ELECTRONIC TELEVISION PROGRAM GUIDE CHANNEL SYSTEM AND METHOD

摘要

An electronic program schedule system which includes a receiver (30) for receiving television program schedule information and promotional information transmitted via satellite (170), a digital playback system (40) for storing the schedule and promotional information and formatting pages of said information, and a cable television channel modulator (50) for modulating the pages of information onto a cable television system. A data processor (41) in the playback system (40) receives and stores in a memory (42) television program schedule information for a plurality of television programs to appear on the plurality of television channels. A televison receiver is used to display the television program schedule and promotional information by tuning the receiver or cable converter box to the designated channel upon which the signals are modulated. A multimedia generator (44) receives control commands from the data processor (41) and program schedule information from the memory (42) and displays a portion of the program schedule information in either full screen grid format or partial screen grid format together with promotional information, as controlled by a schedule for display of the promotional information resident in the data processor (41). The data processor (41) controls the multimedia generator (44) with control commands, issued in response to a computer program resident on the data processor (41), to display program schedule information and promotional information.