JPH0981447A - Data processing device and information acquisition method - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) Abstract: Information related to information provided by a broadcast signal is made available via other media, and an information access mode having bidirectionality is realized. When related information related to hypermedia information provided by FM teletext is requested by a user, telephone number information embedded in the hypermedia information is added to the unique data reading unit. Detected by 112. Then, for the server specified by the detected telephone number information, a telephone line or ISDN
A call processing procedure for connecting via a communication line network such as is automatically executed by the automatic connection unit 113. Therefore, it becomes possible to obtain information related to the information provided by the broadcast signal as needed, and it is possible to realize a bidirectional information access mode.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a data processing device capable of receiving and displaying information transmitted using a teletext channel of a broadcast signal and an information acquisition method using the data processing device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, attempts have been actively made to provide multimedia information via a network. It can be said that WWW (World Wide Web) is a typical example.

Information provided by WWW can be accessed from a computer connected to the Internet through a WWW browser. In this case, the information provided is HTML (Hyper Text Markup).
It is described according to a format called “Language”, and the link function can be used to easily access the related information.

On the other hand, information such as weather forecasts and news is currently provided by utilizing broadcasting means such as FM teletext. However, since the information provided by such a broadcast signal is unidirectional communication, even if the user wants to know the details of the information or related information, there is no means for obtaining it.

[0005]

It will be possible to provide a higher level of service by making it possible to distribute information in the HTML format even in the information service using broadcasting means. When hypermedia information is provided using broadcasting, it is not necessary for the received information to be handled separately from the information provided via the network, and it seems that the user can easily handle the data. In addition, information such as newspapers and news that the same thing is used by an unspecified number of people will be more effective in receiving network information provided by broadcasting from the viewpoint of reducing network traffic.

[0006] With a small portable terminal equipped with a broadcast receiving device, it is possible to use it in such a way as to obtain effective information in real time in a narrow range, such as information on event venues and congestion.

As described above, the multimedia information service using broadcasting is effective as one means for obtaining information even when disconnected from the network, considering that small terminals such as portable terminals will spread. I think that the. However, since broadcasting such as FM broadcasting is unidirectional communication as described above, there are problems to be solved in order to provide an information providing service similar to that performed over bidirectional communication such as the Internet. There are also many.

For example, when a small portable terminal is used to obtain related information by following a link from information received by broadcasting, if this information is not included in the already received data, the small portable terminal There is no way to request information from. For this reason, it seems that the received data needs to include information for obtaining related information.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and makes it possible to obtain information related to information provided by a broadcast signal through another medium, and realize bidirectional information access. It is an object of the present invention to provide a data processing device and information acquisition method that can be performed.

[0010]

According to the present invention, in a data processing device capable of displaying information transmitted using a teletext channel of a broadcast signal, the related information related to the information is provided from the information. And a means for detecting telephone number information for connecting to the server, and means for executing a call processing procedure for connecting to the server specified by the detected telephone number information via a communication network. It is characterized by doing.

In this data processing device, for example, F
The telephone number information embedded in the information provided by M-character broadcasting or the like is detected. And
When the user requests related information related to the information provided by the FM teletext, a telephone line or an IS is sent to the server specified by the detected telephone number information.
A call processing procedure for connecting via a communication network such as DN is automatically executed. Therefore, it becomes possible to obtain information related to the information provided by the broadcast signal as needed, and it is possible to realize a bidirectional information access mode.

[0012] Further, the information provided by the teletext includes the destination information for specifying the server providing the relevant information for each relevant information related to the information, and the telephone number information detecting means is provided by the telephone number information detecting means. Refer to the control information indicating the correspondence between the destination information and the telephone number transmitted using the teletext channel of the signal, and specify the telephone number for connecting to the server corresponding to the related information requested by the user. It is preferable to detect. This makes it possible to reduce the amount of data described in the information itself provided by teletext.

When hypermedia information described in HTML or the like is provided by a broadcast signal, telephone number information for connecting to a server providing the relevant information and the relevant information are included in the hypermedia information. It is preferable to embed connection information indicating the file name of, and connect to the server according to the connection information to obtain the related information from the server. Also in this case, the control information indicating the correspondence between the destination information and the telephone number can be used for detecting the telephone number.

[0014]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a data processing device according to an embodiment of the present invention. The data processing device is a portable electronic information device (hereinafter, referred to as a mobile terminal) such as a sub-notebook personal computer or a PDA, and the mobile terminal 100 uses a character broadcast channel of a broadcast signal such as FM text broadcast. HTM to be multiplexed and transmitted
The antenna 101 is provided with a function for receiving L-format hypermedia information and displaying it on the screen.

