WO2001019105A1

WO2001019105A1 - Displaying of the content of a service

Info

Publication number: WO2001019105A1
Application number: PCT/FI2000/000736
Authority: WO
Inventors: Salla Oksman
Original assignee: Sonera Oyj
Priority date: 1999-08-30
Filing date: 2000-08-30
Publication date: 2001-03-15
Also published as: FI19991835A; EP1208705A1; AU7002000A; FI110983B

Abstract

A method and system for the presentation of a service content in electronic form on a display of a mobile station in a telecommunication system comprising a mobile communication network (PLMN), mobile station (MS) with its displays (1), server (3) which communicates with the mobile communication network, and a gateway (4) which is arranged for the connection of the mobile communication network (PLMN) and the server. In accordance with the invention, a transmission request of service content is sent to said server for receiving the service content, and the request is received by the server, in which case the service content is edited to suit the display of a mobile station, and the service content requested by the mobile station is sent from said server to said mobile station via said gateway.

Description

DISPLAYING OF THE CONTENT OF A SERVICE SCOPE OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to telecommunication systems. In particular, the invention relates to a method and system for presenting service content on a display of a mobile station in a mobile communication system.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Publications subject to copyright are available to the consumer from different media, such as newspapers and magazines, and the Internet. Examples of this kind of publications are comics, cartoons, newspaper drawings, caricatures, calendars, book cov- ers, catalogues, works of art, construction drawings, trademarks, brochure material, and self-made drawings. The consumer has to actively search for the service content, material, and information relating to the publications he or she is interested in. The consumer has not, however, been able to have a look at the publications he or she is interested in irrespective of time and place. Until now, e.g., it has not been possible to read a comic on a display of a mobile telephone . Likewise, the publisher of the piece of information has not had a form of media which would transmit the novelties directly to the persons requiring them right after the publication of the piece of information. WAP (Wireless Application Protocol, WAP) defines a new type of image format, WB P (Wireless Bit Map, WBMP) , which is used for the transmission of information concerning images in the network, and for the receipt and displaying the information on a mobile station. WAP does not, however, define the features of a display of a mobile station. The size and resolution of the display are therefore optional to the device manufactures. Therefore, it depends on the device it- self whether it will be able to recognise other image formats, and what size of images it is capable of displaying.

From the point of view of the operator, it is very essential that the clients are able to use the services independent of terminal device. Therefore, the new WAP services have to be implemented in such a way that they will support all WAP terminal devices.

Patent publication WO 9856197 discloses a mobile communication system in which there is an exter- nal display unit connected to a mobile station. The display unit may be a portable computer or equivalent which has been arranged to communicate with the network by means of a mobile station. The arrangement in accordance with the publication uses SMS messages for updating the saved images on a display. Graphic images have been beforehand saved on an external display device, and the information contained in them is being updated by means of SMS messages. The arrangement in accordance with this publication is not sufficient enough to be able to display graphic service content using a mere mobile station.

In addition, nowadays it is possible to receive icons created and saved in pixel form, but there is only a narrow space on a display of a mobile sta- tion reserved for them. In addition, it is possible, by means of a character-based SMS message, to generate images and to transmit them further to another mobile station. In that case, the display of the sender and receiver have to correspond to one another so that the image would show the same on the receiver's display as it shows on the display of the sender. Therefore, none of the present mobile stations are able to send, re- ceive, or display graphic information covering the whole screen.

OBJECTIVE OF THE INVENTION The objective of the present invention is to eliminate the disadvantages described above or at least significantly to alleviate them. One specific objective of the invention is to disclose a new type of method and system that make it possible effectively and independent of terminal device to present information on a display of a mobile station.

A further objective of the invention is to disclose a solution with the aid of which the subscriber may be offered a versatile and easy-to-use ar- rangement of subscription of electronic publication for a mobile station.

Still another objective of the invention is to enable the transmission of graphic service content containing, e.g. a sketched image and/or text to a mo- bile station and/or from a mobile station, and the presentation and/or generation of it on a mobile station.

