New ATSC PMCP Standard Powers PSIP

29-Nov-04

After two years of dedicated work by a wide range of broadcasters, service providers and equipment manufacturers, the Programming Metadata Communication Protocol (PMCP) was elevated to ATSC Standard A/76 by members of the Advanced Television Systems Committee, Inc. (ATSC).ìStandardization of PMCP could not have come at a better timeî said ATSC President Mark Richer. ìThe FCC mandate for full implementation of the ATSC PSIP standard (Program and System Information Protocol for Terrestrial Broadcast and Cable), comes into effect in February 1, 2005. PMCP will provide the capability for broadcasters and manufacturers to interconnect systems that process PSIP and DTV metadata to help meet that obligation.îPMCP is based on Extensible Markup Language (XML) message documents that are both human and machine readable, and which can be implemented across various system architectures. The standard includes an XML schema defining the message structure for carriage of information to populate the PSIP tables. It specifies which elements are allowed, their relationships, attributes and data types. ìBecause PSIP and other DTV metadata is originated or processed by several separate systems and equipment, up to now there have been some difficulties in communicating the metadata to the PSIP generator. Implementing PMCP will help ensure that transmitted PSIP information is complete and correct, with minimum manual intervention by the broadcaster,î explained Graham Jones of NAB and Chair of T3/S1, the ATSC Specialist Group On PSIP Metadata Communication. The PMCP Standard A/76 is complementary to, and references, existing ATSC standards and supports the ISO standard V-ISAN for unique identification of program content. Additional extensions are in the development stages to provide enhanced support for data broadcasting and enhanced VSB. A companion Guide to the Use of the PMCP Standard is also planned.For more information, visit http://www.atsc.org/standards.html

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