| Document | Document Title |
|---|---|
| US08955271B2 |
Sliding door assembly
A modular wall assembly includes a frame assembly that includes at least one vertical frame member and at least one horizontal frame member, wherein the frame assembly is configured to define a door opening, a door member slidably operable between a closed position, wherein the door member is at least partially located within the door opening, and an open position, wherein the door member is at least partially removed from with the door opening to allow ingress and egress through the door opening, and a support assembly that includes a sliding support member that slidably supports the door member between the open and closed positions, and at least one mounting arrangement coupling the sliding support member, wherein the at least one mounting arrangement allows vertical adjustment of the sliding support member with respect to the frame assembly. |
| US08955261B2 |
Retail marketing environment
Retail marketing environments of the present technology include retail stores and store layouts that provide a plurality of experience zones to guide a consumer through a purchasing experience. The first experience zone includes the front façade of the retail store and at least one window display case displaying merchandise that can be viewed through the front window. The second experience zone includes an interactive display that provides product information to consumers. The third experience zone includes at least one merchandise display area and at least one merchandise handling area. The fourth experience zone includes a plurality of interaction areas in which consumers can interact with store employees. A veil wall can be used to separate one or more of the experience zones. |
| US08955258B2 |
Transportable immersive motion picture display structures
A transportable large capacity theatre includes a primary theatre body with laterally spaced apart first and second long sides, opposing first and second ends attached to the long sides, and a roof over the long sides and ends, the body defining an enclosed interior chamber. The roof, the long sides and the ends may be defined by a plurality of laterally extending inflated tubes, and the long sides of the primary theatre body may have a substantially vertical orientation relative to a surface on which theatre may be supported for at least a major portion of the height of the respective long sides. The theatre further includes a seating section, a display screen positioned in the interior of the primary theatre body and viewable by a viewer seated in the seating section, and a projection system in the interior of the primary theatre body and in communication with the screen. |
| US08955254B1 |
Self-storing security door assembly
A self-storing security door assembly including a door frame and a self-storing glass sub-assembly is disclosed. The door frame may include four side members and a freeze bar extending two opposing side members. The freeze bar may also divide a first portion of the door frame from a second portion of the door frame. A glass section may be coupled over the first portion of the door frame, and a screen section may be coupled over the second portion of the door frame. The self-storing glass sub-assembly may be coupled to the door frame included two protruding tracks. Each protruding track may include a channel and be positioned on an interior edge of opposing side members. At least two opposing side members may also include a recessed track on an interior edge. Each recessed track may include a channel between the protruding track and the respective side member. |
| US08955253B2 |
Sensor for use with automatic door
A detecting unit (14) forms a plurality of detection spots arranged two-dimensionally on a floor surface near a door panel (12). Each detection spot is capable of detecting a human or an object by infrared light independently from other detection spots. Region distinguishing means (30) distinguishes a region formed by plural ones of the said detection spots that have detected the human or object. Person's movement judging means (44) judges the direction in which the distinguished region moves. A signal which causes a door panel (12) to be opened is supplied to a door controller (34) only when the direction of movement of the distinguished region is the direction toward the door panel. |
| US08955250B2 |
Breakaway bracket for use with modular tree guard
Various embodiments related to a tree guard are disclosed. One embodiment provides an L shaped breakaway bracket for use with a modular tree guard assembly. The L shaped breakaway bracket includes a horizontal member extending substantially perpendicularly from a vertical member, wherein the vertical member is thinner and longer than the horizontal member. At least one fastener hole is provided in the horizontal member for receiving a fastener for securing the horizontal member to a rail. At least one fastener hole is provided in the vertical member for receiving a fastener for securing the vertical member to a post. The breakaway bracket is adapted to break along the intersection of the horizontal member and the vertical member and separate the rail from the post when a force that would otherwise be sufficient to deform the rail is applied to the rail. |
| US08955244B2 |
System and method for mounting a badge on a vehicle
A system for mounting a badge to a component of a vehicle is provided. The system comprises a mounting base including a fastening aperture extending in a direction through a plane defined by the mounting base, a trim ring coupled with a peripheral edge of the mounting base and configured to selectively mount the badge between the trim ring and the mounting base when said trim ring is coupled with the peripheral edge, and a flexible fastening member including a first end that is fixedly coupled with the mounting base and a second end that is positioned within the fastening aperture. The flexible fastening member is configured to be positioned around at least a portion of a component of a vehicle and between the mounting base and the badge to fasten the badge to the vehicle. |
| US08955240B1 |
Greeting card with pull activated effects
The greeting card of the present invention contains a sound mechanism which is operative to replay one or more audio clips upon a user pulling a pull device which extends outward from the front of the greeting card. The pull device controls activation of the audio but also serves as a three-dimensional aspect of the scene or picture printed on the front of the greeting card. |
| US08955228B2 |
System consisting of a small electrical device and an auxiliary electrical device assigned thereto
A system comprising a primary electrical device, such as a shaver, and an auxiliary electrical device, such as a shaver cleaner, defining a receiving arrangement for receiving the primary electrical device. The primary electrical device includes a first connector configured to couple with an associated connector of the auxiliary device to transmit electrical or electromagnetic energy between the devices. The primary electrical device includes an additional connector configured to couple the primary electrical device for receiving electrical or electromagnetic energy, such as from an electric mains voltage. |
| US08955226B2 |
Utility knife
A utility knife includes a handle, a blade assembly secured to the handle, a blade cover mechanically coupled to the handle facilitating manipulability of the blade cover to an extended position over the blade assembly, and a slider that is repositionable along the handle to release the blade cover from the extended position, the slider being pivotally coupled to the blade assembly. |
| US08955220B2 |
Powder metal scrolls and sinter-brazing methods for making the same
Methods of forming scroll compressor components are provided. The methods include forming at least one component of a scroll member from a powder metallurgy technique and joining the component with another distinct component via a sinter-brazing process. For example, a baseplate having a spiral scroll involute is joined to a hub via a joint interface having brazing material to form a braze joint with superior quality. At least one component is formed from a powder metal material including carbon and at least one species that reacts with or binds carbon to prevent migration during brazing of the sinter-brazing heat process. Optionally, during the powder metallurgy process, an alloy with a lower concentration of carbon is selected, which may be incorporated into a crystal structure with the species that prevents carbon migration. |
| US08955212B2 |
Method for manufacturing a micro-electro-mechanical microphone
A micro-electro-mechanical microphone and manufacturing method thereof are provided. The micro-electro-mechanical microphone includes a diaphragm, which is formed on a surface of one side of a semiconductor substrate, exposed to the outside surroundings, and can vibrate freely under the pressure generated by sound waves; an electrode plate with air holes, which is under the diaphragm; an isolation structure for fixing the diaphragm and the electrode plate; an air gap cavity between the diaphragm and the electrode plate, and a back cavity under the electrode plate and in the semiconductor substrate; and a second cavity formed on the surface of the same side of the semiconductor substrate and in an open manner The air gap cavity is connected with the back cavity through the air holes of the electrode plate The back cavity is connected with the second cavity through an air groove formed in the semiconductor substrate. |
| US08955211B2 |
Manufacturing an electrode array for a stimulating medical device
A method of forming an electrode array is disclosed, the method comprising: forming an elongate comb structure comprising a plurality of longitudinally-spaced electrode contacts extending from and supported by a spine; electrically connecting each of a plurality of electrically conductive pathways to a respective one of the plurality of electrode contacts; placing the conductive pathways adjacent the contacts; placing silicone over the conductive pathways and contacts; curing the silicone so as to substantially retain the longitudinal spacing between neighboring contacts; and severing the spine from the plurality of electrode contacts. |
| US08955210B2 |
Fastener, installation tool and related method of use
A fastener installation tool and related method are provided for installing fasteners in boards, where the boards are installed immediately adjacent one another, without a gap established therebetween. The tool can include an alignment projection that projects a preselected distance downwardly from a lower surface of the tool. The alignment projection can be disposed between opposing corners of first and second boards to install a fastener without establishing a gap between the boards. This construction can be suitable for installing boards constructed from materials that shrink over time, such as wet, treated lumber or other materials, and even non-shrinkable boards where tighter spacing is desired. A related method of installation is provided. |
| US08955207B2 |
Method for disassembling flat display device
The present disclosure relates to a method for disassembling a flat display device including a panel that includes a pair of glass substrates each having display materials formed on a surface thereof, the glass substrates being arranged so as to face each other. In the disassembling method, rotation body (10) which has recesses and projections (10a) inside thereof and rotates at a non-constant speed is used. The panel is disassembled so as to be separated into glass substrates (1a) and (1b) to thereby expose the display materials, glass substrates (1a) and (1b) each having the display materials formed on the surface thereof are then put into rotation body (10), and rotation body (10) is then rotated to perform a process for removing the display materials from the surface of each of glass substrates (1a) and (1b). |
| US08955204B2 |
Buckle with housing comprising elastomeric damping mass
A buckle for a safety harness in motor vehicles includes a buckle housing and a locking and unlocking mechanism housed therein, and a buckle tongue interacting with the locking and unlocking mechanism. The plastic buckle housing is provided with a silencing damping mass. The damping mass (12) is applied to the housing shells (10, 13) on the inside of the buckle housing to reduce the interior volume of the housing not occupied by the locking and unlocking mechanism. |
| US08955201B2 |
Flexible strap for a securement mechanism
Flexible straps for a carrier include a strap body having a top, bottom, two lateral and two end surfaces. The strap body has a lengthwise axis, a widthwise axis and a thickness axis. At least one aperture can extend through the strap body from the top to the bottom surface and can be space apart from each other along the lengthwise axis by a spacer portion. The flexible strap includes a spacer cross-sectional area defined by an area of a cross-section of the spacer portion cut by a plane oriented orthogonally to the lengthwise axis. The flexible strap includes an aperture cross-sectional area defined by an area of a cross-section taken at a widthwise widest point of at least one of the apertures cut by a plane oriented orthogonally to the lengthwise axis. The aperture cross-sectional area is greater than at least two-thirds of the spacer cross-sectional area. |
| US08955200B2 |
Secure adjustable orthotic device
A secure adjustable orthotic device having multiple brace portions and one or more locking mechanisms. One locking mechanism is a level moving buckle including a top member, a locking member and a base member. The locking member is adapted to engage and disengage an inserted strap in response to the longitudinal movement of the top member relative to the base member. The level moving buckle inhibits accidental longitudinal movement of the inserted strap when the top member is in a locked position. |
| US08955198B2 |
Releasable strap mount
A releasable strap mount having a strap body and a cooperating locking head. The strap body is elongated between first and second ends with an outer interlock engagement member positioned adjacent to the first end. The locking head has an interface surface and an opposite external interconnect, and a passageway extended therethrough that is sized to accept the strap body lengthwise therethrough. The locking head also has an interlock member for releasably interlocking with the outer interlock engagement member of the strap body within the passageway. A releasable rotation coupling is formed between the locking head and the second end of the strap body. The strap body has a plurality of intervening coupling members spaced at intervals along a length thereof, and the strap body is divisible adjacent to each of the intervening coupling members between the intervening coupling member and its second end for shortening the strap body. |
| US08955197B2 |
Detachable grab handle
A detachable handle includes a flexible elongate member, a pair of swivel clips, and a tubular grip. Each of the swivel clips is coupled to the flexible elongate member. The flexible elongate member is disposed through the tubular grip. The swivel clips are disposed at opposite ends of the tubular grip, and militate against a removal of the flexible elongate member from the tubular grip. |
| US08955194B2 |
Fire door hinge with fusible pin
A closures mechanism for a door actuated during a fire, which causes the door to automatically close. The present invention provides a hinge with opposing hinge plates comprising a door leaf and a frame leaf each pivotal around a hinge pin and spring. A hinge spring nub is anchored within a channel having a fusible block that prevents the spring nub and tension from traveling the channel. At a predetermined temperature the fusible block ruptures causing the spring nub and spring tension to move into engagement with the door attached to the hinge door leaf thereby causing the door to close by means of the tensioned spring's kinetic energy. |
| US08955190B2 |
Combined self-cleaning toothbrush and tongue scraper
A toothbrush with improved cleaning after use and integral tongue cleaning features. Multiple groups of brush bristles are positioned around a plurality of cleaning openings that extend through the head of the brush head. Multiple upstanding tongue engagement surfaces are positioned in parallel spaced relation to one another between the flow through cleaning openings for selective engagement on the surface of the user's tongue. |
| US08955187B2 |
Cleaning apparatus
The invention relates to a cleaning apparatus, in particular for cleaning solar installation surfaces or photovoltaic installation surfaces, comprising a carrier, at least one cleaning roller rotatably supported at the carrier, and a rotary drive for the cleaning roller, wherein the rotary drive is designed as a fluid drive, wherein the flow of a cleaning fluid supplied to the cleaning roller for cleaning purposes is converted into a drive movement for the cleaning roller. |
| US08955186B2 |
Electric toothbrushes
A toothbrush has a body, a brush head, and a neck extending between the body and the brush head. The toothbrush also has a massaging element, a plurality of bristles, and a plurality of massaging tips. The brush head has a front face and a rear face. The massaging element is disposed on the rear face of the brush head, while the plurality of bristles and the plurality of massaging tips extend from the front face. |
| US08955185B2 |
Direct drive electric toothbrush
An electric toothbrush has an axially elongated body having a handle defining a hollow interior region for holding a motor disposed therein, a head comprising a static bristle holder plate having tufts of bristles disposed thereon and an oscillatory head bristle holder with other tufts of bristles disposed thereon. One end of the drive shaft is connected to the motor and an opposite end to a cam for directly driving the cam which has at least one lobe a portion of which cam is received in an oscillatory cavity for imparting a pushing force on the walls of the oscillatory cavity in response to rotation of the drive shaft for moving the oscillatory head bristle holder with a back and forth oscillatory motion. By eliminating the need for precision gearing, this direct drive arrangement simplifies and makes more efficient the translation of rotary motion into oscillatory motion. |
| US08955182B1 |
Perimeter-wrapped mattress and method of manufacture
A mattress (22) having a foam core (8) completely extends to the perimeter edges of the mattress wherein side walls (15) of the foam core are compressed inward and held in place using a preferably non-woven strip of fabric (21) or similar non-elastic or non-stretchable material that is wrapped around the side walls of the foam core. A method of wrapping the foam core allows corners (5) of the foam core to be formed under the inward pressure of the non-woven fabric, thereby creating a strong perimeter for the mattress that prevents outward pressure against the sidewalls created by the downward pressure of an individual lying on the mattress from flattening of the mattress by providing more upward pushback against the individual. An optional layer of micro-coil springs (2a) may be located within the foam core to provide more buoyancy and springiness in the mattress. |
| US08955180B2 |
Stretcher with improved use efficiency
A litter comprising two arm shafts. The first arm shaft being the lock receiving frame arm and having a first locking member and a locking shaft having a second locking member. The second and first members interact to releasably retain the two arm shaft adjacent one another. Strap retaining means, each interacting with a strap, are place separately along the first arm shaft. The second arm shaft is a strap receiving arm with at least one ratchet dimensioned to receive a strap. A one torque limiter prevents each strap from being tightened beyond a preset tension point. A ratchet shaft, with a handle, is within the second arm shaft and in rotatable connection with each ratchet. Each arm shaft has a lockable handle rotatable around each end, able to rotate to serve as handles or legs. |
| US08955178B2 |
Adjustable furniture
A novel article of adjustable bed is disclosed. The adjustable bed comprises at least two body-support portions and a base support for supporting the body support portions. The body support portions are mounted with respect to the base to allow angular adjustment of their relative positions to alter the configuration of the bed. Actuators are provided for angularly moving one or more of the body-support portions to effect angular adjustment of the bed. A load-bearing member projects from one of the moveable body-support portions and is supported by a bearing means arranged to run on a curved support such that each moveable body-support portion is pivotally mounted with respect to the base about a respective pivot axis defined by the center of curvature of the respective curved support. The pivot axis of the movable body-support portion is positioned above the base in a plane offset from the top edge thereof. |
| US08955176B1 |
Adjustable bed frame
An adjustable bed frame that includes a headboard, a footboard, a quartet of support posts associated with the headboard and footboard, and support frames that connect the headboard posts to the footboard posts. Both the headboard and footboard are fabricated from two equal halves that can be separated, exposing an internal leaf. Both the headboard and footboard, in conjunction with their internal leaves, can be adjusted to a variety of lengths to accommodate various-sized box springs and mattresses as needed. |
| US08955173B2 |
Portable multifunctional commode chair