This display function comprises a hypermedia information receiving section 110 and a display section 115, and the portable terminal 1
HTM which is the program installed in 00
It is realized by an L viewer or the like. In addition, the reception of the FM teletext broadcast signal is performed by another receiving device,
It is also possible to receive hypermedia information from the receiving device.

Further, the portable terminal 100 has an HTM
There is provided a function of obtaining other related information linked to the hypermedia information displayed by the L viewer through a public line network such as a telephone line network or ISDN. This function includes a request receiving unit 111, a unique data reading unit 112, an automatic connection unit 113, and a related information receiving unit 114, and is also realized by a program installed in the mobile terminal 100.

That is, in the portable terminal 100, when the request receiving unit 111 receives a request for obtaining related information from the user, the unique data reading unit 112 first causes the unique data relating to the information requested by the user. (Telephone number information) is read from the hypermedia information, and the telephone number for connecting to the information location is specified. Next, the automatic connection unit 113 automatically dials the information location specified by the unique data reading unit 112 (server 140 of the broadcast base station where the information exists) using a communication device such as the PHS 130, It is connected to the server 140 via a public line network.

The content of the information request from the user is transmitted to the server 140, and the information corresponding to the user request is transmitted from the server 140 via the PHS 130.
Passed to.

FIG. 2 shows a configuration example of a broadcasting system using the mobile terminal 100. In FIG. 2, a broadcasting base station 20 is a base for transmitting hypermedia information by a unidirectional communication broadcasting means such as FM character multiplexing.
Hypermedia information 2 transmitted from the broadcasting base station 20
1 is received by the computers 22 and 24 having a receiving device. The received data may be used by downloading it to another computer 23 such as a small mobile terminal. The small mobile terminal can be connected to a PHS or the like, and it is assumed that the small mobile terminal uses this to request data.

It should be noted that not only the information distribution by the broadcasting means of the one-way communication such as the FM character multiplexing as described above, but also the CD
-Information distribution using the ROM 25 as a medium is also conceivable. In this case, the computer does not need to be equipped with a receiver.

FIG. 3 is a screen display example of hypermedia information distributed by broadcasting or CD-ROM, and FIG.
Shows an example of a structured document corresponding to this.
Here, consider a case where the user receives the information 50 as shown in FIG. 3 by broadcasting or CD-ROM, wants more detailed information about the weather in Tokyo, and requests the information of the corresponding link destination. The file describing the weather forecast in FIG. 3 is an HTML file 60 as shown in FIG. 4, for example.
It is.

In FIG. 4, more detailed weather forecast information for Tokyo is "phone: //phone.toshib".
a. co. jp / weather / tokyo. htm
It is given by the link information 61 to the place "l".

The link information 61 is a URL (Unif
Orm Resource Locator) description format, the first "phone" indicates that the target information is provided by FM broadcasting, etc., and that a telephone connection to the server is required to obtain the information. Shows.

The following "phone.toshiba.c"
o. jp "indicates the name of the server that owns the information. The telephone number for connecting to the server may be directly described in this part. Also," weather "
Is a directory of weather forecast information, "tokyo.htm
"l" is a file name for more detailed weather forecast information of Tokyo.

FIG. 5 is a description example of the connection data information 70 consisting of a server name and a telephone number for connecting to the server name. This connection data information is necessary when the above-mentioned description of the server name does not describe the telephone number for directly connecting to the server but uses an abstract expression like the link information 61 of FIG. By transmitting this connection data information 70 by FM teletext separately from the hypermedia information, the description of the link information 61 can be simplified.

The connection data information 70 includes a description 71 of the name of the server that owns the information and a telephone number 72 for connecting to the server. When a user who has acquired hypermedia information through a one-way communication such as FM text broadcasting or a medium such as a CD-ROM requests further linked information, the link description in the received information is 61 in FIG. In the case of such a format, the telephone number of the server can be specified by using the connection data information 70 as shown in FIG.

A pair of a server name and a telephone number in the connection data information 70 does not necessarily have to correspond one-to-one, and a plurality of telephone numbers correspond to the description of the server name indicating the location of certain information. You may have.

Such a one-to-many description can occur when the information requested by the user actually exists in a plurality of servers. By associating multiple phone numbers with the location of certain information, it is possible to select and connect to the server that is closest to the area where the user is currently located among the multiple phone numbers described. It also becomes possible. This can be effectively used even when information is distributed by a medium such as a CD-ROM.

When receiving information by a broadcasting means such as FM, it is possible to transmit connection data information in which only the telephone number of the server closest to the broadcasting base station is associated. When the user moves to leave the information receivable area from one broadcasting base station and enters the information receivable area of another broadcasting base station, by updating the connection data information, the user It is possible to specify the server close to the current position.

