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US 6,484,156 B1Granted
Accessing annotations across multiple target media streams
AssigneeMicrosoft Corporation
InventorsAnoop Gupta, David M Bargeron
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An annotation server uses a hierarchical annotation storage structure to maintain a correspondence between a plurality of multimedia stream annotations and a hierarchically higher group identifier. The annotations corresponding to the different multimedia streams can easily be accessed concurrently by referencing the group identifier.
Claims25
One or more computer-readable media containing a computer program for annotating streaming media, wherein the program performs steps comprising:
- receiving an annotation retrieval request from a user of a client computer;
- accessing, based on the annotation retrieval request, a group identifier in a hierarchical annotation storage structure, wherein the group identifier identifies a plurality of media streams each corresponding to different media content;
- retrieving multiple annotations in the hierarchical annotation storage structure that are at a lower hierarchical level than the group identifier;
- and
- providing the multiple annotations to a client computer to be presented to a user.
2 more elements
A method comprising:
- receiving user input identifying annotation search criteria;
- accessing a plurality of annotations corresponding to a plurality of multimedia streams to identify a set of annotations that satisfy the search criteria, wherein each of the plurality of multimedia streams corresponds to different multimedia content, and wherein the accessing comprises,
- using a hierarchical annotation storage structure to determine which groups of the plurality of annotations to access in order to identify the set of annotations,
- identifying a group identifier node corresponding to the request, and
- accessing all lower level nodes in the hierarchical annotation storage structure that correspond to the group identifier;
- and
- presenting the set of annotations to the user.
4 more elements
A computer-readable medium having stored thereon a data structure, comprising:
- a first data node containing data representing an annotation group identifier, wherein the group identifier identifies a plurality of annotations corresponding to a plurality of media streams, and wherein each of the plurality of media streams corresponds to different multimedia content;
- and
- a second data node containing data representing a first plurality of annotations corresponding to the annotation group identifier, the first data node being at a hierarchically higher level than the second data node in a hierarchical storage structure.
A system comprising:
- an annotation database that stores one or more collections of annotations in a hierarchical annotation storage structure having the annotations at a first hierarchical level and a set of group identifiers at a second hierarchical level, wherein each of the annotations identifies at least a segment of a media stream of one or more media streams, wherein each group identifier identifies two or more of the media streams, and wherein each media stream corresponds to different media content;
- and
- an annotation manager to control storage and retrieval of the plurality of annotations from the annotation database, wherein the annotation manager is configured to perform steps comprising:
- identifying, based at least in part on the set of group identifiers, a plurality of the one or more collections of annotations to search,
- searching the plurality of annotations to identify one or more annotations that satisfy a search criteria, and
- presenting the one or more annotations to a user.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.