A portable multifunctional commode chair includes: a chair including a foldable chair back, foldable chair legs and a cushion, wherein a seat hole is provided at a center of the cushion; a concave slot is provided along an edge of said seat hole; a plastic bag is provided in the seat hole and fixed in the concave slot; an anal plug for being inserted into an anus; an adjustable dripping stand hinged on the chair and comprising a dripping bag connected to the anal plug; a closing covering comprising an upper supporting ring and a lower supporting ring, wherein connecting elements are provided at a center of the upper supporting ring; an opaque textile or a plastic cloth is surrounding between the upper supporting ring and the lower supporting ring and a door for opening and closing is provided on the opaque textile or the plastic cloth. |
| US08955170B2 |
Swimming goggles
Swimming goggles include left and right frame bodies installed with lenses, a connecting element, and protective pads and head strap bases respectively disposed on the left and right frame bodies. The left and right frame bodies each of which has an inner peripheral face and an outer peripheral face, and the protective pads each has a face contact portion and a connecting portion. Contours of the outer peripheral faces of the left and right frame bodies and the face contact portions are fit to face portions with respect to inner peripheries of eye sockets of a cranium of a wearer. Upper and lower edges of the face contact portions with respect to lower sides of eyebrows and lower sides of under-eye bags remain gaps with the connecting portions in a manner that the upper and lower edges of the face contact portions are nearly in contact with the connecting portions. |
| US08955169B2 |
Helmet omnidirectional energy management systems
An embodiment of a safety helmet for protecting the human head against repetitive impacts, moderate impacts and severe impacts so as to significantly reduce the likelihood of both translational and rotational brain injury and concussions includes a outer shell, an outer liner disposed within and coupled to the outer shell, and an inner liner disposed within and coupled in spaced opposition to the outer liner by a plurality of isolation dampers for omnidirectional movement of the inner liner relative to the outer liner and the outer shell. |
| US08955168B2 |
Surgical protective system head gear assembly including high volume air delivery system
A surgical protective assembly having an air movement device and a head gear assembly carrying the air movement device. The head gear assembly includes an outer wall, an inner wall, a front end, a back end and a middle portion between the front end and the back end. The outer wall has an upper opening, the inner wall has an array of openings, and the inner and outer wall define a front opening at the front end. The head gear assembly has a passageway that fluidly connects together, the upper opening, the array and the front opening. |
| US08955167B2 |
Golf glove
A golf glove having improved fit and gripping features is disclosed herein. The golf glove of the present invention includes gripping features permanently disposed on one or more of the fingers, preferably the front surfaces of the ring and little fingers, and also includes an expandable slit that extends from an opening and that helps the golf glove expand to receive a golfer's hand and then retract so that the glove fits comfortably on the golfer's hand. |
| US08955166B1 |
Astronaut glove with finger extensions
Finger extensions for astronaut gloves are disposed in sleeves on digits of the gloves. Different embodiments for the extensions are illustrated and discussed. The sleeves are secured to the tops of the digits. The extension elements include bases disposed in the sleeves and tips at outer ends of the bases. The tips may include pads which contact elements desired to be manipulated. The extensions are pivotal with the movement of the astronaut's digits in a glove. Only a slight movement of the astronaut's digits is required to provide the required dexterity for the astronaut user to grasp, pick up, move, etc., desired elements with the extensions. Inflexible rings about the extensions are fixed to the gloves prevent reverse bending of the extensions and maintain the extensions generally parallel to the users fingers. The extensions may be fixed or extendable and retractable, as desired. Particular designs for the extensions may depend on the desired task for the astronaut or astronauts and the elements with which the astronaut(s) will be working. |
| US08955165B1 |
Article of clothing for storing and deploying a scarf
A clothing article surrounds a wearer's upper torso. The article includes connected front portion, a collar. A sleeve is formed in the front portion. A jacket, and coat with an attachable/detachable scarf will be folded and stored in the inter portion of the front side of the collar area with elastic at each end and Velcro onto the inner portion of your collar, therefore eliminating the lost of them by any consumers, and especially children. A sleeve like collar attached to the coat and jacket for storing a scarf and making it easily deployable while in use. |
| US08955162B2 |
Welding helmet including anti-blinding device to selectively and conveniently control welding operation and grinding operation
Disclosed is a welding helmet including an anti-blinding device to selectively control a welding operation and a grinding operation, and more particularly, a welding helmet, which stably protects the welder's eyes and enables easy switching of the anti-blinding device from a welding operation mode to a grinding operation mode or vice versa without taking off the welding helmet. In addition to the anti-blinding device to protect the welder's eyes from light emitted from a welding or cutting torch during a welding or grinding operation, a switch is provided at an outer surface of the welding helmet to allow a welder to conveniently select a welding operation mode or a grinding operation mode without taking off the welding helmet. |
| US08959657B2 |
Secure data management
The disclosed subject matter includes a method. The method includes identifying an attempt to access, by an application instance running in a user space of an operating system, a first security zone of a computer readable medium, where the first security zone is associated with a first security level. The method further includes determining whether a restriction level associated with the application instance is higher than the first security level, where the restriction level is a function of previous security zones that have been accessed by the application instance. When the restriction level associated with the application instance is higher than the first security level, the method would prevent the application instance from writing to the first security zone. When the restriction level associated with the application instance is not higher than the first security level, the method would authorize the application instance to access the first security zone. |
| US08959652B2 |
Graduated authentication in an identity management system
A method and system for graduated security in an identity management system utilize differing levels of time sensitivity, channel security and authentication security to provide a multi-dimensional approach to providing the right fit for differing identity requests. The differing levels of security can be selected by user preference, membersite request or homesite policy. |
| US08959651B2 |
Protecting privacy data in MapReduce system
A method for protecting privacy data in a MapReduce system comprising a private subsystem and a public subsystem includes receiving a MapReduce program to be executed in the MapReduce system, wherein the MapReduce program contains instructions that designate the privacy property of the input and output data of a Map function and the output data of a Reduce function; detecting the privacy property of the input and output data of the Map function and the output data of the Reduce function prior to execution of the MapReduce program; and assigning the data for processing by the private subsystem and the public subsystem based on the detected privacy property, wherein the data of which the privacy property is private are assigned to the private subsystem. |
| US08959646B2 |
Automated detection and validation of sanitizers
Methods, systems, and computer-readable storage media for analyzing security of dataflows in programs. In some implementations, actions include processing source code using static analysis to: identify one or more dataflows and one or more candidate sanitizers, each candidate sanitizer being associated with a respective dataflow, and provide an executable sub-program for each candidate sanitizer to provide one or more executable sub-programs, processing the one or more executable sub-programs using dynamic analysis to: execute the one or more executable sub-programs, and provide dynamic analysis results, providing combined results based on the static analysis and the dynamic analysis, the combined results including the dynamic analysis results, and assigning a priority to each result in the combined results. |
| US08959644B2 |
Use of popularity information to reduce risk posed by guessing attacks
A popularity determination module (PDM) is described which reduces the effectiveness of statistical guessing attacks. The PDM operates by receiving a password (or other secret information item) from a user. The PDM uses a model to determine whether the password is popular among a group of users. If so, the PDM may ask the user to select another password. In one implementation, the model corresponds to a probabilistic model, such a count-min sketch model. The probabilistic model provides an upper-bound assessment of a number of times that a password has been encountered. Further, the probabilistic model provides false positives (in which passwords are falsely assessed as popular) at a rate that exceeds a prescribed minimum rate. The false positives are leveraged to reduce the effectiveness of statistical guessing attacks by malicious entities. |
| US08959643B1 |
Detecting malware infestations in large-scale networks
A method for detecting a malicious activity in a network. The method includes obtaining file download flows from the network, analyzing, the file download flows to generate malicious indications using a pre-determined malicious behavior detection algorithm, extracting a file download attribute from a suspicious file download flow of a malicious indication, wherein the file download attribute represents one or more of the URL, the FQDN, the top-level domain name, the URL path, the URL file name, and the payload of the suspicious file download flow, determining the file download attribute as being shared by at least two suspicious file download flows, identifying related suspicious file download flows and determining a level of association between based at least on the file download attribute, computing a malicious score of the suspicious file download flow based on the level of association, and presenting the malicious score to an analyst user of the network. |
| US08959642B2 |
Real time lockdown
A system and method that trusts software executables existent on a machine prior to activation for different types of accesses e.g. execution, network, and registry. The system detects new executables added to the machine as well as previously existent executables that have been modified, moved, renamed or deleted. In certain embodiments, the system will tag the file with a flag as modified or newly added. Once tagged, the system intercepts particular types of file accesses for execution, network or registry. The system determines if the file performing the access is flagged and may apply one or more policies based on the requested access. In certain embodiments, the system intercepts I/O operations by file systems or file system volumes and flags metadata associated with the file. For example, the NT File System and its extended attributes and alternate streams may be utilized to implement the system. |
| US08959640B2 |
Controlling anti-virus software updates
The present invention relates to a method of controlling the download of anti-virus software updates to a device. The device is configured to transmit an update query to a network device requesting information on whether any updates are available for the anti-virus software. When the device receives the response it stores the response in the cache. The cache can then be queried following a trigger and, if the cache indicates an update to the anti-virus software is available the device downloads an update to the anti-virus software. In an alternative embodiment the device may download and install an update upon receiving the response to the query if the response to the query indicates that an update is available. The query may be transmitted during a scan or upon determining a change in a connection at a device. |
| US08959639B2 |
Method of detecting and blocking malicious activity
A method of detecting and blocking malicious activity of processes in computer memory during unpacking of a file after the code and data contained in the file are unpacked is described. The method includes inserting a hook function into one or more un-assessed processes running in the computer memory. A hook is then placed on one or more system calls carried out by the one or more un-assessed processes; the one or more system calls determining an optimal time period in which to detect malicious activity in the un-assessed processes. During the optimal time period the one or more system calls carried out by the one or more un-assessed processes are suspended and attributes of the one or more un-assessed processes are detected and the likely maliciousness of the one or more un-assessed processes is determined from the attributes. |
| US08959628B2 |
Method and apparatus for preventing unwanted code execution
There is provided a method of preventing unwanted code execution in a computing environment executing a scripting language and associated environment, wherein said computing environment comprises at least one server-side resource and a client side resource, comprising determining “safe” and “at risk” or “restricted” portions of the scripting language and associated environment, determining “trusted” and “untrusted” portions of the scripting language and associated environment, determining at least one “trusted” server-side resource, receiving from the “trusted” server-side resource an initial message containing one or more high-entropy secrets, and providing an unwanted code execution protection mechanism by reconfiguring said “at risk” or “restricted” portions of the scripting language and associated environment to require presentation of the one or more high-entropy secrets in order to execute. |
| US08959623B2 |
Protecting virtual machine console from misuse, hijacking or eavesdropping in cloud environments
Access to virtual machine inputs and outputs are controlled. Controlling access to virtual machine inputs and outputs may comprise locking inputs and outputs of a virtual machine from within the virtual machine, other than a predefined limited access input, detecting a request to unlock the inputs and outputs of the virtual machine; determining if a requester is authorized to unlock the inputs and outputs of the virtual machine and unlocking, temporarily, the inputs and outputs of the virtual machine if the requester is authorized. The predefined limited access input is configured to receive an input device with a private secret for unlocking the inputs and outputs of the virtual machine. The inputs and outputs are unlocked when an input device having a shared password is attached. |
| US08959619B2 |
Graphical image password authentication method
A method for secure authentication is provided which includes having a user who wishes to gain access to a computer or computer network select from among a plurality of randomly displayed images, having different background colors, the correct image and background color which correspond to the user's computer account. In one advantageous form, in addition to selecting the correct image, the user must first enter a username and password. In an alternative form, if a user is seeking access to a computer network by using a preapproved access point or computer having an approved IP address, a user is allowed to gain access to the computer network without being prompted to select a correct image. |
| US08959618B2 |
Managing password expiry
A method and apparatus for managing the expiration of a password. In one embodiment, the method comprises determining whether a behavior anomaly associated with an account has occurred. In response to a determination that the behavior anomaly has occurred, the method expires a password associated with the account and forces the password be changed the next time the password is presented for accessing the account. |
| US08959614B2 |
Apparatus and method for providing virtual private network service based on mutual authentication
An apparatus and method for providing a virtual private network (VPN) service based on mutual authentication are provided, the apparatus including a storage unit configured to store a first public key and a second public key; an authentication unit configured to authenticate a VPN server with the first public key and to authenticate a user device with the second public key; and a tunnel management unit configured to generate a first VPN tunnel and a second VPN tunnel to relay data between the user device and the VPN server based on the authentication of the VPN server and the user device by the authentication unit. |
| US08959612B2 |
Secure system for interconnection between two public networks
A secure interconnection system between two public networks comprises at least one first router, a first firewall, a second router, a second firewall and a blade server, and a first virtual local area network containing the data streams exchanged between a first communications facility and a second communications facility, a second virtual local area network containing the management and maintenance streams of said system which are exchanged between a supervision center and the blade server and a third virtual local area network containing the authentication streams for said first communications facility which are exchanged between the said second firewall and said blade server, said virtual local area networks being designed so as to exhibit an empty intersection. |
| US08959610B2 |
Security bridging
A network media gateway is used to bridge trust between a Service Provider network and subscriber devices. The gateway is authenticated by the Service Provider by using knowledge of network topology. Subscriber devices are authenticated in response to subscriber input to the gateway via an interface. Trusted subscriber devices can be tightly coupled with the Service Provider network, thereby facilitating delivery of QoE. Mobile and remote subscriber devices may also be authenticated. The gateway may also facilitate establishment of VPNs for peer-to-peer communications, and dynamically adjustable traffic, policy and queue weightings based on usage patterns. |
| US08959606B2 |
Key updating method and system thereof
A key updating method and system are provided. In the method, (1) a back-end authentication system receives a current dynamic password generated by a dynamic token and authenticates the current dynamic password, and if the authentication succeeds, generates key updating information and goes to (2); (2), the back-end authentication system generates a first updating key according to the key updating information and a first initial key stored therein and copies the first updating key to a buffer of the first initial key; the dynamic token obtains and authenticates the key updating information, and if the authentication succeeds, generates a second updating key according to the key updating information and a second initial key stored in the dynamic token and copies the second updating key to a buffer of the second initial key; or if authentication fails, quits the key updating. The solution avoids risk incurred by accidental key leakage. |
| US08959605B2 |
System and method for asset lease management
Disclosed herein are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for asset lease management. The system receives, from a client device associated with a user profile, a lease start request for an asset for which the user profile is authorized. The system identifies a number of available slots for progressively downloading content. If the number of available slots is greater than zero, the system assigns an available slot from the number of available slots to the client device to yield an assigned slot. The system transmits security information, a lease key, and a lease duration associated with the assigned slot to the client device in response to the lease start request, wherein the security information and lease key allow the client device to start a progressive download of the asset for the lease duration. At the end of the lease, the system terminates the lease and releases the assigned slot. |
| US08959604B2 |
System and method of verifying a number of a mobile terminal
A client device is coupled with a server. The client device prompts a user to enter a number associated with a mobile device, which can be the client device, and generates data including a code. The code is typically hidden from the user when the code is generated and is saved on the client device. The client device transmits the number entered by the user and the code generated by the client device to the server, which sends a message, including the code, to the mobile device associated with the number. The client device prompts the user to enter the code included in the message. Validity of the number is based on one or more factors, including the accuracy of the code entered by the user. In addition, validity of the number can also be based on whether the second user input was entered within a predetermined time limit. |
| US08959603B2 |
Authentication system
An authentication system by which character strings in squares are selected by a rule determined by a user out of a table in which character strings are assigned to obtain a one-time password. The user memorizes a rule of successively selecting three out of the positions of the squares in a table having five rows and five columns, for example. To each square (402) in the table (401) to be presented to the user, a randomly generated two-digit number is assigned. The table (401) is presented to the user, who arranges the numbers in the squares (402) on the basis of the user's own rule to generate a six-digit number used as a one-time password for authenticating the user. Therefore, the rule for obtaining a one-time password is easy for the user to memorize and a long one-time password can be obtained. |
