Aug. 1991, printed from http://www.kk.iij4u.or.jp/˜kondo/wave/mpidata.txt on Mar. 6, 2006, 100 pgs. |
| Information Technology—MPEG Systems Technologies—Part 7: Common Encryption in ISO Base Media File Format Files (ISO/IEC 23001-7), Apr. 2015, 24 pgs. |
| InformationWeek, “Internet on Wheels”, InformationWeek: Front End: Daily Dose, Jul. 20, 1999, Printed on Mar. 26, 2014, 3 pgs. |
| International Preliminary Report on Patentability for International Application No. PCT/US2004/041667, Report dated Jul. 10, 2007, 7 pgs. |
| International Preliminary Report on Patentability for International Application No. PCT/US2006/000456, report dated Oct. 9, 2007. |
| International Preliminary Report on Patentability for International Application No. PCT/US2008/083816, dated May 18, 2010, 6 pgs. |
| International Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US09/46588, completed Jul. 13, 2009, dated Jul. 23, 2009, 7 pgs. |
| International Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2004/041667, completed May 24, 2007, dated Jun. 20, 2007, 6 pgs. |
| International Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2008/083816, completed Jan. 10, 2009, dated Jan. 22, 2009, 7 pgs. |
| International Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application PCT/US2011/066927, completed Apr. 3, 2012, dated Apr. 20, 2012, 14 pgs. |
| International Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application PCT/US2011/067167, completed Jun. 19, 2012, dated Jul. 2, 2012, 11 pgs. |
| International Search Report for International Publication No. PCT./US2006/000456, completed May 19, 2007, dated Sep. 24, 2007. |
| ISO/IEC 14496-12 Information technology—Coding of audio-visual objects—Part 12: ISO base media file format, Feb. 2004 (“MPEG-4 Part 12 Standard”), 62 pgs. |
| ISO/IEC 14496-12:2008(E) Informational Technology—Coding of Audio-Visual Objects Part 12: ISO Base Media File Format, Oct. 2008, 120 pgs. |
| ISO/IEC 14496-2:2001 (E), Information technology—Coding of audio-visual objects, Part 2: Visual, Dec. 1, 2001, 536 pgs, Annex A.1, section 7.4.1., section, 7.4.3., section 7.6.3, section 7.7.1., Annex B. |
| ISO/IEC FCD 23001-6 MPEG systems technologies Part 6: Dynamic adaptive streaming over HTTP (DASH), Jan. 28, 2011, 86 pgs. |
| ITS International, “Fleet System Opts for Mobile Server”, Aug. 26, 1999, Printed on Oct. 21, 2011 from http://www.itsinternational.com/News/article.cfm?recordID=547, 2 pgs. |
| Linksys Wireless-B Media Adapter Reviews, printed May 4, 2007 from http://reviews.cnet.com/Linksys_Wireless_B_Media_Adapter/4505-6739_7-30421900.html?tag=box, 5 pgs. |
| Linksys, KISS DP-500, printed May 4, 2007 from http://www.kiss-technology.com/?p=dp500, 2 pgs. |
| LINKSYS® : “Enjoy your digital music and pictures on your home entertainment center, without stringing wires!”, Model No. WMA 11B, printed May 9, 2007 from http://www.linksys.com/servlet/Satellite?c=L_Product_C2&childpagename=US/Layout&cid=1115416830950&p. |
| Microsoft Corporation, “Chapter 8, Multimedia File Formats” 1991, Microsoft Windows Multimedia Programmer's Reference, 3 cover pgs, pp. 8-1 to 8-20. |
| Microsoft Corporation, Advanced Systems Format (ASF) Specification, Revision 01.20.03, Dec. 2004, 121 pgs. |
| Microsoft Media Platform: Player Framework, “Microsoft Media Platform: Player Framework v2.5 (formerly Silverlight Media Framework)”, May 3, 2011, 2 pages. |
| Microsoft Media Platform: Player Framework, “Silverlight Media Framework v1.1”, Jan. 2010, 2 pages. |
| Microsoft Windows® XP Media Center Edition 2005, Frequently asked Questions, printed May 4, 2007 from http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/evaluation/faq.mspx. |
| Microsoft Windows® XP Media Center Edition 2005: Features, printed May 9, 2007, from http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/evaluation/features.mspx, 4 pgs. |
| MPEG-DASH presentation at Streaming Media West 2011, Nov. 2011, 14 pgs. |
| Netflix Invalidity Chart for U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Case No. IPR2020-00614, IPR filed Feb. 29, 2020, 17 pgs. |
| Open DML AVI-M-JPEG File Format Subcommittee, “Open DML AVI File Format Extensions”, Version 1.02, Feb. 28, 1996, 29 pgs. |
| Patent Assignment Conveying U.S. Pat. No. 7,212,726 to Hulu, LLC, 8 pgs Recorded Jun. 17, 2016. |
| Patent Owner's Preliminary Response to Petition for Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Case No. IPR2020-00614, filed Jun. 17, 2020, 52 pgs. |
| Patent Owner's Preliminary Response to Petition for Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, Case No. IPR2020-00646, filed Jun. 17, 2020, 40 pgs. |
| Patent Owner's Preliminary Surreply to Petition for Inter Partes Review, Case No. IPR2020-00614, U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, filed Feb. 29, 2020, 14 pgs. |
| Patent Owner's Preliminary Surreply to Petition for Inter Partes Review, Case No. IPR2020-00646, U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, filed Jul. 15, 2020, 14 pgs. |
