Electronic program guide: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 19:09, 4 August 2019

Revision as of 17:03, 19 September 2019

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====Western Europe====

In Western [[Europe]], 59 million television households were equipped with EPGs at the end of 2008, a penetration of 36% of all television households. The situation varies from country to country, depending on the status of digitization and the role of pay television and [[IPTV]] in each market. With [[BSkyB|Sky]] as an early mover and the [[BBC iPlayer]] and [[Virgin Media]] as ambitious followers, the United Kingdom is the most developed and innovative EPG market to date, with 96% of viewers having frequently used an EPG in 2010.<ref>{{cite web|title=Looking for TV Genius? |url=http://www.tvgenius.net/blog/2010/10/25/epgs-viewers-find/ |website=[[TV Genius]] |publisher=Red Bee Media |date=October 25, 2010 |accessdate=October 23, 2012 |deadurlurl-status=yesdead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120304051150/http://www.tvgenius.net/blog/2010/10/25/epgs-viewers-find/ |archivedate=March 4, 2012 |df= }}</ref> [[Inview Technology]] is one of the UK's largest and oldest EPG producers, dating back to 1996 and currently in partnership with [[Humax]] and [[Skyworth]].

[[Scandinavia]] also is a highly innovative EPG market. Even in [[Italy]], the EPG penetration is relatively high with 38%. In [[France]], IPTV is the main driver of EPG developments. In contrast to many other European countries, [[Germany]] lags behind, due to a relatively slow digitization process and the minor role of pay television in that country.<ref>{{cite web|title=EPG Forecast, Western Europe (2008–2014)|url=http://www.international-television.org/tv_market_data/epg-penetration-forecast-europe_2008-2014.html|website=International-Television.org}}</ref>

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==Current applications==

<!-- Deleted image removed: [[File:TV Guide Interactive.jpg|thumb|upright=1.4|''[[TV Guide Interactive|i-Guide]]'', a [[TV Guide]] IPG for North American [[digital cable]] boxes from 2007.]] -->

Interactive program guides are nearly ubiquitous in most broadcast media today. EPGs can be made available through television (on [[set-top box]]es and all current digital TV receivers), [[mobile phone]]s (particularly through [[smartphone]] [[mobile app|apps]]), and on the Internet. Online TV Guides are becoming more ubiquitous, with over 7 million searches for "TV Guide" being logged each month on [[Google]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Looking for TV Genius? |url=http://www.tvgenius.net/resources/white-papers/online-tv-guide-optimisation/ |website=TV Genius |publisher=Red Bee Media |accessdate=October 23, 2012 |deadurlurl-status=yesdead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20111213050201/http://www.tvgenius.net/resources/white-papers/online-tv-guide-optimisation/ |archivedate=December 13, 2011 |df= }}</ref>

For television, IPG support is built into almost all modern receivers for digital cable, [[Direct-broadcast satellite|digital satellite]], and over-the-air [[digital television|digital broadcasting]]. They are also commonly featured in digital video recorders such as [[TiVo]] and [[MythTV]]. Higher-end receivers for [[digital radio|digital broadcast radio]] and digital [[satellite radio]] commonly feature built-in IPGs as well.

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A growing trend is for manufacturers such as [[Elgato]] and [[Topfield]] and software developers such as [[Microsoft]] in their [[Windows Media Center]] to use an Internet connection to acquire data for their built-in IPGs. This enables greater interactivity with the IPG such as media downloads, [[Season ticket|series recording]] and programming of the recordings for the IPG remotely; for example, [[Icetv|IceTV]] in Australia enables TiVo-like services to competing DVR/PVR manufacturers and software companies.

In developing IPG software, manufacturers must include functions to address the growing volumes of increasingly complex data associated with programming. This data includes program descriptions, schedules and [[television content ratings systems|parental television ratings]], along with flags for technical and access features such as display formats, [[closed captioning]] and [[Descriptive Video Service]]. They must also include user configuration information such as favorite channel lists, and multimedia content. To meet this need, some set-top box software designs incorporate a "database layer" that utilizes either proprietary functions or a [[commercial off-the-shelf]] [[embedded database]] system for sorting, storing and retrieving programming data.<ref>{{cite web|title=Programming Guide Manages Networked Digital TV|url=http://www.eetimes.com/in_focus/communications/OEG20021127S0035|author=Andrei Gorine|website=EE Times|date=December 2002|accessdate=August 15, 2008}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Hybrid Data Management Gets Traction In Set-Top Boxes |url=http://www.embedded.com/columns/technicalinsights/209601833?_requestid=19509 |archive-url=http://arquivo.pt/wayback/20160523201602/http://www.embedded.com/columns/technicalinsights/209601833?_requestid=19509 |dead-url-status=yesdead |archive-date=2016-05-23 |author=Steve Graves |website=Embedded.com |date=July 2008 |accessdate=August 15, 2008 }}</ref>

==See also==