| US08959602B2 |
Modification of a secured parameter in a user identification module
There is provided a user identification module configured for use in a mobile communication device. An exemplary user identification module comprises a first data item being accessible for reading a value of a parameter used in the operation of the user identification module. The exemplary user identification module also comprises at least two second data items, the second data items being unmodifiable and each second data item including a value of the parameter. The first data item includes a modifiable reference addressing one second data item. |
| US08959600B2 |
Proxy data views for administrative credentials
A method of providing an administrator with a managerial view of personnel data may include receiving a login that includes administrator credentials from a personnel administrator and receiving a command associated with the administrator credentials to view personnel data in a personnel database. The personnel data may be associated with a group of employees under a manager in a managerial hierarchy. The method may also include selecting between a manager view of the personnel data and an administrator view of the personnel data. The manager view may include a first subset of the personnel data, the administrator view may include a second subset of the personnel data, and/or the first subset may be smaller than the second subset. The method may additionally include causing the first subset of personnel data to be displayed on a display device according to the manager view. |
| US08959598B2 |
Wireless device authentication between different networks
A method and system for roaming between heterogeneous networks. The method involves authenticating a mobile communication device on a first network, and providing the device with a single-use token that can be used to sign on to a second network without requiring conventional re-authentication over the second network. |
| US08959596B2 |
One-time password validation in a multi-entity environment
A single passcode can be used for validation by a user of several entities in a system without compromising security. The source of the entity providing validation credentials, along with the passcode, is considered when determining validity. A one-time password system validates credentials if a validation credentials, such as a user's valid passcode and the source of the credentials, have not been used previously. In a one-time passcode system, a validation processor receives validation credentials from a client processor. If the client processor has not previously sent the validation credentials to the validation processor, and the credentials are valid, the validation processor will validate the credentials. Otherwise, the credentials are invalid. Other client processors can utilize the same passcode and their respective source identifiers, and as long as the other client processors have not previously utilized the credentials, the credentials are declared valid. |
| US08959594B2 |
Systems and methods for collecting and accruing labor activity data under many-to-many employment relation and with distributed access
A system and methods enable distributed users to have controlled and distributed access to labor data, and the labor data are produced as the results of monitoring and accruing labor activities with many-to-many employment relation. One method further comprises: (1) a method of importing data as the result of monitoring labor activities, and resolving the employment relation under which a labor activity is performed; (2) a method of accruing labor activities using input data according to the employment relation identified by method (1), and; (3) a method of enabling controlled access to labor and payroll data for distributed users. Labor monitoring software system (a) accrues labor activities from field-collected labor monitoring data, (b) identifies the employment relation, and (c) prepares payroll report based on the terms defined in the employment relation. Authorized users may access the data in raw or processed format from a variety of Internet-connected devices, including smartphones, tablets, and desktop computers. The system may be used in a variety of applications in which an employee has multiple employers, and distributed access to labor data is needed. |
| US08959591B2 |
Follow location handler and selector functionality in a stateless microkernel web server architecture
A method of serving a resource to a client via a computer network is provided. The method may include providing a follow location handler logically positioned on a WAN side of an HTTP server. At the follow location handler, the method may include receiving a POST request from the client, and forwarding the POST request to the HTTP server. At the HTTP server, the method may include receiving the POST request, creating a modified data object based upon the form data, generating a link to the modified data object, and returning the link. At the follow location handler, the method may include intercepting the link to the modified data object from the server, sending a GET request to the server to retrieve the modified data object, and, in response, receiving the modified data object. The method may further include forwarding the modified data object to the client. |
| US08959587B2 |
System and method for authentication for wireless emergency services
A method of authenticating a user device includes transmitting a request, the request including a query for information, and receiving an identifier, the identifier being associated with one or more authentication mechanisms for obtaining access to emergency services. |
| US08959584B2 |
Systems and methods for universal enhanced log-in, identity document verification and dedicated survey participation
Systems and methods are provided for controlling access via a computer network to a subscriber server. A log-in server receives a query to connect through the computer network to the subscriber server, and the log-in server receives registrant identification data, A first session is established between the log-in server and the subscriber server to validate the registrant identification data, and to generate a session password. A second session is established between the log-in server and the subscriber server. The second session is configured to authorize, based in part on the registrant identification data, access to at least a portion of a website associated with the subscriber server. |
| US08959581B2 |
Switching apparatus, authentication server, authentication system, authentication method, and computer program product
A switching apparatus includes an authentication client unit that requests user authentication to a user authentication server that performs user authentication of the switching apparatus, and, when the requested user authentication is successfully performed, receives from the user authentication server, information of success of the user authentication and setting information used when terminal authentication of a terminal to be connected to the switching apparatus is relayed to a terminal authentication server that performs terminal authentication; an authentication setting unit that sets the setting information to an authentication relay unit that relays terminal authentication; and a control unit that allows the authentication relay unit to relay the terminal authentication when the setting information is set to the authentication relay unit. |
| US08959580B2 |
Enforcing policy-based application and access control in an information management system
A method and apparatus for controlling document access and application usage using centrally managed rules. The rules are stored and manipulated in a central rule database via a rule server. Policy enforcers are installed on client systems and/or on servers and perform document access and application usage control for both direct user document accesses and application usage, and application program document accesses by evaluating the rules sent to the policy enforcer. The rule server decides which rules are required by each policy enforcer. A policy enforcer can also perform obligation and remediation operations as a part of rule evaluation. Policy enforcers on client systems and servers can operate autonomously, evaluating policies that have been received, when communications have been discontinued with the rule server. |
| US08959579B2 |
Controlling mobile device access to secure data
Various aspects of the disclosure relate to providing secure containers or data vaults for data of one or more managed applications. In some embodiments, each managed application may be assigned its own private data vault and/or may be assigned a shared data vault that is accessible to at least one other managed application. As the managed application executes, calls for access to the data may be intercepted and redirected to the secure containers. Data stored in a secure container may be encrypted according to a policy. Other aspects relate to deleting data from a secure container, such as via a selective wipe of data associated with a managed application. Further aspects relate to configuring and creating the secure containers, retrieving key information required to encrypt/decrypt the data stored in the secure containers, and publishing the managed applications, policy information and key information for download to a mobile device. |
| US08959575B2 |
Control of communication ports of computing devices using policy-based decisions
In a computing system environment, an arrangement of computing devices includes multiple layers behind a content flow director, such as an L4 switch in a web service. In a computing device of an outermost layer directly communicating with the content flow director, a communications port is conditionally enabled upon policy being met or exceeded in the computing system environment behind the content flow director. If unmet, the communications port is disabled, if already enabled, or prevented from becoming enabled, if not otherwise already enabled. In this manner, policy establishes port enablement. In certain aspects, policy determinations include determining a time of response, a quality of service check or a pass/fail condition of the one of the computing devices. Policy is also easily implemented as remote or local computer executable instructions on the computing devices. Representative computing devices include switches, such as L4 switches, routers, servers, repeaters, adapters or the like. |
| US08959572B2 |
Policy enforcement of client devices
A method may include sending, by a client device, an access request to an authentication server device. The access request may include a request to access an administered resource. The method may include in response to the client device not complying with an administrative policy associated with the administered resource, receiving, from the authentication server device, one or more instructions regarding installation of a client application, receiving, by the client device, a client application in accordance with the instructions, and installing the client application on the client device. |
| US08959570B2 |
Verifying a security token
A policy description for a web service is received at a web service client. The policy description includes a predefined security policy constraint, requires that an application requesting execution of the web service also provide a security token generated by a security token service, and requires that the security token complies with the predefined security policy constraint. A message is generated that is compliant with the policy description for obtaining the security token. The message is sent to the security token service. The security token generated by the security token service is received in response to receipt of the message. The security token is compared against the predefined security policy constraint to verify compliance of the security token generated by the security token service against the predefined security policy constraint. |
| US08959568B2 |
Enterprise security assessment sharing
An enterprise-wide sharing arrangement uses a semantic abstraction, called a security assessment, to share security-related information between different security products, called endpoints. A security assessment is defined as a tentative assignment by an endpoint of broader contextual meaning to information that is collected about an object of interest. Its tentative nature is reflected in two of its components: a fidelity field used to express the level of confidence in the assessment, and a time-to-live field for an estimated time period for which the assessment is valid. Endpoints may publish security assessments onto a security assessment channel, as well as subscribe to a subset of security assessments published by other endpoints. A specialized endpoint is coupled to the channel that performs as a centralized audit point by subscribing to all security assessments, logging the security assessments, and also logging the local actions taken by endpoints in response to security threats. |
| US08959567B1 |
Identification and recording of program sub-segments
Techniques are provided for identifying and recording program segments and sub-segments for later playback and use. In general, in one aspect, the invention features a method of recording a sub-segment of a broadcast program. The method includes receiving a user input of one or more user specified parameters, identifying a program sub-segment starting point within a program using data in a broadcast stream, and identifying a program sub-segment ending point within a program. The method also includes storing a program sub-segment and presenting the program sub-segment to a user. |
| US08959563B2 |
Methods and apparatus for revenue-optimized delivery of content in a network
Methods and apparatus for optimizing the distribution and delivery of multimedia or other content within a content-based network. In one embodiment, the network comprises a broadcast switched cable television network, which utilizes a Network optimization controller (NOC) that processes subscriber program viewing requests to identify options available to fulfill the request (including, e.g., the creation of one or more “microcasts” specifically targeting one or more users), and evaluate these options to determine one that optimizes network operation. The NOC performs these decisions by considering various parameters including network resource availability, type of CPE, subscriber's targeted advertisement profile, and business rules programmed by operator of the network. Business methods based on such network optimization are also described. |
| US08959561B2 |
System and method for tagging video content
A method of tagging video content includes receiving video content at a set-top box device via a private video distribution access network. The method also includes receiving a tag associated with the video content at the set-top box device and sending the tag to a tag management system via the private video distribution access network. Further, the method includes sending a request for content associated with the tag to the tag management system and receiving the video content at the set-top box device. |
| US08959560B2 |
Navigation within switched digital streamed content
In certain embodiments, a method carried out in a digital television receiver device incapable of full two way communications, of receiving switched digital television programs involves storing a virtual channel table in the digital television receiver device, the virtual channel table having entries for each available channel and having a channel type indicator that identifies switched digital channels; receiving a command indicative of selection of a switched digital channel having the switched digital channel type indicator in the stored virtual channel table; sending a request from the television receiver device for the switched digital channel; responsive to the request, receiving a response that either grants the request or denies the request; and if the response grants the request, receiving an updated virtual channel table having updated table entries. This abstract is not to be considered limiting, since other embodiments may deviate from the features described in this abstract. |
| US08959559B2 |
Content distribution system, content distribution apparatus, content distribution method, content distribution program, and content playback apparatus
A content distribution system that is supplied with power from a plurality of power sources having different environmental loads and that distributes content to a content playback apparatus connected via a communication circuit, the content distribution system distributing content with respect to a content distribution request from the content playback apparatus with a service quality that is determined so as to suppress the environmental load by the power supplied from the plurality of power sources to a predetermined environmental load. |
| US08959550B2 |
Information descriptor and extended information descriptor data structures for digital television signals
According to an aspect, there is provided a digital television (DTV) data stream including program and system information protocol (PSIP) data associated with content of the DTV data stream, the PSIP data including a virtual channel table (VCT) and an event information table (EIT), the EIT comprising: a source identification field identifying a source of an associated event in a DTV data stream; an event identification field indicating an identification of the event; a start time field indicating a star time of the event; a title field indicating a title of the event; and a descriptor comprising: a descriptor tag identifying the descriptor as a genre descriptor, a descriptor length indicating a total length of the descriptor; and at least one category code for an associated event in a DTV data stream, each category code specifying genre, program type, or category information of the associated event, wherein the at least one category code specifies at least one of a set of basic categories. |
| US08959538B2 |
Method and system for modeling of system content
A method and system of managing content at a network site can allow easier use by business users. A higher level of abstraction can be used to allow business users to create their own objects that may reference or contain other objects or records as managed by a content management system. Business users do not have to learn programming code in order to work those objects, which are content types. A graphical user interface (“GUI”) can be used to help the business users to create, modify, and delete content types. The GUI and the ability for business users to the create content types greatly shortens the time between receiving software to operate a network site and launching content at that network site. |
| US08959537B2 |
Configurable generation of proxies for backend APIs
A proxy remote function call is created in a first component of an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, the proxy remote function call acting as a proxy for a previously created remote function call in the first component. A field mapping table may then be maintained for the proxy remote function call, the field mapping table containing a mapping of first data fields used for operation of a process in a second component of the ERP system to second data fields utilized by the remote function call in the first component, at least one of the first data fields mapping to a data field in the second data fields having a different data type and/or different field names. When a call is received from the process on the second component, fields in the parameters of the call may be converted using the field mapping table. |
| US08959534B2 |
Enabling legacy applications to achieve end-to-end communication with corresponding legacy device services
Embodiments described herein enable legacy applications to achieve end-to-end communication with their corresponding device services in a host computer. To that end, one or more legacy protocol stacks are configured to interface with a component that implements and manages a Device Service Streams (DSS) application programming interface (API) which communicates through a Mobile Broadband class driver to a Device Service residing in a Mobile Broadband Interface Model (MBIM) compliant device attached to the computer. In one or more embodiments, end-to-end communication is illustratively achieved through the use of a plurality of components: a Device Services Composite Driver (DSCD), a Device Services Legacy Software Protocol Driver (DSLSPD), and a Device Services Legacy Software Protocol Controller (DSLSPC). |
| US08959533B2 |
Communicating between a first operating environment and a second operating environment in an operating system
An apparatus for communicating between a first operating environment and a second operating environment in an operating system includes a storage device storing machine-readable code and a processor executing the machine-readable code. The machine-readable code includes a receiving module receiving a request in a first operating environment from an application executing in a second operating environment. The first and second operating environments are provided by a common operating system. The request is communicated through a first communication path. The machine-readable code includes a response module sending a response from the first operating environment to the application in the second operating environment through a second communication path distinct from the first communication path. |
| US08959525B2 |
Systems and methods for affinity driven distributed scheduling of parallel computations
Embodiments of the invention provide efficient scheduling of parallel computations for higher productivity and performance. Embodiments of the invention provide various methods effective for affinity driven and distributed scheduling of multi-place parallel computations with physical deadlock freedom. |
