Electronic program guide
Electronic program guide
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Electronic program guide

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Electronic program guide

Electronic programming guides (EPGs) and interactive programming guides (IPGs) are menu-based systems that provide users of television, radio, and other media applications with continuously updated menus that display scheduling information for current and upcoming broadcast programming (most commonly, TV listings). Some guides also feature backward scrolling to promote their catch up content. They are commonly known as guides or TV guides.

Non-interactive electronic programming guides (sometimes known as "navigation software") are typically available for television and radio, and consist of a digitally displayed, non-interactive menu of programming scheduling information shown by a cable or satellite television provider to its viewers on a dedicated channel. EPGs are transmitted by specialized video character generation (CG) equipment housed within each such provider's central headend facility. By tuning into an EPG channel, a menu is displayed that lists current and upcoming television shows on all available channels.

A more modern form of the EPG, associated with both television and radio broadcasting, is the interactive [electronic] programming guide (IPG, though often referred to as EPG). An IPG allows television viewers and radio listeners to navigate scheduling information menus interactively, selecting and discovering programming by time, title, channel or genre using an input device such as a keypad, computer keyboard or television remote control. Its interactive menus are generated entirely within local receiving or display equipment using raw scheduling data sent by individual broadcast stations or centralized scheduling information providers. A typical IPG provides information covering a span of seven or 14 days.

Data used to populate an interactive EPG may be distributed over the Internet, either for a charge or free of charge, and implemented on equipment connected directly or through a computer to the Internet.

Television-based IPGs in conjunction with Programme Delivery Control (PDC) technology can also facilitate the selection of TV shows for recording with digital video recorders (DVRs), also known as personal video recorders (PVRs).

In 1981, United Video Satellite Group launched the first EPG service in North America, a cable channel known simply as The Electronic Program Guide. It allowed cable systems in the United States and Canada to provide on-screen listings to their subscribers 24 hours a day (displaying programming information up to 90 minutes in advance) on a dedicated cable channel. Raw listings data for the service was supplied via satellite to participating cable systems, each of which installed a computer within its headend facility to present that data to subscribers in a format customized to the system's unique channel lineup. The EPG Channel would later be renamed Prevue Guide and go on to serve as the de facto EPG service for North American cable systems throughout the remainder of the 1980s, the entirety of the 1990s, and – as TV Guide Network or TV Guide Channel – for the first decade of the 21st century.

In 1986 at a trade show in Nashville, STV/Onsat, a print programming guide publisher, introduced SuperGuide, an interactive electronic programming guide for home satellite dish viewers. The system was the focus of a 1987 article in STV Magazine. The original system had a black-and-white display, and would locally store programming information for around one week in time. A remote control was used to interact with the unit. When the user found a show they wanted to watch, they would have to turn off the guide and then tune the satellite receiver to the correct service. The system was developed by Chris Schultheiss of STV/OnSat and engineer Peter Hallenbeck. The guide information was distributed by satellite using the home owner's dish as the receiver. The information was stored locally so that the user could use the guide without having to be on a particular satellite or service.

In March 1990, a second generation SuperGuide system was introduced that was integrated into the Uniden 4800 receiver. This version had a color display and the hardware was based on a custom chip; it was also able to disseminate up to two weeks of programming information. When the user found the show of interest, they pressed a button on the remote and the receiver tuned to the show they wanted to watch. This unit also had a single button recording function, and controlled VCRs via an infrared output. Available in North America, it was the first commercially available unit for home use that had a locally stored guide integrated with the receiver for single button viewing and taping. A presentation on the system was given at the 1990 IEEE consumer electronics symposium in Chicago.

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