MHEG-5 Country Profiles

MHEG uses a country profiles system to allow some flexibility when it comes to deploying the technology. Country profiles of the MHEG-5 specification are used for the implementation and deployment of MHEG-5-based services on a given platform. Profiles define the sections of the MHEG specification that are mandatory for a specific market and also extend the specification where necessary for country-specific requirements.


MHEG-5 was developed by the DAVIC project and was originally published as an ISO specification (ISO-13522-5). This was first profiled for implementation in the UK DTT launch of OnDigital, (now Freeview) and the profile has been maintained and enhanced over the years by the Digital TV Group (DTG) and published as part of the DBook receiver specifications. A comprehensive conformance test suite has been developed by DTG Testing (part of the DTG). The UK Profile was also standardised as ETSI specification ES 202184.


MHEG-5 has been profiled for other platforms and territories, including New Zealand, Hong Kong, South Africa, Australia, Malaysia and the Freesat platform in the UK. These profiles have added extensions to the DBook profiles including:


• Additional character sets (Maori in NZ; traditional Chinese in HK)
• PVR support (NZ and Australia)
• File System Acceleration (cache) in Australia and South Africa
 

In all cases, the DTG Testing conformance test suites have - or are being - extended or adapted to include the features of the relevant profile in order to provide similar cost-effective conformance testing.


The latest version of the MHEG specification in DBook Version 6.2, plus many of the international profile extensions, have now been standardised in a new version of the ETSI ES 202184. This enables territories and operators who wish to use MHEG-5 to reference an international public standard rather than the DTG publications.


Please visit DTG Testing for more information. Alternatively visit our MHEG Country Profiles Links page, which will help you find more detailed information about each deployment and how they work.