| US08959524B2 |
Full exploitation of parallel processors for data processing
Exemplary method, system, and computer program product embodiments for full exploitation of parallel processors for data processing are provided. In one embodiment, by way of example only, a set of parallel processors is partitioned into disjoint subsets according to indices of the set of the parallel processors. The size of each of the disjoint subsets corresponds to a number of processors assigned to the processing of the data chunks at one of the layers. Each of the processors are assigned to different layers in different data chunks such that each of processors are busy and the data chunks are fully processed within a number of the time steps equal to the number of the layers. A transition function is devised from the indices of the set of the parallel processors at one time steps to the indices of the set of the parallel processors at a following time step. |
| US08959522B2 |
Full exploitation of parallel processors for data processing
For full exploitation of parallel processors for data processing, a set of parallel processors is partitioned into disjoint subsets according to indices of the set of the parallel processors. The size of each of the disjoint subsets corresponds to a number of processors assigned to the processing of the data chunks at one of the layers. Each of the processors are assigned to different layers in different data chunks such that each of processors are busy and the data chunks are fully processed within a number of the time steps equal to the number of the layers. A transition function is devised from the indices of the set of the parallel processors at one time steps to the indices of the set of the parallel processors at a following time step. |
| US08959518B2 |
Window-based scheduling using a key-value data store
A scheduling system for scheduling executions of tasks within a distributed computing system may include an entry generator configured to store, using at least one key-value data store, time windows for scheduled executions of tasks therein using a plurality of nodes of the distributed computing system. The entry generator may be further configured to generate scheduler entries for inclusion within a time window of the time windows, each scheduler entry identifying a task of the tasks and an associated schedule for execution thereof. The system may further include an execution engine configured to select the time window and execute corresponding tasks of the included scheduler entries in order. |
| US08959517B2 |
Cancellation mechanism for cancellable tasks including stolen task and descendent of stolen tasks from the cancellable taskgroup
A scheduler in a process of a computer system schedules tasks of a task group for concurrent execution by multiple execution contexts. The scheduler provides a mechanism that allows the task group to be cancelled by an arbitrary execution context or an asynchronous error state. When a task group is cancelled, the scheduler sets a cancel indicator in each execution context that is executing tasks corresponding to the cancelled task group and performs a cancellation process on each of the execution contexts where a cancel indicator is set. The scheduler also creates local aliases to allow task groups to be used without synchronization by execution contexts that are not directly bound to the task groups. |
| US08959515B2 |
Task scheduling policy for limited memory systems
A system, method, and program product for scheduling applications in a data processing system. The method of the invention includes a step of monitoring memory availability within the data processing system during execution of one or more applications. The method further includes recording a memory usage history for one or more applications from which a memory requirement may be determined. A kernel scheduler is utilized to schedule a next application for execution in accordance with the memory availability and the determined memory requirements of the one or more monitored applications. |
| US08959512B2 |
System and method to improve memory usage in virtual machines running as hypervisor guests
A system and method to improve memory usage in virtual machines running as hypervisor guests. In accordance with an embodiment, the invention provides a system for changing the memory usage of a virtual machine on request from a hypervisor, comprising: a hypervisor; a guest operating system executing inside the hypervisor; a communication channel between the hypervisor and the guest operating system; a balloon driver in the guest operating system; a virtual machine for executing a software application; a communication channel between the balloon driver and the virtual machine; a memory space or heap for use by the virtual machine in storing software objects and pointers as part of the software application; and a compacting garbage collector for use by the virtual machine. |
| US08959510B2 |
Providing a trusted environment for provisioning a virtual machine
In one embodiment, a mechanism for providing a trusted environment for provisioning a virtual machine is disclosed. In one embodiment, a method includes beginning an initialization process of a virtual machine (VM) hosted by a VM host server, obtaining by the VM as part of the initialization process a one-time password from the VM host server, the one-time password provided to the VM host server from a management server that created the one-time password, and authenticating the VM with an identity server using the one-time password. |
| US08959509B1 |
Techniques for virtual machine backup scheduling
Techniques for virtual machine backup scheduling are disclosed. In one particular exemplary embodiment, the techniques may be realized as an apparatus for scheduling one or more backup operations. The apparatus may comprise one or more virtual machines to operate on one or more systems. The apparatus may also comprise a backup manager to monitor resource requirements associated with at least one of the one or more virtual machines, associate the resource requirements with each of the one or more virtual machines, and to create a backup schedule for the one or more virtual machines based at least in part upon the resource requirements associated with the at least one of the one or more virtual machines. The apparatus may further comprise a module for implementing backups of the one or more virtual machines based at least in part upon the backup schedule created by the backup manager. |
| US08959501B2 |
Type and length abstraction for data types
Embodiments are directed to implementing a generic SIMD data type in software code. In an embodiment, a computer system accesses a portion of software code that includes an algorithm with a generic SIMD data type that includes a variable number of elements. The algorithm with the generic SIMD data type is to be processed by a specific processor that includes various specific hardware features. The computer system determines at runtime a portion of customized processor-specific code that is to be used with the specified processor based on the generic SIMD data type, wherein the runtime determination resolves the number of elements that are to be used with the specified processor. The computer system also processes the software code including the algorithm with the generic SIMD data type using the determined, customized processor-specific code. |
| US08959499B2 |
Parallel processing of data
A data parallel pipeline may specify multiple parallel data objects that contain multiple elements and multiple parallel operations that operate on the parallel data objects. Based on the data parallel pipeline, a dataflow graph of deferred parallel data objects and deferred parallel operations corresponding to the data parallel pipeline may be generated and one or more graph transformations may be applied to the dataflow graph to generate a revised dataflow graph that includes one or more of the deferred parallel data objects and deferred, combined parallel data operations. The deferred, combined parallel operations may be executed to produce materialized parallel data objects corresponding to the deferred parallel data objects. |
| US08959497B1 |
System and method for dynamically spawning thread blocks within multi-threaded processing systems
One embodiment of the present invention sets forth a technique for partitioning a predecessor thread program into sub-programs and dynamically spawning a thread grid of the sub-programs based on the outcome of a conditional statement in the predecessor thread program. The programming instructions for the predecessor thread program are analyzed to assess the benefit of partitioning the thread program at a conditional statement into sub-programs. If the predecessor thread program is partitioned, then each branch of the conditional statement may be used to form a separate sub-program. Predicate tables are populated at the predecessor thread program run-time to establish which possible instances of the thread sub-programs should be spawned in subsequent execution phases. |
| US08959496B2 |
Automatic parallelization in a tracing just-in-time compiler system
A tracing just-in-time (TJIT) compiler system is described for performing parallelization of code in a runtime phase in the execution of code. Upon detecting a hot loop during the execution of the code, the compiler system extracts trace information from sequentially recorded traces. In a first phase, the compiler system uses the trace information to identify at least one group of operation components that can be operated on in a parallel manner. In a second phase, the compiler system provides instructions which allocate the group of operation components to plural processing resources. A native code generator module carries out those instructions by recompiling native code that directs the operation of a native system to perform parallel processing. The compiler system terminates a group if it encounters program data in a loop iteration that is not consistent with previously encountered predicated information (upon which it records a new trace in a sequential manner). |
| US08959492B2 |
Communication protocol between a high-level language and a native language
A system and a method are disclosed for communicating between two programming languages on a client device. Commands in a high-level language are encoded as character string containing a series of numbers separated by delimiters, with each component of the command encoded as a different number. The encoded character strings are passed to compiled code that runs natively on the client device, and the native code decodes the character strings into corresponding native commands and executes the native commands. This communication protocol allows applications written in high-level code to perform functions that are typically set aside for native code, such as communicating with web servers and modifying files saved in memory. High-level code may also be transferred to client devices without being subjected to the restrictions that some operating systems place on the transfer for application binaries, which allows application developers to automatically send application updates to users. |
| US08959490B2 |
Optimizing heap memory usage
Embodiments of the present invention provide a computing system and method to profile a program for finding potential optimization in heap usage by reducing lag and drag in lifetimes of heap memory blocks. The process consists of three steps. First, an instrumentation engine analyzes a given program and inserts additional code at interesting locations to collect needed information. Second, when the instrumented program is executed on a set of test cases, runtime data is collected. Third, since this data is large for a complex and long running program, data is processed to present it to a user in useful ways so that a programmer improves the heap utilization in the program. |
| US08959486B2 |
Automatic regression testing based on cyclomatic complexity
A processor-implemented method, system, and/or computer program product automates regression testing based on cyclomatic complexity of changed code. A base code change to a software program is identified as having a particular cyclomatic complexity. Multiple different software test routines are mapped to the base code change. A specific quantity of the different software test routines are then run to test the base code change, where the quantity of test routines that is run is based on the cyclomatic complexity of the base code change. |
| US08959485B2 |
Security protection domain-based testing framework
Methods and apparatus for security protection domain-based testing. A testing framework enables the same certification tests to be run across different protection domains or operation modes, and on different platforms or devices. The testing framework may, for example, be directed to testing implementations of the Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME®) using Connected Device Configuration (CDC) or Connected Limited Device Configuration (CLDC) as the configuration layer and Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) as the profile layer. Different Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) specifications (e.g., MIDP 2.x and MIDP 3.x specifications) may be supported. The testing framework may be deployed in the context of compatibility testing and technology compatibility kits (TCKs). The testing framework may, for example, be applied in compatibility testing for Java ME® platform technology implementations. |
| US08959480B2 |
Methods and apparatus for integration of declarative rule-based processing with procedural programming in a digital data-processing environment
The present invention provides methods and systems for integrating a procedural computational model with a declarative computational model. For example, in one aspect, the present invention provides a method for integrating a plurality of procedural instructions in a procedural computational system with a plurality of declarative rules in a declarative computational system. In such a method, for each of the procedural instructions operating on one or more variables, a hash table indexed by variable names is utilized to determine whether any of these variables participate in at least one of the declarative rules. Upon execution of a procedural instruction that changes a variable participating in a declarative rule, other variables associated with the rule are updated so as to maintain a relationship imposed by the rule among the variables. The updating of the other variables is performed prior to execution of other procedural instructions. |
| US08959479B2 |
Presenting a custom view in an integrated development environment based on a variable selection
Within a system comprising a processor and a memory, a method for, within integrated development environment (IDE), presenting a custom view in the IDE based on a variable selection. The method can include selecting a first instance of the first variable in a first portion of program code. Via the processor, the program code can be searched to identify at least a second instance of the first variable in at least a second portion of the program code. Further, via the processor, the custom view can be presented in the IDE to present at least the first portion of the program code and the second portion of the program code based on the identification of the first variable in the second portion of the program code. |
| US08959478B2 |
Plan-based program slicing
A method for generating a slice from a plan-based representation of a program is provided. The method comprises constructing a plan representation of a program, wherein the plan representation comprises a plurality of nodes, edges, and ports; and receiving one or more slicing criteria from a user. The slicing criteria comprise one or more variable occurrences or statements from the program, according to which a slice is generated from the plan representation. |
| US08959477B2 |
Scripting language for business applications
The present disclosure involves systems, software, and computer implemented methods for providing a scripting language for business applications. One process includes operations for providing a scripting language editor for generating software components for a business application, the scripting language editor configured to receive scripting language input. A scripting language file saved by the scripting language editor is identified. Metadata associated with at least one of a business object or a data type of a platform of the business application is retrieved. A business application language file is generated based on the scripting language file and the retrieved metadata. |
| US08959473B2 |
Multiple level spine routing
Multiple level spine routing is disclosed. In some embodiments, in response to receiving a specification of a plurality of nets and a specification of a set of routing tracks available for main spines, a main spine routing track is assigned to each of the plurality of nets based at least in part on a cost function and main spine wires are generated on the assigned main spine routing tracks for each of the plurality of nets. |
| US08959471B2 |
Integrated circuit having adaptive via sizing
A method and system for improving the yield of integrated devices is invented by adaptively selecting contact and via sizes. According to this invention, the drawn size of via holes in a design layout is selected based on its neighboring layout geometries. The invention comprises identifying the minimal space required for placing a via; analyzing available free space for potential via size increase; identifying the proximity configuration of the via with other vias on the via layer; selecting an appropriate via size based on the free space and proximity configuration to create an improved design layout; and fabricate the new layout with model based proximity correction such that vias of a plurality of sizes are reproduced on silicon within predetermined tolerances. |
| US08959469B2 |
Configuring a programmable device using high-level language
A method of preparing a programmable integrated circuit device for configuration using a high-level language includes compiling a plurality of virtual programmable devices from descriptions in said high-level language. The compiling includes compiling configurations of configurable routing resources from programmable resources of said programmable integrated circuit device, and compiling configurations of a plurality of complex function blocks from programmable resources of said programmable integrated circuit device. A machine-readable data storage medium may be encoded with a library of such compiled configurations. A virtual programmable device may include a stall signal network and routing switches of the virtual programmable device may include stall signal inputs and outputs. |
| US08959465B2 |
Techniques for phase tuning for process optimization
Techniques are provided for determining how thick or how deep to make the phased regions of a lithography mask. One example embodiment provides a method that includes: providing a first mask layout design including a first test set, and providing a second mask layout design including a second test set, wherein the second test set is larger than the first test set; simulating critical dimensions through focus of structures of interest in the first test set for a range of phase depths/thicknesses, and selecting an initial preferred mask phase depth/thickness based on results of the simulating; and generating a fast thick-mask model (FTM) at the initial preferred phase depth/thickness, and correcting the second test set of the second mask layout design using the FTM, thereby providing an optimized mask layout design. A mask having the optimized mask layout design may be implemented to give the optimum patterning. |
| US08959464B2 |
Multi-etch process using material-specific behavioral parameters in 3-D virtual fabrication environment
A virtual fabrication environment for semiconductor device structure development is discussed. The insertion of a multi-etch process step using material-specific behavioral parameters into a process sequence enables a multi-physics, multi-material etching process to be simulated using a suitable numerical technique. The multi-etch process step accurately and realistically captures a wide range of etch behavior and geometry to provide in a virtual fabrication system a semi-physical approach to modeling multi-material etches based on a small set of input parameters that characterize the etch behavior. |
| US08959461B2 |
Pattern measurement device and pattern measurement method
A pattern measurement device includes: a storage section storing mask edge data of a circuit pattern and image data obtained by imaging the circuit pattern; an SEM contour extracting section receiving the image data, SEM contour of the circuit pattern, and cause an exposure simulator to generate estimated SEM contour data of an estimated SEM contour on the basis of the mask edge data and SEM contour data of the extracted SEM contour; a shape classifying section receiving the mask edge data, the SEM contour data, and the estimated contour data to classify the SEM contour data and the estimated SEM contour data into a one-dimensionally shaped contour and a two-dimensionally shaped contour; and an SEM contour sampling section receiving the SEM contour data and the estimated SEM contour data to sample the SEM contour data on the basis of types of the one-dimensionally and two-dimensionally shaped contours. |
| US08959458B2 |
Mobile terminal and method of controlling the mobile terminal
A method of controlling a mobile terminal, and which includes displaying, on a display module of the mobile terminal, a first screen corresponding to a current operating mode and including a plurality of objects relevant to the current operating; receiving an input signal indicating a screen reconfiguration event has occurred on the mobile terminal, the screen reconfiguration event including at least one of a predefined movement of a main body of the mobile terminal and a blow signal being obtained by blowing onto the mobile terminal; and reconfiguring, via a controller on the mobile terminal, the first screen by removing at least one of the plurality of objects that do not meet a predefined screen reconfiguration condition from the first screen, and displaying a second screen obtained by the reconfiguration of the first screen on the display module based on the received input signal. |