| pc world.com, Future Gear: PC on the HiFi, and the TV, from http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,108818-page,1/article.html, printed May 4, 2007, from IDG Networks, 2 pgs. |
| Petition for Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, IPR2020-00614, 89 pgs, IPR filed Feb. 29, 2020. |
| Petition for Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, IPR2020-00646, 90 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| Petitioners' Reply to Patent Owner's Preliminary Response, Case No. IPR2020-00614, U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, Jul. 8, 2020, 13 pgs. |
| Petitioners' Reply to Patent Owner's Preliminary Response, Case No. IPR2020-00646, U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, filed Jul. 8, 2020, 13 pgs. |
| Petitioner's Request for Rehearing, Case No. IPR2020-00614, U.S. Pat. No. 7,295,673, filed Oct. 12, 2020, 14 pgs. |
| Pomelo, LLC Tech Memo, Analysis of Netflix's Security Framework for ‘Watch Instantly’ Service, Mar.-Apr. 2009, 18 pgs. |
| Power of Attorney—Hulu, LLC (IPR2020-00646), 4 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| Power of Attorney—Netflix, Inc. (IPR2020-00646), 4 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. |
| Prosecution File History for U.S. Pat. No. 8,472,792, 1450 pgs, IPR filed Mar. 6, 2020. (presented in 10 parts). |
| Qtv—About BroadQ, printed May 11, 2009 from http://www.broadq.com/en/about.php, 1 pg. |
| Search Report and Written Opinion for International Application No. SG 200603807-9, Report dated Oct. 22, 2007, 15pgs. |
| Server-Side Stream Repackaging (Streaming Video Technologies Panorama, Part 2), Jul. 2011, 15 pgs. |
| Sony U.S. Appl. No. 60,409,675, filed Sep. 9, 2002, 144 pgs. |
| Supplementary European Search Report for Application No. EP 04813918, Search Completed Dec. 19, 2012, 3 pgs. |
| Text of ISO/IEC 23001-6: Dynamic adaptive streaming over HTTP (DASH), Oct. 2010, 71 pgs. |
| Transmission of Non-Telephone Signals, Video Coding for Low Bit Rate Communication, ITU-T Recommendation H.263, ITU-T Telecommunication Standardization Sector of ITU, Mar. 1996, 52 pgs. |
| Unified Patents Patroll Winning Subimission, PATROLL—Prior Art Crowdsourcing http://patroll.unifiedpatents.com, 5 pgs. |
| United States Patent and Trademark Office, In re Campana, Jr., et al., Control Nos. 90/006,494, 90/006,681, 90/007,726, Decision Denying Petition, Feb. 22, 2007, 11 pgs. |
| Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), ETSI TS 126 233 V9.1.0 (Jun. 2011) 3GPP TS 26.233 version 9.1.0 Release 9, 18 pgs. |
| Universal Mobile Telecommunications Systems (UMTS); ETSI TS 126 244 V9.4.0 (May 2011) 3GPP TS 26.244 version 9.4.0 Release 9, 58 pgs. |
| W3C, Eds. Klyne, G. et al., Resource Description Framework (RDF): Concepts and Abstract Syntax, Section 3.3, Oct. 10, 2003, available online at https://www.w3.org/TR/2003/WD-rdf-concepts-20031010/#section-Datatypes-intro. |
| Windows Media Center Extender for Xbox, printed May 9, 2007 from http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/systemuse/xbox/console/mediacenterextender.htm, 2 pgs. |
| Windows® XP Media Center Edition 2005, “Experience more entertainment”, retrieved from http://download.microsoft.com/download/c/9/a/c9a7000a-66b3-455b-860b-1c16f2eecfec/MCE.pdf on May 9, 2007, 2 pgs. |
| Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2006/000456, report completed May 19, 2007. |
| Extended European Search Report for European Application EP08849996.7, Report Completed Dec. 19, 2014, dated Jan. 23, 2015, 7 Pgs., dated Jan. 23, 2015. |
| Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2008/083816, Opinion completed Jan. 10, 2009, dated Jan. 22, 2009, 5 pgs. |
| Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2009/046588, completed Jul. 14, 2009, dated Jul. 23, 2009, 5 pgs. |
| Written Opinion for International Application No. PCT/US2004/041667, Filing Date Dec. 8, 2004, Report Completed May 24, 2007, dated Jun. 20, 2007, 4 pgs. |
| Innovation of technology arrived, I-O Data, Nov. 2004, Retrieved from http://www.iodata.com/catalogs/AVLP2DVDLA_Flyer200505.pdf on May 30, 2013, 2 pgs., I-O Data, 2 pgs. |
| “0penDML AVI File Format Extensions”, XP002179318,Retrieved from the Internet: URL:http://www.rahul.net/jfm/odmlff2.pdf [retrieved on Oct. 4, 2001], Sep. 1997. |
| “Adaptive Streaming Comparison”, Jan. 28, 2010, 5 pgs. |
| “Apple HTTP Live Streaming specification”, Aug. 2017, 60 pgs. |
| “AVI”, OpenNET, Mar. 5, 2003, available at https://web.archive.org/web/20030305042201/http://www.opennet.ru/docs/formats/avi.txt. |
| “AVI files and common problems”, virtualdub.org, Current version: v1.10.4Nov 11, 2004, Retrieved from: http://www.virtualdub.org/blog/pivot/entry.php?id=25, 14 pgs. |
| “Best Practices for Multi-Device Transcoding”, Kaltura Open Source Video, Printed on Nov. 27, 2013 from knowledge.kaltura.com/best-practices-multi-device-transcoding, 13 pgs. |
| “Common Interface Specification for Conditional Access and other Digital Video Broadcasting Decoder Applications”, European Standard, EN 50221, Feb. 1997, 86 pgs. |
