text:
Weeks showing early-season slump is behind him
By Mike Still / MLB.com
After enduring a dreadful start to the season, in which he batted just .158 with 12 RBIs through May 31 -- Weeks' average has steadily climbed. He entered Friday batting .212, and is hitting .295 since July 1.
"I couldn't care less what happened last night or anything in the past," Weeks said. "I'm looking forward every time.
"Just showing up, playing every day and working hard. There's no reason. You just have to show up every day and know that things are going to turn around. That's about it."
There hasn't been any specific tweak Weeks has made to his swing and he hasn't had a groundbreaking realization. When asked, Weeks continued to reiterate the importance of coming to the park each day ready to work.
Brewers manager Ron Roenicke alluded to lasting effects of the severe ankle sprain Weeks sustained last season as a possible factor for Weeks' slow start. But ultimately, Weeks' work ethic has gotten him through his early slump.
"He's out working early all the time. he's in the cage with [hitting coach Johnny Narron]. He's out here when we hit early," Roenicke said. "I think he's just finally getting back to Rickie. For the first two months, or however long that was, ... I don't really know the exact reason, but I think that ankle has something to do with it. He's swinging it like we saw last year and like you guys have seen for longer than that."
Mending Marcum to throw simulated game Sunday
ST. LOUIS -- Brewers starter Shaun Marcum is scheduled to throw a simulated game on Sunday before Milwaukee takes on St. Louis for Game 3 of a weekend series. Marcum, who's been shelved since mid-June with right elbow soreness, will face hitters for the first time in nearly two months and expects to throw around 40 pitches.
"Obviously not try to hit anybody," Marcum joked when asked on Friday if he had specific goals set for the simulated game. "Don't want to hurt any of my teammates. But the main thing will be the up and down, trying to simulate between innings and seeing how I bounce back from that. But the way things have been going, I don't anticipate having any problems."
Marcum threw a successful bullpen session on Wednesday, his first time pitching since heading to the disabled list. The right-hander said he felt no soreness or tightness in his elbow after that workout, which was a major step in the right direction.
If all goes well on Saturday, Marcum's next step would be at least two Minor League rehabilitation appearances. He is eligible to come off the 60-day DL beginning on Aug. 14. Before he starts looking too far ahead, Marcum wants to mix up all his pitches with batters in the box on Saturday.
"It's tough to sit back to watch for almost two months," Marcum said. "It's been awhile, and I'm looking forward to getting out on the mound."
Parra likely out for series vs. Cardinals
ST. LOUIS -- Brewers manager Ron Roenicke said on Friday that it looks as if reliever Manny Parra will be unavailable to pitch in Milwaukee's three-game series against the Cardinals this weekend. Parra has been sidelined with left shoulder impingement, but said his shoulder feels better each day.
"Anytime for me, because I've had shoulder issues, anytime something bothers you in your shoulder, you're thinking, 'What is it?' Because it could be anything," Parra said. "But I'm not worried about it."
Parra had his shoulder examined by doctors on Wednesday, and will be re-evaluated on Monday. Parra said he last played catch last Thursday, and each day meets with team trainers to learn the next step in his recovery.
He added that the extra rest he's had helped reduce swelling in his shoulder, which has relieved a pinching pain the impingement causes.
Parra last appeared in a game on July 24, allowing four earned runs over 1/3 of an inning on one hit and three walks against the Phillies. Prior to that rough outing, the 29-year-old left-hander had a 1.13 ERA over 11 appearances in July.
Roenicke said that if Parra's re-evaluation on Monday doesn't show much evidence of improvement, the Brewers would then consider making a roster move and sending Parra to the disabled list.
Aramis given day off to rest sore left wrist
ST. LOUIS -- Brewers third baseman Aramis Ramirez, who's been battling a sore left wrist, received a cortisone injection on Thursday in order to help calm down the area. Ramirez is out of the starting lineup for Friday's game against St. Louis to rest his wrist. It is the second time this week Ramirez hasn't started.
Manager Ron Roenicke said he was optimistic that the cortisone injection will help Ramirez to play pain-free from now on, and added he's hopeful that Ramirez will be available on Saturday.
"He's been fighting this thing for a while and it doesn't look like it's going to go away," Roenicke said. "I've tried to give him a day off and it doesn't seem to completely get rid of it. Hopefully he won't have to deal with this the rest of the year."
Ramirez is second on the team with 67 RBIs, and his .291 average and 13 homers are both third-best, as well. Considering how valuable Ramirez's bat has been, Roenicke has no qualms with sitting Ramirez for a day or two in order to keep his third baseman healthy for the future.
"He's really swinging the bat well," Roenicke said. "But I kind of like doing it because I don't want him to fight this thing the rest of the year."
Worth noting
Five pitchers for the Double-A Huntsville starters combined to throw a no-hitter on Thursday night against the Chattanooga Lookouts. Jimmy Nelson, Dan Merklinger, R.J. Seidel, Darren Byrd and Brandon Kintzler walked 11 batters collectively, but represented the most pitchers used in a no-hitter in Southern League history.
While Brewers starter Mark Rogers hadn't heard about the no-hitter as of Friday afternoon, he was not surprised to hear the news. Rogers has spent time with four of those five pitchers either in Spring Training or while rehabbing injuries.
"We have some good arms down there," Rogers said. "All those guys have all kinds of potential. They have great stuff and I can definitely see that happening with those guys going out there."
Mike Still is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


text:
The VORG's "Electile Dysfunction" Team
Election Day is finally here. If you had trouble voting, be it from long lines, voter suppression efforts, ballot tampering or something similar, the VORG feels your pain. To commemorate the difficulty in this civil process, the VORG presents its "Electile Dysfunction" team. Vote early (and often) for these players! Commissioner: Kenesaw Landis (Judge) Mgr.: … Read more

subset: commoncrawl


text:
|About us | Contact us |Site Map
Detailed structure and explanatory notes
CPC Ver.1.0 code 01231Structure
Changes have been made to the original printed version. Check the Registry for details.
Last change: 1/1/2000
No explanatory note available for this code.
This code corresponds to the following:
ISIC Rev.3 code(s) 0112
SITC Rev.3 code(s) 054.89
HS 1996 code(s) 1212.10
Click here for complete correspondences for this code.
Click here to see the alphabetical index for this code
Click here to see the Registry entries for this code
Would you like to leave some feedback?
(on this code, this classification, the site in general or any other issue)
Then drop us a line at email@example.com.


text:
I decided to sell my GT. I've liked the bike but could never love it. I just never felt comfortable on it. I am the proud owner of multiple seats and even GTL and GT handlebars as well as foot pegs but the bike is not for me.
It's funny that for many years I bought and sold bikes, and the bike that I loved the most was my '09 RT. I ended up trading for the GT. I guess I got intrigued with the engine.
The icing on the cake was last week when I picked up a used '09 GS and as soon as I got on it, I realized the GT was a goner.
I'm not sure if I will get a '12 RT or wait until the water cooled ones come out in '13 and just ride the GS for now.


text:
|Publication number
|Publication type
|Application number
|Publication date
|Aug 7, 2007
|Filing date
|May 30, 2000
|Priority date
|Apr 15, 1999
|Fee status
|Publication number
|Donald F. Gordon, Sadik Bayrakeri, John P. Comito, Edward A. Ludvig, Harold P. Yocom
|Original Assignee
|Sedna Patent Services, Llc
|Export Citation
|BiBTeX, EndNote, RefMan
|Patent Citations (113), Non-Patent Citations (1), Referenced by (18), Classifications (36), Legal Events (9)
|External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, Espacenet
The present application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. Ser. No. 09/293,526 commonly-owned U.S. Pat. No. 6,754,905, entitled "Data Structure and Methods for Providing an Interactive Program Guide," filed Apr. 15, 1999. The present application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. Ser. No. 09/428,066 commonly-owned U.S. Pat. No. 6,651,252, entitled "Method and Apparatus for Transmitting Video and Graphics in a Compressed Form," filed Oct. 27, 1999. The present application is also a continuation-in-part of commonly-owned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/458,796, entitled "Apparatus and Method for Combining Realtime and Non-Realtime Encoded Content," filed Dec. 9, 1999.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to communications systems in general and, more specifically, the invention relates to encoding techniques for use in an interactive multimedia information delivery system.
2. Description of the Background Art
Over the past few years, the television industry has seen a transformation in a variety of techniques by which its programming is distributed to consumers. Cable television systems are doubling or even tripling system bandwidth with the migration to hybrid fiber coax (HFC) cable transmission systems. Customers unwilling to subscribe to local cable systems have switched in high numbers to direct broadcast satellite (DBS) systems. And, a variety of other approaches have been attempted focusing primarily on high bandwidth digital technologies, intelligent two way set top boxes, or other methods of attempting to offer service differentiated from standard cable and over the air broadcast systems.
With this increase in bandwidth, the number of programming choices has also increased. Leveraging off the availability of more intelligent set top boxes, several companies have developed elaborate systems for providing interactive listings. These interactive listings may include the following aspects and features: a vast array of channel offerings; expanded textual information about individual programs; the ability to look forward to plan television viewing as much as several weeks in advance; and the option of automatically programming a video cassette recorder (VCR) to record a future broadcast of a television program.
Unfortunately, the existing program guides have several drawbacks. They tend to require a significant amount of memory, some of them needing upwards of one megabyte of memory at the set top terminal (STT). They are very slow to acquire their current database of programming information when they are turned on for the first time or are subsequently restarted (e.g., a large database may be downloaded to a STT using only a vertical blanking interval (VBI) data insertion technique). Disadvantageously, such slow database acquisition may result in out-of-date database information or, in the case of a pay-per-view (PPV) or video-on-demand (VOD) system, limited scheduling flexibility for the information provider.
An interactive program guide (IPG) may include a program grid section and a multimedia section. The program grid section typically contains program information organized in a grid with a time axis and a channel axis. The multimedia section may include video for advertisement, previews, and other purposes.