| US08959454B2 |
Table management
Managing a display of objects is provided. A processor unit displays a graphical control configured to receive a user input of a value to control the display of a set of objects relative to a group of properties for the set of objects in a table. A processor unit changes the display of the set of objects to a ratio in a plurality of ratios in the table for the set of objects relative to the group of properties for the set of objects in the table based on the value. |
| US08959453B1 |
Autohiding video player controls
Methods are described for maximizing the size of a video displayed in a display area of a video player. The maximum height of the video is determined using its aspect ratio and the dimensions of the display area in the video player. The control panel is removed from the display in the video player if this allows the video to be shown at its maximum height while preserving the video's resolution. The control panel is displayed in the video player if the video can be shown at its maximum height without removing the control panel from the display. |
| US08959452B2 |
Method, system and computer program product for receiving information from a user
A window is displayed on a display device. The window includes at least first and second portions thereof. In response to a user selecting the first portion of the window on the display device, a first set of keys are displayed on the display device. The first set of keys are operable by the user to specify a first type of information within the first portion of the window. In response to the user selecting the second portion of the window on the display device, a second set of keys are displayed on the display device. The second set of keys are operable by the user to specify a second type of information within the second portion of the window. The second type of information includes at least some information that is unsupported by operation of the first set of keys. |
| US08959450B2 |
Path explorer visualization
A system and method that allows for dynamic conversion path exploration. Users can explore all their conversion paths and narrow events they want to investigate by prepending or appending events to the analysis view. In addition, users segment the neighboring events by one of the event dimensions (e.g., source, medium, campaign, keyword). |
| US08959446B2 |
Information processing apparatus and method of controlling the same
When a plurality of overlapping windows are displayed on a display screen, each window is displayed in a convenient state for a user operation, thereby reducing the load of the user operation. Upon detecting an object drag operation, an information processing apparatus displays the window of a predetermined application, which is displayed behind another window, as the topmost window. At this time, the window of the predetermined application reduces its size or changes the display position so as not to interfere with the other window displayed in front of it. |
| US08959438B2 |
Media control pane in browser
Methods, systems and computer programs are presented for generating media tabs for playing media files of various websites or applications. One method includes detecting a selected website through a browser and scanning the selected website to identify media files. For identified media files in the selected website, the method creates a media tab for association with the browser. The method generates a unified set of media controls for the media tab, where the unified set of media controls is mapped to native controls of the selected website having the media files. The method provides tab rendering data for the media tab. The tab rendering data is configured for associating the media tab with the browser. The tab rendering data, when associated with the browser, enables input at the media tab to be communicated to selected ones of the native controls, without accessing the native controls at the selected website. |
| US08959435B2 |
System and methods for detecting debris on a touchscreen system display screen
Touchscreen electronics for detecting debris on a display screen of a touchscreen system and alerting a user to the presence of the debris broadly comprises a plurality of transmitters, a plurality of receivers, and a controller. Each transmitter may transmit at least one beam across the display screen. The receivers may detect the beams from the transmitters, and each receiver may generate a receive signal. The controller communicates with the transmitters and the receivers and may be configured to analyze the receive signals to determine if debris may be present on the display screen. If so, then the controller may generate an alert signal to indicate that the display screen needs to be cleaned or examined. |
| US08959425B2 |
Inference-based extension activation
Extension activation may be provided. A document may be opened within a software application associated with an extension. Upon determining that a data element associated with the document is associated with an activation condition of the extension, the extension may be activated. |
| US08959423B2 |
Drill-through lens for generating different types of reports
Provided are techniques for providing drill-through information. User input of locations of one or more target documents and values of parameters for those one or more target documents is received. A user is allowed to move a drill-through lens window across a source document, wherein the drill-through lens window displays a floating, transparent target document. In response to the drill-through lens window floating over the data in the source document, in real time: the data is selected in the source document, the selected data is identified as a parameter for a target document, the parameter is used to obtain further details from the target document, and the drill-through lens window is displayed showing the further details. |
| US08959417B2 |
Providing low-latency error correcting code capability for memory
A memory controller provides low-latency error correcting code (ECC) capability for a memory. In some implementations, the controller is configured to receive a memory access command that includes an address and a length associated with data that is to be transferred to or from the memory device, and transfer one or more bytes of data and one or more bytes of ECC information to or from locations of the memory device associated with the address and the length. |
| US08959415B2 |
Memory system and memory controller
A memory system according to the embodiment comprises a memory device including plural memory cells capable of storing d bits of data and operative to read/write data at every page; and a memory controller operative to control the memory device. The memory controller includes a page buffer operative to hold page data to be read from/written in a page of the memory device and send/receive the page data to/from the memory device, a data processing unit operative to detect and correct an error in the page data by processing target data in a finite field Zp modulo p generated based on the page data (p is a prime that satisfies 2 |
| US08959409B2 |
Detection and recovery of HARQ NAK-to-ACK feedback error in wireless communications systems
In wireless communication networks that use ARQ/HARQ feedback protocols, when a first device receives an apparent HARQ ACK from a second device, the first device may make a new transmission using a HARQ Channel ID whose previous usage was under conditions indicating a likelihood of error in the ACK. When the second device receives the new transmission, the reuse of that HARQ Channel ID in a new transmission rather than a retransmission lets the second device know that its previous NAK transmission was incorrectly received as an ACK. |
| US08959407B2 |
Scaling factors for hard decision reads of codewords distributed across die
Embodiments include methods, apparatuses, and instructions for encoding a codeword of data as codeword portions stored across multiple die in a non-volatile memory. Embodiments further include a decoder which may be configured to decode the portions of the codeword using hard decision reads. The decoder may then be configured to estimate the quality of each die, and apply a scaling factor to the decoded codeword portions such that confidence or reliability information can be determined for the codeword. |
| US08959405B2 |
Signal transmission device for elevator
Each of a master node and a slave node has a safety data processing unit and a high reliability communication unit. At the time of transmission, the safety data processing unit creates a safety data packet including data about safety and the high reliability communication unit creates a communication data packet including the safety data packet and transmits the communication data packet a predetermined number of times. At the time of reception, the high reliability communication unit acquires and outputs a safety data packet by determining one of one or more communication data packets having the same contents which it has received properly as an effective packet, and the safety data processing unit analyzes a state concerning the safety of a system on the basis of the data about safety acquired from the safety data packet. |
| US08959400B2 |
System, program, and method for collecting errors which occur while a user uses a computer
A method, computer program product, and computer system for collecting errors which occur while a user uses a computer includes collecting log information on an operating environment including an operating procedure from a computing device associated with a user; accumulating the collected log information; identifying, from the log information, a second operating procedure similar to the operating procedure, wherein the second operating procedure had an error occur and no longer includes the error, in response to receiving the log information corresponding to the operating procedure in which the error occurs; and providing the user with the second operating procedure included in the searched log information. |
| US08959399B2 |
Capturing data during operation of an industrial controller for the debugging of control programs
An industrial controller module (13a) is provided with a routine of program instructions (29a) for storing a log of I/O table state changes (31) in a defined portion of memory (23). Upon the occurrence of a trigger event, a file of the state changes (37) is saved in the memory (23). Each entry (32) in the log of I/O table state changes (31) includes a timestamp (33) and values of each word of I/O state data (36) that changed at a time of the timestamp. Logs of state change data (16a), including timestamp data can also be saved for intelligent sensors and actuators (16) and uploaded with the log of controller processor state data (31) to a computer (20) with a diagnostic program (21a) for playing back the state changes and synchronizing changes of the intelligent sensors and actuators (16) with changes of the controller processor module (13a). |
| US08959390B2 |
Directory-level RAID
A method and system for reducing replication factor in a file system are provided. In some embodiments, two or more requested files may be grouped together under a leaf directory for RAID process. All data under the directory are grouped into one or more data stripes, each of which comprises a plurality of data blocks. One or more parity data blocks may be generated for each data stripe according to a computing algorithm, such as an exclusive OR (XOR) code or a Reed-Solomon (RS) code. Parity blocks corresponding to the one or more data stripes are concatenated into one parity file. Data blocks of the two or more requested files and their corresponding parity blocks are stored in separate partitions and/or separate storage drives of the file system. |
| US08959387B2 |
Tape drive retry
The present disclosure provides techniques for operating a tape drive. A method of operating a tape drive includes monitoring a parameter of the tape drive during a data access operation. The method also includes detecting an access failure. The method further includes selecting a treatment based on the parameter, applying the treatment, and performing a retry. |
| US08959382B2 |
Controlling communication of a clock signal to a peripheral
A method of communicating in an electronic system or apparatus is disclosed. The method includes using a processor to communicate with a peripheral. The method further includes using the peripheral to request a clock signal. The method also includes selectively control communication of the clock signal to the peripheral in response to the request. |
| US08959380B2 |
Dynamically optimizing bus frequency of an inter-integrated circuit (‘I2C’) bus
Optimizing an I2C bus frequency, the bus including signal lines coupling a master and slave nodes, a signal line coupled to a rise time detection circuit monitoring a voltage of the signal line, the voltage alternating between a logic low and logic high, where optimizing the frequency includes: detecting, during a rise in the signal line, a first voltage, the first voltage being greater than the logic low voltage; starting a counter to increment once for each clock period of the circuit; detecting a second voltage on the signal line, the second voltage greater than the first and less than the logic high; stopping the counter; calculating, in dependence upon the clock period and the counter value, a rise time; determining whether the rise time is greater than a maximum threshold; and increasing the I2C bus frequency if the calculated rise time is greater than the maximum threshold. |
| US08959378B2 |
Output timing control circuit and semiconductor apparatus using the same
An output timing control circuit of a semiconductor apparatus includes a delay amount counter block configured to count a delay amount of an output reset pulse signal based on an external clock signal and output a first counting code, wherein the delay amount counter block is configured to control the delay amount of the output reset pulse signal depending upon a frequency of the external clock signal; an operation block configured to subtract a code value of the first counting code from a code value of a data output delay code, and output a delay control code; and a phase control block configured to control a phase of a read command signal by the number of clocks of a DLL clock signal corresponding to a code value of the delay control code, and output an output enable flag signal. |
| US08959362B2 |
Systems and methods for controlling file execution for industrial control systems
A system includes a controller configured to control a process, and store at least one binary file, wherein the at least one binary files is generated from at least one source file, wherein the at least one source file comprises instructions configured to be executed by a processor in the controller. The controller may also be configured to retrieve a whitelist file comprising a first hash key value derived from the at least one binary file, and execute an executable file based on the whitelist file, wherein the executable file comprises the source file. |
| US08959359B2 |
Methods and systems for improving the security of secret authentication data during authentication transactions
A method for improving the security of secret authentication data during authentication transactions is provided that includes converting the secret authentication data of a user into scrambled secret authentication data by associating a different text-string with each item of information included in the secret authentication data. The method also includes capturing the scrambled secret authentication data with a communications device, and conducting an authentication transaction with the captured authentication data. |
| US08959358B2 |
User-based identification system for social networks
Techniques disclosed herein provide for verifying the identity of a prospective social network member using an authentication process in which one or more existing members of the social network who are knowledgeable of the identity of the prospective member communicate with the prospective member in real time. During the real-time communication, biometric information of the prospective member can be associated with a profile for the prospective member. During or after the real-time communication, the existing member(s) can verify the identity of the prospective member. Once the prospective member's identity has been properly verified, the prospective member can be granted access to the social network. |
| US08959357B2 |
Biometric encryption and key generation
A system, method and program product for generating a private key. A system is disclosed that includes a signal acquisition system for obtaining biometric input from a user and encoding the biometric input into an acquired biometric; a recognition system for determining an identity based on the acquired biometric and outputting an absolute biometric associated with the identity; an input device for accepting a knowledge input from the user; and a key generator that generates a private key based on the knowledge input and the absolute biometric. |
| US08959353B2 |
Distributed system for multi-function secure verifiable signer authentication
A distributed multi-function secure system for verifiable signer authentication having a personal private key stored in a secure storage of a mobile device where the mobile device connects to a fragmented distributed signing engine by a secure protocol and is issued a signer certificate from a circle of trust certificate server to securely electronically sign documents. |
| US08959350B2 |
Token for securing communication
In general, the invention relates to a method for performing a command on a token. The method includes receiving a first command authentication message digest (CAMD), a command, and scrambled data from a sender, and making a first determination that the sender is allowed to send commands to the token. The method further includes, based on the first determination, generating a second CAMD on the token using the command, the scrambled data, and an Administrative Command Authentication Secret (ACAS), making a second determination that the first CAMD and the second CAMD match, and based on the second determination, performing the command by the token. |
| US08959340B2 |
Method for accessing and transferring data linked to an application installed on a security module associated with a mobile terminal, and associated security module, management server and system
A method is provided for transferring data linked to an application installed on a security module associated with a mobile terminal, the data being stored in a first secure memory area of the security module, suitable for receiving a request to access the data, to read the data, and to transmit or store the data after encryption. A method is also provided for accessing these data suitable for transmitting a request to access, to receive and to decrypt the encrypted data. A security module, a management server, and a system implementing the transfer and access methods are also provided. |
| US08959336B1 |
Securing locally stored web-based database data
The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for locally storing Web-based database data in a secure manner. Embodiments of the present invention permit Web-based database data to be locally stored at a computer system to increase the efficiency of rendering the Web-based database data within a Web browser at the computer system. Web-based database data can be sandboxed per domain to mitigate (and possibly eliminate) the exposure of the Web-based database data to malicious computer systems. A web server may be required to authenticate itself before it may present database data to be locally stored at a computer system. A web server may be required to authenticate itself before being allowed to access database data stored locally at a computer system. |
| US08959335B2 |
Secure password-based authentication for cloud computing services
Secure password-based authentication for cloud service computing. A request for cloud computing resource access includes a derivative password that contains a parameter that the recipient may extract in order to independently calculate the derivative password based on the parameter and a stored password which may then be verified against a known-to-be-correct password. Other systems and methods are disclosed. |
| US08959327B2 |
Method and system for an architecture of DCR DTV receiver SoC with embedded reprogrammable security
A security processor may be embedded within a digital cable ready (DCR) digital TV (DTV) system-on-chip to performing content protection operations during digital TV signal processing. The embedded security processor may be used to perform operations that are currently performed by an external entity, such as, for an example, a CableCard. The embedded security processor maybe configured to use a conditional access function including, but not limited to, CableLabs® Downloadable Conditional Access System (DCAS) based function. The security processor may be reprogrammable to enable the system-on-chip to be reconfigured with a different function and/or to allow operation with a new cable service provider. The security processor may enable secure reprogrammability of the system-on-chip utilizing security algorithms and/or other mechanisms including use of chip-specific identification information. The SoC may be enabled to operate with a CableCard whenever the security processor may be disabled. |
| US08959324B2 |
Dual OS system using a smart SIM module and controlling method thereof