| “Container format (digital)”, printed Aug. 22, 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_format_(digital), 4 pgs. |
| “Data Encryption Decryption using AES Algorithm, Key and Salt with Java Cryptography Extension”, Available at https://www.digizol.com/2009/10/java-encrypt-decrypt-jce-salt.html, Oct. 200, 6 pgs. |
| “DCMI Metadata Terms: A complete historical record”, Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, Dec. 18, 2006, showing Term name: title, version 004, Date modified Oct. 14, 2002, available at http://dublincore.org/usage/terms/history/#title-004. |
| “Delivering Live and On-Demand Smooth Streaming”, Microsoft Silverlight, 2009, 28 pgs. |
| “DVD—MPeg differences”, printed Jul. 2, 2009 from http://dvd.sourceforge.net/dvdinfo/dvdmpeg.html, 1 pg. |
| “DVD subtitles”, sam.zoy.org/writings/dvd/subtitles, dated Jan. 9, 2001, printed Jul. 2, 2009, 4 pgs. |
| “Final Committee Draft of MPEG-4 streaming text format”, International Organisation for Standardisation, Feb. 2004, 22 pgs. |
| “HTTP Based Adaptive Streaming over HSPA”, Apr. 2011, 73 pgs. |
| “HTTP Live Streaming”, Mar. 2011, 24 pgs. |
| “HTTP Live Streaming”, Sep. 2011, 33 pgs. |
| “Information Technology—Coding of audio-visual objects—Part 17: Streaming text”, International Organisation for Standardisation, Feb. 2004, 22 pgs. |
| “Information technology—Coding of audio-visual objects—Part 18: Font compression and streaming”, ISO/IEC 14496-18, First edition Jul. 1, 2004, 26 pgs. |
| “Information Technology—Coding of Audio Visual Objects—Part 2: Visual”, International Standard, ISO/IEC 14496-2, Third Edition, Jun. 1, 2004, pp. 1-724. (presented in three parts). |
| “ISO/IEC 8859-1”, Wikipedia, Last updated Aug. 8, 2017, Retrieved from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_8859-1, 8 pgs. |
| “Java Cryptography Architecture API Specification & Reference”, Available at https://docs.oracle.com/javase/1.5.0/docs/guide/security/CryptoSpec.html, Jul. 25, 2004, 68 pgs. |
| “Java Cryptography Extension, javax.crypto.Cipher class”, Available at https://docs.oracle.com/javase/1.5.0/docs/api/javax/crypto/Cipher.html, 2004, 24 pgs. |
| “JCE Encryption—Data Encryption Standard (DES) Tutorial”, Available at https://mkyong.com/java/jce-encryption-data-encryption-standard-des-tutorial/, Feb. 25, 2009, 2 pgs. |
| “KISS Players, KISS DP-500”, retrieved from http://www.kiss-technology.com/?p=dp500 on May 4, 2007, 1 pg. |
| “Liaison Statement from ITU-T SG 9 to SC 29/WG 11 on Draft New Recommendation J.123 (j.mfweb) [SC 29 M 4877]”, 61. MPEG Meeting; Jul. 22, 2002-Jul. 26, 2002, Klagenfurt; (Motion Picture Expert Group or ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11), No. M8488. Jul. 25, 2002 (Jul. 25, 2002). XP030037444. |
| “Live and On-Demand Video with Silverlight and IIS Smooth Streaming”, Microsoft Silverlight, Windows Server Internet Information Services 7.0, Feb. 2010, 15 pgs. |
| “Microsoft and Leading Professional Media Companies Release Advanced Authoring Format Specification”, Retrieved from: https://news.microsoft.com/1998/04/03/microsoft-and-leading-professional-media-companiesrelease-advanced-authoring-format-specification/, Apr. 3, 1998, 10 pgs. |
| “Microsoft Smooth Streaming specification”, Jul. 22, 2013, 56 pgs. |
| “Multimedia Programming Interface and Data Specifications 1.0”, IBM Corporation and Microsoft Corporation, Ch. 2 (RIFF), Aug. 1991. |
| “Netflix turns on subtitles for PC, Mac streaming”, Yahoo! News, Apr. 21, 2010, Printed on Mar. 26, 2014, 3 pgs. |
| “OpenDML AVI File Format Extensions”, OpenDML AVI M-JPEG File Format Subcommittee, retrieved from www.the-labs.com/Video/odmlff2-avidef.pdf, Sep. 1997, 42 pgs. |
| “OpenDML AVI File Format Extensions Version 1.02”, OpenDMLAVI MJPEG File Format Subcommittee. Last revision: Feb. 28, 1996. Reformatting: Sep. 1997, 42 pgs. |
| “QCast Tuner for PS2”, printed May 11, 2009 from http://web.archive.org/web/20030210120605/www.divx.com/software/detail.php?ie=39, 2 pgs. |
| “QuickTime File Format”, Apple Computer, Inc., Mar. 1, 2001, 274 pgs. |
| “Single-Encode Streaming for Multiple Screen Delivery”, Telestream Wowza Media Systems, 2009, 6 pgs. |
| “Smooth Streaming Client”, The Official Microsoft IIS Site, Sep. 24, 2010, 4 pages. |
| “Supported Media Formats”, Supported Media Formats, Android Developers, Printed on Nov. 27, 2013 from developer.android.com/guide/appendix/media-formats.html, 3 pgs. |
| “Text of ISO/IEC 14496-18/COR1, Font compression and streaming”, ITU Study Group 16—Video Coding Experts Group—ISO/IEC MPEG & ITU-T VCEG(ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 and ITU-T SG16 06), No. N8664, Oct. 27, 2006, 8 pgs. |
| “Text of ISO/IEC 14496-18/FDIS, Coding of Moving Pictures and Audio”, ITU Study Group 16—Videocoding Experts Group—ISO/IEC MPEG & ITU-T VCEG(ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 and ITU-T SG16 06), No. N6215, Dec. 2003, 26 pgs. |
| “The MPEG-DASH Standard for Multimedia Streaming Over the Internet”, IEEE MultiMedia, vol. 18, No. 4, 2011, 7 pgs. |
