Patent ID: 8566869

Claim:
A machine implemented method comprising the steps of: receiving, at an interactive television platform, a plug-in module from a first interactive television virtual machine during a process registering the first interactive television virtual machine, the plug-in allows detection of a first interactive television format, the first interactive television format is one of a plurality of interactive television formats; receiving a digital television data stream at the interactive television platform; analyzing the digital television data stream by the interactive television platform to determine which of the plurality of interactive television formats is present, the analyzing includes using the plug-in module to detect whether the first interactive television format is present; searching a list of interactive television virtual machines to determine whether a virtual machine is available for an interactive television format present in the digital television data stream, each of the interactive television virtual machines in the list is adapted for at least one of the interactive television formats; loading the first interactive television virtual machine in response to determining that the interactive television format present in the digital television data stream includes the first interactive television format; and hosting the first virtual machine by the interactive television platform after the loading, including providing a plurality of services to the first virtual machine through a plurality of common application programming interfaces (APIs), a first of the APIs is a generic tuning interface, the generic tuning interface is used by each of the interactive television virtual machines.