A computer system, and more particularly, to a system and controlling method thereof are disclosed, by which a plurality of operating systems can be driven using a smart subscriber authentication module. The present invention includes at least one display unit, a first memory provided with a first operating system, a subscriber identification module (SIM) including a second memory provided with a second operating system different from the first operating system and a second controller configured to perform an operation for the second operating system, and a first controller determining whether the subscriber identification module is connected via a prescribed interface, the first controller, if determining that the subscriber identification module is connected, controlling a booting of the first operating system or a booting of the second operating system through the operation by the second controller to be selectively executed on the at least one display unit. |
| US08959322B2 |
Information handling system image management deployment of virtual machine images to physical information handling systems
Images for information handling system manufacture and maintenance are created and managed by manipulating the images as virtual machines through a secure remote network interface, such as a virtual private network or virtual desktop infrastructure. Operating system and application installation and updates, such as service packs and patches, are performed on a virtual machine of the image to adjust the image as desired, and then the image is transformed for loading on physical information handling systems, such as newly manufactured information handling systems or deployed information handling systems in need of maintenance. |
| US08959321B1 |
Fast restart on a virtual machine
Media, methods, and computer systems are provided for performing a quick restart of applications in a virtual machine of the computer system. The virtual machine is configured with a critical object array that identifies the critical applications. In response to a quick restart request, the garbage collector operates in a quick restart mode to remove all objects for each application that is not in critical object array. |
| US08959319B2 |
Executing first instructions for smaller set of SIMD threads diverging upon conditional branch instruction
Embodiments of the present invention provide systems, methods, and computer program products for improving divergent conditional branches in code being executed by a processor. For example, in an embodiment, a method comprises detecting a conditional statement of a program being simultaneously executed by a plurality of threads, determining which threads evaluate a condition of the conditional statement as true and which threads evaluate the condition as false, pushing an identifier associated with the larger set of the threads onto a stack, executing code associated with a smaller set of the threads, and executing code associated with the larger set of the threads. |
| US08959317B2 |
Processor and method for saving designated registers in interrupt processing based on an interrupt factor
A microcomputer includes: a plurality of register lists having a plurality of register patterns, respectively, wherein each of plurality of register patterns designates registers, data of which are to be saved in a data memory; an instruction fetch control circuit configured to fetch instruction code from an instruction memory in response to an interrupt request issued based on occurrence of an interrupt factor; and a register data saving control circuit configured to acquire one register pattern from one of the plurality of register lists in response to the interrupt request, and issue a microinstruction based on the acquired register pattern in response to the interrupt request. An instruction executing section is configured to execute the microinstruction prior to the fetched instruction code, to save the data of registers designated based on the acquired register pattern in the data memory. |
| US08959316B2 |
Actual instruction and actual-fault instructions for processing vectors
The described embodiments include a processor that executes a vector instruction. The processor starts by receiving a vector instruction that optionally receives a predicate vector (which has N elements) as an input. The processor then executes the vector instruction. In the described embodiments, executing the vector instruction causes the processor to generate a result vector. When generating the result vector, if the predicate vector is received, for each element in the result vector for which a corresponding element of the predicate vector is active, otherwise, for each element of the result vector, the processor determines element positions for which a fault was masked during a prior operation. The processor then updates elements in the result vector to identify a leftmost element for which a fault was masked. |
| US08959314B2 |
MFENCE and LFENCE micro-architectural implementation method and system
A system and method for fencing memory accesses. Memory loads can be fenced, or all memory access can be fenced. The system receives a fencing instruction that separates memory access instructions into older accesses and newer accesses. A buffer within the memory ordering unit is allocated to the instruction. The access instructions newer than the fencing instruction are stalled. The older access instructions are gradually retired. When all older memory accesses are retired, the fencing instruction is dispatched from the buffer. |
| US08959313B2 |
Using predictive determinism within a streaming environment
Techniques are described for transmitting predicted output data on a processing element in a stream computing application instead of processing currently received input data. The stream computing application monitors the output of a processing element and determines whether its output is predictable, for example, if the previously transmitted output values are within a predefined range or if one or more input values correlate with the same one or more output values. The application may then generate a predicted output value to transmit from the processing element instead of transmitting a processed output value based on current input values. The predicted output value may be, for example, an average of the previously transmitted output values or a previously transmitted output value that was transmitted in response to a previously received input value that is similar to a currently received input value. Moreover, the processing element or elements that transmit the predicted output data may be upstream from the processing element with the predictable output. |
| US08959312B2 |
Object storage system
The storage system exports logical storage volumes that are provisioned as storage objects. These storage objects are accessed on demand by connected computer systems using standard protocols, such as SCSI and NFS, through logical endpoints for the protocol traffic that are configured in the storage system. Logical storage volumes are created from a logical storage container having an address space that maps to storage locations of the physical data storage units. Each of the logical storage volumes so created has an address space that maps to the address space of the logical storage container. A logical storage container may span more than one storage system and logical storage volumes of different customers can be provisioned from the same logical storage container with appropriate security settings. |
| US08959308B2 |
Device and method for monitoring and using internal signals in a programmable system
The invention relates to a device for monitoring and using internal signals in a programmable system (2), wherein said device includes at least one programmable system (2) including at least one programmable circuit (10, 20, 30), and at least one host system (3) capable of communicating with said programmable system for controlling the monitoring and the use of internal signals in at least one programmable circuit, characterized in that the device further comprises at least one local storage unit (12, 22, 32), at least one control and data-exchange logic unit (4) controlled by a host system, and at least one processing and control unit (8) connected to the at least one host system for communication between the associated host system and at least one storage unit, and for indexing the internal signals of each programmable circuit associated with at least one interface relative to each storage unit. |
| US08959307B1 |
Reduced latency memory read transactions in storage devices
A solution for performing reduced latency memory read transactions is disclosed. In one example, a storage apparatus has a memory array that includes: a flash device having a data register, a memory interface coupled to the memory array and a buffer set that includes at least one buffer suitable for use as a prefetch buffer. The memory interface, in response to a memory read transaction request, performs a read operation and, if stored data exists within the memory array that meets a prefetch selection criterion, also performs an internal read operation. The internal read operation includes allocating a prefetch buffer in the buffer set and storing the data as prefetch data in the prefetch buffer. If the memory interface receives a second memory read transaction request for data that is currently available as prefetch data, the memory interface responds by performing a forwarding transaction that includes retrieving the prefetch data from the prefetch buffer and forwarding the prefetch data to a host. |
| US08959306B2 |
Storage device, sweep operation control method and sweep operation control program
A storage device which includes a plurality of magnetic disk drives has a storage unit that stores, for each of the plurality of magnetic disk drives, information of whether or not the magnetic disk drive is incorporated in a redundant structure, a specifying unit that specifies, among the plurality of magnetic disk drives, a plurality of magnetic disk drives which have a redundant structure on the basis of the information stored in the storage unit, and a control unit that controls, for the plurality of magnetic disk drives specified by the specifying unit, an execution timing of sweep operation in which a head smoothes a lubricant material such that the sweep operation is executed for a single magnetic disk drive at a time. |
| US08959302B2 |
Computer system, server module, and storage module
An exemplary computer system includes a server module including a first processor and first memory, a storage module including a second processor, a second memory and a storage device, and a transfer module. The transfer module retrieves a first transfer list including an address of a first storage area, which is set on the first memory for a read command, from the server module. The transfer module retrieves a second transfer list including an address of a second storage area in the second memory, in which data corresponding to the read command read from the storage device is stored temporarily, from the storage module. The transfer module sends the data corresponding to the read command in the second storage area to the first storage area by controlling the data transfer between the second storage area and the first storage area based on the first and second transfer lists. |
| US08959297B2 |
Retrieving a user data set from multiple memories
An apparatus and associated methodology for a data storage system having a data storage space operably transferring user data via input/output (I/O) commands between the data storage system and another device. The data storage space includes a first memory device operably storing location information for a selected user data set corresponding to one of the I/O commands. The first memory also operably stores a first amount of the selected user data set. The data storage space also includes a second memory device different than the first memory device and operably storing a different second amount of the selected user data set. The data storage system has a controller that interleaves an entirety of the selected user data set from the first and second memory devices during execution of another of the I/O commands. |
| US08959294B2 |
Storage device, host device, circuit board, liquid container, and system
A storage device includes a control unit performing communication processing for communication with a host device connected to the storage device via a bus, a storage unit to which data from the host device is written, and a storage control unit exerting access control over the storage unit. In a first mode, when receiving a write command and data, the control unit indicates the storage control unit to write the received data to the storage unit, and if the data has been normally written to the storage unit, the control unit returns an acknowledgment to the host device. In a second mode, when receiving the write command and the data, the control unit indicates the storage control unit to write the received data to the storage unit and does not return the acknowledgment to the host device. |
| US08959293B2 |
Data deduplication in a virtualization environment
Techniques are described herein that are capable of optimizing (i.e., deduplicating) data in a virtualization environment. For example, optimization designations (a.k.a. deduplication designations) may be assigned to respective regions of a virtualized storage file. A virtualized storage file is a file that is configured to be mounted as a disk or a volume to provide a file system interface for accessing hosted files. In accordance with this example, each optimization designation indicates an extent to which the respective region is to be optimized (i.e., deduplicated). In another example, a virtualized storage file is mounted to provide a virtual disk that includes hosted files. In accordance with this example, optimization designations are assigned to the respective hosted files. In further accordance with this example, each optimization designation indicates an extent to which the respective hosted file is to be optimized. |
| US08959292B1 |
Atomic memory access hardware implementations
Atomic memory access requests are handled using a variety of systems and methods. According to one example method, a data-processing circuit having an address-request generator that issues requests to a common memory implements a method of processing the requests using a memory-access intervention circuit coupled between the generator and the common memory. The method identifies a current atomic-memory access request from a plurality of memory access requests. A data set is stored that corresponds to the current atomic-memory access request in a data storage circuit within the intervention circuit. It is determined whether the current atomic-memory access request corresponds to at least one previously-stored atomic-memory access request. In response to determining correspondence, the current request is implemented by retrieving data from the common memory. The data is modified in response to the current request and at least one other access request in the memory-access intervention circuit. |
| US08959290B2 |
Methods and apparatus for reusing snoop responses and data phase results in a cache controller
Methods and apparatus are provided for reusing snoop responses and data phase results in a cache controller. A cache controller receives a broadcast combined snoop response from a bus controller, wherein the broadcast combined snoop response corresponds to an incoming bus transaction BTR1 corresponding to a cache transaction CTR1 for an entry in at least one cache and wherein the combined snoop response is a combination of at least one snoop response from a plurality of cache controllers; receives broadcast cache line data from a source cache as instructed by the bus controller for the entry during a data phase; and processes a subsequent cache transaction CTR2 for the entry based on one or more of the broadcast combined snoop response and the broadcast cache line data. |
| US08959288B1 |
Identifying invalid cache data
Cache lines are identified that provide incorrect data for read requests. The cache lines are invalidated before the incorrect data causes processing failure conditions. The cache lines providing incorrect data may be detected according to a number of the same read requests to the same cache lines. The cache lines may also be identified according to an amount of time between the same read requests to the same cache lines. The same read requests to the same cache lines may be identified according to associated start addresses and address lengths. |
| US08959286B2 |
Hybrid storage subsystem with mixed placement of file contents
A storage subsystem combining solid state drive (SSD) and hard disk drive (HDD) technologies provides low access latency and low complexity. Separate free lists are maintained for the SSD and the HDD and blocks of file system data are stored uniquely on either the SSD or the HDD. When a read access is made to the subsystem, if the data is present on the SSD, the data is returned, but if the block is present on the HDD, it is migrated to the SSD and the block on the HDD is returned to the HDD free list. On a write access, if the block is present in the either the SSD or HDD, the block is overwritten, but if the block is not present in the subsystem, the block is written to the HDD. |
| US08959284B1 |
Disk drive steering write data to write cache based on workload
A disk drive is disclosed comprising a non-volatile write cache and a head actuated over a disk. A plurality of write commands are received from a host, wherein each write command comprises write data. A workload for a non-cache area of the disk is determined, and when the workload for the non-cache area of the disk is less than a threshold independent of a workload for the write cache, substantially all of the write data is stored in the non-cache area of the disk. When the workload for the non-cache area of the disk is greater than the threshold independent of the workload for the write cache, a first percentage of the write data is stored in the non-volatile write cache and a second percentage of the write data is stored in the non-cache area of the disk, wherein the first percentage is proportional to the workload for the non-cache area of the disk. |
| US08959283B2 |
Flash storage controller execute loop
A storage controller is provided that contains multiple processors. In some embodiments, the storage controller is coupled to a flash memory module having multiple flash memory groups, each flash memory group corresponding to a distinct flash port in the storage controller, each flash port comprising an associated processor. Each processor handles a portion of one or more host commands, including reads and writes, allowing multiple parallel pipelines to handle one or more host commands simultaneously. |
| US08959276B2 |
Byte selection and steering logic for combined byte shift and byte permute vector unit
Exemplary embodiments of the present invention disclose a method and system for executing data permute and data shift instructions. In a step, an exemplary embodiment encodes a control index value using the recoding logic into a 1-hot-of-n control for at least one of a plurality of datum positions in the one or more target registers. In another step, an exemplary embodiment conditions the 1-hot-of-n control by a gate-free logic configured for at least one of the plurality of datum positions in the one or more target registers for each of the data permute instructions and the at least one data shift instruction. In another step, an exemplary embodiment selects the 1-hot-of-n control or the conditioned 1-hot-of-n control based on a current instruction mode. In another step, an exemplary embodiment transforms the selected 1-hot-of-n control into a format applicable for the crossbar switch. |
| US08959271B2 |
System and method for accessing memory
A close proximity memory arrangement maintains a point to point association between DQs, or data lines, to DRAM modules employs a clockless state machine on a DRAM side of the memory controller-DRAM interface such that a single FIFO on the memory controller side synchronizes or orders the DRAM fetch results. Addition of a row address (ROW-ADD) and column address (COL-ADD) strobe reducing latency and power demands. Close proximity point to point DRAM interfaces render the DRAM side FIFO redundant in interfaces such as direct stacked 3D DRAMs on top of the logic die hosting the memory controller. The close proximity point to point arrangement eliminates the DRAM internal FIFO and latency scheme, resulting in just the memory controller internal clock domain crossing FIFOs. |
| US08959269B2 |
Memory interface and method of interfacing between functional entities
A data and signal interface for controlling the transfer of data and signals between a memory array and macro function such as that of a digital signal processor (DSP) core. In one embodiment, the interface comprises a plurality of memory ports which interface with X/Y memory banks, a plurality of function ports, each with a function controller, which interface with DSP functions, a crossbar connecting the memory and function ports, and an arbitration unit for arbitrating memory access by the function ports. The memory interface advantageously allows multiple simultaneous accesses of memory banks via a plurality of macro functions, each access under the control of a parent processor instruction. A standardized protocol used for memory read/write operations is also disclosed. |
| US08959266B1 |
Dynamic priority control based on latency tolerance
A dynamic priority controller monitors a level of data in a display engine buffer and compares the level of data in the display engine buffer to a plurality of thresholds including a first threshold and a second threshold. When the level of data in the display engine buffer is less than or equal to the first threshold, the dynamic priority controller increases a priority for processing display engine data in a communication channel. When the level of data in the display engine buffer is greater than or equal to the second threshold, the dynamic priority controller decreases the priority for processing the display engine data in the communication channel. |
| US08959265B2 |
Reducing size of completion notifications
