Television programming system and operating method

摘要

A method for identifying program information for a viewer, the method comprising: receiving information from television program guides associated with a series of programs that are available in a series of transmitted program sources, where each transmitted program source provides a signal independent input containing the information for that source; receiving the input signals in a series of inputs of a user receiving system, each input signal being associated with one of the sources; generate a merged guide of television programs from the information received from program guides; generate a display of a series of program listings available in a first source of the series of transmitted program sources; receive a viewer selection from one of the displayed series of listings, in which the selected list is associated with a case of a particular program available at the first source of broadcast programs; and search the merged guide of television programs for another case of the particular program, available from any of these sources.