In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, such an IPG may be rendered and encoded at a server and distributed to client terminals in the form of compressed bit streams. However, encoding such an IPG for efficient use of bandwidth and high viewing quality poses various challenges and problems. Some of these challenges and problems stem from the different characteristics of the program grid section and the multimedia section. These different characteristics mean that a single encoding algorithm has difficulty compressing both sections efficiently and with a high viewing quality.
Therefore, in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, at least two different algorithms may be used to encode such an IPG. One algorithm may be used to encode the program grid section, and another algorithm may be used to encode the multimedia portion. Available bandwidth may be allocated between the two sections in a predetermined way. Specific embodiments of the present invention generally improve viewing quality of the program grid section while staying within an allocated bit rate for that section.
For certain IPGs, the program grid section may comprise alternating stripes of background with different shades (lighter/darker) or different colors. Typically, the alternating background stripes may be used to visually separate text information into timeslots or channels. Embodiments of the present invention may encode such background stripes and the programming text on each stripe in such a way as to provide high viewing quality within a limited bit rate.
Blank areas of the background may be "skip" encoded to "save" a portion of the bit rate. Meanwhile, the quantizer stepsize for encoding the text portions of the same stripe may be lowered so as to utilize the saved bits to improve the viewing quality of the text region. Additionally or alternatively, the quantization matrix for encoding the program grid section may be optimized for encoding text (rather than being, for example, a standard quantization matrix created as suitable for various types of content).
Encoding may be performed on the program grid section such that encoded macroblocks do not cross a border between two stripes, by adjusting the stripe width to macroblock width. Additionally or alternatively, low-pass frequency filtering may be applied on the stripes as pre-encoding step. Such low-pass filtering reduces visual defects due to ringing from edges between stripes and also text region encoding artifacts by reducing the high frequency components gracefully.
The teachings of the present invention can be readily understood by considering the following detailed description in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:
To facilitate understanding, identical reference numerals have been used, where possible, to designate identical elements that are common to the figures.
Embodiments of the present invention relate to a system for generating, distributing and receiving a transport stream containing compressed video and graphics information. Embodiments of the present invention may be illustratively used to encode a plurality of interactive program guides (IPGs) that enable a user to interactively review, preview and select programming for a television system.
Embodiments of the present invention utilize compression techniques to reduce the amount of data to be transmitted and increase the speed of transmitting program guide information. As such, the data to be transmitted is compressed so that the available transmission bandwidth is used more efficiently. To transmit an IPG having both graphics and video, embodiments of the present invention separately encode the graphics from the video such that the encoder associated with each portion of the IPG can be optimized to best encode the associated portion. Embodiments of the present invention may illustratively use a slice-based, predictive encoding process that is based upon the Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG) standard known as MPEG-2. MPEG-2 is specified in the ISO/IEC standards 13818, which is incorporated herein by reference.
The above-referenced standard describes data processing and manipulation techniques that are well suited to the compression and delivery of video, audio and other information using fixed or variable rate digital communications systems. In particular, the above-referenced standard, and other "MPEG-like" standards and techniques, compress, illustratively, video information using intra-frame coding techniques (such as run-length coding, Huffman coding and the like) and inter-frame coding techniques (such as forward and backward predictive coding, motion compensation and the like). Specifically, in the case of video processing systems, MPEG and MPEG-like video processing systems are characterized by prediction-based compression encoding of video frames with or without intra- and/or inter-frame motion compensation encoding.
To enhance error recovery, the MPEG-2 standard contemplates the use of a "slice layer" where a video frame is divided into one or more slices. A slice contains one or more contiguous sequence of macroblocks. The sequence begins and ends at any macroblock boundary within the frame. An MPEG-2 decoder, when provided a corrupted bitstream, uses the slice layer to avoid reproducing a completely corrupted frame. For example, if a corrupted bitstream is decoded and the decoder determines that the present slice is corrupted, the decoder skips to the next slice and begins decoding. As such, only a portion of the reproduced picture is corrupted.
Embodiments of the present invention may use the slice layer for the main purpose of flexible encoding and compression efficiency in a head end centric end-to-end system. A slice-based encoding system enables the graphics and video of an IPG to be efficiently coded and flexibly transmitted as described below. Consequently, a user can easily and rapidly move from one IPG page to another IPG page.
A. An Exemplary Interactive Program Guide
Embodiments of the present invention may be employed for compressing and transmitting various types of video frame sequences that contain graphics and video information, and may be particularly useful in compressing and transmitting interactive program guides (IPG) where a portion of the IPG contains video (referred to herein as the video portion or multimedia section) and a portion of the IPG contains a programming guide grid (referred to herein as the guide portion or graphics portion or program grid section). The present invention slice-based encodes the guide portion separately from the slice-based encoded video portion, transmits the encoded portions within a transport stream, and reassembles the encoded portions to present a subscriber (or user) with a comprehensive IPG. Through the IPG, the subscriber can identify available programming and select various services provided by their information service provider.
A user may transition from one IPG page to another, where each page contains a different graphics portion 102, i.e., a different program guide graphics. The details regarding the encoding and decoding of a series of IPG pages in accordance with the present invention are provided below.
Details regarding the operation of the IPG page of
B. System
The HEE 202 produces a plurality of digital streams that contain encoded information in illustratively MPEG-2 compressed format. These streams are modulated using a modulation technique that is compatible with a communications channel 230 that couples the HEE 202 to one or more LNE (in
In an interactive information distribution system such as the one described in commonly assigned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/984,710, filed Dec. 3, 1997, the program streams are addressed to particular subscriber equipment locations that requested the information through an interactive menu. A related interactive menu structure for requesting video-on-demand is disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/984,427, filed Dec. 3, 1997. Another example of interactive menu for requesting multimedia services is the interactive program guide (IPG) disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. patent application 60/093,891, filed in Jul. 23, 1998.
To assist a subscriber (or other viewer) in selecting programming, the HEE 202 produces information that can be assembled to create an IPG such as that shown in
A video source 214 supplies the video sequence for the video portion of the IPG to an encoding unit 216 of the present invention. Audio signals associated with the video sequence are supplied by an audio source 212 to the encoding and multiplexing unit 216. Additionally, a guide data source 232 provides program guide data to the encoding unit 216. This data is typically in a database format, where each entry describes a particular program by its title, presentation time, presentation date, descriptive information, channel, and program source.
The encoding unit 216 compresses a given video sequence into one or more elementary streams and the graphics produced from the guide data into one or more elementary streams. As described below with respect to
The streams are assembled into a transport stream that is then modulated by the cable modem 222 using a modulation format that is compatible with the head end communications channel 230. For example, the head end communications channel may be a fiber optic channel that carries high-speed data from the HEE 202 to a plurality of LNE 228. The LNE 228 selects IPG page components that are applicable to its neighborhood and re-modulates the selected data into a format that is compatible with a neighborhood distribution network 204. A detailed description of the LNE 228 is presented below with respect to
The subscriber equipment 206 contains a receiver 224 and a display 226 (e.g., a television). The receiver 224 demodulates the signals carried by the distribution network 204 and decodes the demodulated signals to extract the IPG pages from the stream. The details of the receiver 224 are described below with respect to
C. Encoding Unit 216
The system of the present invention is designed specifically to work in a slice-based ensemble encoding environment, where a plurality of bitstreams are generated to compress video information using a sliced-based technique. In the MPEG-2 standard, a "slice layer" may be created that divides a video frame into one or more "slices". Each slice includes one or more macroblocks, where the macroblocks are illustratively defined as rectangular groups of pixels that tile the entire frame, e.g., a frame may consist of 30 rows and 22 columns of macroblocks. Any slice may start at any macroblock location in a frame and extend from left to right and top to bottom through the frame. The stop point of a slice can be chosen to be any macroblock start or end boundary. The slice layer syntax and its conventional use in forming an MPEG-2 bitstream is well known to those skilled in the art and shall not be described herein.
When the invention is used to encode an IPG comprising a graphics portion and a video portion, the slice-based technique separately encodes the video portion of the IPG and the grid graphics portion of the IPG. As such, the grid graphics portion and the video portion are represented by one or more different slices.
Although the following description is presented within the context of an IPG, it is important to note that the present invention may be equally applicable in a broad range of applications, such as: broadcast video on demand delivery; e-commerce; Internet video education services; and similar applications.
As depicted in
The encoding unit 216 comprises video processor 400, a graphics processor 402 and a controller 404. The video processor 400 comprises a compositor unit 406 and an encoder unit 408. The compositor unit 406 combines a video sequence with advertising video, advertiser or service provider logos, still graphics, animation, or other video information. The encoder unit 408 comprises one or more video encoders 410, e.g., a real-time MPEG-2 encoder and an audio encoder 412, e.g., an AC-3 encoder. The encoder unit 408 produces one or more elementary streams containing slice-based encoded video and audio information.
The video sequence is coupled to a real time video encoder 410. The video encoder then forms a slice based bitstream, e.g., an MPEG-2 compliant bit stream, for the video portion of an IPG. For purposes of this discussion, it is assumed that the GOP structure consists of an I-picture followed by ten B-pictures, where a P-picture separates each group of two B-pictures (i.e., "I-B-B-P-B-B-P-B-B-P-B-B-P-B-B"), however, any GOP structure and size may be used in different configurations and applications.
The video encoder 410 "pads" the graphics portion (illustratively the left half portion of IPG) with null data. The null data may be replaced by the graphics grid slices, at a later step, within the LNE. Since the video encoder processes only motion video information, excluding the graphics data, it is optimized for motion video encoding.
The controller 404 manages the slice-based encoding process such that the video encoding process is time and spatially synchronized with the grid encoding process. This is achieved by defining slice start and stop locations according to the objects in the IPG page layout and managing the encoding process as defined by the slices.