A computer peripheral device includes a host interface, which is configured to communicate over a bus with a host processor and with a system memory of the host processor. Processing circuitry in the peripheral device is configured to receive and execute work items submitted to the peripheral device by client processes running on the host processor, and responsively to completing execution of the work items, to write completion reports to the system memory, including first completion reports of a first data size and second completion reports of a second data size, which is smaller than the first data size. |
| US08959263B2 |
Maintaining I/O priority and I/O sorting
Multiple variants of a data processing system, which maintains I/O priority from the time a process makes an I/O request until the hardware services that request, will be described. In one embodiment, a data processing system has one or more processors having one or more processor cores, which execute an operating system and one or more applications of the data processing system. The data processing system also can have one or more non-volatile memory device coupled to the one or more processors to store data of the data processing system, and one or more non-volatile memory controller coupled to the one or more processors. The one or more non-volatile memory controller enables a transfer of data to at least one non-volatile memory device, and the priority level assigned by the operating system is maintained throughout the logical data path of the data processing system. |
| US08959260B2 |
Memory system having high data transfer efficiency and host controller
According to one embodiment, the host controller includes a register set to issue command, and a direct memory access (DMA) unit and accesses a system memory and a device. First, second, third and fourth descriptors are stored in the system memory. The first descriptor includes a set of a plurality of pointers indicating a plurality of second descriptors. Each of the second descriptors comprises the third descriptor and fourth descriptor. The third descriptor includes a command number, etc. The fourth descriptor includes information indicating addresses and sizes of a plurality of data arranged in the system memory. The DMA unit sets, in the register set, the contents of the third descriptor forming the second descriptor, from the head of the first descriptor as a start point, and transfers data between the system memory and the host controller in accordance with the contents of the fourth descriptor. |
| US08959257B2 |
Information processing apparatus and information processing method
According to one embodiment, a first controller is connected to one of a plurality of terminals. A detector is configured to detect a connection between each of the plurality of terminals and an MHL cable. A power supply module supplies electric power to a first connected apparatus connected via a first MHL cable in response to a first connection detection between a first terminal and the first MHL cable. A second controller is configured to connect the first terminal and the first controller, in response to the first connection detection, and to connect a second terminal and the first controller, when a signal is not received from the first connected apparatus via the first terminal at a timing of a second connection detection between the second terminal and a second MHL cable. |
| US08959253B2 |
Virtualizing a powered down input/output device
Embodiments of systems, apparatuses, and methods for virtualizing a powered-down input/output device are disclosed. In one embodiment, an apparatus includes a storage location and a decoder. The storage location is to store an indication that an input/output device is inaccessible. The decoder is to decode a configuration transaction directed to the input/output device and redirect the configuration transaction to an other target if the contents of the first storage location indicate that the input/output device is inaccessible. |
| US08959251B2 |
Implementation of switches in a communication network
A routing device such as either a 1:N demultiplexer or N:1 multiplexer can provide a power dissipation proportional to log2(N) by augmenting a conventional data demultiplexer/multiplexer with additional control circuitry. The control circuit ensures that control signals that trigger configuration of individual demultiplexer/multiplexer elements are propagated only along a data transmission path. Logic components of the control circuitry enable the multiplexers to be self-configuring and to prevent multiplexers from switching to elements with empty data buffers. |
| US08959250B2 |
Electronic device and method for fabricating the same
An electronic device including a semiconductor memory is provided. The semiconductor memory includes an interlayer dielectric layer disposed over a substrate, and having a recess which exposes a portion of the substrate; a bottom contact partially filling the recess; and a resistance variable element including a bottom layer which fills at least a remaining space of the recess over the bottom contact, and a remaining layer which is disposed over the bottom layer and protrudes out of the interlayer dielectric layer. |
| US08959244B2 |
System and method for network aware adaptive streaming for nomadic endpoints
In a system for streaming data over a network, the type and rate of streaming are automatically varied based on available network bandwidth. Video media is transcoded into different bit rate encodings that are divided into segment files. Segments are sent from a network-aware adaptive streaming (NAAS) server and reassembled and presented to a media player at a client device. The system may download additional segment files ahead of time from multiple NAAS servers to increase throughput. A playback status (“bookmark”) may be maintained to keep track of what the user has viewed and to allow the user to continue playing from where the user left off. The user may continue watching from the bookmark point on the same device or on a different device. |
| US08959243B2 |
System and method to guide active participation in peer-to-peer systems with passive monitoring environment
A method includes identifying shared content by inspecting a peer-to-peer traffic flow and identifying source peers providing the shared content, and requesting the shared content from the source peers. The method further includes receiving requests for the shared content from requesting peers, identifying requesting peers based on the requests for the shared content, and providing the shared content to a local subset of the requesting peers. |
| US08959240B2 |
Method, apparatus and system for rapid acquisition of multicast realtime transport protcol sessions
Provided are a method, an apparatus, and a system for rapid acquisition of multicast realtime transport protocol sessions. The method comprises the following steps executed by a unicast server: receiving multicast rapid acquisition control request signalling sent by a media client, wherein the control request signaling contains synchronization request information; determining data synchronization of the media client according to the synchronization request information in the control request signaling; determining synchronization response information according to the time difference between play time of a stored random access point and the current time, wherein the synchronization response information contains play speed information and play duration of unicast media stream; generating multicast rapid acquisition control response signaling, wherein the control response signaling contains synchronization response information and multicast acquisition information; unicasting the control response signaling and stored media stream to the media client. With the invention, the media client that lags more can play lagged media stream with a faster play speed and thus synchronization of video play picture between different media clients can be achieved. |
| US08959237B2 |
Web services requests throttling
A method of web services throttling in a web application server environment, where a number of web services servers communicate with web services clients over a network. A request is received from a web services client which contains an account ID related to the web services client. An ID reader resident on one of the web services servers reads the account ID; and a value related to the account ID in a counter, resident on the one of the services servers, is incremented. The method also involves communicating with the remaining web services servers to increment the value in a plurality of counters, each of which is resident on one of the remaining web services servers. The web services servers compare the count value related to the account ID to a throttling limit value. |
| US08959233B2 |
Network bottlenecks
A method comprises receiving a request for a network connection and determining if the requested network connection is available. Based on the network connection not being available, the method comprises incrementing a counter. Based on the counter exceeding a threshold value, the method comprises setting a status indicating a bottleneck condition and further responding to the status indicative of the bottleneck condition. |
| US08959232B2 |
IMS and MMS interworking
A method for providing multimedia message service (MMS) in an Internet protocol (IP) multimedia subsystem (IMS) network can include establishing a first session initiation protocol (SIP) session between a source IMS device and a next generation multimedia message service center (NG MMSC), encapsulating, at the source IMS device, an MMS message in a message session relay protocol (MSRP) message, transmitting the MSRP message from the IMS device to the NG MMSC; and storing the MMS message at the NG MMSC for further delivery to the destination device. The method can further include transmitting the MMS message to a destination legacy device via legacy MMS protocols or transmitting the MMS message to a destination IMS device via MSRP. Alternative methods can include receiving a legacy MMS message and delivering the MMS message to a destination IMS device via MSRP. Systems for providing MMS in an IMS network are also described. |
| US08959231B2 |
Representation of Boolean expressions for specifying filters using XML
A simplified evaluation of messages that control connection setup is made possible by a method for filtering (4) incoming messages (3) at a connection controlling element (5) of a telecommunications network (13, 14, 5) on the basis of predetermined filtering conditions (8). According to this method, the filtering (4) ensues by comparing (4) text elements (20 to 29) in a received (6) message (3) with text elements (20 to 29) in a document (8), which can be accessed (7) by the connection controlling element (5) and which contains the filtering conditions in the form of text elements (20 to 29), and by verifying (4) whether, inside the document (8), logical links (30 to 32) of filtering conditions (20 to 29) apply to the message (3), said logical links being specified in an internet page description method (XML). |
| US08959222B2 |
Load balancing system for workload groups
An apparatus for managing requests. The requests are received by a workload manager system to perform operations on data. A set of server applications is identified by the workload manager system to perform the operations in the requests based on a set of common resources used by the set of server applications. The set of server applications is in a workload group and the workload group is comprised of a plurality of application groups. |
| US08959221B2 |
Metering cloud resource consumption using multiple hierarchical subscription periods
Embodiments relate to systems and methods for metering cloud resource consumption using multiple hierarchical subscription periods. A set of aggregate usage history data can record consumption of processor, software, or other resources subscribed to by a set of users, in one cloud or across multiple clouds. An entitlement engine can analyze the usage history data to identify a subscription margin for the subscribed resources, reflecting collective under-consumption of resources by the set of users on a collective basis, over different and/or dynamically updated subscription periods. In aspects, the entitlement engine or other logic can generate multiple hierarchical time periods or layers over which resource consumption can be tracked. For instance, processor usage can be tracked over blocks of two hours or other intervals, but can also be tracked over 24 hour intervals for which additional subscription costs, terms, or factors may apply. In aspects, the consumption of not just one but multiple resources can be tracked over the hierarchical time periods, with cost adjustments being keyed to joint consumption levels of those resources, and/or over different time periods or layers. |
| US08959219B2 |
Dynamic rerouting of service requests between service endpoints for web services in a composite service
Technologies are described herein for rerouting a service request between service endpoints. The service request is received, at a first web service, from a second web service. The first web service and the second web service may be components of a composite service. The service request is routed to an initial service endpoint configured to respond to the service request according to a service level agreement between the first web service and the second web service. Service criteria associated with the initial service endpoint are monitored. A determination is made as to whether the service criteria meet a performance threshold specified by the service level agreement. If the service criteria do not meet the performance threshold specified by the service level agreement, then the service request is rerouted from the initial service endpoint to an alternate service endpoint. |
| US08959211B2 |
Prompting social networking system users in a newsfeed to provide additional user profile information
A social networking system presents questions to a user on an interface associated with the social networking system to elicit information about the user that is missing from the user's profile or is otherwise outdated. The questions are selected based on a number of factors, such as the need for or value of the information item, probability of a response, or cost of collecting the information item. In presenting the selected question, the social networking system prompts a user for information about the user in a an interface associated with a page from the social networking system, an application external to the social networking system, or using a push notification or prompt. The questions may be formatted in various ways, such as an explicit question, confirmation, a selection of responses, or social context to encourage the user to respond to the question. |
| US08959208B2 |
Equipment set generation support apparatus and method
An equipment set generation support apparatus (a) acquires, from a plurality of equipments connected to a network, state change event information notifying a state change of each equipment and an occurrence time and date of the state change, (b) sets a detection condition including a start time and an end time of a detection period, (c) selects state change event information whose occurrence time and date of the state change falling within the detection period from the state change event information acquired, and (d) detects, from the plurality of equipments, a set of equipments whose states change in the detection period and a set of state values after the state change of each equipment based on the state change event information selected. |
| US08959206B2 |
Desktop control of traffic transmitted to a user device
A system is configured to obtain information that identifies a first rate for first traffic associated with an object within a desktop associated with a user device and a second rate for second traffic associated with another object within the desktop; provide a virtual desktop based on the information; create a first zone, within the desktop, associated with the object; create a second zone, within the desktop, associated with the other object; compare the first rate and the second rate to a threshold; provide, via the virtual desktop, the first zone, having first appearance attributes, based on the first rate being greater than the threshold, and the second zone, having second appearance attributes, based on the second rate not being greater than the threshold; receive selection of the first zone; and output a request to control the first traffic based on the selection of the first zone. |
| US08959205B2 |
Method and system to recognize and inventory applications
There is provided a system and method to inventory application program files. An exemplary method comprises searching a managed device in a computer network and discovering a program file on the managed device. The exemplary method also comprises identifying an installed package that includes the program file. The exemplary method additionally comprises applying one or more rules to normalize a representation of the installed package. |
| US08959202B2 |
Generating statistics of popular content
Client terminals report an easy-to-calculate identifier such as the Internet URL or a cryptographic hash of the content to a server. The server collects and counts the reported identifiers so as to obtain preliminary statistics. By aggregating these reported identifiers into the preliminary statistics, identifiers are revealed that are likely popular content. The server selects one or more identifiers from the preliminary statistics and makes these available to at least a subset of clients. The clients that obtain these one or more identifiers then access content and compute the easy-to-calculate identifiers as usual. If the computed identifier matches one of the identifiers obtained from the server, the client will additionally extract a watermarked identifier or compute a digital fingerprint of the content in question and report this to the server. The server then uses the received identifier or fingerprint to create final statistics by aggregating the preliminary statistics. |
| US08959201B2 |
Limiting control traffic in a redundant gateway architecture
Control traffic in a virtual LAN (VLAN) may be reduced. In one implementation, a network device may implement one of a plurality of redundant gateway devices in a virtual router that includes one or more other network devices, where the network device and the one or more other network devices are associated with a first address that corresponds to the virtual router. The network device may filter egress traffic to drop egress traffic that includes a particular destination address and that is at an interface of the device that is not needed to deliver control traffic. |
| US08959200B2 |
Event-based communication in a clinical diagnostic analyzer
A networked clinical diagnostic analyzer is disclosed with support for monitoring by a remote back office. The disclosed analyzer includes a module to detect in real-time events of interest while allowing the back office to modify the definitions of the events. The module may be networked using virtual private networking into the back office network, which is usually different from the network at the site of the clinical diagnostic analyzer's deployment. The real-time alerts allow both a quick response to actual or expected error conditions and the downloading of logged data that is likely of most interest and relevance. |
| US08959195B1 |
Cloud service level attestation
Techniques are disclosed for measuring and attesting to service levels offered by a service provider in a computing system implemented with a distributed virtual infrastructure. In one example, a method comprises the following steps. Information is maintained relating to one or more services offered by one or more service providers in accordance with a distributed virtual infrastructure. One or more service level claims associated with the one or more services are validated. A subscriber is sent validation results for at least a portion of the one or more services. |
| US08959190B2 |
Contextual data communication platform
Systems and methods for a contextual data platform are provided. According to one embodiment, a web server receives from a web browser running on an Internet-enabled device a HyperText Transport Protocol (HTTP) request. The HTTP request includes multiple HTTP header fields. A value of at least one of the HTTP header fields has been set based on a web browser privacy setting that was active at the time the HTTP request was generated by the Internet-enabled device. And, the web browser privacy setting was selected by an end user of the Internet-enabled device from among multiple web browser privacy settings supported by the web browser. The value of the at least one HTTP header field is determined by the web server. Based on the value and responsive to the HTTP request, content tailored in accordance with the web browser privacy setting is returned by the web server. |
| US08959183B2 |
System for downloading and executing a virtual application
A virtual process manager for use with a client application. Both the process manager and the client application are installed on a client computing device. In response to a user command to execute a virtual application at least partially implemented by a virtualized application file stored on a remote computing device, the client application sends a high priority command to the process manager to execute the virtual application. Before receiving the user command, the client application sends a low priority command to the process manager to download at least a portion of the virtualized application file. In response to the high priority command, and without additional user input, the process manager downloads any portion of the file not downloaded in response to the low priority command, and executes the virtual application on the client computing device. The client application may comprise a conventional web browser or operating system shell process. |
| US08959181B2 |
System and method for creating and posting media lists for purposes of subsequent playback