| “Thread: SSME (Smooth Streaming Medial Element) config.xml review (Smooth Streaming Client configuration file)”, Printed on Mar. 26, 2014, 3 pgs. |
| “Transcoding Best Practices”, From movideo, Printed on Nov. 27, 2013 from code.movideo.com/Transcoding_Best_Practices, 5 pgs. |
| “Using HTTP Live Streaming”, iOS Developer Library, http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/networkinginternet/conceptual/streamingmediaguide/UsingHTTPLiveStreaming/UsingHTTPLiveStreaming.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40008332-CH102-SW1, Feb. 11, 2014, 10 pgs. |
| “Video Manager and Video Title Set IFO file headers”, printed Aug. 22, 2009 from http://dvd.sourceforge.net/dvdinfo/ifo.htm, 6 pgs. |
| “What is a DVD?”, printed Aug. 22, 2009 from http://www.videohelp.com/dvd, 8 pgs. |
| “What is a VOB file”, http://www.mpucoder.com/DVD/vobov.html, printed on Jul. 2, 2009, 2 pgs. |
| “What's on a DVD?”, printed Aug. 22, 2009 from http://www.doom9.org/dvd-structure.htm, 5 pgs. |
| “Windows Media Player 9”, Microsoft, Mar. 23, 2017, 3 pgs. |
| “DVD-Mpeg differences”, printed on Jul. 2, 2009, http://dvd.sourceforge.net/dvdinfo/dvdmpeg.html, 1 pg. |
| Casares, Juan et al. “Simplifying Video Editing Using Metadata”. |
| Long et al., “Silver: Simplifying Video Editing with Metadata”, CHI 2003: New Horizons, Apr. 5-10, 2003, pp. 628-629. |
| U.S. Appl. No. 13/224,298, “Final Office Action Received”, dated May 19, 2014, 26 pgs. |
| Abomhara et al., “Enhancing Selective Encryption for H.264/AVC Using Advanced Encryption Standard”, International Journal of computer Theory and Engineering, Apr. 2010, vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 223-229. |
| Agi et al., “An Empirical Study of Secure MPEG Video Transmissions”, IEEE, Mar. 1996, 8 pgs., DOI: 10.1109/NDSS.1996.492420. |
| Akhshabi et al., “An Experimental Evaluation of Rate-Adaptation Algorithms in Adaptive Streaming over HTTP”, MMSys'11, Feb. 23-25, 2011, 12 pgs. |
| Alattar et al., A.M. “Improved selective encryption techniques for secure transmission of MPEG video bit-streams”, In Proceedings 1999 International Conference on Image Processing (Cat. 99CH36348), vol. 4, IEEE, 1999, pp. 256-260. |
| Alvestrand, “Tags for the Identification of Languages”, Jan. 2001, Retrieved from: http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3066.txt, 12 pgs. |
| Anonymous, “Method for the encoding of a compressed video sequence derived from the same video sequence compressed at a different bit rate without loss of data”, ip.com, ip.com No. IPCOM000008165D, May 22, 2002, pp. 1-9. |
| Antoniou et al., “Adaptive Methods for the Transmission of Video Streams in Wireless Networks”, 2015, 50 pgs. |
| Apostolopoulos et al., “Secure Media Streaming and Secure Transcoding”, Multimedia Security Technologies for Digital Rights Management, 2006, 33 pgs. |
| Asai et al., “Essential Factors for Full-Interactive VOD Server: Video File System, Disk Scheduling, Network”, Proceedings of Globecom '95, Nov. 14-16, 1995, 6 pgs. |
| Beker et al., “Cipher Systems, The Protection of Communications”, 1982, 40 pgs. |
| Blasiak, “Video Transrating and Transcoding: Overview of Video Transrating and Transcoding Technologies”, Ingenient Technologies, TI Developer Conference, Aug. 6-8, 2002, 22 pgs. |
| Bocharov et al, “Portable Encoding of Audio-Video Objects, The Protected Interoperable File Format (PIFF)”, Microsoft Corporation, First Edition Sep. 8, 2009, 30 pgs. |
| Bulterman et al., “Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL 3.0)”, W3C Recommendation, Dec. 1, 2008, https://www.w3.org/TR/2008/REC-SMIL3-20081201/, 321 pgs. (presented in five parts). |
| Cahill et al., “Locally Adaptive Deblocking Filter for Low Bit Rate Video”, Proceedings 2000 International Conference on Image Processing, Sep. 10-13, 2000, Vancouver, BC, Canada, 4 pgs. |
| Candelore, U.S. Appl. No. 60/372,901, filed Apr. 17, 2002. |
| Casares et al., “Simplifying Video Editing Using Metadata”, DIS2002, 2002, pp. 157-166. |
| Chaddha et al., “A Frame-work for Live Multicast of Video Streams over the Internet”, Proceedings of 3rd IEEE International Conference on Image Processing, Sep. 19, 1996, Lausanne, Switzerland, 4 pgs. |
| Cheng, “Partial Encryption for Image and Video Communication”, Thesis, Fall 1998, 95 pgs. |
| Cheng et al., “Partial encryption of compressed images and videos”, IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing, vol. 48, No. 8, Aug. 2000, 33 pgs. |
| Cheung et al., “On the Use of Destination Set Grouping to Improve Fairness in Multicast Video Distribution”, Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM'96, Conference on Computer Communications, vol. 2, IEEE, 1996, 23 pgs. |
| Collet, “Delivering Protected Content, An Approach for Next Generation Mobile Technologies”, Thesis, 2010, 84 pgs. |
| Conklin et al., “Video coding for streaming media delivery on the Internet”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, Mar. 2001, vol. 11, No. 3, pp. 269-281. |