The graphics portion of the IPG is separately encoded in the graphics processor 402. The processor 402 is supplied guide data from the guide data source (232 in
The guide grid is a video frame that is encoded using a video encoder 416 optimized for video with text and graphics content. The video encoder 416, which can be implemented as software, slice-based encodes the guide data grid to produce one or more bitstreams that collectively represent the entire guide data grid. The encoder is optimized to effectively encode the graphics and text content.
The controller 404 defines the start and stop macroblock locations for each slice. The result is a GOP structure having intra-coded pictures containing I-picture slices and predicted pictures containing B and P-picture slices. The I-pictures slices are separated from the predicted picture slices. Each encoded slice is separately stored in a slice form grid page database 418. The individual slices can be addressed and recalled from the database 418 as required for transmission. The controller 404 controls the slice-based encoding process as well as manages the database 418.
D. Local Neighborhood Equipment (LNE) 228
The LNE 228 is programmed to extract particular information from the signal transmitted by the HEE 202. As such, the LNE can extract video and guide data grid slices that are targeted to the subscribers that are connected to the particular LNE. For example, the LNE 228 can extract specific channels for representation in the guide grid that are available to the subscribers connected to that particular LNE. As such, unavailable channels to a particular neighborhood would not be depicted in a subscriber's IPG. Additionally, the IPG can contain targeted advertising, e-commerce, program notes, and the like. As such, each LNE can combine different guide data slices with different video to produce IPG screens that are prepared specifically for the subscribers connected to that particular LNE. Other LNEs would select different IPG component information that is relevant to their associated subscribers.
The foregoing embodiments assumed that the IPG page was divided into one guide portion and one video portion. For example, in
To change pages in the guide, it is required to switch between programs (video PIDs for groups of slices) in a seamless manner. This cannot be done cleanly using a standard channel change by the receiver switching from PID to PID directly, because such an operation flushes the video and audio buffers and typically gives half a second blank screen.
To have seamless decoder switching, a splice countdown (or random access indicator) method is employed at the end of each video sequence to indicate the point at which the video should be switched from one PID to another.
Using the same profile and constant bit rate coding for the video and graphics encoding units, the generated streams for different IPG pages are formed in a similar length compared to each other. This is due to the fact that the source material is almost identical differing only in the characters in the guide from one page to another. In this way, while streams are generated having nearly identical lengths, the streams are not exactly the same length. For example, for any given sequence of 15 video frames, the number of transport packets in the sequence varies from one guide page to another. Thus, a finer adjustment is required to synchronize the beginnings and ends of each sequence across all guide pages in order for the countdown switching to work.
Synchronization of a plurality of streams may be accomplished in a way that provides seamless switching at the receiver.
Three methods are provided for that purpose:
First, for each sequence the multiplexer in the LNE identifies the length of the longest guide page for that particular sequence, and then adds sufficient null packets to the end of each other guide page so that all the guide pages become the same length. Then, the multiplexer adds the switching packets at the end of the sequence, after all the null packets.
The second method requires buffering of all the packets for all guide pages for each sequence. If this is allowed in the considered system, then the packets can be ordered in the transport stream such that the packets for each guide page appear at slightly higher or lower frequencies, so that they all finish at the same point. Then, the switching packets are added by the multiplexer in the LNE at the end of each stream without the null padding.
A third method is to start each sequence together, and then wait until all the packets for all the guide pages have been generated. Once the generation of all packets is completed, switching packets are placed in the streams at the same time and point in each stream.
Depending on the implementation of decoder units within the receiver and requirements of the considered application, each one of the methods can be applied with advantages. For example, the first method, which is null-padding, can be applied to avoid bursts of N packets of the same PID into a decoder's video buffer faster than the MPEG specified rate (e.g., 1.5 Mbit).
The teachings of the above three methods can be extended apply to similar synchronization problems and to derive similar methods for ensuring synchronization during stream switching.
E. Receiver 224
Transport stream demultiplexer 1430, in response to a control signal TD produced by controller 1470, demultiplexes (i.e., extracts) an audio information stream A and a video information stream V. The audio information stream A is coupled to audio decoder 1440, which decodes the audio information stream and presents the decoded audio information stream to an audio processor (not shown) for subsequent presentation. The video stream V is coupled to the video decoder 1450, which decodes the compressed video stream V to produce an uncompressed video stream VD that is coupled to the video compositor 1490. OSD 1460, in response to a control signal OSD produced by controller 1470, produces a graphical overlay signal VOSD that is coupled to the video compositor 1490. During transitions between streams representing the user interfaces, buffers in the decoder are not reset. As such, the user interfaces seamlessly transition from one screen to another.
The video compositor 1490 merges the graphical overlay signal VOSD and the uncompressed video stream VD to produce a modified video stream (i.e., the underlying video images with the graphical overlay) that is coupled to the frame store unit 1462. The frame store unit 1462 stores the modified video stream on a frame-by-frame basis according to the frame rate of the video stream. Frame store unit 1462 provides the stored video frames to a video processor (not shown) for subsequent processing and presentation on a display device.
Controller 1470 comprises a microprocessor 1472, an input/output module 1474, a memory 1476, an infrared (IR) receiver 1475 and support circuitry 1478. The microprocessor 1472 cooperates with conventional support circuitry 1478 such as power supplies, clock circuits, cache memory and the like as well as circuits that assist in executing the software routines that are stored in memory 1476. The controller 1470 also contains input/output circuitry 1474 that forms an interface between the controller 1470 and the tuner 1410, the transport demultiplexer 1430, the onscreen display unit 1460, the back channel modulator 1495, and the remote control unit 1480. Although the controller 1470 is depicted as a general purpose computer that is programmed to perform specific interactive program guide control function in accordance with the present invention, the invention can be implemented in hardware as an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC). As such, the process steps described herein are intended to be broadly interpreted as being equivalently performed by software, hardware, or a combination thereof.
In the exemplary embodiment of
After the signal is tuned and demodulated, the video streams are recombined via stream processing routine 1402 to form the video sequences that were originally compressed. The processing unit 1402 employs a variety of methods to recombine the slice-based streams, including, using PID filter 1404, demultiplexer 1430, as discussed in the next sections of this disclosure of the invention. Note that the PID filter implemented illustratively as part of the demodulator is utilized to filter the undesired PIDs and retrieve the desired PIDs from the transport stream. The packets to be extracted and decoded to form a particular IPG are identified by a PID mapping table (PMT) 1477. After the stream processing unit 1402 has processed the streams into the correct order (assuming the correct order was not produced in the LNE), the slices are sent to the MPEG decoder 1450 to generate the original uncompressed IPG pages. If an exemplary transport stream with two PIDs as discussed in previous parts of the this disclosure, excluding data and audio streams, is received, then the purpose of the stream processing unit 1402 is to recombine the intra-coded slices with their corresponding predictive-coded slices in the correct order before the recombined streams are coupled to the video decoder. This complete process is implemented as software or hardware. In the illustrated IPG page slice structure, only one slice is assigned per row and each row is divided into two portions, therefore, each slice is divided into guide portion and video portion. In order for the receiving terminal to reconstruct the original video frames, one method is to construct a first row from its two slices in the correct order by retrieving two corresponding slices from the transport stream, then construct a second row from its two slices, and so on. For this purpose, a receiver is required to process two PIDs in a time period. The PID filter can be programmed to pass two desired PIDs and filter out the undesired PIDs. The desired PIDs are identified by the controller 1470 after the user selects an IPG page to review. A PID mapping table (1477 of
E1. Recombination Method 1
In this first method, intra-coded slice-based streams (I-streams) and the predictive-coded slice-based streams (PRED streams) to be recombined keep their separate PID's until the point where they must be depacketized. The recombination process is conducted within the demultiplexer 1430 of the subscriber equipment For illustrative purposes, assuming a multi-program transport stream with each program consisting of I-PIDs for each intra-coded guide slice, I-PIDs for the intra-coded video slices, one PRED-PID for predicted guide and video, an audio-PID, and multiple data-PIDs, any packet with a PID that matches any of the PID's within the desired program (as identified in a program mapping table) are depacketized and the payload is sent to the elementary stream video decoder. Payloads are sent to the decoder in exactly in the order in which the packets arrive at the demultiplexer.
At step 1515, the I-PID packets (e.g., packets having PID-1 and PID-11) are extracted from the transport stream, including the header information and data, until the next picture start code. The header information within the first-received I-PID access unit includes sequence header, sequence extension, group start code, GOP header, picture header, and picture extension, which are known to a reader that is skilled in MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 compression standards. The header information in the next I-PID access units that belongs to the second and later GOP's includes group start code, picture start code, picture header, and extension. The method 1500 then proceeds to step 1520 where the payloads of the packets that includes header information related to video stream and I-picture data are coupled to the video decoder as video information stream V. The method 1500 then proceeds to step 1525.
At step 1525, the predicted picture slice-based stream packets PRED-PID, illustratively the PID-11 packets of fourteen predicted pictures in a GOP of size fifteen, are extracted from the transport stream. At step 1530, the payloads of the packets that includes header information related to video stream and predicted-picture data are coupled to the video decoder 1550 as video information stream V. At the end of step 1530, a complete GOP, including the I-picture and the predicted-picture slices, are available to the video decoder. As the payloads are sent to the decoder in exactly in the order in which the packets arrive at the demultiplexer, the video decoder decodes the recombined stream with no additional recombination process. The method 1500 then proceeds to step 1535.
At step 1535, a query is made as to whether a different I-PID is requested, e.g., new IPG is selected. If the query at step 1535 is answered negatively, then the method 1500 proceeds to step 1510 where the transport demultiplexer 1530 waits for the next packets having the PID of the desired I-picture slices. If the query at step 1535 is answered affirmatively, then the PID of the new desired I-picture slices is identified at step 1540 and the method 1500 returns to step 1510.