As for the features characteristic of the invention, reference is made to them in the claims.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The invention has been meant to implement a method and system that make it possible to display products subject to copyright, such as comics and the like in a new form of media, the mobile station. The invention enables the transmission of service content containing a sketched image and/or text to a mobile station, and the presentation of it by means of a mobile station. The invention relates to a method for the presentation of a service content in electronic form on a display of a mobile station in a telecommunication system. The telecommunication system comprises a mobile communication network with its displays, a server communicating with the mobile communication network, and a gateway that has been arranged for the connection of the mobile communication network and the server. In the method, a transmission request for the transmission of the service content is sent to the server via gateway by means of a mobile station or some other form of media. The request is received by the server, and after that the desired service content is edited to suit the display of a mobile station. The edited service content is then sent by the server to the mobile station via gateway. When editing the serv- ice content, it is divided into parts each of which is saved as a separate file.

Once the request for the receipt of the service content has been received, the type of the mobile station is checked in order to be able to define its features, especially the display features, and the service content to be sent to the mobile station is edited based on the type . The type may be checked by receiving the type data in conjunction with the transmission request, or by actively examining the messages sent by the mobile station. This makes it possible, transparent to users, to make sure of the fact that the user will see the service content received by him or her accurate and flawless and exactly the way as it is meant to be for the display concerned. In addition, the user may add to the transmission request of the service content a point of time in which he or she wants to receive the service content. The point of time is saved by means of a server, and at scheduled intervals it is checked whether the requested point of time of receipt has been reached. When the point of time has been reached, the service content is sent to the user. Alternatively, the user may be sent a notification in which the user is given a possibility to confirm the receipt of service content. This feature makes it possible to implement either a push-type of service in which the service con- tent is transmitted to the user right after the publication of the service content or in periods defined by the user, or an on-demand type of service in which the service content is transmitted to the user on demand.

In one embodiment, the service content is ex- tracted from a comic, in which case each image of the comic is divided into a set of blocks, which each set of blocks is saved to separate image files. Further, from each set of blocks a transmission card is extracted that contains the description of the content and the blocks. The transmission card or the WML card is a file or a data record comprising information relating to the content sent by the server. The description of the content may be implemented, e.g. by means of a WML content description language or some other corresponding means. In the content description, display data may be saved that comprises at least the display order described, e.g. in links or lists of links .

In another embodiment, the service content may be generated by means of a mobile station, and it may be further transmitted to the server. The service content received by the server may be transmitted based on the transmission data given by the mobile station further on, e.g. to a second server or second mobile station.

In addition, the invention relates to a system for presenting a service content in electronic form on a display of a mobile station in a telecommunication system. The telecommunication system com- prises a mobile communication network with its displays, a server communicating with the mobile communication network, and a gateway that has been arranged for the connection of the mobile communication network and the server. In accordance with the invention, the system further comprises an editor for editing the service content to suit the display, and a transmitter for sending said service content from said server via said gateway to said mobile station. In addition, the system comprises a checker for checking the type of the mobile station in order to find out the display features of the mobile station before sending the service content.

Further, the system may comprise an adder by means of which the desired point of time of receipt is added to the transmission request, and a timer by means of which it is checked, at scheduled intervals, whether the required point of time has been reached. Moreover, the system may comprise a data recorder for saving the edited service content and the transmission card extracted from it with its link references on a server or to an external database. As compared with prior art, the present invention provides the advantage that it makes it possible effectively and independent of terminal device to display information on a mobile station.

In addition, the invention provides the ad- vantage that it makes it possible to offer to the subscriber a versatile and easy-to-use subscription arrangement of electronic publication for a mobile station.

Moreover, the invention makes it possible to transmit a graphic service content consisting of, e.g. a sketched image and/or text to a mobile station and/or from the mobile station, and to display and/or generate it by means of a mobile station.

In addition, as compared with the present forms of media, such as newspapers and magazines, the invention provides the advantage that it provides privacy, and does not depend on time and place. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

In the following section, the invention will be described in detail by means of examples of its embodiments, in which fig. 1 is a schematic representation of a system of the invention, fig. 2a - 2c represent the functionality of a user interface in one embodiment of the present invention, and fig. 3a and 3b represent alternative ways of implementing the generation of the WLM cards or packs in another embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The system as illustrated in fig. la comprises a mobile communication network PLMN, and a mobile station MS with its displays 1. The mobile station MS of this example has been provided with WAP features. In addition, the system comprises a WAP server 3 which has been connected to the mobile communication network PLMN, and a WAP gateway 4 which has been arranged in order to connect the mobile communication network PLMN with the server 3. The server 3 comprises, in addition, a transmitter 2 by means of which the ordered service content is sent to the subscriber. Further, the system comprises an editor 5 for editing the service content to suit the display 1. In this example, the editor 5 has been implemented via software on the server 3, and examples of this kind of software are, e.g. a Photoshop graphics program, or a specific BMP-WBMP converter.

