Patent ID: 8626733

Claim:
A method of enabling a particular feature among a plurality of features contained in a software application loaded on one or more set-top boxes in a cable system, the one or more set-top boxes located remotely from a head-end in the cable system, the method comprising: at the head-end, receiving from a first requesting set-top box a first data profile request indicating one or more of a plurality of features contained in the software application to be enabled thereon; at the head-end, receiving from a second requesting set-top box a second data profile request indicating one or more of a plurality of features contained in the software application to be enabled thereon, wherein at least one of the software applications and the one or more features contained therein in the second data profile request differs from at least one of the software applications and the one or more features contained therein in the first data profile request; at the head-end, generating and transmitting a first data profile based on the first data profile request and a second data profile based on the second data profile request, each data profile comprising: a profile key identifying a sub-set of requesting set-top boxes each having loaded thereon a plurality of software applications for implementing one or more features, an application key identifying a corresponding software application having one or more features to be enabled, and a feature selector identifying the one or more features contained in the software application to be enabled; at the first requesting set-top box, enabling the one or more identified features contained in the identified software application by sending the data profile from the head-end to the plurality of set-top boxes such that each of the sub-set of requesting set-top boxes uses the first data profile after ascertaining that the profile key contained in the first data profile corresponds to the first requesting set-top box; and at the second requesting set-top box, enabling the one or more identified features contained in the identified software application by sending the data profile from the head-end to the plurality of set-top boxes such that each of the sub-set of requesting set-top boxes uses the second data profile after ascertaining that the profile key contained in the second data profile corresponds to the second requesting set-top box.