The method 1500 of
E2. Recombination Method 2
The second method of recombining the video stream involves the modification of the transport stream using a PID filter. A PID filter 1404 can be implemented as part of the demodulator 1420 of
For illustrative purposes, assuming a multi-program transport stream with each program consisting of an I-PIDs for both video and guide, PRED-PID for both video and guide, audio-PID, and data-PID, any packet with a PID that matches any of the PIDs within the desired program as identified by the program mapping table to be received have its PID modified to the lowest video PID in the program (the PID which is referenced first in the program's program mapping table (PMT)). For example, in a program, assuming that a guide slice I-PID is 50, the video slice I-PID is 51 and PRED-PID is 52. Then, the PID-filter modifies the video I-PID and the PRED-PID as 50 and thereby, I- and Predicted-Picture slice access units attain the same PID number and become a portion of a common stream.
As a result, the transport stream output from the PID filter contains a program with a single video stream, whose packets appear in the proper order to be decoded as valid MPEG bitstream.
Note that the incoming bit stream does not necessarily contain any packets with a PID equal to the lowest video PID referenced in the programs PMT. Also note that it is possible to modify the video PID's to other PID numbers than lowest PID without changing the operation of the algorithm.
When the PID's of incoming packets are modified to match the PID's of other packets in the transport stream, the continuity counters of the merged PID's may become invalid at the merge points, due to each PID having its own continuity counter. For this reason, the discontinuity indicator in the adaptation field is set for any packets that may immediately follow a merge point. Any decoder components that check the continuity counter for continuity is required to correctly process the discontinuity indicator bit.
At step 1615, the PID number of the I-stream is re-mapped to a predetermined number, PID*. At this step, the PID filter modifies all the PID's of the desired I-stream packets to PID*. The method then proceeds to step 1620, wherein the PID number of the predicted picture slice streams, PRED-PID, is re-mapped to PID*. At this step, the PID filter modifies all the PID's of the PRED-PID packets to PID*. The method 1600 then proceeds to step 1625.
At step 1625, the packets of the PID* stream are extracted from the transport stream by the demultiplexer. The method 1600 then proceeds to step 1630, where the payloads of the packets that includes video stream header information and I-picture and predicted picture slices are coupled to the video decoder as video information stream V. Note that the slice packets are ordered in the transport stream in the same order as they are to be decoded, i.e., a guide slice packets of first row followed by video slice packets of first row, second row, and so on. The method 1600 then proceeds to 1635.
At step 1635, a query is made as to whether a different set of (two) I-PIDs are requested. If the query at step 1635 is answered negatively, then the method 1600 proceeds to step 1610 where the transport demultiplexer waits for the next packets having the identified I-PIDs. If the query at step 1635 is answered affirmatively, then the two PIDs of the new desired I-picture is identified at step 1640 and the method 1600 returns to step 1610.
The method 1600 of
E3. Recombination Method 3
The third method accomplishes MPEG bitstream recombination by using splicing information in the adaptation field of the transport packet headers by switching between video PIDs based on splice countdown concept.
In this method, the MPEG streams signal the PID to PID switch points using the splice countdown field in the transport packet header's adaptation field. When the PID filter is programmed to receive one of the PIDs in a program's PMT, the reception of a packet containing a splice countdown value of 0 in its header's adaptation field causes immediate reprogramming of the PID filter to receive the other video PID. Note that a special attention to splicing syntax is required in systems where splicing is used also for other purposes.
At step 1715, the I-PID packets are extracted from the transport stream until, and including, the I-PID packet with slice countdown value of zero. The method 1700 then proceeds to step 1720 where the payloads of the packets that includes header information related to video stream and I-picture slice data are coupled to the video decoder as video information stream V. The method 1700 then proceeds to step 1725.
At step 1725, the PID filter is re-programmed to receive the predicted picture packets PRED-PID. The method 1700 then proceeds to 1730. At step 1730, the predicted stream packets, illustratively the PID11 packets of predicted picture slices, are extracted from the transport stream. At step 1735, the payloads of the packets that includes header information related to video stream and predicted-picture data are coupled to the video decoder. At the end of step 1735, a complete GOP, including the I-picture slices and the predicted-picture slices, are available to the video decoder. As the payloads are sent to the decoder in exactly in the order in which the packets arrive at the demultiplexer, the video decoder decodes the recombined stream with no additional recombination process. The method 1700 then proceeds to step 1740.
At step 1740, a query is made as to whether a different I-PID set (two) is requested. If the query at step 1740 is answered negatively, then the method 1700 proceeds to step 1750 where the PID filter is re-programmed to receive the previous desired I-PIDs. If answered affirmatively, then the PIDs of the new desired I-picture is identified at step 1745 and the method proceeds to step 1750, where the PID filter is re-programmed to receive the new desired I-PIDs. The method then proceeds to step 1745, where the transport demultiplexer waits for the next packets having the PIDs of the desired I-picture.
The method 1700 of
E4. Recombination Method 4
For the receiving systems that do not include a PID filter and for those receiving systems in which the demultiplexer can not process two PIDs for splicing the streams, a fourth method presented herein provides the stream recombination. In a receiver that cannot process two PIDs, two or more streams with different PIDs are spliced together via an additional splicing software or hardware and can be implemented as part of the demultiplexer. The process is described below with respect to
In this manner, the slices are spliced together by the hardware within the receiver. To facilitate recombining the slices, the receiver is sent an array of valid PID values for recombining the slices through a user data in the transport stream or another communications link to the STT from the HEE. The array is updated dynamically to ensure that the correct portions of the IPG are presented to the user correctly. Since the splice points in slice based streams may occur at a frequent level, a software application may not have the capability to control the hardware for splicing operation as discussed above. If this is the case, then, firmware is dedicated to control the demodulator hardware for splicing process at a higher rate than a software application can handle.
F. Example: Interactive Program Guide
The video streams representing the IPG may be carried in a single transport stream or multiple transport streams, within the form of a single or multi-programs as discussed below with respect to the description of the encoding system. A user desiring to view the next 1.5 hour time interval (e.g., 9:30–11:00) may activate a "scroll right" object (or move the joystick to the right when a program within program grid occupies the final displayed time interval). Such activation results in the controller of the STT noting that a new time interval is desired. The video stream corresponding to the new time interval is then decoded and displayed. If the corresponding video stream is within the same transport stream (i.e., a new PID), then the stream is immediately decoded and presented. If the corresponding video stream is within a different transport stream, then the related transport stream is extracted from the broadcast stream and the related video stream is decoded and presented. If the corresponding transport stream is within a different broadcast stream, then the related broadcast stream is tuned, the corresponding transport stream is extracted, and the desired video stream is decoded and presented.
Note that each extracted video stream is associated with a common audio stream. Thus, the video/audio barker function of the program guide is continuously provided, regardless of the selected video stream. Also note that the teachings of the invention is equally applicable to systems and user interfaces that employs multiple audio streams.
Similarly, a user interaction resulting in a prior time interval or a different set of channels results in the retrieval and presentation of a related video stream. If the related video stream is not part of the broadcast video streams, then a pointcast session is initiated. For this purpose, the STT sends a request to the head end via the back channel requesting a particular stream. The head end then processes the request, retrieves the related guide and video streams from the information server, incorporates the streams within a transport stream as discussed above (preferably, the transport stream currently being tuned/selected by the STT) and informs the STT which PIDs should be received, and from which transport stream should be demultiplexed. The STT then extracts the related PIDs for the IPG. In the case of the PID being within a different transport stream, the STT first demultiplexes the corresponding transport stream (possibly tuning a different QAM stream within the forward channel).
Upon completion of the viewing of the desired stream, the STT indicates to the head end that it no longer needs the stream, whereupon the head end tears down the pointcast session. The viewer is then returned to the broadcast stream from which the pointcast session was launched.
Note that the method and apparatus described herein is applicable to any number of slice assignments to a video frame and any type of slice structures. The presented algorithms are also applicable to any number of PID assignments to intra-coded and predictive-coded slice based streams. For example, multiple PIDs can be assigned to the predictive-coded slices without loss of generality. Also note that the method and apparatus described herein is fully applicable picture based encoding by assigning each picture only to a one slice, where each picture is encoded then as a full frame instead of multiple slices.
G. Multi-Functional User Interface with Picture-in-Picture Functionality
Picture-in-picture (PIP) functionality may be provided using slice-based encoding. The PIP functionality supplies multiple (instead of singular) video content. Moreover, an additional user interface (UI) layer may be provided on top (presented to the viewer as an initial screen) of the interactive program guide (IPG). The additional UI layer extends the functionality of the IPG from a programming guide to a multi-functional user interface. The multi-functional user interface may be used to provide portal functionality to such applications as electronic commerce, advertisement, video-on-demand, and other applications.
A matrix representation of IPG data with single video content is described above in relation to
In the example illustrated in
As shown in
In the example illustrated in
As shown in
For each time t2 through t15, the packets containing the skipped guide pages may follow the corresponding packets containing the predictive-coded video frames. For example, for time t2, the first row of skipped guide packets 2102 follow the first row of predictive-coded packets 2002. For time t3, the second row of skipped guide packets 2103 follow the second row of predictive-coded packets 2003. And so on.
The three packetized audio streams 2202, 2204, and 2206 are input into a multiplexer 2208. The multiplexer 2208 combines the three streams into a single audio packet stream 2210. The single audio stream 2210 is then input into a remultiplexer 2212. An alternate embodiment of the present invention may input the three streams 2202, 2204, and 2206 directly into the remultiplexer 2212, instead of first creating the single audio stream 2210.
The video and graphic packet stream 2214 is also input into the remultiplexer 2212. As described above in relation to
The remultiplexer 2212 combines the video and graphic packet stream 2214 with the audio packet stream 2210 to generate a transport stream 2216. In one embodiment, the transport stream 2216 interleaves the audio packets with video and graphics packets. In particular, the interleaving may be done such that the audio packets for time t1 are next to the video and graphics packets for time t1, the audio packets for time t2 are next to the video and graphics packets for time t2, and so on.