Further, the system as illustrated in fig. 1 comprises a checker 8 which has been arranged on the server 3 in order to find out the type of the mobile station MS and the features of its display 1 before sending the piece of information. This may be imple- mented by means of a small program block which filters from the WAP message sent by the mobile station the features of a mobile station. For example, in the WAP version 1.2, a profile is defined based on which the system is able to recognise the features of a telephone. Instead, for the WAP version 1.0, an identification functionality has to be created in order to be able to define the type of the terminal device.

Further, the system as illustrated in fig. 1 comprises an adder 9 for adding the desired point of receipt to said transmission request. Also this feature may be implemented via software at a user interface of a mobile station. The server 3 may be provided with a timer 10 by means of which it is checked, at scheduled intervals, whether the requested point of time of receipt has been reached. When it has been reached, the timer 10 gives an instruction to send either the service content as it is, or the confirmation request before sending the service content. The system also comprises a data recorder 6 by means of which the edited service content, and the transmission card extracted from it, is stored on a transmission card with its link references.

Accordingly, fig. 1 illustrates the general architecture of the system. All the software applications required for the functions of the system are located on the WWW server 3, from where the information created by them is retrieved to the terminal device via the WAP gateway 4. When the user selects in the service menu a comics service, or in some other way enters the front page of the comics service, he or she will see a WML page which looks approximately the same as the one illustrated in fig. 1. Thus, the functions provided by the front page enable one to select the newest comic daily changing, or to go and browse old comics. The V & W link of the day brings the user to the WML card which shows the first illustration of the comic of the day. Since all mobile stations do not support a scroll function, not even in the direction up-down, the images have to be divided in several blocks in the vertical direction in order to implement the virtual scroll function. Therefore, on the card containing the first image there are in fact three images which have been got by dividing the first frame of the comic in three parts. When the user then scrolls the card downwards, he or she will see the first frame of the comic as a whole. The undermost of the images on the card functions as a link to the next card, which contains the next frame of the comic di- vided in the same way. If desired, the bottom of the page may be provided with a text link which allows one to go and browse the next image. Fig. 2b illustrates an example in which one frame is displayed on the telephone while the user is scrolling, see black ar- rows, down the card. The bottom of the last frame of the comic is provided with a link which brings one back to the main menu in fig. 2a, and a link which gets one the comic of the previous day.

The old comics link brings the user to a card on which the user, in this example, may select one of the comics published in the previous two weeks. In addition, one may enter on the page the publication date of the desired comic already published. If the user, e.g. remembers that on a certain day there was a very good comic published, he may retrieve it even after two weeks have passed.

Fig. 2c illustrates an old comics card with the black arrow indicating again that the user has scrolled the card downwards. On the image of the right-hand side in fig. 2c, the display has got enough capacity for all the four lines to fit in. The "select the date" field brings one a selection list on which one may select a date during the previous two weeks. If the user enters a date, the system prefers to search based on it rather than based on a date selected on the selection list. When the user retrieves the comic of the desired by him or her date, it will be displayed for him or her in the same way as the comics of the day. The difference from the presentation of the comic of the day is that the bottom of the last image of the old comics is provided with links "previous" and "next" by following which one is able to read a comic of the previous or next day. The "next" link shows only in a case, when there are newer comics, and also the "previous" link shows only, if there are older ones. In the following section, examples are shown of the generation of the WML cards with reference to figures 3a and 3b. There are in principle only two ways of generating the cards. Either the packs of cards are re-generated when retrieved by each user, i.e. the links of the main menu refer to cgi scripts, or a separated script is run every morning that forms the updated pages for the day concerned.

Alternative 1, a script to be run every morning Every morning, e.g. at six a.m. a program is automatically run that forms a new front page, let it be, e.g. vwmain.wml. If the date is 14/9/1999, then the link of the generated main page, fig. 2a, the "V & W of the day" refers to file .../14091999.wml , which is also generated, and it contains the comic of the current day as well as the links to the main menu and to the comic of the previous day (file .../13091999.wml) . The link of the main page " Old comics" refers to file .../vwoldies . wml , which contains as illustrated in fig. 3 links to the comics of the previous two weeks. Since also the vwoldies. wml file is changing every day, it is also automatically generated by the program to be run. The fourth file the program has to handle is the comic file of the previous day, i.e. in this case the .../13091999.wml . one. It has to be provided with an additional link referring to the comic of the following day because today it is the 14^th.