| Deshpande et al., “Scalable Streaming of JPEG2000 Images Using Hypertext Transfer Protocol”, MULTIMEDIA '01: Proceedings of the Ninth ACM International Conference on Multimedia, Oct. 2001, pp. 372-381. https://doi.org/10.1145/500141.500197. |
| Deutscher, “IIS Transform Manager Beta—Using the MP4 to Smooth Task”, Retrieved from: https://web.archive.org/web/20130328111303/http://blog.johndeutscher.com/category/smooth-streaming, Blog post of Apr. 29, 2011, 14 pgs. |
| Diamantis et al., “Real Time Video Distribution using Publication through a Database”, Proceedings SIBGRAPI'98. International Symposium on Computer Graphics, Image Processing, and Vision (Cat. No. 98EX237), Oct. 1990, 8 pgs. |
| Dworkin, “Recommendation for Block Cipher Modes of Operation: Methods and Techniques”, NIST Special Publication 800-38A, 2001, 66 pgs. |
| ETSI, “Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) Support for use of scrambling and Conditional Access (CA) within digital broadcasting systems”, Oct. 1996, 13 pgs. |
| ETSI, “Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB); Implementation guidelines for the use of Video and Audio Coding in Contribution and Primary Distribution Applications based on the MPEG-2 Transport Stream”, ETSI TS 102 154 V1.2.1, May 2004, 73 pgs. |
| Fahmi et al., “Proxy Servers for Scalable Interactive Video Support”, Computer, Sep. 2001, vol. 45, No. 9, pp. 54-60, https://doi.org/10.1109/2.947092. |
| Fan et al., “Class View: Hierarchical Video Shot Classification, Indexing, and Accessing”, IEEE Transactions on Multimedia, IEEE Service Center, Piscataway, NJ, US, vol. 6, No. 1, Feb. 1, 2004, pp. 70-86, XP011105807, ISSN: 1520-9210, DOI: 10.1I09/TMM.2003.8195. |
| Fang et al., “Real-time deblocking filter for MPEG-4 systems”, Asia-Pacific Conference on Circuits and Systems, Oct. 28-31, 2002, Bail, Indonesia, 4 pgs. |
| Fecheyr-Lippens, “A Review of HTTP Live Streaming”, Jan. 2010, 38 pgs. |
| Fielding et al., “Hypertext Transfer Protocol—HTTP1.1”, Network Working Group, RFC 2616, Jun. 1999, 114 pgs. |
| Fitzek et al., “A Prefetching Protocol for Continuous Media Streaming in Wireless Environments”, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, Oct. 2001, vol. 19, No. 10, pp. 2015-2028, DOI: 10.1109/49.957315. |
| Fukuda et al., “Reduction of Blocking Artifacts by Adaptive DCT Coefficient Estimation in Block-Based Video Coding”, Proceedings 2000 International Conference on Image Processing, Sep. 10-13, 2000, Vancouver, BC, Canada, 4 pgs. |
| Gannes, “The Lowdown on Apple's HTTP Adaptive Bitrate Streaming”, GigaOM, Jun. 10, 2009, 12 pgs. |
| Ghosh, “Enhancing Silverlight Video Experiences with Contextual Data”, Retrieved from: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/ee336025.aspx, 2010,15 pgs. |
| Griffith, Eric “The Wireless Digital Picture Frame Arrives”, Wi-Fi Planet, printed May 4, 2007 from http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/news/article.php/3093141, Oct. 16, 2003, 3 pgs. |
| Ho, “Digital Video Broadcasting Conditional Access Architecture”, Report prepared for CS265—Section 2, Fall 2002, Prof Stamp, 7 pgs. |
| Huang, U.S. Pat. No. 7,729,426, U.S. Appl. No. 11/230,794, filed Sep. 20, 2005. |
| Huang et al., “Adaptive MLP post-processing for block-based coded images”, IEEE Proceedings—Vision, Image and Signal Processing, vol. 147, No. 5, Oct. 2000, pp. 463-473. |
| Huang et al., “Architecture Design for Deblocking Filter in H.264/JVT/AVC”, 2003 International Conference on Multimedia and Expo., Jul. 6-9, 2003, Baltimore, MD, 4 pgs. |
| Inlet Technologies, “Adaptive Delivery to iDevices”, 2010, 2 pages. |
| Inlet Technologies, “Adaptive delivery to iPhone 3.0”, 2009, 2 pgs. |
| Inlet Technologies, “HTTP versus RTMP”, 2009, 3 pages. |
| Inlet Technologies, “The World's First Live Smooth Streaming Event: The French Open”, 2009, 2 pages. |
| I-O Data, “Innovation of technology arrived”, Nov. 2004, Retrieved from http://www.iodata.com/catalogs/AVLP2DVDLA_Flyer200505.pdf, 2 pgs. |
| ITU-T, “Series J: Cable Networks and Transmission of Television, Sound Programme and Other Multimedia Signals”, Technical method for ensuring privacy in long-distance international MPEG-2 television transmission conforming to ITU-T J.89, ITU-T Recommendation J.96, Mar. 2001, 34 pgs. |
| Jain et al., U.S. Appl. No. 61/522,623, filed Aug. 11, 2011. |
| Jung et al., “Design and Implementation of an Enhanced Personal Video Recorder for DTV”, IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, vol. 47, No. 4, Nov. 2001, 6 pgs. |
| Kalva, Hari “Delivering MPEG-4 Based Audio-Visual Services”, 2001, 113 pgs. |
| Kang et al., “Access Emulation and Buffering Techniques for Steaming of Non-Stream Format Video Files”, IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, vol. 43, No. 3, Aug. 2001, 7 pgs. |
| Kim et al, “A Deblocking Filter with Two Separate Modes in Block-Based Video Coding”, IEEE transactions on circuits and systems for video technology, vol. 9, No. 1, 1999, pp. 156-160. |
| Kim et al., “Tree-Based Group Key Agreement”, Feb. 2004, 37 pgs. |
| Kurzke et al., “Get Your Content Onto Google TV”, Google, Retrieved from: http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/io2012/presentations/live%20to%20website/1300.pdf, 2012, 58 pgs. |