Part (b) on the right side of
The first compositor 2402 receives a first set of three full-size video inputs which correspond to the first row of video objects O1, O2, and O3 in
The second compositor 2404 receives the first composite video signal 2403 from the first compositor 2402. The second compositor 2404 also receives a second set of three full-size video inputs which corresponds to the second row of video objects O4, O5, and O6 in
The third compositor 2406 receives the second composite video signal 2405 and a third set of three full-size video inputs which corresponds to the third row of video objects O7, O8, and O9 in
An encoder 2408 receives the third composite video signal 2407 and digitally encodes it to form a video object stream 2409. The encoding may be slice-based encoding using the partitioning shown in
The multiplexed packetized audio stream 2504 includes multiple audio streams which are multiplexed together. Each audio stream may belong to a corresponding video object. The multiplexed packetized audio stream 2504 is input into a remultiplexer (remux) 2506.
The video object stream 2502 is also input into the remultiplexer 2506. The encoding of the video object stream 2502 may be slice-based encoding using the partitioning shown in
The remultiplexer 2506 combines the video object stream 2502 with the multiplexed packetized audio stream 2504 to generate an object transport stream 2508. In one embodiment, the object transport stream 2508 interleaves the audio packets with video object packets. In particular, the interleaving may be done such that the audio packets for time t1 are next to the video object packets for time t1, the audio packets for time t2 are next to the video object packets for time t2, and so on.
The demultiplexer 2602 receives the object transport stream 2508 and demultiplexes the stream 2508 to separate out the video object stream 2502 and the multiplexed packetized audio stream 2504. The video object stream 2502 is further processed by the video decoder 2604. For example, as illustrated in
Each of the displayed objects may be selected by a user interacting with a set-top terminal. For example, if the user selects the channel A object, then the display may change to show a relevant interactive program guide (IPG) page 2704. The relevant IPG page 2704 may include, for example, a reduced-size version of the current broadcast on channel A and guide data with upcoming programming for channel A or the guide page where channel A is located. The audio may also change to the audio stream corresponding to channel A.
As another example, if the user selects the advertisement object, then the display may change to show a related advertisement video (ad video) 2706. Further, this advertisement video may be selected, leading to an electronic commerce page relating to the advertisement. The audio may also change to an audio stream corresponding to the advertisement video.
As yet another example, if the user selects the VOD object, then the display may change to show a VOD window 2708 which enables and facilitates selection of VOD content by the user. Further, once the user selects a particular video for on-demand display, an electronic commerce page may be displayed to make the transaction between the user and the VOD provider.
As yet another example, if the user selects the electronic commerce (e-commerce) object, then the display may change to show an e-commerce window 2710 which enables and facilitates electronic commerce. For example, the e-commerce window 2710 may comprise a hypertext markup language (HTML) page including various multimedia content and hyperlinks. The hyperlinks may, for example, link to content on the world wide web, or link to additional HTML pages which provides further product information or opportunities to make transactions.
In a first step 2902, the video decoder 2604 (decodes and) outputs the video object page 2606 which includes the nine objects O1 through O9. In a second step 2904, a user selects an object via a set top terminal or remote control. For example, the object may be the first object O1 which may correspond to channel A. In this example, selection of the first object O1 results in the display on a corresponding IPG page 2704 including guide data and a reduced-size version of the channel A broadcast.
In a third step 2906, a PID filter is reprogrammed to receive packets for O1 and associated guide data. For example, if packets for video object O1 are identified by PID 101, and packets for the associated guide data are identified by PID 1, then the PID filter would be reprogrammed to receive packets with PID 101 and PID 1. This filtering step 2906 is described further below in relation to
In a fourth step 2908, a demultiplexer (Demux) depacketizes slices of the first object O1 and associated guide data. Note that this step 2908 and the previous step 2906 are combined in some of the related methods of
Finally, in a sixth step 2912, a video decoder decodes and outputs the IPG page for viewing by the user.
In the example illustrated in
Similarly, the skipped-coded guide packets 3006 include skipped-coded data for the second through last frames of each GOP for each of ten IPG pages. These skipped-coded packets 3006 may be identified, for example, by PID 11 as described above in relation to
In the example illustrated in
The transport stream 3002 is filtered 3010 by a PID filter. The filtering process 3010 results in received packets 3012. For example, if the PID filter is programmed to receive only packets corresponding to the first object O1 (PID 101) and associated guide data (PIDs 1 and 11), then the received packets 3012 would include only those packets with PIDs 101, 1, and 11.
The above discussed encoding and delivery methods for PIP utilizes a combination of broadcast/demandcast traffic model where multiple video signals are broadcast and delivered to the set top box even the viewer does not utilize some of the video content at a particular time. Such an approach makes response times far more consistent, and far less sensitive to the number of subscribers served. Typical latencies may remain sub-second even when the subscriber count in a single modulation group (aggregation of nodes) exceeds 10 thousand. On the other hand, the bandwidth necessary to delivery the content increases compared to a point-to-point traffic model. However, with the advantage of the slice-based recombinant MPEG compression techniques, the latency reduction of broadcast/demandcast model is achieved without much bandwidth compromise.
In addition, with a server-centric content generation and control, the transport streams containing tremendous motion video information is delivered and decoded directly through the transport demultiplexer and MPEG decoder without being accessible to the microprocesssor, saving processing and memory resources and costs at set top terminal.
The multi-functional user interface supports any combination of full-motion video windows, at least one or more of these video inputs can be driven from existing ad-insertion equipment enabling the operator to leverage existing equipment and infrastructure, including ad traffic and billing systems, to quickly realize added revenues. The discussed system does not have any new requirements for ad production. The ads can be the same as are inserted into any other broadcast channels.
H. General Head-End Centric System Architecture for Encoding and Delivery of Combined Realtime and Non-Realtime Content
A unique feature of the head-end centric system discussed in previous sections (for encoding and delivery of interactive program guide, multi-functional user interfaces, picture-in-picture type of applications) is the combined processing of realtime and non-realtime multimedia content. In other words, the discussed head-end centric system architecture can be utilized for other related applications that contain realtime and non-realtime content in similar ways with the teachings of this invention. For further clarification,
The apparatus includes a non-realtime content source 3202, a realtime content source, a non-realtime encoder 3206, a rate control unit 3208, a realtime encoder 3210 (including a realtime video encoder 3211 and a realtime audio encoder 3212), a slice combiner 3214, a remultiplexer 3216, a re-timestamp unit 3218, and a clock unit 3220. The apparatus shown in
The non-realtime content may include guide page graphics content for an interactive program guide (IPG). The realtime content may include video and audio advertisement content for insertion into the IPG.
The rate control unit 3208 may implement an algorithm which sets the bit rate for the output of the non-realtime encoder 3206. Based on a desired total bit rate, the algorithm may substract out a maximum bit rate anticipated for the realtime video and audio encoded signals. The resultant difference would basically give the allowed bit rate for the output of the non-realtime encoder 106. In a slice-based embodiment, this allowed bit rate would be divided by the number of slices to determine the allowed bit rate per slice of the IPG content. In a page-based embodiment, this allowed bit rate would be the allowed bit rate per page of the IPG content.
The re-timestamp unit 3218 may receive a common clock signal from the common clock unit 3220 and generates therefrom presentation and decoding timestamps. These timestamps are transferred to the remultiplexer (Remux) 3216 for use in re-timestamping the packets (overriding existing timestamps from the encoders 3206, 3211, and 3212). The re-timestamping synchronizes the non-realtime and realtime content so that non-realtime and realtime content intended to be displayed in a single frame are displayed at the same time.
The common clock unit 3220 may also provide a common clock stream to the set-top terminals. The common clock stream is transmitted in parallel with the transport stream.
I. Techniques for Encoding Program Grid Section of IPG
In the embodiment depicted by the layout 3300 in
In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, blank areas of the background are "skip" encoded to "save" a portion of the bit rate. In the example depicted in
Meanwhile, the quantizer stepsize for encoding the regions that include text is lowered to utilize the saved bits to improve the viewing quality of the text regions. The quantizer stepsize scales the granularity at which the image is quantized. Lower quantizer stepsize produces an increased fineness in granularity of the quantization. The increased fineness results in a higher viewing quality with lower loss of original content.
The quantizer step size chosen for each text region macroblock can be determined based on the rate allocated to the program grid portion. The program grid portion target rate is determined by subtracting the motion region 3302 target rate from the total bitrate. The program grid bitrate is then allocated to text and background regions by skip encoding the uniform color regions and then allocating the remaining bitrate to text regions via adjustment of the quantizer step size, e.g, MQUANT parameter in MPEG-1/2. For text regions that show encoding artifacts, the quantizer step size is further forced to lower values.
In accordance with another embodiment of the present invention, the quantization matrix (also called the quantization weighting matrix) for encoding the program grid section may be optimized for encoding text, rather than being, for example, a standard or default quantization matrix. The MPEG compression standard, for example, provides two default quantization matrices: an intraframe quantization matrix for non-predicted blocks and an interframe quantization matrix for predicted blocks. The MPEG default matrix for non-predicted blocks is biased towards lower frequencies. The MPEG default matrix for predicted blocks is flat. A quantization matrix suitable for the specific program grid content is designed by analyzing the DCT coefficients of the transformed blocks. The coefficients are collected in a test pool and an optimum quantizer matrix is designed by a chosen rate-distortion optimization algorithm, which shall be known by a reader familiar in the art of quantizer design.
In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, encoding is performed on the program grid section such that encoded macroblocks do not cross a border between two stripes. In other words, stripe borders are aligned with the macroblocks in the program grid section. For example, as depicted in
The first step 3502 receives as input a source image and applies low-pass filtering. The low-pass filtering serves to reduce visual defects, such as ringing, because those defects tend to comprise higher frequency components. The program guide grid high frequency components are removed, before the encoding process starts, to minimize the negative quantization effects of the encoder.
