Command packets for personal video recorder

Abstract

Command packets for personal video recorder. The invention provides for transport stream (TS) that contains data and also includes a transport packet (TP)/TS formatted command packets. The TP/TS formatted command packet may be communicated between any number of devices, including multiple chips, multiple boards, and multiple processors. A decoder is able to decode the TP/TS formatted command packet and to perform the appropriate operation on data portions of the TS. When a TS is provided to a device not having the capability to perform the proper decoding of the TP/TS formatted command packet, that particular packet may be deemed as being unidentified (or unknown) adaptation field data. Alternatively, the packet may be identified as being corrupted data and/or irrelevant data. The invention is operable to encode command packets into the transport stream in such a way that it is backward compatible with previous systems.

What is claimed is:  
     
         1 . A transport stream, comprising: 
 a data packet having a transport stream format; and    a command packet having a format that substantially complies with the transport stream format; and    wherein the command packet directs an operation to be performed on the packet.    
     
     
         2 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the transport stream comprises a motion picture expert group, MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         3 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the command packet comprises a header syntax that substantially follows an MPEG-2 transport header syntax.  
     
     
         4 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein a decoder decodes the command packet of the transport stream; 
 the decoder identifies a command within the command packet; and    the decoder executes the command on the data packet.    
     
     
         5 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein a decoder decodes the command packet of the transport stream; 
 the decoder identifies the command packet as an irrelevant data packet; and    the decoder discards the irrelevant data packet.    
     
     
         6 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the command packet comprises at least one trick play operation.  
     
     
         7 . The transport stream of  claim 6 , wherein the at least one trick play operation comprises at least one of pause/still, fast forward, rewind, slow forward, slow rewind, and skip.  
     
     
         8 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the command packet is inserted into the transport stream.  
     
     
         9 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the command packet precedes the data packet within the transport stream.  
     
     
         10 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the transport stream is written to a hard disk.  
     
     
         11 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the transport stream is read from a hard disk.  
     
     
         12 . The transport stream of  claim 1 , wherein the command packet comprises a plurality of fields.  
     
     
         13 . The transport stream of  claim 12 , wherein the plurality of fields comprises information related to a start picture and an end picture.  
     
     
         14 . A transport stream decoding method, the method comprising: 
 receiving a motion picture expert group, MPEG-2 transport stream, the MPEG-2 transport stream comprises an MPEG-2 transport stream formatted command packet;    calculating an entry point picture within the MPEG-2 transport stream based on a parameter;    decoding the MPEG-2 transport stream formatted command packet, thereby identifying an operation; and    executing at least a portion of the operation at the entry point picture.    
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the operation comprises at least one of playback and trick play.  
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 15 , wherein the trick play comprises at least one of pause/still, fast forward, rewind, slow forward, slow rewind, and skip.  
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the parameter comprises at least one of a trick play mode, a current location within the MPEG-2 transport stream, and a plurality of possible entry point pictures within the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 14 , further comprising calculating at least one additional entry point picture within the MPEG-2 transport stream based on at least one additional parameter.  
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 18 , wherein the parameter and the at least one additional parameter each comprise a common parameter.  
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 18 , wherein the entry point picture comprises a start picture and the at least one additional entry point picture comprises an end picture.  
     
     
         21 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream is read from a hard disk.  
     
     
         22 . The method of  claim 14 , further comprising: 
 identifying the MPEG-2 transport stream formatted command packet as a corrupted data packet; and    discarding the corrupted data packet; and    wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream comprises a remaining MPEG-2 transport stream.    
     
     
         23 . The method of  claim 22 , further comprising playing back the remaining MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         24 . The method of  claim 14 , further comprising inserting at least one additional MPEG-2 transport stream formatted command packet into the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         25 . The method of  claim 14 , further comprising executing at least one additional portion of the operation on a plurality of data packets that come after the entry point picture within the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         26 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream is received from a host processor.  
     
     
         27 . The method of  claim 14 , further comprising identifying at least one additional operation by decoding the MPEG-2 transport stream formatted command packet.  
     
     
         28 . The method of  claim 27 , wherein the operation corresponds to a data packet within the MPEG-2 transport stream; and 
 the at least one additional operation corresponds to at least one additional data packet within the MPEG-2 transport stream.    
     
     
         29 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream comprises at least one of video data and audio data.  
     
     
         30 . A method to perform encoding and decoding of a motion picture expert group, MPEG-2 transport stream, the method comprising: 
 encoding data into a plurality of data packets having an MPEG-2 transport stream format;    encoding a command into a command packet having an MPEG-2 transport stream format;    generating an MPEG-2 transport stream, the MPEG-2 transport stream comprising the plurality of data packets and the command packet;    communicating the transport stream from a first device to a second device;    decoding the MPEG-2 transport stream, thereby extracting a portion of the data from the plurality of data packets and extracting the command from the command packet; and    performing the command on the portion of the data.    
     
     
         31 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein at least one of the first device and the second device comprises a hard disk.  
     
     
         32 . The method of  claim 30 , at least one of the first device and the second device comprises a host processor.  
     
     
         33 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein command packet precedes a data packet within the plurality of data packets from which the portion of the data is extracted.  
     
     
         34 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein the data is received via at least one of a digital channel and an analog channel.  
     
     
         35 . The method of  claim 30 , further comprising displaying the portion of the data on a display.  
     
     
         36 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein the encoding of the command into the command packet having the MPEG-2 transport stream format is performed substantially immediately before decoding the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         37 . The method of  claim 30 , further comprising identifying the command packet within the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         38 . The method of  claim 37 , wherein the command packet is identified during the decoding of the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         39 . The method of  claim 30 , wherein an MPEG video decoder performs the decoding of the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         40 . A motion picture expert group, MPEG-2 transport stream having command packets, comprising: 
 a plurality of data packets having MPEG-2 transport stream format; and    a command packet having MPEG-2 transport stream format; and    wherein the command packet directs an operation to be performed on a data packet within the plurality of data packets; and    the operation comprises trick play.    
     
     
         41 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the transport stream is communicated from a host processor to a display.  
     
     
         42 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein a decoder decodes the command packet of the transport stream; 
 the decoder identifies the operation within the command packet; and    the decoder executes the operation on the data packet.    
     
     
         43 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein a decoder decodes the command packet of the MPEG-2 transport stream; 
 the decoder identifies the command packet as an irrelevant data packet; and    the decoder discards the irrelevant data packet.    
     
     
         44 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the trick play operation comprises at least one of pause/still, fast forward, rewind, slow forward, slow rewind, and skip.  
     
     
         45 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the command packet is inserted into the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         46 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the command packet precedes the data packet within the MPEG-2 transport stream.  
     
     
         47 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream is written to a hard disk.  
     
     
         48 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the MPEG-2 transport stream is read from a hard disk.  
     
     
         49 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 40 , wherein the command packet comprises a plurality of fields.  
     
     
         50 . The MPEG-2 transport stream of  claim 49 , wherein the plurality of fields comprises information related to a start picture and an end picture.