| Lang, “Expression Encoder, Best Practices for live smooth streaming broadcasting”, Microsoft Corporation, 2010, retrieved from http://www.streamingmedia.com/conferences/west2010/presentations/SMWest-12010-Expression-Encoder.pdf, 20 pgs. |
| Laukens, “Adaptive Streaming—A Brief Tutorial”, EBU Technical Review, 2011, 6 pgs. |
| Lee et al., “Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax”, Aug. 1998, Retrieved from: http://ietf.org/rfc/rfc2396.txt, 35 pgs. |
| Legault et al., “Professional Video Under 32-bit Windows Operating Systems”, SMPTE Journal, vol. 105, No. 12, Dec. 1996, 10 pgs. |
| Levkov, “Mobile Encoding Guidelines for Android Powered Devices”, Adobe Systems Inc., Addendum B, Dec. 22, 2010, 42 pgs. |
| Li et al., “Layered Video Multicast with Retransmission (LVMR): Evaluation of Hierarchical Rate Control”, Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM'98, the Conference on Computer Communications. Seventeenth Annual Joint Conference of the IEEE Computer and Communications Societies. Gateway to the 21st Century, Cat. No. 98, vol. 3, 1998, 26 pgs. |
| Lievaart, “Characteristics that differentiate CA Systems”, Irdeto access, Nov. 2001, 5 pgs. |
| List et al., “Adaptive deblocking filter”, IEEE transactions on circuits and systems for video technology, vol. 13, No. 7, Jul. 2003, pp. 614-619. |
| Long et al., “Silver: Simplifying Video Editing with Metadata”, Demonstrations, CHI 2003: New Horizons, Apr. 5-10, 2003, pp. 628-629. |
| Mark D. Pesce, “Programming Microsoft DirectShow for Digital Video and Television”, Washington: Microsoft Press, 2003, 17 pgs. |
| Massoudi et al., “Overview on Selective Encryption of Image and Video: Challenges and Perspectives”, EURASIP Journal on Information Security, Nov. 2008, 18 pgs. |
| McCanne et al., “Receiver-driven Layered Multicast”, Conference proceedings on Applications, technologies, architectures, and protocols for computer communications, Aug. 1996, 14 pgs. |
| Meier, “Reduction of Blocking Artifacts in Image and Video Coding”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, vol. 9, No. 3, Apr. 1999, pp. 490-500. |
| Meyer et al., “Security mechanisms for Multimedia-Data with the Example MPEG-I-Video”, SECMPEG, 1992, 10 pgs. |
| Morrison, “EA IFF 85 Standard for Interchange Format Files”, Jan. 14, 1985, printed from http://www.dcs.ed.ac.uk/home/mxr/gfx/2d/IFF.txt on Mar. 6, 2006, 24 pgs. |
| MSDN, “Adaptive streaming, Expression Studio 2.0”, Apr. 23, 2009, 2 pgs. |
| NCITS/ISO/IEC, “Information Technology—Generic Coding of Moving Pictures and Associated Audio Information: Video (Formerly ANSI/ISO/IEC 13818-2-2000)”, Second edition, Dec. 15, 2000, 220 pgs. |
| Nelson, “Arithmetic Coding + Statistical Modeling = Data Compression: Part 1—Arithmetic Coding”, Doctor Dobb's Journal, Feb. 1991, USA, pp. 1-12. |
| Nelson, “Smooth Streaming Deployment Guide”, Microsoft Expression Encoder, Aug. 2010, 66 pgs. |
| Nelson, “The Data Compression Book”, M&T Publishing, 1992, 533 pgs., (presented in two parts). |
| Newton et al., “Preserving Privacy by De-identifying Facial Images”, Carnegie Mellon University School of Computer Science, Technical Report, CMU-CS-03-119, Mar. 2003, 26 pgs. |
| Noboru, “Play Fast and Fine Video on Web! codec”, Co.9 No. 12, Dec. 1, 2003, pp. 178-179. |
| Noe, A. “Matroska File Format (under construction!)”, Retrieved from the Internet: URL:http://web.archive.orgweb/20070821155146/www.matroska.org/technical/specs/matroska.pdf [retrieved on Jan. 19, 2011], Jun. 24, 2007, 1-51. |
| Noe, Alexander “AVI File Format”, http://www.alexander-noe.com/video/documentation/avi.pdf, Dec. 14, 2006, pp. 1-26. |
| Noe, Alexander “Definitions”, Apr. 11, 2006, retrieved from http://www.alexander-noe.com/video/amg/definitions.html on Oct. 16, 2013, 2 pages. |
| O'Brien, U.S. Appl. No. 60/399,846, filed Jul. 30, 2002. |
| O'Rourke, “Improved Image Decompression for Reduced Transform Coding Artifacts”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, vol. 5, No. 6, Dec. 1995, pp. 490-499. |
| Ozer, “The 2012 Encoding and Transcoding Buyers' Guide”, Streamingmedia.com, Retrieved from http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/Editorial/Featured-Articles/The-2012-Encoding-and-Transcoding-Buyers-Guide-84210.aspx, 2012, 8 pgs. |
| Pantos, “HTTP Live Streaming, draft-pantos-http-live-streaming-10”, IETF Tools, Oct. 15, 2012, Retrieved from: http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-pantos-http-live-streaming-10, 37 pgs. |
| Park et al., “A postprocessing method for reducing quantization effects in low bit-rate moving picture coding”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, vol. 9, No. 1, Feb. 1999, pp. 161-171. |
| Pearce, Chris “Indexing keyframes in Ogg videos for fast seeking”, Retrieved from: http://blog.pearce.org.nz/2010/01/indexing-keyframes-in-ogg-videos-for.html, Jan. 11, 2010, 4 pgs. |
| Phamdo, “Theory of Data Compression”, printed on Oct. 10, 2003, 12 pgs. |