The second step 3504 receives the pre-filtered content and applies a forward transform to the source image. The forward transform may comprise, for example, a discrete cosine transform. As a result of the forward transform, the image is transformed from image space to frequency space.
The third step 3506 receives the filtered output and applies quantization, as applied in MPEG-1/2 standards.
The fourth step 3508 receives the quantized output and applies lossless encoding. The encoding may comprise, for example, a form of variable-length coding similar to the modified Huffman coding applied under the MPEG standard. An encoded image is output from this step 3508 for transmission to a decoder. In this method, the uniqueness of invention is the adjustment of the lowpass filter parameters in a certain manner to remove the negative quantization effects of the quantizer in a pre-encoding stage.
The provided encoding optimization techniques can be applied within the context of slice based encoding and picture based encoding. Although various embodiments which incorporate the teachings of the present invention have been shown and described in detail herein, those skilled in the art can readily devise many other varied embodiments that still incorporate these teachings. For example, while some of the above Figures depict horizontal background stripes, other embodiments of the present invention may instead involve vertical background stripes. In addition, while a user interface with a program information section is described above, other embodiments of the present invention may involve other information sections. Similarly, while a multimedia section is described above, other embodiments of the present invention may involve other display sections.
|Cited Patent
|Filing date
|Publication date
|Aug 3, 1979
|Sep 15, 1981
|Harris Data Communications, Inc.
|Video display terminal having means for altering data words
|Aug 12, 1981
|Mar 13, 1984
|International Business Machines Corporation
|Apparatus and method for scrolling text and graphic data in selected portions of a graphic display
|Dec 27, 1982
|Jan 29, 1985
|Rockwell International Corporation
|Reduced memory graphics-to-raster scan converter
|Aug 20, 1982
|May 28, 1985
|Honeywell Information Systems Inc.
|Display video generation system for modifying the display of character information as a function of video attributes
|Oct 19, 1983
|Jul 15, 1986
|Zenith Radio Corporation
|Full-field teletext system with dynamic addressability
|Apr 1, 1985
|Dec 30, 1986
|Zenith Electronics Corporation
|Television receiver having teletext processor with ROM for on-screen message
|May 6, 1986
|Nov 10, 1987
|Patrick Young
|TV schedule system and process
|Jun 16, 1986
|Dec 8, 1987
|General Instrument Corporation
|Security arrangement for downloadable cable television converters
|May 6, 1985
|Mar 29, 1988
|Cableshare, Inc.
|Cable television system selectively distributing pre-recorded video and audio messages
|Jan 23, 1984
|Apr 19, 1988
|Global Integration Technologies, Inc.
|Visual display system for use with ideographic languages
|Nov 27, 1985
|May 3, 1988
|International Business Machines Corp.
|Digital display system with refresh memory for storing character and field attribute data
|Mar 10, 1986
|May 17, 1988
|Kohorn H Von
|System for evaluation and recording of responses to broadcast transmissions
|May 28, 1985
|Jun 14, 1988
|David P. Gordon
|System for electronically controllably viewing on a television updateable television programming information
|Dec 2, 1986
|Dec 20, 1988
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Cable television impulse pay per view system
|Aug 4, 1987
|Dec 20, 1988
|Telaction Corporation
|Digital interactive communication system
|Aug 20, 1987
|May 9, 1989
|Telaction Corporation
|Presentation player
|Jul 8, 1986
|May 9, 1989
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Communication of individual messages to subscribers in a subscription television system
|Aug 10, 1987
|Jul 11, 1989
|Levine Michael R
|Method and apparatus for signaling the volume level of reproducing apparatus for digitally recorded sound
|Jun 30, 1988
|Aug 22, 1989
|Telaction Corporation
|Electronic store
|Aug 14, 1986
|Sep 12, 1989
|Scientific Atlanta, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for communication of video, audio, teletext, and data to groups of decoders in a communication system
|May 10, 1988
|Oct 24, 1989
|Henry Von Kohorn
|System for merchandising and the evaluation of responses to broadcast transmissions
|Sep 21, 1984
|Dec 5, 1989
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Information display scheme for subscribers of a subscription television system
|Sep 30, 1988
|Dec 26, 1989
|Scientific Atlanta, Inc.
|Communications format for a subscription television system permitting transmission of individual text messages to subscribers
|Jun 30, 1988
|Feb 27, 1990
|Telaction Corporation
|System for audio/video presentation
|Jun 29, 1988
|Mar 13, 1990
|Levine Michael R
|VCR Programmer
|May 10, 1988
|May 15, 1990
|Kohorn H Von
|System for evaluation of response to broadcast transmissions
|Feb 10, 1988
|Jul 10, 1990
|Cableshare, Inc.
|Cable television system selectively distributing pre-recorded video and audio messages
|Feb 23, 1990
|Oct 16, 1990
|Levine Michael R
|VCR programmer
|Jul 15, 1988
|Dec 11, 1990
|Insight Telecast, Inc.
|System and process for VCR scheduling
|Apr 20, 1989
|Feb 5, 1991
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Interactive television terminal with programmable background audio or video
|Apr 20, 1989
|Feb 19, 1991
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Interactive room status/time information system
|May 5, 1989
|May 7, 1991
|Cableshare, Inc.
|Television system for the interactive distribution of selectable video presentations
|Oct 19, 1989
|Jul 23, 1991
|Kohorn H Von
|System for evaluation and rewarding of responses and predictions
|Jul 5, 1989
|Aug 6, 1991
|The Superguide Corporation
|Method and apparatus for transmitting and receiving television program information
|Oct 25, 1990
|Oct 15, 1991
|Kohorn H Von
|System and method for attracting shoppers to sales outlets
|Oct 1, 1990
|Oct 15, 1991
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|In-band controller
|Mar 27, 1989
|Apr 28, 1992
|Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
|Television receiver with teletext receiving function and a method for superimposing a teletext picture on a television picture
|Mar 8, 1989
|May 12, 1992
|Mccalley Karl W
|Bus interconnection structure with redundancy linking plurality of groups of processors, with servers for each group mounted on chassis
|Sep 4, 1990
|Jun 2, 1992
|Telaction Corporation
|Digital audio-video presentation display system
|Nov 5, 1990
|Jun 16, 1992
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|Vcr with cable tuner control
|Oct 25, 1990
|Jul 7, 1992
|Kohorn H Von
|System and method for generating and redeeming tokens
|Jul 26, 1990
|Sep 8, 1992
|Deutsche Itt Industries Gmbh
|Wireless remote control system for a television receiver
|Oct 17, 1991
|Sep 29, 1992
|Insight Telecast, Inc.
|System and method for automatic, unattended recording of cable television programs
|Feb 5, 1991
|Mar 2, 1993
|Telaction Corporation
|Interactive multimedia presentation and communications system
|Aug 30, 1991
|Mar 16, 1993
|Telaction Corporation
|Interactive multimedia presentation & communication system
|Feb 15, 1991
|May 4, 1993
|Telaction Corporation
|Presentation player for an interactive digital communication system
|Oct 15, 1991
|Jul 13, 1993
|Kohorn H Von
|Method for measuring the effectiveness of stimuli on decisions of shoppers
|Nov 20, 1991
|Jul 27, 1993
|Zenith Electronics Corporation
|Cable television system having dynamic market code shuffling
|Nov 27, 1990
|Aug 24, 1993
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for transmitting, receiving and communicating digital data signals with corresponding program data signals which describe the digital data signals
|Nov 29, 1991
|Sep 21, 1993
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for tuning data channels in a subscription television system having in-band data transmissions
|May 5, 1992
|Sep 28, 1993
|Kohorn H Von
|Product information storage, display, and coupon dispensing system
|Jun 26, 1990
|Nov 9, 1993
|General Instrument Corporation
|Apparatus for selective distribution of messages over a communications network
|Mar 29, 1991
|Dec 14, 1993
|Data return for a television transmission system
|Sep 19, 1991
|Feb 1, 1994
|Kohorn H Von
|System and method of communication with authenticated wagering participation
|Sep 10, 1990
|Mar 8, 1994
|The Superguide Corporation
|Method and apparatus for controlling a television program recording device
|Dec 10, 1991
|Mar 22, 1994
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|VCR with cable tuner control
|Nov 29, 1991
|Apr 5, 1994
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for displaying channel identification information
|May 20, 1992
|Apr 12, 1994
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Enhanced versatility of a program control by a combination of technologies
|Feb 3, 1992
|Apr 26, 1994
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Apparatus and method using compressed codes for television program record scheduling
|Nov 13, 1990
|Jun 7, 1994
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|CATV system enabling access to premium (pay per view) program events by bar code data entry
|Nov 2, 1992
|Jun 7, 1994
|Scientific Atlanta
|System and method for multiplexing a plurality of digital program services for transmission to remote locations
|Mar 27, 1991
|Aug 2, 1994
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Apparatus and method using compressed codes for recorder preprogramming
|Mar 19, 1993
|Oct 4, 1994
|Starsight Telecast, Inc.
|Television schedule system
|Jan 19, 1993
|Nov 15, 1994
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|Television system module with remote control code determination
|Jan 19, 1993
|Dec 13, 1994
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|Remote-controlled VCR using an associated TV for audible feedback
|Oct 2, 1992
|Jan 3, 1995
|Xerox Corporation
|Decompression of standard ADCT-compressed images
|Sep 8, 1993
|Jan 17, 1995
|Kwoh; Daniel S.
|Apparatus and method for total parental control of television use
|Oct 30, 1992
|Mar 21, 1995
|Scientific Atlanta, Inc.
|System and method for transmitting a plurality of digital services
|May 3, 1993
|Apr 11, 1995
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Apparatus for communicating program information corresponding to digital data
|Sep 1, 1992
|May 9, 1995
|Hitachi, Ltd.
