Patent ID: 12204806

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Reference will now be made in detail to the present embodiments of the disclosure, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. Wherever possible, the same reference numbers are used in the drawings and the description to refer to the same or like parts.

FIG.1is a simplified functional block diagram of a display system100in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. The display system100comprises an input device110, a control circuit120and a display circuit130. The control circuit120is coupled between the input device110and the display circuit130. The input device110and the control circuit120may be coupled to each other through various suitable wired or wireless transmission methods, such as universal serial bus (USB), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter (UART), wired network, etc. The control circuit120is configured to receive update data UDa from the input device110, and configured to output display data DDa to the display circuit130according to the update data UDa, so as to control on-screen display (OSD) information of the display circuit130. In some embodiments, the control circuit120may receive video data from an external video source (not shown, such as a display card), and the control circuit120is configured to synchronously generate display data DDa according to the update data UDa and the video data.

In some embodiments, the display circuit130comprises a display panel, a data driving circuit, a scan driving circuit and a timing control circuit. The control circuit120and the display circuit130may be integrated into the same display device, such as a television, a computer screen or an electronic signage.

A display control chip122of the control circuit120comprises a computing circuit124and a memory126. The computing circuit124may read the memory126, wherein the memory126is configured to store character images Cm0-Cmn respectively corresponding to characters of a character encoding format.

In an embodiment, the aforementioned character encoding format is Unicode. Therefore, the character image Cm67 is an image of the letter “C”, the character image Cm97 is an image of the letter “a”, etc. In another embodiment, the aforementioned character encoding format is American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII).

The computing circuit124may also read another memory128in the control circuit120. The memory128is configured to store text data TD, wherein the text data TD comprises one or a plurality of character strings. The computing circuit124is configured to update the text data TD by using the update data UDa. The computing circuit124is further configured to read the text data TD, and control the OSD information displayed by the display circuit130according to the text data TD. In some embodiments, the memory128is a non-volatile memory, such as an electrically-erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM) or a flash memory.

In some embodiments, the display control chip122and the memory128are different circuits located on the same circuit board. In other embodiments, the memory128is a pluggable memory device (e.g., an USB flash drive), and is electrically connected to the display control chip122in a pluggable manner.

For convenience of description, in the following embodiments of the operation method of the display control chip122, the Unicode is used as the character encoding format, but the present disclosure is not limited thereto. Person having ordinary skill in the art can understand based on the teachings of the present disclosure document that other suitable character encoding formats (e.g., ASCII) are also applicable to the operation method described below.

FIG.2is a flowchart of an operating method200in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. The operating method200is applicable to the display control chip122ofFIG.1. In step S210, the computing circuit124is configured to receive the update data UDa from the input device110. The input device is configured to encode input data with the aforementioned character encoding format, so as to generate the update data UDa.

For example, the input device110may receive the input data from the user through an input interface (not shown, e.g., a keyboard, a touch screen or a microphone). For example, when the user wants to use the display circuit130as an electronic bulletin board, the user can input the text “Call Brian” to be announced into the input device110as the input data. Next, the input device110may convert the input data “Call Brian” into an Unicode string, and transmit the Unicode string to the computing circuit124as the update data UDa. Before the transmission, the input device110may further encode the update data UDa with UTF-8 encoding format to compress the size of the update data UDa. In other words, in the case that the input data is “Call Brian”, the update data UDa may comprise 8 bytes, as shown in Table 1 below.

TABLE 1Byte number0123456789UTF-8 code43616c6c20427269616e

In some embodiments, the input device110may not need to comprise an input interface, and may generate the input data by itself. For example, the input device110may be a measuring instrument such as an illuminance meter, a decibel meter, etc., and the input device110may convert the measured value into the input data.

Next, in step S220, the computing circuit124updates the text data TD in the memory128by using the update data UDa. For example, the text data TD may comprise an Unicode string, and the computing circuit124replaces the Unicode string of the text data TD with the Unicode string of the update data UDa. Therefore, after step S220, the text data TD comprises the character string “Call Brian”.