Thus, the program will generate every day:

A new main menu, vwmain.wml

A pack of cards containing the comic of the day concerned date.wml A new "old comics" menu, vwoldies.wml

A new pack of cards containing the comic of the previous date prev_date.wml

The shaded boxes in fig. 3a stand for files that are generated by the program to be run in the mornings. The image files in white boxes have been made beforehand and located at a predetermined place, where the image links of the file 14091999.wml refer to.

Alternative 2, wml files are dynamically created on retrieval

In the other alternative the front page would always remain the same. "The V&W link of the day" would refer, e.g. to the script

.../searchComic . cgi?what=new, and the "Old comics" link to the script ...searchOldies . cgi . The searchComic . cgi checks its parameters and discovers that it is the newest comic that has been asked for, in which case it will form the wml card in such a way that the images to be displayed are the image files named after the day concerned. In other words, if it still would be the 14^th of September, 1999, then the image files of the new comic would be 14091999_la .wbmp

14091999_3c .wbmp. The last image will be provided with a link to the main menu below it, and the comic of the previous day with a link to the comic

(.../searchComic. cgi?what=13091999) . The searchComic . cgi may get as a parameter also a date, e.g. .../searchComic. cgi?what=13091999. In this kind of inquiry the wml card is extracted from the images of the day concerned, and below the last image there will be links to the main menu, and also to the previous and the following comic, if there are any.

The searchOldies. cgi forms a wml card with the links to the comics of the last two weeks. In this alternative, the links are cgi calls: searchComic. cgi?what=01091999, .../searchComic. cgi?what=02091999, ...,

.../searchComic . cgi?what=13091999.

Alternative 1 vs Alternative 2 The first alternative is in that sense better than the second one that there is no need for running the scripts every time when loading the pages, instead an already generated static WML pack may be loaded. It is enough to run every morning one small program to keep the files updated. On the other hand, the static feature of the pages is a disadvantage. If there are, e.g. any changes one wishes to make in the layout or function of the pages while the service has been in use for some time, then making changes in the old files has to be effected separately. Instead, in the alternative 2 the changes are not going to cause prob- lems.

In the alternative 1, all the old files required have to be saved just in case they are searched later on, but in alternative 2, one has to save only the image files. The alternative 2 is a clearer one, and more recommendable for its better dynamics.

In one example, the service content to be sent is extracted from the comic in the following way:

At first the image is converted into a two- tone one, which improves the quality of the image af- ter a wbmp conversion done to it, at least when converting using a program called the Prism. After that, the frames of the comic are divided into separate im- ages with each of the frames being the width of 96 pixels at the maximum.

The texts are easy to read. If the texts are not easy to read, they are edited. Each frame is di- vided into blocks of the height of 40 pixels depending naturally on the type of the telephone. After this, the blocks are converted into a wbmp form. The example presented below is a WBMP conversion. The images are saved with the names: date_la.wbmp date_.wbmp date_lc .wbmp date_2a.wbmp date_2b.wbmp date_2c .wbmp date_3a.wbmp date_3b.wbmp date_3c .wbmp

A date in the form ddmmyyyy, i.e. the blocks of the first frame of a comic being published on 15 September 1999 would then be 15091999_la .wbmp, 15091999_lb.wbmp, and 15091999_lc.wbmp.

A WBMP conversion WBMP is an image format defined by the WAP.

Until now, the only commercial program known to public that enables the conversion from the general formats

(GIF, JPG) into a WBMP format is the Spyglass Prism

2.2. The program concerned functions as a WWW proxy, and it is able to do much more than just the WBMP conversion. The WBMP conversion is only a small part of the functions of the program concerned.

Below one can find some examples illustrating the WML cards extracted from different parts of the comics service by the scripts. In the example below, the alternative 2 has been chosen as the means of im- plementing the service, i.e. the pages are generated dynamically when searching them.

