Set top box health and configuration

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10015483-B2
Application number	US-201715639871-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 30, 2017
Priority date	Feb 28, 2011
Publication date	Jul 3, 2018
Grant date	Jul 3, 2018

Abstract

Disclosure is directed to determining a condition of the television receiver and communicating information regarding that condition to end-points that are external to the television receiver. The television receiver may create a two-dimensional barcode with information regarding the receiver condition and output the two-dimensional barcode for display on a display device. Once displayed on the display device, the two-dimensional barcode may be scanned into a mobile device where the information regarding the receiver condition may be stored, processed and/or forwarded to another location or device.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method of managing a television receiver, comprising:
sensing a condition of a television receiver;
in response to sensing the condition of the television receiver, creating a two-dimensional barcode with information corresponding to configuration settings of the television receiver, the information comprising settings information corresponding to user-adjustable settings;
outputting the two-dimensional barcode from the television receiver for display on a display device;
wherein, when the two-dimensional barcode is scanned from the display device into a mobile device, the two-dimensional barcode conveys the information corresponding to the configuration settings to the mobile device, so that the mobile device obtains the information for later use by the television receiver;
subsequently communicating, by the television receiver with the mobile device, to transfer the information corresponding to the configuration settings from the mobile device to the television receiver; and
self-configuring, by the television receiver, based at least in part on the information corresponding to the configuration settings transferred from the mobile device to the television receiver, including the settings information corresponding to the user-adjustable settings.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request to reconfigure the television receiver according to the information corresponding to the configuration settings retained by the mobile device;
where the communicating, by the television receiver with the mobile device, is responsive to the request and comprises establishing a connection from the television receiver to a storage medium on which the mobile device has stored the information corresponding to the configuration settings.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the condition corresponds to one or more user-adjustable settings for the television receiver, and the sensing is executed in response to receiving a user request at the television receiver to save the one or more user-adjustable settings.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the condition of the television receiver is an error condition occurring during an operation of the television receiver, and the method further comprises:
determining that the error condition will result in an imminent failure of an internal component of the television receiver;
wherein the creating the two-dimensional barcode with information corresponding to configuration settings of the television receiver is in response to the determining.

5. The method of claim 4 , further comprising:
developing a second two-dimensional barcode based on a corresponding error code, wherein the developing includes encoding the second two-dimensional barcode with routing information; and
outputting the second two-dimensional barcode from the television receiver for display on the display device;
wherein, when the second two-dimensional barcode is scanned from the display device into the mobile device, the second two-dimensional barcode conveys the routing information to the mobile device, so that the mobile device obtains the information to access a remote site with the routing information and direct error information regarding the error condition to a service provider capable of mitigating the error condition.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein:
the routing information includes a uniform resource locator configured to access a website through a browser operating on the mobile device; and
the website is configured to communicate the error condition to the service provider using information obtained by scanning the second two-dimensional barcode.

7. The method of claim 5 , wherein the routing information causes the mobile device to automatically launch an application that is configured to communicate with the service provider.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the two-dimensional barcode is additionally created with second information corresponding to configuration settings of a user input device configured to communicate to the television receiver, and, when the two-dimensional barcode is scanned from the display device into the mobile device, the two-dimensional barcode conveys the second information to the mobile device so that the mobile device obtains the second information for later use in input device reconfiguration.

9. A method, comprising:
scanning a two-dimensional barcode into a mobile device, the two-dimensional barcode:
being displayed on a display device associated with a television receiver;
and created with information corresponding to configuration settings of a television receiver in response to a condition of the television receiver, the information comprising settings information corresponding to user-adjustable settings;

wherein, when the two-dimensional barcode is scanned from the display device into the mobile device, the two-dimensional barcode conveys the information corresponding to the configuration settings to the mobile device, so that the mobile device obtains the information for later use by the television receiver;
decoding the two-dimensional barcode at the mobile device to determine the information corresponding to the configuration settings to the mobile device;
storing the information corresponding to the configuration settings for later use in reconfiguring the television receiver; and
subsequently communicating with the television receiver to transfer the information corresponding to the configuration settings from the mobile device to the television receiver to reconfigure the television receiver based at least in part on the information, including the settings information corresponding to the user-adjustable settings.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the information corresponding to the configuration settings includes a configuration setting for a remote control device associated with the television receiver.

11. The method of claim 9 , wherein the storing the information corresponding to the configuration settings comprises:
establishing a network connection between the mobile device and a storage device that is remote from the mobile device;
transmitting the storing the information corresponding to the configuration settings from the mobile device to the storage device across the network connection; and
storing the information corresponding to the configuration settings at the storage device.

12. The method of claim 9 , further comprising:
receiving a request to reconfigure the television receiver according to the information corresponding to the configuration settings retained by the mobile device;
where the communicating comprises establishing a connection between the television receiver and a storage medium on which the mobile device has stored the information corresponding to the configuration settings.

13. A television receiver, comprising:
a tuner operable to receive a program service transmission having a plurality of channels, the tuner operable to select one of the channels and to prepare the channel to be output in a data signal to a display device;
a memory connected to the tuner, the memory including a tangible storage medium operable to store computer readable data and instructions;
a processor connected to the memory operable to run computer executable code stored in the memory;
a sensing module configured to execute on the processor to sense a condition of the television receiver;
an encoding module configured to execute on the processor to create, in response to sensing the condition of the television receiver, a two-dimensional barcode with information corresponding to configuration settings of the t

Assignees

• Dish Tech Llc
• Dish Tech Llc

Inventors

• Schaefer Germar
• Minnick Danny J

Classifications

• H04N21/4424

  Monitoring of the internal components or processes of the client device, e.g. CPU or memory load, processing speed, timer, counter or percentage of the hard disk space used (error monitoring in general G06F11/30; arrangements for monitoring conditions of receiving stations in broadcast systems H04H60/32; diagnosis, testing or measuring for television receivers H04N17/04) · CPC title

• H04N17/04 Primary

  for receivers · CPC title

• H04N21/4223

  Cameras (H04N23/00 takes precedence) · CPC title

• H04N21/4425

  Monitoring of client processing errors or hardware failure · CPC title

• H04N21/4882

  for displaying messages, e.g. warnings, reminders (arrangements for providing short real-time information to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1895) · CPC title