The OpenCable Application Platform (OCAP) is a software middleware layer that resides functionally on top of the Operating System of a OpenCable terminal or receiver. It provides an interface enabling application portability. A fundamental requirement is that applications written for OpenCable be capable of running on any network and on any hardware platform, without recompilation.
The OCAP specification is built on the DVB MHP 1.0 specification with modifications for the North American Cable environment that includes a full time return channel. A major modification to the MHP is the addition of a Presentation Engine (PE), that supports HTML, XML, ECMAScript. A bridge between the PE and the Java Execution Engine (EE), enables PE applications to obtain privileges and directly manipulate privileged operations