Please refer toFIG.3at the same time.FIG.3is a schematic diagram of image overlaying in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. In step S230, the computing circuit124reads the text data TD in the memory128, and converts the text data TD into target images Tm0-Tm9 ofFIG.3according to the character images Cm0-Cmn in the memory126. In detail, the computing circuit124searches a corresponding character image among the character images Cm0-Cmn for each character of the character string “Call Brian” of the text data TD, and take the searched corresponding character image as the target image of the character. For example, the computing circuit124takes the character image Cm67 (i.e., the image of the letter “C”) as the first target image Tm0 of the character string “Call Brian”, takes the character image Cm97 (i.e., the image of the letter “a”) as the second target image Tm1 of the character string “Call Brian”, etc. In other words, the sequence of the target images Tm0-Tm9 corresponds to the sequence of characters in the character string of the text data TD.

In step S240, the computing circuit124outputs the display data DDa to the display circuit130according to the target images, so as to control the OSD information displayed by the display circuit130. For example, the computing circuit124is configured to overlay the target images Tm0-Tm9 to a background image Bm, and generates the display data DDa according to the result of overlaying. The display picture D_Pic inFIG.3is generated by the display circuit130according to the display data DDa, and the content of the display picture D_Pic is the new image generated by overlaying the target images Tm0-Tm9 to the background image Bm. In other words, the display picture D_Pic comprises the target images Tm0-Tm9 and the background image Bm at the same time, and the target images Tm0-Tm9 form the OSD information I_OSDa in the display picture D_Pic.

In some embodiments, the computing circuit124receives video data from an external video source (not shown, e.g., a display card) and acquires the background image Bm from the video data in step S240. In some embodiments that the external video source does not exist, the background image Bm may be stored in the memory126or the memory128.

In yet some embodiments, the computing circuit124determines whether it has received the video data from an external video source in step S240first. If it has, the computing circuit124acquires the background image Bm from the video data. If it has not, the computing circuit124reads the background image Bm in the memory126or the memory128.

In some embodiments, steps S210-S220may be performed repeatedly to modify the updated character string of the text data TD, until the computing circuit124receives an instruction from the input device110indicating the end of updating the text data TD. Next, the computing circuit124performs steps S230-S240.

FIG.4is a flowchart of an operating method400in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure, wherein the operating method400is applicable to the display control chip122.FIG.5is a schematic diagram of image overlaying in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure. In the following embodiments shown inFIG.4andFIG.5, the text data TD in the memory128comprises a plurality of character strings (e.g., 3 character strings, but the present disclosure is not limited thereto). In an embodiment, the character strings of the text data TD are shown in Table 2 below. The character strings of the text data TD are referred to by different numbers below, but this is only for convenience of description, and is not used to limit the storage format of the character strings of the text data TD.

TABLE 2Number010203Character stringMeeting03/1513:30

Step S410is similar to aforementioned step S210, except that the update data UDa comprises update target information in addition to the character string. The user can specify a specific character string of the text data TD that the user wants to update to the computing circuit124with the update target information. For example, the user can input the text “04/20” to the input device110, and specify to update the character string numbered with “02” of the text data TD, thus the update data UDa will comprise the character string “04/20” and the update target information corresponds to the number “02”.

In step S420, the computing circuit124determines the character string specified by the update target information first. Next, in step S430, the computing circuit124replaces the specified character string (i.e., the character string numbered with “02”) with the character string of the update data UDa. Therefore, after step S430, the text data TD is shown in Table 3 below.

Therefore, after step S430, the text data TD is shown in Table 3 below.

TABLE 3Number010203Character stringMeeting04/2013:30

Please refer toFIG.5together, in step S440, the computing circuit124converts the character strings of text data TD into the target images of groups G1-G3, according to the character images Cm0-Cmn. For example, the computing circuit124may perform an operation similar to the aforementioned step S230for each character string of the text data TD, so as to obtain the target images corresponds to the character string, and for the sake of brevity, details are not repeated here.

