Method, a hypermedia communication system, a hypermedia server, a hypermedia client, and computer software products for accessing, distributing, and presenting hypermedia documents

Abstract

The present invention relates to accessing, distributing, and presenting hypermedia documents (5, 6). In particular the invention relates to a method for a hypermedia communication system comprising the steps of generating a hypermedia by presenting the hypermedia in a hypermedia description at a hypermedia server, requesting the hypermedia at a hypermedia client, deploying the hypermedia description from the server to said hypermedia client, presenting the hypermedia by translating the hypermedia description, where said hypermedia description comprising expression means for a reference (70) from an atemporal hypermedia object to a referred hypermedia object, where said method comprises the steps of generating, requesting, deploying, and presenting hypermedia, uniformly, using a hypermedia description comprising further expression means for a reference from a temporal hypermedia object (5) to a referred hypermedia object (5,6). The invention also relates to a hypermedia communication system, a hypermedia server, a hypermedia client, and computer software products therefor.

Description

[0001] This is a divisional of application Ser. No. 10 / 893,296, filed Jul. 19, 2004, which claims priority from European Patent Application No. 03291938.3 filed Jul. 31, 2003, the disclosures of which are incorporated in their entirety.TECHNICAL FIELD [0002] The present invention relates to accessing, distributing, and presenting hypermedia documents. In particular the invention relates to a method, a hypermedia communication system, a hypermedia server, a hypermedia client, and computer software products. [0003] The invention is based on a priority application, EP 03291938.3, which is hereby incorporated by reference. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0004] Hypermedia, a term derived from hypertext, extends the notion of the hypertext link to include links among any set of multimedia objects, including sound, motion video, and virtual reality. It also connotes a higher level of user / network interactivity than the interactivity already implicit in hypertext. [0005] Hypermedia is currentl...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0069] Accordingly, it is an object and advantage of the present invention to provide a framework that enables integrated temporal hypermedia like a hyper-motion-picture-stream.

[0070] Another advantage of the present invention is that the infrastructure requirements like the computational power and the network capabilities can cope with the high multimedia requirements. And there are now techniques available for performant mobile video services like universal mobile telephone system (UMTS) video services, being a rich source for (temporal) multimedia objects.

[0071] A further advantage of the present invention is that the used technique spreads the network load over time. A continuous media stream could now be broken down into pieces—not by coding and packeting only, but also by semantically meaningful inter-relationship.

[0072] Yet another advantage of the present invention is that the technique provides means for a bunch of attractive applications like interactive video, video sightseeing, etc. The new temporal hypermedia modality is well integrated within current hypermedia.

[0073] A further advantage is that referenced media transport is de-coupled allowing enhanced reactivity and might even stipulate a better quality of service.

Problems solved by technology

The requirements of MPEG-4 are so complex that bit-streams and the higher-level representations they encode are designed in isolation from the application environment.

The separation of underlying techniques (due to their complexity) yields to an unfortunate separation of media description in a multimedia hypermedia document.

The problem to be solved is that for continuous temporal media objects like video within a hypermedia description it is not possible to refer, link, embed or relate to other hypermedia resources using the known techniques.

This results in a morphological break and temporal media could not be treated as hypermedia.

Moreover, the volume and unstructured format of digital video data make it difficult to manage, access and compose video segments into hypermedia documents.

They do not take full advantage of either the logical structure of the video or of hierarchical relationships between video segments.

Moreover, access based on the structure and its hierarchy is not supported.

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