Thomson Licensing

Deutsche Thomson-brandt Gmbh

Thomson Licensing S.a.

Dietmar Hepper

Meinolf Blawat

Stefan Kubsch

Wolfgang Klausberger

Hui Li

Marco Winter

Uwe Janssen

Hartmut Peters

Dirk Adolph

Gael Pilard

Hans-Joachim Platte

Herbert Hoelzemann

Uwe Riemann

Ralf Ostermann

Carsten Herpel

Heinz-Werner Keesen

Stephan Knappmann

Jens Spille

Jens Cahnbley

Xiaoming Chen

Oliver Theis

Erich Geiger

Ingo Hütter

Dieter Haupt

Wulf-Christian Streckenbach

Kai Dorau

Johannes Böhm

Martin Plantholt

Dietrich Westerkamp

The motion of image content such as a point of interest in a video frames sequence is tracked using sub-pixel resolution motion estimation in forward and/or backward direction. The motion of image content or a point of interest between a reference frame and a following frame is estimated, starting from an integer pixel position in the reference frame. If the motion vector has a position between integer pixel positions, the coordinates of that motion vector are replaced by an adjacent integer pixel position in the following or previous frame, and the error value between these coordinates and the replacement coordinates is stored. Thereafter the following or previous frame is defined as the current frame, the motion of the object is estimated between the replacement coordinates in the current frame and a following frame, and the stored error value is added in opposite direction to the corresponding motion vector, so as to get a corresponding precise motion vector. If the precise motion vector has a position between integer pixel positions in the following or previous frame, its coordinates are replaced by an adjacent integer pixel position in the following or previous frame, and the corresponding error value is stored, and so on.

Method and apparatus for tracking the motion of image content in a video frames sequence using sub-pixel resolution motion estimation

In accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, a method for measuring a quality parameter of an optical storage system comprising a non-diffraction-limited optical storage medium and a readout device, the method comprising the process of deriving an impulse response of the optical storage system, and the process of analyzing the impulse response to determine at least one of a width of the impulse response and a skewness of the impulse response as the quality parameter.

Method and system for determining the quality of a storage system

A distributed storage system able to support real-time recording of streaming data shall be provided. Therefore, on the basis of Material Exchange Format (MXF) formatted files a data stream is packed into at least a first MXF formatted file and a second formatted MXF file. First connection data are inserted into the first MXF formatted file, wherein this first connection data points to the second MXF formatted file. Furthermore, second connection data are inserted into the second MXF formatted file, wherein the second connection data points to the first MXF formatted file. These connection data inserted as metadata into the MXF formatted files enable both seamless real-time stream recording and stream-able data playback.

Method and device for recording or playing back a data stream

The optical storage medium comprises a substrate layer, a data layer having a pit/land data structure with data arranged in tracks on the substrate layer and a nonlinear layer with a super-resolution material, wherein the data structure comprises diffractive pits and lands having a size above an optical resolution limit of a pickup for reading of the data and super-resolution pits and lands having a size below the optical resolution limit, said pits and lands having a defined length with regard to a channel bit length. A diffractive land preceding a super-resolution pit is changed by a first length depending on the laser power of the pickup, and/or a diffractive pit preceding a super-resolution land is changed by the first length depending on the laser power of the pickup, to compensate a phase shift of the super-resolution pit, respectively super-resolution land.

Optical storage medium comprising a phase shift compensation

Search in stocks of data, particularly on optical media, is intended to be optimized in terms of the time required for the search. It is therefore proposed that the search be carried out in two steps. In a first search step, the entire database is scanned on the disk storage medium. In a second search step, executed in parallel, intermediate results from the first search step are searched. This allows the number of skips on a disk to be reduced, which results in increases of speed, particularly in the case of optical drives.

Method and apparatus for searching a database in two search steps

In current Distributed Storage Systems, applications may determine the device on which data shall be stored. The invention provides a method for automatically selecting an individual storage device within a DSS. A method for automatically classifying a node in a network comprises determining data classes, automatically classifying data of said data classes stored on a node, determining the amount of stored data per data class, calculating data dominance values for each of the data classes, receiving a request that indicates a data type according to one of said data classes, and providing said dominance value according to the requested data class. Further, a method for automatically organizing nodes in a network comprises receiving a request for storing data of a particular data type, transmitting the request to storage nodes, receiving from the storage nodes respective dominance values, and selecting the node with the highest dominance value for storing the data.

