Patent ID: 7992187

Claim:
A dual-screen interactive digital television (IDTV) system, realized with a single-screen mode and a dual-screen mode by applying a modality-independent remote console technology, said system comprising: a host IDTV, including a host IDTV content, an IDTV middleware in communication with and managing said host IDTV content, a host graphic user interface (GUI) in communication with said IDTV middleware, and a server-side remote console control protocol in communication with said IDTV middleware and said host GUI, said host IDTV content at least including a computer program or a combination of a computer program and data; and a handheld device, including a handheld IDTV content comprising two user interface (UI) abstract descriptions that contain UI functional information without detailed presentation information of a concrete UI, an interface generator parsing said UI abstract descriptions and constructing a handheld concrete UI, a handheld GUI in communication with said interface generator, and a client-side remote console control protocol in communication with said interface generator, said two UI abstract descriptions including a UI abstract description of a single-screen IDTV input device realized in said single-screen mode, and a UI abstract description of said host IDTV content realized in said dual-screen mode; wherein said server-side remote console control protocol and said client-side remote console control protocol are connected by a multi-layer networking technology, UI input information to said host IDTV content is relayed through said client-side remote console control protocol and said multi-layer networking technology to said server-side remote control protocol, and transmitted by said IDTV middleware to said host IDTV content, UI output information from said host IDTV content is transmitted through said IDTV middleware to either said handheld GUI or said host GUI, and in said dual-screen mode, an AV content is presented on said host GUI but not on said handheld GUI and said UI output information from said host IDTV content is presented on said handheld GUI but not on said host GUI, said server-side remote control protocol enables said host IDTV content to become a remote console server with said handheld concrete UI of said handheld device being a remote console when said host IDTV content is a computer program or a combination of a computer program and data, and said server-side remote control protocol enables said IDTV middleware to become a remote console server when said host IDTV content is data.