Digital work structure
A digital work for use within a rights management system for controlling use of the digital work in accordance with usage rights. The work is organized into an acyclic structure and includes a contents file including information related to content that can be interpreted by an interpreter, and a description tree file including descriptor blocks organized in a hierarchical manner. At least some of the descriptor blocks contain usage rights associated with the content. The usage rights specify a manner of use for the content.
1. A digital work organized into an acyclic structure for use within a system for enforcing usage rights associated with content, said digital work comprising:
a contents file including information related to content that can be interpreted by an interpreter; and
a description tree file including descriptor blocks organized in a hierarchical manner, at least some of said descriptor blocks containing usage rights associated with the content, said usage rights specifying a manner of use for the content,
wherein at least one of said descriptor block comprises a content identifier and a rights portion, said content identifier including a unique identifier of content and said rights portion containing said usage rights,
wherein said contents file comprises plural content portions,
wherein said rights portion comprises a rights code field containing a code indicative of a manner of use of the digital content and a status information field containing information relating to a state of the manner of use,
wherein at least one of said descriptor blocks does not include a content identifier and includes a pointer to a child descriptor block and a usage rights portion containing usage rights information associated with said child descriptor block, and
wherein said usage rights portion comprises a transactional component including a specification of said manner of use for the associated digital content and a specifications component specifying conditions that must be satisfied to exercise the manner of use or transaction related parameters.
2. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said usage rights information is contained in a data structure.
3. A digital work as recited in claim 2 , wherein said data structure is a lookup table containing the usage rights information.
4. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the interpreter is a rendering device for rendering the content into a desired form.
5. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said contents file comprises a stream of addressable bytes representing the information related to the content.
6. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said content portions are stored linearly.
7. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein each of the content identifiers include a pointer to one of said content portions.
8. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises at least one content object.
9. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises audio information.
10. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises video information.
11. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises textual information.
12. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises graphical information.
13. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the content comprises a computer program.
14. A digital work as recited in claim 13 , wherein the manner of use is a manner of executing the computer software.
15. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said contents file and said description tree file are adapted to be stored on the same device.
16. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said contents file and said description tree file are adapted to be stored on different devices.
17. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said contents file remains with said description tree file.
18. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said transaction related parameters specify a financial account.
19. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said usage rights portion further comprises a label indicating the manner of use specified by the transactional component.
20. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein said transactional component further comprises software instructions which implement the manner of use specified by the usage right.
21. A digital work as recited in claim 1 , wherein the manner of use is a manner of rendering and the content.
22. A digital work as recited in claim 21 , wherein the content is adapted to be rendered by a rendering system as the interpreter.
23. A digital work as recited in claim 21 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of displaying.
24. A digital work as recited in claim 21 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of playing.
25. A digital work as recited in claim 21 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of printing.
26. A data structure for specifying usage rights that can be associated with content for use within a system for enforcing use of the content in accordance with the usage rights, said data structure comprising:
a description tree file including descriptor blocks organized in a hierarchical manner, at least some of said descriptor blocks containing usage rights associated with the content, said usage rights specifying a manner of use for the content, at least one of said descriptor block comprises a unique identifier of content and a rights portion comprising a rights code field containing a code indicative of a manner of use of the digital content and a status information field containing information relating to a state of the manner of use,
wherein said content comprises plural content portions,
wherein at least one of said descriptor blocks does not include a content identifier and includes a pointer to a child descriptor block and a rights portion containing usage rights information associated with said child descriptor block, and
wherein said rights portion comprises a transactional component including a specification of said manner of use for the content and a specifications component specifying conditions that must be satisfied to exercise the manner of use or transaction related parameters.
27. A data structure as recited in claim 26 , wherein said rights portion further comprises a label indicating the manner of use.
28. A data structure as recited in claim 26 , wherein the manner of use is a manner of rendering and the content.
29. A data structure as recited in claim 28 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of displaying.
30. A data structure as recited in claim 28 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of playing.
31. A data structure is as recited in claim 28 , wherein the manner of rendering is a manner of printing.
32. A data structure as recited in claim 26 , wherein the manner of use is a manner of executing the computer software.