Media Content Presentation via Pre-Buffering to Reduce Channel Change Delay

Solution Overview

Problem

Conventional digital entertainment systems experience delays in rendering media content when switching channels, requiring users to wait several seconds for the desired content to appear after a channel change request.

Innovation Solution

The system presents thumbnail content representing available channels, allowing users to select and preview channels before switching, and prepares the selected channel's media content for immediate display upon readiness, reducing wait time by presenting media content in a timely manner.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If conventional digital entertainment systems tune to a new channel and decode video/audio signals in real-time, then the system ensures accurate and synchronized media content delivery, but the channel change delay increases to one second or more

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemedia content delivery accuracyVSAvoidchannel change delay

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary actions by decoding and buffering a predetermined number of seconds of video and audio signals from the target channel in advance, before the user actually requests to switch to that channel. This pre-decoding and pre-buffering process ensures that when the channel change is requested, the media content is already prepared and ready for immediate playback, thereby reducing channel change delay while maintaining reliable and synchronized content delivery.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

2Speed

If the system pre-decodes and buffers media content for multiple channels in advance, then the channel change speed improves significantly, but the memory usage and processing load increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvechannel change speedVSAvoidmemory buffer size

Core Design Contradiction:

SpeedVSQuantity of substance

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary actions by decoding and buffering a predetermined number of seconds of video and audio signals from the target channel in advance, before the user actually requests to switch to that channel. This pre-decoding and pre-buffering process ensures that when the channel change is requested, the media content is already prepared and ready for immediate playback, thereby reducing channel change delay while maintaining reliable and synchronized content delivery.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system applies different buffering strategies to different channels based on their specific characteristics and user behavior patterns. Instead of uniformly pre-buffering all channels, the system selectively pre-decodes and buffers content for channels that are more likely to be switched to, optimizing memory usage by allocating buffer resources locally to specific channels rather than globally across all channels.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #3Local quality

3Stability of the object's composition

If the system waits for complete media content readiness before switching channels, then the synchronization between video and audio is maintained, but the user experience deteriorates due to longer wait times

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvevideo-audio synchronizationVSAvoiduser experience

Core Design Contradiction:

Stability of the object's compositionVSEase of operation

Solution Approach 1:

The system performs preliminary actions by decoding and buffering a predetermined number of seconds of video and audio signals from the target channel in advance, before the user actually requests to switch to that channel. This pre-decoding and pre-buffering process ensures that when the channel change is requested, the media content is already prepared and ready for immediate playback, thereby reducing channel change delay while maintaining reliable and synchronized content delivery.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system skips the traditional sequential process of tuning, decoding, and buffering by having already completed these steps in advance for the target channel. The predetermined buffering period allows the system to rush through the channel change process by simply switching to the pre-prepared content, bypassing the usual time-consuming steps while maintaining synchronization through the advance preparation of both video and audio streams.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #21Skipping (Rushing through)

Data Source

PatentUS11917255B2Methods, systems, and media for presenting media content in response to a channel change request

Publication Date: 2024.02.27 GOOGLE LLC

AI summary

Methods, systems, and media for presenting media content in response to a channel change request are provided. In some implementations, methods for presenting media content in response to a channel change request are provided, the methods comprising: causing media content provided on a first channel to be presented in a first display area on a first screen; receiving, at a hardware processor, a request to switch to a second channel; in response to receiving the request to switch to the second channel, causing thumbnail content corresponding to the second channel to be presented in the first display area; determining whether media content provided on the second channel is ready for presentation; and in response to determining that the media content provided on the second channel is ready for presentation, causing the media content provided on the second channel to be presented in the first display area.