|Character/pattern generator and information processing system
|Jan 21, 1994
|May 9, 1995
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|Telephonically programmable apparatus
|Jan 19, 1993
|May 30, 1995
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|T.V. viewing and recording system
|Dec 22, 1993
|Jun 6, 1995
|Digital Equipment Corporation
|Remote display of an image by transmitting compressed video frames representing background and overlay portions thereof
|Jan 29, 1993
|Jun 27, 1995
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Apparatus for method for selectively demodulating and remodulating alternate channels of a television broadcast
|Jul 14, 1994
|Aug 1, 1995
|Scientific Atlanta
|Apparatus and methods for providing close captioning in a digital program services delivery system
|Mar 28, 1994
|Aug 8, 1995
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Reprogrammable subscriber terminal
|May 26, 1994
|Dec 5, 1995
|Thomson Consumer Electronics, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for processing a conditional access program guide as for a satellite TV service
|Jun 1, 1994
|Dec 5, 1995
|Asahi Kogaku Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
|Apparatus for substituting character data for image data using orthogonal conversion coefficients
|Jun 22, 1994
|Dec 12, 1995
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Remote control mounting stand
|Nov 29, 1991
|Dec 19, 1995
|Scientific-Altanta, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for providing an on-screen user interface for a subscription television terminal
|Jun 7, 1995
|Dec 26, 1995
|Starsight Telecast Inc.
|User interface for television schedule system
|Feb 18, 1994
|Dec 26, 1995
|Starsight Telecast Inc.
|User interface for television schedule system
|Apr 19, 1994
|Jan 16, 1996
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|Subscription television system and terminal for enabling simultaneous display of multiple services
|Sep 16, 1993
|Jan 30, 1996
|Yuen; Henry C.
|Apparatus and method for tracking the playing of VCR programs
|Dec 3, 1993
|Feb 20, 1996
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|System and method for transmitting a plurality of digital services including compressed imaging services and associated ancillary data services
|Apr 28, 1994
|Mar 26, 1996
|Prevue Networks, Inc.
|Video mix program guide
|Sep 13, 1995
|Apr 16, 1996
|Smart Vcr Limited Partnership
|Schedule display system for video recorder programming
|Jun 2, 1993
|May 7, 1996
|Gemstar Developement Corporation
|System and method for automatically recording television programs in television systems with tuners external to video recorders
|Apr 16, 1993
|Jun 4, 1996
|Mankovitz; Roy J.
|Method and apparatus for portable storage and use of data transmitted by television signal
|May 20, 1994
|Jun 4, 1996
|Prevue Networks, Inc.
|Video clip program guide
|Sep 16, 1993
|Jul 2, 1996
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Apparatus and methods for using compressed codes for monitoring television program viewing
|Apr 11, 1994
|Jul 2, 1996
|Starsight Telecast Inc.
|Background television schedule system
|Sep 22, 1994
|Jul 23, 1996
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Remote controller for controlling turning appliances on and off
|Apr 19, 1994
|Jul 23, 1996
|Scientific-Atlanta, Inc.
|System and method for subscriber interactivity in a television system
|Jun 24, 1994
|Aug 6, 1996
|Index Systems, Inc.
|Apparatus and methods for avoiding loss of closed caption data when using extended data services
|Apr 17, 1995
|Aug 27, 1996
|Starsight Telecast Incorporated
|Method and apparatus for merging television program schedule information received from multiple television schedule information sources
|Mar 1, 1995
|Sep 3, 1996
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Remote controller for scanning data and controlling a video system
|Jun 9, 1994
|Sep 3, 1996
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Method for downloading setup data via telephone to an appliance controller
|Apr 13, 1995
|Sep 24, 1996
|Gemstar Development Corporation
|Apparatus and methods for synchronizing a clock to a network clock
|Oct 31, 1996
|May 5, 1998
|Microsoft Corporation
|Transparent block skipping in object-based video coding systems
|Jun 10, 1998
|Jul 11, 2000
|Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
|Video coding device and video decoding device
|Jul 21, 1998
|Jan 23, 2001
|Index Systems, Inc.
|Systems and methods for displaying and recording control interface with television programs, video, advertising information and program scheduling information
|May 30, 2001
|May 14, 2002
|Worldgate Service, Inc.
|MPEG encoding technique for encoding web pages
|Feb 8, 1999
|Jun 25, 2002
|Webtv Networks, Inc.
|System for transmitting digital data through a lossy channel
|Nov 30, 1998
|Jul 2, 2002
|Diva Systems Corporation
|Method and apparatus for combining video sequences with an interactive program guide
|Feb 2, 1998
|May 6, 2003
|Vcon Ltd.
|Video transmission system
|Jun 17, 1998
|Aug 12, 2003
|Opentv, Inc.
|Interactive television system and method for displaying a graphical user interface using insert pictures
|Jan 27, 1998
|Aug 31, 2004
|Nippon Telegraph And Telephone Corporation
|Predictive encoding and decoding methods of video data
|Mar 20, 1998
|May 24, 2001
|Charles E. Boice
|Adaptive encoding of a sequence of still frames or partially still frames within motion video
|Feb 21, 2001
|Aug 30, 2001
|Barton James M.
|Analog video tagging and encoding system
|Jul 21, 1998
|Jan 3, 2002
|Hewlett-Packard Company
|System for variable quantization in jpeg for compound documents
|Jan 30, 2002
|Sep 5, 2002
|Sharp Laboratories Of America, Inc.
|Method and apparatus for selecting image data to skip when encoding digital video
|Jun 3, 1981
|Jun 17, 1986
|Etablissement Public De Diffusion Dit "Telediffusion De France"
|System for digitally transmitting and displaying texts on television screen
|Vasconcelos, Nuno; Dufaux, Frederic; "Pre and Post-Filtering For Low Bit-Rate Video Coding," Oct. 26-29, 1997, Image Processing, 1997. Proceedings., International Conference on Meeting.
|Citing Patent
|Filing date
|Publication date
|Sep 28, 2006
|Apr 13, 2010
|Sony Corporation
|System and method for effectively performing an audio/video synchronization procedure
|May 2, 2011
|Jul 10, 2012
|Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
|Information processing apparatus and recovery processing method
|Dec 15, 2008
|Jun 10, 2014
|Telefonaktiebolaget L M Ericsson (Publ)
|Method and apparatus for avoiding quality deterioration of transmitted media content
|Nov 18, 2011
|Dec 27, 2016
|Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
|Apparatus and method for encoding combined image including different images
|Jun 30, 2009
|Sep 12, 2017
|Thomson Licensing Dtv
|Method of display of a user interface and corresponding transmission method
|Feb 1, 2011
|Oct 17, 2017
|Vdopia, INC.
|Video display method
|Sep 28, 2006
|Jan 25, 2007
|Klaus Zimmermann
|System and method for effectively performing an audio/video synchronization procedure
|Dec 21, 2006
|Jun 26, 2008
|Mark Stross
|Virtual interface and system for controlling a device
|Apr 22, 2009
|Dec 17, 2009
|Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
|Information processing apparatus and recovery processing method
|Jun 30, 2009
|Dec 31, 2009
|Jean-Francois Lagardere
|Method of display of a user interface and corresponding transmission method.
|May 2, 2011
|Aug 25, 2011
|Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
|Information processing apparatus and recovery processing method
|Nov 18, 2011
|Jun 7, 2012
|Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
|Image coding apparatus and image coding method
|Feb 1, 2011
|Aug 2, 2012
|Mcconville Ryan Patrick
|Video display method
|Nov 5, 2013
|May 8, 2014
|Kt Corporation
|Server hosting web-based applications on behalf of device
|Aug 29, 2014
|Mar 5, 2015
|Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
|Method and apparatus for applying nested network cording in multipath protocol
|Jun 30, 2009
|Oct 29, 2014
|Dec 15, 2008
|Apr 2, 2014
|Method and apparatus for avoiding quality deterioration of transmitted media content
|Dec 15, 2008
|Jun 24, 2010
|Telefonaktiebolaget Lm Ericsson (Publ)
|Method and apparatus for avoiding quality deterioration of transmitted media content
|U.S. Classification
|International Classification
|Cooperative Classification
|European Classification
|Nov 2, 2000
Owner name: DIVA SYSTEMS CORPORATION, CALIFORNIA
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNORS:GORDON, DONALD F.;BAYRAKERI, SADIK;COMITO, JOHN P.;AND OTHERS;REEL/FRAME:011274/0449
Effective date: 20000926
|Apr 28, 2004
Owner name: TVGATEWAY, LLC, PENNSYLVANIA
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:DIVA SYSTEMS CORPORATION BY HOWARD B. GROBSTEIN, CHAPTER 11 TRUSTEE;REEL/FRAME:014567/0512
Effective date: 20040421
Owner name: TVGATEWAY, LLC,PENNSYLVANIA
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:DIVA SYSTEMS CORPORATION BY HOWARD B. GROBSTEIN, CHAPTER 11 TRUSTEE;REEL/FRAME:014567/0512
Effective date: 20040421
|Sep 20, 2004
Owner name: SEDNA PATENT SERVICES, LLC, PENNSYLVANIA
Free format text: CHANGE OF NAME;ASSIGNOR:TVGATEWAY, LLC;REEL/FRAME:015177/0980
Effective date: 20040824
Owner name: SEDNA PATENT SERVICES, LLC,PENNSYLVANIA
Free format text: CHANGE OF NAME;ASSIGNOR:TVGATEWAY, LLC;REEL/FRAME:015177/0980
Effective date: 20040824
|Nov 6, 2007
|Certificate of correction
|Dec 29, 2008
Owner name: CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS VENTURES, LLC, MISSOURI
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:SEDENA PATENT SERVICES, LLC (F/K/A TVGATEWAY, LLC);REEL/FRAME:022024/0827
Effective date: 20080913
|Dec 30, 2008
Owner name: CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS OPERATING, LLC, MISSOURI
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS VENTURES, LLC;REEL/FRAME:022034/0374
Effective date: 20081229
Owner name: CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS VENTURES, LLC, MISSOURI
Free format text: CORRECTIVE ASSIGNMENT TO CORRECT THE CONVEYING PARTY DATA;ASSIGNOR:SEDNA PATENT SERVICES, LLC (F/K/A TVGATEWAY, LLC);REEL/FRAME:022034/0587
Effective date: 20080913
Owner name: CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS VENTURES, LLC, MISSOURI
Free format text: CORRECTIVE ASSIGNMENT TO CORRECT THE CONVEYING PARTY DATA: SEDENA PATENT SERVICES, LLC (F/K/A TVGATEWAY, LLC PREVIOUSLY RECORDED ON REEL 022024 FRAME 0827. ASSIGNOR(S) HEREBY CONFIRMS THE CONVEYING PARTY DATA: SEDNA PATENT SERVICES, LLC (F/K/A TVGATEWAY, LLC);ASSIGNOR:SEDNA PATENT SERVICES, LLC (F/K/A TVGATEWAY, LLC);REEL/FRAME:022034/0587
Effective date: 20080913
|Dec 28, 2010
|Fee payment
Year of fee payment: 4
|Dec 31, 2014
|Fee payment
Year of fee payment: 8
|May 18, 2016
Owner name: BANK OF AMERICA, N.A., AS ADMINISTRATIVE AGENT, NE
Free format text: SECURITY INTEREST;ASSIGNORS:BRIGHT HOUSE NETWORKS, LLC;CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS OPERATING, LLC;TIME WARNER CABLE ENTERPRISES LLC;REEL/FRAME:038747/0507
Effective date: 20160518


text:
National Survey of Black Americans, Waves 1-4, 1979-1980, 1987-1988, 1988-1989, 1992 (ICPSR 6668)
Principal Investigator(s): Jackson, James S., University of Michigan. Institute for Social Research. Survey Research Center; Neighbors, Harold W., University of Michigan. Institute for Social Research. Survey Research Center
The purpose of this data collection was to provide an appropriate theoretical and empirical approach to concepts, measures, and methods in the study of Black Americans. Developed with input from social scientists, students, and a national advisory panel of Black scholars, the survey investigates neighborhood-community integration, services, crime and community contact, the role of religion and the church, physical and mental health, self-esteem, life satisfaction, employment, the effects of chronic unemployment, the effects of race on the job, interaction with family and friends, racial attitudes, race identity, group stereotypes, and race ideology. Demographic variables include education, marital status, income, employment status, occupation, and political behavior and affiliation.