| Qiao et al., “Comparison of MPEG Encryption Algorithms”, Comput. & Graphics, 1998, vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 437-448. |
| RGB Networks, “Comparing Adaptive HTTP Streaming Technologies”, Nov. 2011, Retrieved from: http://btreport.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/RGB-Adaptive-HTTP-Streaming-Comparison-1211-01.pdf, 20 pgs. |
| Richardson, “H.264 and MPEG-4 Video Compression”, Wiley, 2003, 306 pgs. (presented in 2 parts). |
| Senoh et al., “DRM Renewability & Interoperability”, IEEE Xplore, Conference: Consumer Communications and Networking Conference, 2004, Feb. 2004, pp. 424-429, DOI: 10.1109/CCNC.2004.1286899 Conference: Consumer Communications and Networking Conference, 2004. CCNC 2004. First IEEE. |
| Shojania et al., “Experiences with MPEG-4 Multimedia Streaming”, CiteSeer, Jan. 2001, 3 pgs., DOI: 10.1145/500141.500221. |
| Siglin, “HTTP Streaming: What You Need to Know”, streamingmedia.com, 2010, 15 pages. |
| Siglin, “Unifying Global Video Strategies, MP4 File Fragmentation for Broadcast, Mobile and Web Delivery”, Nov. 16, 2011, 16 pgs. |
| Sima et al., “An Efficient Architecture for Adaptive Deblocking Filter of H.264 AVC Video Coding”, IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, vol. 50, No. 1, Feb. 2004, pp. 292-296. |
| Spanos et al., “Performance Study of a Selective Encryption Scheme for the Security of Networked, Real-Time Video”, Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Computer Communications and Networks, IC3N'95, Sep. 20-23, 1995, Las Vegas, NV, pp. 2-10. |
| Srinivasan et al., “Windows Media Video 9: overview and applications”, Signal Processing: Image Communication, 2004, 25 pgs. |
| Stockhammer, “Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP—Standards and Design Principles”, Proceedings of the second annual ACM conference on Multimedia, Feb. 2011, pp. 133-145. |
| Symes, “Video Compression Demystified”, McGraw-Hill, 2001, 353 pgs., (presented in two parts). |
| Taxan, “AVel LinkPlayer2 for Consumer”, I-O Data USA—Products—Home Entertainment, printed May 4, 2007 from http://www.iodata.com/usa/products/products.php?cat=HNP&sc=AVEL&pId=AVLP2/DVDLA&ts=2&tsc, 1 pg. |
| Timmerer et al., “HTTP Streaming of MPEG Media”, Proceedings of Streaming Day, 2010, 4 pgs. |
| Tiphaigne et al., “A Video Package for Torch”, Jun. 2004, 46 pgs. |
| Tosun et al., “Efficient multi-layer coding and encryption of MPEG video streams”, 2000 IEEE International Conference on Multimedia and Expo. ICME2000. Proceedings. Latest Advances in the Fast Changing World of Multimedia (Cat. No. 00TH8532), Jul. 30-Aug. 2, 2000, pp. 119-122, DOI: 10.1109/ICME.2000.869559. |
| Trappe et al., “Key Management and Distribution for Secure Multimedia Multicast”, IEEE Transaction on Multimedia, vol. 5, No. 4, Dec. 2003, pp. 544-557. |
| Trott et al., “File format provides a useful tool to multimedia authors”, INFOWORLD, Apr. 13, 1998, 1 pg. |
| Unknown, “AVI RIFF File Reference (Direct X 8.1 C++ Archive)”, printed from http://msdn.microsoft.com/archive/en-us/dx81_c/directx_cpp/htm/avirifffilereference.asp?fr . . . on Mar. 6, 2006, 7 pgs. |
| Unknown, “Entropy and Source Coding (Compression)”, TCOM 570, Sep. 1999, pp. 1-22. |
| Unknown, “MPEG-4 Video Encoder: Based on International Standard ISO/IEC 14496-2”, Patni Computer Systems, Ltd., publication date unknown, 15 pgs. |
| Van Deursen et al., “On Media Delivery Protocols in the Web”, 2010 IEEE International Conference on Multimedia and Expo, Jul. 19-23, 2010, 6 pgs. |
| Ventura, Guillermo Albaida “Streaming of Multimedia Learning Objects”, AG Integrated Communication System, Mar. 2003, 101 pgs. |
| Waggoner, “Compression for Great Digital Video”, 2002, 184 pgs. |
| Wan et al, “Variance-Based Color Image Quantization for Frame Buffer Display”, Color Research & Application 15, No. 1 (1990), pp. 52-58. |
| Watanabem et al., “MPEG-2 decoder enables DTV trick plays”, esearcher System LSI Development Lab, Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd., Kawasaki, Japan, Jun. 2001, 2 pgs. |
| Wiegand, “Joint Video Team (JVT) of ISO/IEC MPEG and ITU-T VCEG”, Jan. 2002, 70 pgs. |
| Willig et al., U.S. Appl. No. 61/409,285, filed Nov. 2, 2010. |
| Wong, “Web Client Programming with Perl”, 1997, printed Jan. 8, 2021 from: https://www.oreilly.com/openbook-webclientch03.html, 31 pgs. |
| Wu, “A Fast MPEG Encryption Algorithm and Implementation of AES on CAM”, Thesis, Oct. 6, 2003, 91 pgs. |
| Yang et al., “Projection-Based Spatially Adaptive Reconstruction of Block-Transform Compressed Images”, IEEE Transactions on Image Processing, vol. 4, No. 7, Jul. 1995, pp. 896-908. |
| Yang et al., “Regularized Reconstruction to Reduce Blocking Artifacts of Block Discrete Cosine Transform Compressed Images”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, vol. 3, No. 6, Dec. 1993, pp. 421-432. |
| Yu et al., “Video deblocking with fine-grained scalable complexity for embedded mobile computing”, Proceedings 7th International Conference on Signal Processing, Aug. 31-Sep. 4, 2004, pp. 1173-1178. |