Method and apparatus for organizing nodes in a network

A logical quality-of-service management method for peer-to-peer networks uses a special group service for QoS management within peer-groups. This group service determines and assigns a budget per time unit for each peer. Such time unit may be in the range of milliseconds or few seconds. It may also determine a group budget for the peer-group. While a peer uses bandwidth, i.e. while it sends or receives data, its budget is decreased. When a peer has exhausted its budget, it has to lower its priority for transferring or receiving data. Each peer is responsible for keeping its own budget. If a peer does not keep the conditions, other peers may have the right to deny the data transfer from that peer. The QoS service function is advertised in peer-group advertisement messages.

Method for improving quality-of-service management in networks

The handling of metadata being provided in different formats shall be simplified. Therefore, it is suggested to provide metadata in a first metadata structure having a first format and providing a second metadata structure having a first format and providing a second metadata structure having a second format, wherein link data are deposited in the second metadata structure. The link data point to metadata in the first metadata structure. Thus, it is possible to trealize synchronous and automatic editing of metadata and its mirror metadata.

Method and device for handling metadata

The use of disk-assisted, dynamic databases is to be optimized. To this end, provision is made for new data intended to update an old stock of data to have a second index, relating to the new data, generated for them, and for said second index to be stored on the disk storage medium as a supplement to the first index relating to the old stock of data. This allows the number of write access operations to the disk storage medium to be reduced. This is particularly advantageous for optical media, whose useful life can be increased as a result.

Method and apparatus for updating data on disk storage medium

When recording packetized real-time streaming data, e.g. multimedia data, it is in general not possible to know in advance the size of the data stream, and thus the required storage area. Therefore the storage device may be full before the data stream is completely stored. The disclosed method for storing and retrieving the remaining part of the data stream on another storage device uses metadata tags () and data buffers (IBIB) to split a data stream seamlessly into chunks while recording it, and distribute the chunks in real-time to different connected storage devices (D,D), so that the chunks can be seamlessly concatenated again in real-time for replaying the stream. The metadata tags () contain identifiers for the successive storage node (N) and/or the preceding storage node (N) and for the last stored application packet.

Method for seamless real-time splitting and concatenating of a data stream

The generation of metadata shall be simplified. Therefore, a method is presented in which a metadata-template is filled with selected essence and MD-links obtained from a list of links to essence and/or a list of current metadata. Furthermore, it is possible to obtain the MD-links from further metadata or essences directly or indirectly linked with the selected essence.

Device and method for generating metadata from essence

An architecture for a multimedia peer-to-peer home network allows the simple definition of peer groups, or zones, where each peer is capable of automatically identifying whether other peers are members of the same group, or of another group, by using group labels. Each peer may freely cooperate with the other peers of the same group, or with peers of previously specified other groups. e.g. exchange information or share resources. The architecture aims to map an atmosphere of trust existing between users to a technical system. namely their respective home networks. Using this architecture, it is e.g. possible that users who trust each other may give each other access to their own home network, or parts of it.

Method for communication between nodes in peer-to peer networks using common group label

The present invention relates to a method for ensuring data consistency upon mapping of a hierarchical data format to a relational database management system. According to the invention, a method for ensuring data consistency upon storage of a data item in a database, the data item having an identifier and a locator for linking the data item to a destination, whereby the identifier and the locator are stored in the database in addition to the data item, comprises the steps of:

Database model for hierarchical data formats

An architecture for a multimedia peer-to-peer home network allows the automated definition of peer groups, or zones, by using group labels, where each peer is capable of automatically identifying whether other peers are members of the same group, or of another group, and where each peer may freely cooperate with other peers of the same group, e.g. exchange information or share resources like storage capacity. Using this architecture, it is e.g. possible that a user who is accessing a node within a peer group has also access to any other node of the peer group, without being requested for authentication. Another characteristic is that other peer groups can be defined which have access rights to network resources and services. Advantageously, the invention simplifies network creation and operation by not requiring the user to have special networking knowledge.

Method for creating a peer-to-peer home network using common group label

The invention relates to a storage medium on which a set of data is stored, whereby a first data section of the data set is stored in a read-only memory area and a second data section of the data set is stored in a read/write memory area, and the data set comprises language-independent data and language-dependent data. The data set can be processed in a handling device either in a first processing form related to a first language, or in a different processing form related to a second language. Language-independent data and language-dependent data which are related to the first language are included in the first data section, and language-dependent data which are related to the second language are included in the second data section. For the processing in different form, data from the second data section as well as data from the first data section are to be used.

Growing community of inventors

Hannover, Germany

Dietmar Hepper