Access Notes
The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.
This study is maintained and distributed by the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging (NACDA), the aging program within ICPSR. NACDA is sponsored by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) at the National Institutes of Heath (NIH).
ASCII + SAS Setup SPSS Setup Stata Setup
ASCII + SAS Setup
Study Description
Jackson, James S., and Harold W. Neighbors. National Survey of Black Americans, Waves 1-4, 1979-1980, 1987-1988, 1988-1989, 1992. ICPSR06668-v1. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1997. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR06668.v1
Persistent URL: https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR06668.v1
Export Citation:
- RIS (generic format for RefWorks, EndNote, etc.)
- EndNote XML (EndNote X4.0.1 or higher)
This study was funded by:
- United States Department of Health and Human Services. National Institutes of Health. National Institute of Mental Health
Scope of Study
Subject Terms: African Americans, community involvement, crime, economic indicators, ethnic identity, family relationships, life satisfaction, mental health, physical health, political ideologies, psychological wellbeing, race relations, racial attitudes, racial discrimination, racism, reactions to crime, religious attitudes, religious beliefs, residential segregation, self esteem, social indicators, social interaction, social networks, social services, stereotypes, unemployment, work attitudes
Geographic Coverage: United States
Universe: Black United States citizens 18 years of age or older.
(1) Data for Wave 1 of this study supersede the data released in NATIONAL SURVEY OF BLACK AMERICANS, 1979-1980 (ICPSR 8512). (2) Users should note that data for the "state and county" codes (Variables 1405, 1407, and 1410) were entered in COUNTY/STATE order and not STATE/COUNTY order, i.e., the first three digits are the county code and the last two digits are the state code. This is the reverse of how Note 3 of the codebook describes the interpretation of these variables. (3) Variables for Wave 2 begin at V3001, Wave 3 begins at V4001, and Wave 4 begins at V5001. (4) The codebook and questionnaires are provided as Portable Document Format (PDF) files. The PDF file format was developed by Adobe Systems Incorporated and can be accessed using the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Information on how to obtain a copy of the Acrobat Reader is provided through the ICPSR Website on the Internet.
Sample: National multistage probability sample. The sample is self-weighting. Every Black American household in the continental United States had an equal probability of being selected. Wave 1 was administered to 2,107 respondents, Wave 2 to 951 respondents (including 935 from Wave 1), Wave 3 to 793 respondents (including 779 from Wave 2), and Wave 4 to 659 respondents (including 1 from Wave 1, 28 from Wave 2, and 623 from Wave 3).
personal interviews and questionnaires
Extent of Processing: ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:
- Performed consistency checks.
- Standardized missing values.
- Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
Original ICPSR Release: 1996-10-01
- 1997-11-13 The SAS and SPSS data definition statements have been reissued, and the codebook is being released as a PDF file. PDF questionnaires for Waves 1-4 also have been added to the collection. The Crosswave Variable Listing is now machine-readable and is part of the PDF codebook.
Related Publications
- List all ~79 citations associated with this study
- View citations for the entire series
Most Recent Publications
Export Options: RIS/EndNote
Export Options: RIS/EndNote
Export Options: RIS/EndNote
Metadata Exports
- Citations exports are provided above.
Export Study-level metadata (does not include variable-level metadata)
If you're looking for collection-level metadata rather than an individual metadata record, please visit our Metadata Records page.


text:
1. Gaara's Sand.
Gaara is shown to easily counter Amaterasu with his sand, technically he could also use the Amaterasu flames against you, example if you have comrades along with you.
2. Pure Speed
Raikage dodged Amaterasu flawlessly without much effort, speed like 8 Gates should do the same.
3. Shinra Tensei
The gravity force can be used to push the flames away.
4. Gentle Fist: One Body Blow and 8-Trigrams Palms Rotation
Similar to Shinra Tensei but it uses chakra to push the flames away. Palms Rotation is basically the spinning variant of One Body Blow.
5. Fire Sealing Method
Shown by Jiraiya, its capable of even sealing Amaterasu effortlessly.
So my point, every jutsu has a weakness, no jutsu is perfect.


text:
© 2008 MLB Advanced Media, L.P. All rights reserved.
Goose not a fan of Joba's celebrations
Soon-to-be Hall of Famer: 'There's no place for it in the game'
By Barry M. Bloom / MLB.com
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. -- As one of the game's dominant relief pitchers, Rich "Goose" Gossage was known for his intimidating demeanor and mean-looking fastball. His opinions on the state of the game don't vary from that approach, especially for present Yankees reliever Joba Chamberlain, of whom he says: cut out the antics on the mound. "There's no place for it in the game," Gossage, who'll be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame this summer, said Monday about last week's Chamberlain celebration on the mound. "I will stand by that and I love Joba Chamberlain. I'm with him down in Spring Training. He's a great kid, but no one is passing the torch today. Nobody talks to them. When I broke into the big leagues, I didn't say two words all year." Last Tuesday, Chamberlain surrendered a three-run, eighth-inning homer to Cleveland's David Dellucci. Two days later, as Chamberlain retired the Indians on 13 pitches to protect a three-run lead in the eighth, he celebrated after punching out Dellucci, drawing the ire of the Indians' outfielder. Gossage agreed with Dellucci. "I'm old school, I'm sorry," Gossage said. "I didn't see [Dellucci] celebrating when he hit the home run." About Mariners first baseman Rich Sexson, who had his suspension reduced from six games to five for charging Texas left-hander Kason Gabbard, whose pitch came in high, though over the plate, Gossage said: "Sexson should have been suspended for a month, not the five days or so he got. That pitch wasn't even close." Gossage added that another Yankees reliever, Kyle Farnsworth, shouldn't have been suspended for throwing a warning pitch behind Boston's Manny Ramirez last month in a game at Yankee Stadium. Ramirez had been hot in two early April series against Yankees pitching, before Farnsworth issued what was construed by Major League Baseball's disciplinarians as a warning. He was suspended for three games, a sentence that was reduced to one. "It used to be part of the game and isn't part of the game anymore," Gossage said about backing a hitter off the plate. "It just goes into this whole thing of protecting hitters. And money has controlled that. They wanted to put more offense in the game by design. And to me, they've gone completely out of their minds. I hate to see that history of the game changed and being manipulated." Gossage played with the Yankees from 1978-83, then again for a brief encore in 1989, and is one of the guest coaches invited to Tampa, Fla., during Spring Training. He played for 10 teams, including a season in Japan, but will be inducted into the Hall on July 27 wearing a Yankees cap. Along the way, Gossage was a setup reliever in Oakland (1992-93) for friend and fellow Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley. Gossage said he was appalled even back then by Eckersley's penchant to point at hitters from the mound after striking them out. "Eckersley used to do it all the time, and it used to bother me even then," Gossage said. "The only thing with Eckersley is that he pitched only one inning and he usually didn't have to go back out there. I remember one instance in the playoffs against the Blue Jays when Eck came on in the eighth. He punched out somebody to end it, and he really gave it the old pump fist. I looked over at their bench and they just jumped up. He had to go back out there in the ninth and they ended up beating us." Gossage said his motto as a player was "to let sleeping dogs lie." He said during 22 seasons that he only hit three batters intentionally: Ron Gant, Andres Galarraga and Al Bumbry. When asked why that trio, he said: "Because they had it coming."
Barry M. Bloom is a national reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.