Fernando Masami Matsubara

Lightweight interactive multimedia environment for TV

This paper describes an interactive framework called LIME (Lightweight interactive multimedia environment). LIME provides a profile based on Web standards including XHTML, CSS and ECMAScript that addresses specific requirements and limitations of consumer electronics devices such as TV and IPTV. Since Web standards are typically developed for PC browsers, content rendering, navigation, and user interface considerations for TV require special attention. The LIME profile supports a subset of functions relevant to TV, as well as extensions to enable functions such as synchronized rendering of monomedia content including audio, video, graphics, and text, while providing interactivity.

Content Aware Media Server for Multimedia Home Network

This paper describes the design and implementation of a Media Server for Multimedia Home Network environments and particularly focuses on one of its components namely Content Management. A core design goal is the aggregation and presentation of content metadata regardless of location of the original source. The implementation of our user-centric approach proved to be an effective solution enabling a unified view of home and Internet content available to the user.

QoS harmonization for home networks

A modern home could contain a large variety of devices and all of them should be able to work together so as to bring a rich experience to the users. Quality of service (QoS) is a critical factor for measuring user satisfaction. It represents the ability to provide different priorities based on the type of the data flows or to guarantee a certain quality of performance to a particular service. Different devices may follow different protocols and each protocol has its own QoS management scheme. These QoS schemes are not necessarily compatible with one another and the inconsistency will significantly impair their efficacy. In this paper, we propose a harmonized protocol for home network, which unifies all other protocols and solves the inconsistency problem effectively.

Simplified content access for net-enabled DTV

Digital Television (DTV) is a device with enoiigh compiiting and disp1a.v capahilities to siipport additionalfi,iictions and play a sign~icant role in the jiitiire networked home. Today manv consiimrr electronics dcvices enohle device connectivity, d i . s cove~ . and access to content regardle.~s of’ its location However, in many cases the design of’ these networked CE (Consumer Electronics) devices hac become a mere e.rte17.sion of’ IT (Injtwmation Technolo& devices such as the PC. The mi.stake ~j’siipporting fl7e mine approach jar both is prevalent. In thiv paper, the aiitliors propose a novel DTV ai-chiteetiire which takes into accoiirit,fiindaamental man-machine interlace limitations oJthe TV, combined with the strong connectivil?, Jimtrrres of netenabled DTVS. The architectire provides a simple uay to access a rich variety of’ content vithoiit reqiriring cump1e.r ii.wr commands and operations. Index Terms Home Networking, Digital TV, Content Delivery. Personalization.

Context driven web applications for networked DTV

With the explosive growth and ubiquity of the Internet, consumers are experiencing the benefits of accessing a large amount of digital information. The trend is evolving to include net-enabled DTVs in addition to PCs and mobile phones. Latest DTVs can support advanced networking and rendering functions useful to access and display a variety of Web content and information in addition to traditional TV. The DTV however presents particular usability problems and obstacles that in many cases result in bad user experience as demonstrated by multiple failed attempts to introduce web browsers in consumer AV devices. In this paper we summarize the key problems and challenges and propose as solution a context aware method to select web mini applications that provide customized content and information. Our method improves usability when compared with other methods based on web browsers or walled garden portals and provides compelling personalized content by taking into account consumer preferences and behavior.