| Yuksel, “Partial Encryption of Video for Communication and Storage”, Thesis, Sep. 2003, 78 pgs. |
| Zakhor, “Iterative Procedures for Reduction of Blocking Effects in Transform Image Coding”, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, vol. 2, No. 1, Mar. 1992, pp. 91-95. |
| Zambelli, “IIS Smooth Streaming Technical Overview”, Microsoft Corporation, Mar. 2009. |
| Final draft ETSI ES 202 109, V1.1.1, ETSI Standard, Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA); Security; Synchronization mechanism for end-to-end encryption, Oct. 2002, 17 pgs. |
| International Telecommunication Union, Telecommunication Standardization Sector of ITU, H.233, Line Transmission of Non-Telephone Signals, Confidentiality System for Audiovisual Services, ITU-T Recommendation H.233, Mar. 1993, 18 pgs. |
| 3GPP TS 26.247, V1.3.0, 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Services and System Aspects Transparent end-to-end Packet-switches Streaming Services (PSS);, Progressive Download and Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (3GP-DASH) (Release 10), Mar. 2011, 72 pgs. |
| “Draft CR: Trick Mode for HTTP Streaming”, 3GPP TSG-SA4 Meeting #58, Apr. 26-30, 2010, Vancouver, Canada, S4-100237, 3 pgs. |
| Adhikari et al., “Unreeling Netflix: Understanding and Improving Multi-CDN Movie Delivery”, 2012 Proceedings IEEE InfoCom, Mar. 25-30, 2012, Orlando, Florida, 9 pgs. |
| Bloom et al., “Copy Protection for DVD Video”, Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 87, No. 7, Jul. 1999, pp. 1267-1276. |
| Concolato et al., “Live HTTP Streaming of Video and Subtitles within a Browser”, MMSys 2013, Feb. 26-Mar. 1, 2013, Oslo, Norway, 5 pgs. |
| Eskicioglu et al., “An Integrated Approach to Encrypting Scalable Video”, Proceedings IEEE International Conference on Multimedia and Expo, Aug. 26-29, 2002, Lausanne, Switzerland, 4 pgs. |
| Hartung et al., “DRM Protected Dynamic Adaptive HTTP Streaming”, MMSys 2011 Proceedings of the Second Annual ACM Conference on Multimedia Systems, San Jose, California, Feb. 23-25, 2011, pp. 277-282. |
| Hurtado Guzman, “Development and Implementation of an Adaptive HTTP Streaming Framework for H264/MVC Coded Media”, Politecnico di Torino, Nov. 2010, 108 pgs. |
| Hwang et al., “Efficient and User Friendly Inter-domain Device Authentication/Access control for Home Networks”, Proceedings of the 2006 International Conference on Embedded and Ubiquitous Computing, Seoul, Korea, Aug. 1-4, 2006, pp. 131-140. |
| Kabir, “Scalable and Interactive Multimedia Streaming Over the Internet”, Thesis, 2005, 207 pgs. |
| Lian et al., “Efficient video encryption scheme based on advanced video coding”, Multimed. Tools Appl. vol. 38, 2008, pp. 75-89. |
| Lian et al., “Selective Video Encryption Based on Advanced Video Coding”, PCM, Nov. 2005, Part II, LNCS 3768, pp. 281-290. |
| Liu et al., “A Formal Framework for Component Deployment”, OOPSLA 2006, Proceedings of the 21st Annual ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Object-Oriented Programming Systems, Language, and Applications, Portland, Oregon, Oct. 22-26, 2006, pp. 325-344. |
| Lloyd, “Supporting Trick Mode Playback Universally Across the Digital Television Industry”, Thesis, 2005, 111 pgs. |
| Macaulay et al., “Whitepaper—IP Streaming of MPEG-4: Native RTP vs MPEG-2 Transport Stream”, Envivio, Oct. 2005, 12 pgs. |
| Molavi et al., “A Security Study of Digital TV Distribution Systems”, Thesis, Jun. 2005, 112 pgs. |
| Moscoso, Pedro Gomes, “Interactive Internet TV Architecture Based on Scalable Video Coding”, Institute Superior Techico, Universidad Technica de Lisboa, May 2011, 103 pgs. |
| Ozer, Jan, “Adaptive Streaming in the Field”, Streaming Media, Dec. 2010-Jan. 2011, pp. 36-47. |
| Padiadpu, Rashmi, “Towards Mobile Learning: A SCORM Player for the Google Android Platform”, Master Thesis, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences, 2008, 66 pgs. |
| Peek, David, “Consumer Distributed File Systems”, Dissertation, Doctor of Philosophy, Computer Science and Engineering, The University of Michigan, 2009, 118 pgs. |
| Rosenberg et al., “Indicating User Agent Capabilities in the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)”, Network Working Group, RFC 3840, Aug. 2004, 36 pgs. |
| Venkatramani et al., “Securing Media for Adaptive Streaming”, Multimedia 2003 Proceedings of the Eleventh ACM International Conference on Multimedia, Nov. 2-8, 2003, Berkeley, California, 4 pgs. |
| Wang, “Lightweight Encryption in Multimedia”, Thesis, Jun. 2005, 184 pgs. |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20210258514 A1 | Aug 2021 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 16882328 | May 2020 | US |
| Child | 17308948 | US | |
| Parent | 16373513 | Apr 2019 | US |
| Child | 16882328 | US | |
| Parent | 15144776 | May 2016 | US |
| Child | 16373513 | US | |
| Parent | 14281791 | May 2014 | US |
| Child | 15144776 | US | |
| Parent | 11016184 | Dec 2004 | US |
| Child | 14281791 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 10731809 | Dec 2003 | US |
| Child | 11016184 | US |