Main menu <?xml versιon="l .0"?>

<!DOCTYPE wml PUBLIC " -//WAPFORUM//DTD WML 1.1//EN" "http://www.wapforum.org/DTD/wml_l .1.xml">

<a href="/cgι-bιn/search01dιes .cgι">01d comιcs</a> </p> </card> </wml>

The newest comic, date 14/9/1999

<?xml versιon="l.0"?>

<!D0CTYPE wml PUBLIC " -//WAPFORUM//DTD WML 1.1//EN"

"http://www.wapforum.org/DTD/wml_l .1.xml"> <wml>

<ιmg src="/ιmages/14091999_la.wbmp" alt="vwla"/> <ιmg src="/ιmages/14091999_lb.wbmp" alt="vwlb"/>

>Prevιous day</a>

</wml> Old comics, i.e. the pack generated by the script searchOldies. cgi 14/9/1999

<?xml versιon="l .0"?>

<!D0CTYPE wml PUBLIC " -//WAPFORU //DTD WML 1.1//EN" "http : //ww .wapforum. org/DTD/wml_l .1. ml" >

<wml>

Select date:<br/>

< ! cut >

Input date:<input name="pvm2"/> <a href =" /cgi - bin/searchComic .cgi?what = $ (pvm) &#38 ;what2 = $ (pvm2) ">search a comic</a> </p>

</card> </wml>

The invention is not restricted to the examples of its embodiments, instead many variations are possible within the scope of the inventive idea defined by the claims.

Claims

1. A method for displaying a service content on a mobile station in a telecommunication system comprising: a mobile communication network (PLMN) , mobile station(MS) with its displays (1), server (3) which communicates with the mobile communication network, and a gateway ( 4) which has been arranged for the connection of the mobile communication network (PLMN) with the server, which method comprises the following steps : a transmission request of service content is sent to the server for sending the service content, said request is received by the server, c ha r a c t e r i s ed in that the method further comprises the following steps: the service content is edited to suit the display of a mobile station, and the service content requested by said mobile station is sent from said server to said mobile station via said gateway.

2. A method as defined in claim 1, chara c t e r i s e d in that said editing phase further comprises the following steps: the service content is divided into parts, and each part is saved as a separated file,

3. A method as defined in claim 1 or 2 , characterised in that said editing phase further comprises the following steps: the type of the mobile station is checked in order to find out the display features of the mobile station, and the service content to be sent to the mobile station is edited based on said type.

4. A method as defined in claim 1, char a c t e r i s e d in that the method further comprises the following steps: a desired point of time of receipt is added to said transmission request of service content, the desired point of time of receipt is saved on said server, it is checked at scheduled intervals whether the required point of time of receipt has been reached, and the service content is sent, if said point of time of receipt has been reached.

5. A method as defined in claim 3, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the method further comprises the following steps: the publication date of the piece of information is entered to indicate the point of time of receipt, and the service content is sent to the receiver right after it has been published.

6. A method as defined in claim 1, 2, or 3, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that said editing phase further comprises the following steps: a service content is extracted from a comic, each image of a comic is divided into a separate set of image blocks, each set of image blocks is saved to separate im- age files, and a transmission card is extracted from each set of image blocks that comprises the content description and the image blocks .

7. A method as defined in claim 6, c h a r - a c t e r i s e d in that said editing phase further comprises the following step: display information of the images is added to the content description comprising at least the display order of the images .

8. A method as defined in claim 7, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that said display order of images is generated with link references provided.

9. A method as defined in claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the method further comprises the following steps: the service content is transmitted from the mobile station to the server, and the service content is transmitted further on based on the transmission data given by the mobile station.

10. A system for the presentation of a serv- ice content in electronic form on a display of a mobile station in a telecommunication system comprising a mobile communication network (PLMN) , mobile station (MS) with its displays (1) , server (3) which communicates with the mobile com- munication network, and a gateway (4) that has been arranged for the connection of the mobile communication network (PLMN) and the server, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the system further comprises: an editor (5) for editing the service content to suit the display (1) , and a transmitter for sending said service content from said server (3) via said gateway (4) to said mobile station (MS) .

11. A system as defined in claim 10, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the system further comprises a checker (8) for checking the type of the mobile station (MS) and the features of its display (1) before sending the service content.

12. A system as defined in claim 10 or 11, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the system further comprises : an adder (9) for adding the desired point of time of receipt to said transmission request, and a timer (10) by means of which it is checked at scheduled intervals whether the requested point of time of receipt has been reached.

13. A system as defined in claim 10, c ha r a c t e r i s e d in that the system further comprises a data recorder (6) for saving the edited service content, and the transmission card extracted from it, as well as the link references determining the transmission order on a transmission card.