Step S450is similar to the aforementioned step S240, that is, the computing circuit124overlays the target images of the groups G1-G3 to the background image Bm to generate the display data DDa. The difference between steps S450and S240is that in step S450, the computing circuit124uses the groups G1-G3 to respectively form three fields F_title, F_date and F_time of the OSD information I_OSDb inFIG.5. In conclusion, with the operation method400, the user can update the content of the specific field of the OSD information I_OSDb.

In some embodiments, steps S410-S430may be performed repeatedly to update different character strings of the text data TD or modify the updated character string of the text data TD, until the computing circuit124receives an instruction from the input device110indicating the end of updating the text data TD. Next, the computing circuit124performs steps S440-S450.

In some embodiments, during the process of receiving the update data UDa and updating the text data TD by the computing circuit124(i.e., during steps S210-S220or steps S410-S430), the computing circuit124may read a default image in the memory126and generate the display data according to the default image, so as to control the display circuit130to provide a display picture comprising the default image. The default image is used to inform the user that the computing circuit124is receiving the update data UDa. For example, the default image may comprise text such as “character string sending”. In other embodiments, when the computing circuit124finish updating the text data TD (i.e., finish performing step S250or S430), the computing circuit124may read another default image in the memory126, and control the display circuit130to provide a display picture comprising the another default image. The another default image is used to inform the user that the computing circuit124has finished updating the text data TD. For example, the another default image may comprise text such as “character string modified successfully”.

FIG.6is a simplified functional block diagram of a display system600in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure. The display system600comprises the input device110, a control circuit620and the display circuit130. The display system600is similar to the display system100inFIG.1, thus only the differences between the two will be described below. The control circuit620comprises the display control chip122, the memory128and a timing circuit622. The timing circuit622is configured to calculate an operating time of the display circuit130. The operation time is, for example, the total lighting time of the display circuit130in a fixed time period (e.g., one day or one week).

The timing circuit622can convert the operation time into a character string (e.g., a character string “the screen time is 3 hours and 20 minutes”), and encode the character string by using the same character encoding format as that of the display control chip122, so as to output update data UDb to the computing circuit124. The computing circuit124may update the text data TD in the memory128with the update data UDb in a manner similar to the aforementioned step S220or similar to the aforementioned steps S420-S430. For the sake of brevity, details are not repeated here.

It can be known from the above that the display system100inFIG.1and the display system600inFIG.6can store customized information for a long time. Even if the display device formed by the control circuit120(or the control circuit620) and the display circuit130is powered off, the display device can still display the information previously stored by the user again when the display device is powered on next time. Therefore, the display systems100and600have a high flexibility, and are suitable for various situations where OSD information needs to be modified. For example, The management personnel of a company may push the information to be announced to each display device in the local network, through the main control computer of the local network. For another example, the user of the display device may use the OSD information to mark to-do items on the display device.

Certain terms are used in the specification and the claims to refer to specific components. However, those of ordinary skill in the art would understand that the same components may be referred to by different terms. The specification and claims do not use the differences in terms as a way to distinguish components, but the differences in functions of the components are used as a basis for distinguishing. Furthermore, it should be understood that the term “comprising” used in the specification and claims is open-ended, that is, including but not limited to. In addition, “coupling” herein includes any direct and indirect connection means. Therefore, if it is described that the first component is coupled to the second component, it means that the first component can be directly connected to the second component through electrical connection or signal connections including wireless transmission, optical transmission, and the like, or the first component is indirectly electrically or signally connected to the second component through other component(s) or connection means.

It will be understood that, in the description herein and throughout the claims that follow, the phrase “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one or more of the associated listed items. Unless the context clearly dictates otherwise, the singular terms used herein include plural referents.

Although the present disclosure has been described in considerable detail with reference to certain embodiments thereof, other embodiments are possible. Therefore, the spirit and scope of the appended claims should not be limited to the description of the embodiments contained herein. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made to the structure of the present disclosure without departing from the scope or spirit of the present disclosure. In view of the foregoing, it is intended that the present disclosure cover modifications and variations of this disclosure provided they fall within the scope of the following claims and their equivalents.