An electronic programme (or program) guide (EPG) or also an ínteractive program(me) guide or (IPG) is a on-screen guide to scheduled broadcast television programs, allowing a viewer to navigate, select and discover content by time, title, channel, genre, etc, using their remote control.
The technology is based upon broadcasting data to an application usually residing within middleware in a set-top box which connects to the television set and enables the application to be displayed. The technology is predominant in the digital television and radio world, but equally EPGs exist that rely upon analogue technology (using the VBI - or vertical blanking interval). These signals may arrive via cable TV, satellite TV, cable radio, satellite radio, or via over-the-air terrestrial broadcast stations.
By navigating through an EPG on a receiving device, users can see more information about the current program and about future programs. When EPGs are connected to PVRs, or Personal Video Recorders they enable a viewer to plan their viewing and record broadcast programs to a hard disk for later viewing.
Typical elements of an EPG comprise a graphical user interface which enable the display of program titles, descriptive information such as a synopsis, actors, directors, year of production and so on, the channel name and the programmes on offer from subchannels such as pay-per-view and VOD or video-on-demand services, program start times, genres and other descriptive metadata. The information is typically displayed on a grid with the option to select more information on each program. Radio EPGs offer simpler, more text-based displays of artist, album and track title information.
An EPG allows the viewer to browse programme summaries, search by genre or channel, immediate access to the selected program, reminders, and parental control functions. If the device is capable of it, an EPG can enable one-touch recording of programs, as some DirecTV IRDs can do with a VCR using an attached infrared emitter (which emulates a remote control).
EPGs are typically sent within the broadcast transport stream or alongside it in a special data channel. The ATSC standard for DTV uses tables sent in each station's PSIP, for example. These tables are meant to contain the program start time and title, and additional programme descriptive ´metadata´. In the U.S., these devices receive time signals from local PBS TV network affiliates, so that they can record on time. Most systems, however, rely upon third party ¨metadata aggregators¨ (companies such as Tribune TV Data or Gemstar TV Guide in the US and Europe), to provide good quality data content.
External links
For state-of-the-art digital EPGs see: [EPG applications][NDS], [TVTV.de], [TVTV.co.uk], [Gemstar]
Analogue EPGs: NexTView [Sourceforge/NextView Info]
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