At the end of the 2nd project year, MHP-CONFIDENCE concentrated on test development for MHP specifications beyond MHP 1.0.3: MHP 1.1.2 and the PVR/PDR extensions which became available from DVB during the lifetime of the project.

Development for MHP 1.1.2
A research on these specification was carried out to prioritise those areas for assertion and test development which

• are most relevant for practical use, or are even already used in upcoming 1.0.2/1.0.3 products with extended functionality, e.g. in the Italian market (but without any conformance testing), and
• are likely to be not covered by other test creators.

A good summary (btw published by one of the project’s members) of the MHP 1.1.2 additional features is available at www.mhp.org/mhp_technology/mhp_1_1/tam0926-mhp112-for-www-mhp-org.pps.

MHP-CONFIDENCE took the following actions in order to identify the areas of MHP 1.1.2 specification requiring test coverage:

• Analysis of MHP 1.1.2 specification in comparison to MHP 1.0.3
• Identification of on-going specification changes (specification issues and their implemented solutions)
• Definition of requirements for generating assertions
• Development of test assertions

Identification of selected highlights for test development, based on test impact and expected market take-up of certain features of MHP 1.1.2.

DVB-HTML and Plugins were considered as not being of practical relevance in the near future. Since no earlier version of a MHP 1.1.2 Test Suite existed, and also no experience on interoperability with any MHP 1.1.2 implementations, a pure “specification centric” approach for identifying test assertions had to be chosen. The main additional areas of MHP 1.1.2 vs. 1.0.3 were identified and prioritised as following:

Tests assertions, strategies and test implementations were developed in a similar way as for MHP 1.0.3 by both, sub-contracting and development by partners. Validation and debugging of these tests is ongoing.

During this activity 65 specification issues for the MHP 1.1.2  area have been identified and discussed with DVB. Most of them have been successfully settled meanwhile.

Development for PVR/PDR
The MHP project carried out an investigation and estimation on APIs that are likely to be of high relevance for first PVR implementations. For example, the PVR/PDR specification for MHP in certain areas depends on the digital recording specification for GEM. This portion is therefore a candidate for high and world-wide exploitation.

Rather than attempting to provide complete coverage of MHP PVR/PDR, the MHP-CONFIDENCE project decided to focus on a subset likely to be relevant in early products and which are not likely to be addressed by others.

A good summary (btw published by one of the project’s members) of the MHP PVR/PDR additional features is available at www.mhp.org/mhp_technology/other_mhp_documents/tam0927-pvr-pdr-dvr-for-www-mhp-org.pps.

Since no earlier version of a PVR/PDR Test Suite existed, and also no experience on interoperability with any implementations, a pure “specification centric” approach for identifying test assertions had to be chosen. In a similar way as for the MHP 1.1.2 specification, the main areas for PVR/PDR were identified and prioritised as:

Assertions and Strategies for these tests were created and all reviewed and validated by project partners during the 3rd project year. During this activity 156 specification issues for the PVR/PDR area have been identified and discussed with DVB. Most of them have been successfully settled meanwhile.

An announcement to DVB on both activities, MHP 1.1.2 and PVR/PDR, is being made.