A method for locating a program by searching in a program guide according to search criteria

摘要

In a television system in which at least program title information for programs which are to be transmitted in the future is transmitted in advance to form a channel guide listing, apparatus is provided for searching the listing for specific user-entered information, and upon successful conclusion to the search, the apparatus schedules the tuning of the desired program, or in the alternative, notifies the viewer of the availability of the program. The invention relates that descriptive text accompanies the program listing, and the apparatus of the invention performs a search of the text for a particular text string which may relate to the title, the star, the director, or the context of the program, among other search criteria. The invention relates that the search is made by using a concatenated search criteria comprising at least two separate search criterion. <IMAGE>