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of the information acquisition process according to the present invention. When the user requests the related information linked to the information displayed by the viewer in step 401, first, step 402
At, the request of the user is accepted by the request acceptance unit 111. Next, in step 403, the unique data (link information or connection data information) relating to the requested information is read by the unique data reading unit 112, and the location of the server that owns the information is specified. A telephone number for connecting to the server is used to specify the location of the server. That is, the link information 61 in FIG.
ne. toshiba. cp. If a telephone number is directly described instead of being described as "jp", it is used as the location of the information. The corresponding phone number is detected.

Finally, in step 404, the server specified in step 403 is automatically called by using a communication means such as PHS 130 to connect, and in step 405 the information is obtained from the server.

FIG. 7 shows an example of the data format transmitted from the broadcasting base station. In FIG. 7, the information body 32 is hypermedia information provided to the user. on the other hand,
The index part 31 is a part including control information related to the information body 32. The index part 31 does not necessarily have to be added to the information body 32, and may be transmitted as needed.

The control information included in the index section 31 includes, for example, an identifier for identifying each content in hypermedia information including links, update date and version information of hypermedia information, type of hypermedia information, and the like. It has been described. The type of hypermedia information is used to roughly classify the contents of received data such as news, sports, and weather forecasts, and by using this, users can select and receive only information in fields of interest. It becomes possible. The above-mentioned connection data information is transmitted by this index unit 31.

As described above, in this embodiment, F
The telephone number information embedded in the hypermedia information provided by M character broadcasting or the like is detected. When the user requests the related information related to the information provided by the FM teletext, the communication line network such as a telephone line or ISDN is connected to the server specified by the detected telephone number information. A call processing procedure for connecting via the telephone is automatically executed. Therefore, it becomes possible to obtain information related to the information provided by the broadcast signal as needed, and it is possible to realize a bidirectional information access mode.

[0035]

As described in detail above, according to the present invention,
It is possible to obtain the information by using the telephone number information that is added in advance to the hypermedia information to connect to the information source and automatically calls the information source requested by the user. Becomes Therefore, the information related to the information provided by the broadcast signal can be obtained through other media, and bidirectional information access can be realized.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a data processing device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an exemplary block diagram showing the configuration of a teletext system using the data processing device of the embodiment.

FIG. 3 is an exemplary view showing a screen display example of hypermedia information used in the data processing apparatus of the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is an exemplary view showing a data structure of hypermedia information used in the data processing apparatus of the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is an exemplary view showing a description example of connection data information including a server name used in the data processing apparatus of the embodiment and a telephone number for connecting to the server name.

FIG. 6 is an exemplary flowchart showing a procedure of information acquisition processing executed by the data processing apparatus of the embodiment.

FIG. 7 is an exemplary view showing an example of a data format transmitted from the broadcast base station to the data processing device of the embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

100 ... Mobile terminal, 111 ... Request acceptance unit, 112 ... Unique data reading unit, 113 ... Automatic connection unit, 130 ... PH
S, 140 ... Broadcast base station server, 50 ... Hypermedia information, 60 ... HTML document, 61 ... Link information.

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A data processing device capable of displaying information provided using a teletext channel of a broadcast signal, and a server providing relevant information related to the information from among the information provided by the broadcast signal. It is provided with means for detecting telephone number information for connecting, and means for executing a call processing procedure for connecting to the server specified by the detected telephone number information via a communication network. A data processing device characterized by: 2. The information transmitted using the teletext channel of the broadcast signal includes destination information for specifying a server providing the relevant information for each relevant information related to the information, The telephone number information detecting means refers to the control information indicating the correspondence between the destination and the telephone number, which is transmitted using the teletext channel of the broadcast signal,
The data processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a telephone number for connecting to a server corresponding to the related information requested by the user is detected. 3. A data processing device capable of displaying hypermedia information transmitted using a teletext channel of a broadcast signal, wherein related information linked to the hypermedia information is provided from the hypermedia information. Means for detecting connection information indicating a telephone number for connecting to the server and a file name of the related information, and a call processing procedure for connecting to the server via the communication network according to the detected connection information To obtain the related information specified by the file name from the server. 4. A method for obtaining information, wherein a data processing device for receiving and displaying hypermedia information transmitted using a teletext channel of a broadcast signal obtains related information linked to the hypermedia information from a server. Then, from the received hypermedia information, phone number information for connecting to a server providing related information linked to the hypermedia information and connection information indicating a file name of the related information are detected, and the detected information is detected. According to the connection information, a call processing procedure for connecting to the server via the communication network is executed, and related information specified by the file name is obtained from the server via the communication network. How to obtain characteristic information.