A method and apparatus for creating and posting media is provided. For example, the invention allows a user to quickly create, signal process, encode, and transfer media files to a server for storage, posting, distribution, and retrieval. Thus, media such as audio, video, display, photo, spreadsheet, Web Clips, and HTML pages can be combined into a media file for uploading to a server and accessed from listings posted at web sites. In accordance with embodiments, a user downloads and installs a plug-in at the user's client computer. The user then registers and logs onto the server to perform various tasks. For example, the user can create a combined audio and photo media file at the client computer, in accordance with server based control parameters received from the system server. The plug-in then allows the user to perform digital signal processing and encoding of the media file at the client computer. After the file is encoded, it may be uploaded to a server for storage, posting, distribution, and retrieval. A file management system provides copies and listings of the file to other servers and web sites as permitted. Thus, other user having access to the database or web site lists via other client computers may select the file for retrieval. In accordance with another aspect of the invention, an information management system provides file and file list rankings based upon selection or click through of files and file listings. |
| US08959179B2 |
System and method for selectively caching hot content in a content distribution network
A method includes altering a request interval threshold when a cache-hit ratio falling below a target, receiving a request for content, providing the content when the content is in the cache, when the content is not in the cache and the time since a previous request for the content is less than the request interval threshold, retrieving and storing the content, and providing the content to the client, when the elapsed time is greater than the request interval threshold, and when another elapsed time since another previous request for the content is less than another request interval threshold, retrieving and storing the content, and providing the content to the client, and when the other elapsed time is greater than the other request interval threshold, rerouting the request to the content server without caching the content. |
| US08959178B2 |
Transmission apparatus and transmission method
A transmission apparatus for transmitting content data to a receiving apparatus includes an establishing unit configured to establish a state where the content data can be transmitted to the receiving apparatus, a reception unit configured to receive a transmission request of the content data from the receiving apparatus in the established state where the content data can be transmitted, and a control unit configured to perform control such that, while a number of transmissions of the content data is equal to or greater than a predetermined number, the control unit does not transmit the content data to the receiving apparatus having issued the transmission request but keeps the state where the content data can be transmitted to the receiving apparatus and, when the number of transmissions of the content data becomes less than the predetermined number, the control unit permits the content data to be transmitted to the receiving apparatus. |
| US08959168B2 |
Weather forecasts based on expected location
A computing system is described that can automatically provide weather forecast information to a user based on the user's expected future location. In some embodiments, the methods can include predicting a future location of a user and storing the future location in the memory, fetching weather forecast information associated with the future location of the user, and outputting, to a mobile device associated with the user, the weather forecast information associated with the future location of the user. |
| US08959166B1 |
System and method for identifying websites
A method in accordance with the present disclosure may include identifying a first set of visits to one or more webpages by a first participant of a social network, determining whether the first participant received a social annotation during the visit to the webpages, calculating a first total number of missed social annotations for each of the webpages for the first participant of the social network based on the first set of visits to the webpages and the determined social annotations received during the visit to the webpages, determining a combined calculation of missed social annotations for each of the webpages based at least in part on the total number of missed social annotations for each of the webpages for the first participant and the total number of missed social annotations for each of the webpages for the second participant, generating an indication for a third participant. |
| US08959161B2 |
Method and apparatus for electronic messaging for managing and communicating availability of a user
A method, apparatus and systems for managing and communicating the availability of a first user to a community using an electronic message board connected to a wall or door. The electronic message board may display messages to the community. The first user and the community may leave recorded audio and/or video messages for each other on the electronic message board through a user interface and the location of the first user may be determined by the electronic message board and displayed to the community. |
| US08959160B2 |
Method and apparatus for displaying a message intended for different recipients
A method and apparatus for displaying a message destined for different recipients, wherein the apparatus programs a computer to perform the method, which includes: determining that a message is destined for a first recipient and a second recipient; determining a message size limit for the message based on capabilities of a first device used by the first recipient and a second device used by the second recipient; displaying a first portion of the message in a first format when a length of the message is less than the message size limit; displaying a next portion of the message in a second different format when the length of the message exceeds the message size limit. |
| US08959159B2 |
Personalized email interactions applied to global filtering
A computer implemented method for filtering unwanted bulk email in an email system and providing a positive user experience is provided. The method enables protection of email users from unsolicited bulk email using user-provided data on user interactions at both a user storage level and a global level with an email system. Metadata on user interactions with messages is collected. Messages are received by the system and evaluated using a global filter which assigns a score resulting in a message action. The action may be message delivery, message non-delivery or message routing, based on a score assigned by the global filter. When the message is delivered to user storage, the message may be examined relative to the metadata, and may alter the message action to an action different than the message action resulting from the score. Metadata for a plurality of users is returned to the global filter for use in making filtering future messages and modifies the global filter. |
| US08959156B2 |
Peer-to-peer aggregation system
An aggregation apparatus including: a computer, an output device, a display controlled by the computer, and networking hardware connecting the computer to a network, the computer programmed so that the aggregation apparatus: communicates with at least one computer via the Internet to obtain peer-to-peer information corresponding to real time data shared by at least one other computer; processes the peer-to-peer information to produce an aggregation; and then renders the aggregation as output; and then presents at least some of the aggregation and at least one of at least some of the information in a customizable user interface, at least some of the aggregation in association with an automatically generated score that represents a level of communication activity, and at least some of the information in a user interface which includes an automatically generated list of contacts and their associated recent activity. |
| US08959155B1 |
Data compression through redundancy removal in an application acceleration environment
A method, an apparatus and/or a system of data compression through redundancy removal in an application acceleration environment is disclosed. In one aspect, a method includes generating through a fingerprint module of a redundancy removal engine associated with a first network element a hash identifier of at least one portion of data of a contiguous data block stored in a bidirectional cache memory of the redundancy removal engine associated with a first network element. The size of contiguous data block is larger than the size of the at least one portion of data of the contiguous data block for which the hash identifier is generated. The method further includes compressing a data stream through a transmission compression module of the redundancy removal engine based on the at least one a hash identifier that is indexed. |
| US08959151B1 |
Establishing per-page multi-party communication sessions
A system and method for providing per-page multi-party communication sessions to users are disclosed. The system includes a communication module and a session module. The communication module receives page identification data identifying a web page navigated to by a user. The session module determines a multi-party communication session associated with the web page based at least in part on the page identification data and attribute data describing a communication attribute. The session module adds the user to the multi-party communication session associated with the web page. |
| US08959150B2 |
Providing a requisite level of service for an electronic meeting
Providing a requisite level of service for an electronic meeting. An embodiment can include receiving a request to schedule a first electronic meeting in a time slot, identifying an electronic meeting system to host the first electronic meeting, identifying a second electronic meeting scheduled to be hosted by the electronic meeting system in the time slot, determining an estimate of resource usage within the electronic meeting system during the time slot at least based on the second electronic meeting being scheduled to be hosted by the electronic meeting system in the time slot, comparing the estimate of resource usage with a threshold value, responsive to determining that the estimate of resource usage exceeds the threshold value, providing the requisite level of service to the first electronic meeting in the time slot by reducing anticipated resource usage of the electronic meeting system by the second electronic meeting. |
| US08959147B2 |
Information management systems with time zone information, including event scheduling processes
Information management systems with time zone information, including event scheduling processes are disclosed. One aspect of the invention is directed toward a computer-implemented scheduling method that can include identifying a difference between a participant time zone and a user time zone, reviewing availability information for the participant and/or one or more selected time preference periods for the participant, and selecting a time range for an event. The method can further include reviewing one or more selected time preference periods for the user. Another aspect of the invention is directed toward a computer-implemented method for associating time zone information with a contact in an information management program application that includes selecting a contact, analyzing contact information associated with the contact, and determining a time zone for the contact based on the analysis of the contact information. |
| US08959142B2 |
Combining server-side and client-side user interface elements
A method and apparatus are disclosed for combining server-supplied user interface elements with client-supplied user interface elements. The server-supplied user interface elements can be received by a client device and inserted into a client-supplied object model, such as a Document Object Model (DOM). The object model can then be used to render a page, such as a webpage. By injecting server-supplied user interface elements into a client object model, the client can intelligently combine UI elements from a server with UI elements from a client. In the situation where there are conflicting or overlapping UI elements, the client device can modify the object model to eliminate such conflicts or overlaps. |
| US08959141B2 |
System and method for pervasive computing
A method and system for pervasive computing are disclosed. According to one embodiment, a computer implemented method comprises a server communicating with a first device in a cloud computing environment, wherein the first device can detect surrounding devices, and an application program executable by the server, wherein the application program is controlled by the first device and the output of the application program is directed by the server to one of the devices detected by the first device. |
| US08959140B1 |
Seamless integration of cellular and internet text messaging services
A communication device may include a text messaging routing application. In response to a user-request to send a text message to a designated recipient over an Internet messaging system, the text messaging routing application may cause a query to be sent to the Internet messaging system asking whether the designated recipient of the text message is registered with the Internet messaging system or with an affiliate thereof. If the response to the query is in the negative, the text messaging routing application may cause the text message to be sent to the designated recipient over a cellular telephone network. If the response to the query is in the affirmative, the text messaging routing application may cause the text message to be sent to the designated recipient over the Internet using the Internet messaging system. |
| US08959139B2 |
Application-layer traffic optimization service endpoint type attribute
Using the ALTO Service, networking applications can request through the ALTO protocol information about the underlying network topology from the ISP or Content Provider. The ALTO Service provides information such as network resource preferences with the goal of modifying network resource consumption patterns while maintaining or improving application performance. This document describes, in one example, an ALTO server that implements enhancements to the ALTO service to assign a PID-type attribute to each of a set of one or more PIDs each associated with a subset of one or more endpoints of a network, wherein a PID-type attribute specifies a type for the subset of endpoints associated with the PID. The ALTO server generates an ALTO network map that includes a PID entry to describe each of the PIDs, wherein each PID entry includes a PID-type field that stores the assigned PID-type attribute for the PID described by the PID entry. |
| US08959138B2 |
Distributed data scalable adaptive map-reduce framework
A method for generating a distributed data scalable adaptive map-reduce framework for at least one multi-core cluster. The method includes partitioning a cluster into at least one computational group, determining at least one key-group leader within each computational group, performing a local combine operation at each computational group, performing a global combine operation at each of the at least one key-group leader within each computational group based on a result from the local combine operation, and performing a global map-reduce operation across the at least one key-group leader within each computational group. |
| US08959137B1 |
Implementing large multipliers in a programmable integrated circuit device
A specialized processing block is configurable as one ternary linear decomposition or two binary linear decompositions to perform large multiplications using smaller multipliers, and includes a first number of multiplier circuits of a first size, a second number of pre-adders, and a third number of block inputs. The block inputs are connected to a first subset of the multiplier circuits, and to the pre-adders which are connected to a second subset of the multiplier circuits. There is also a fourth number of additional inputs. A plurality of shifters shift partial product outputs of each of the multipliers by various shift amounts. A joint adder structure combines the shifted partial products. Controllable elements controllably select between different configurations of inputs to the multipliers and pre-adders, controllably connect and disconnect certain ones of the shifted partial products, and selectively split the joint adder structure into two smaller adder structures. |
| US08959136B1 |
Matrix operations in an integrated circuit device
Efficient matrix operations circuitry is based on combining a matrix decomposition and a forward substitution operations to share the same processing overhead. A dual multiplier circuit selectively applies complex multiplication operations to a first and second input vectors for computing a conjugate dot product vector or a non-conjugate dot product vector. The conjugate dot product vector corresponds to the matrix decomposition operation for triangulating an input matrix to generate an element of a triangulated matrix. The non-conjugate dot product vector corresponds to a forward substitution operation for determining an element of a forward substitution vector from the triangulated matrix. |
| US08959130B2 |
Compression of floating-point data in encoding groups
Exponents, mantissas and signs of floating-point numbers are compressed in encoding groups. Differences between maximum exponents of encoding groups are encoded by exponent tokens selected from a code table. Each mantissa of an encoding group is encoded to a mantissa token having a length based on the maximum exponent. Signs are encoded directly or are compressed to produce sign tokens. Exponent tokens, mantissa tokens and sign tokens are packed in a compressed data packet. For decompression, the exponent tokens are decoded using the code table. The decoded exponent difference is added to a previous reconstructed maximum exponent to produce the reconstructed maximum exponent for the encoding group. The reconstructed maximum exponent is used to determine the length of the mantissa tokens that are decoded to produce the reconstructed mantissas for the encoding group. The reconstructed sign, reconstructed exponent and reconstructed mantissa are combined to form a reconstructed floating-point number. |
| US08959126B2 |
Device management apparatus and device management method
A device management apparatus is capable of communicating with a plurality of devices connected thereto via a network. The device management apparatus includes a storage unit that stores therein setting items and setting values for the devices; an acquiring unit that acquires, from each of the devices, a file describing a setting item currently set in the device and a current setting value of the setting item; a determination unit that determines whether the acquired file includes a setting item not being stored in the storage unit; and a storage controller that causes the storage unit, if the acquired file includes a setting item not being stored in the storage unit, to store therein the setting item not being stored in the storage unit and a current setting value of the setting item. |
| US08959125B2 |
File system having inverted hierarchical structure
A computer system that improves upon the traditional file system hierarchy is disclosed. The computer system includes a processor and a persistent data storage device that is accessible by the processor. The system also may include file system software that is executed by the processor. The file system software may operate to organize the files of the persistent data storage device into a plurality of records that are contained in a metafile. Within the metafile, the files and directories of the file system may be organized in an inverted hierarchical structure. In the inverted hierarchical structure, records corresponding to child files and child directories of a parent directory may directly point to a record in the metafile that corresponds to the parent directory. In one implementation of the file system, individual records of the metafile may be each addressable by a file identifier. Each of the individual records, in turn, may include a parent identifier that corresponds to the file identifier of its parent directory record. |
| US08959124B2 |
Automated selection of functions to reduce storage capacity based on performance requirements
A plurality of functions to configure a unit of a storage volume is maintained, wherein each of the plurality of functions, in response to being applied to the unit of the storage volume, configures the unit of the storage volume differently. Statistics are computed on growth rate of data and access characteristics of the data stored in the unit of the storage volume. A determination is made as to which of the plurality of functions to apply to the unit of the storage volume, based on the computed statistics. |
| US08959120B2 |
Information processing apparatus, information processing method, and function expansion program
Disclosed is an information processing apparatus provided with a software environment in which a function of the information processing apparatus is added and deleted by a plug-in and having a storage unit which stores, in a prescribed storage region, information that is composed of one or more attribute data and the function uses. The apparatus includes an information generation unit that has registration information in which a software component for constructing/deleting the attribute data of the information that the function uses is installed and registered in the information processing apparatus in accordance with the plug-in, specifies the software component used when the information is generated based on the registration information, and executes the specified software component to generate the information that the function uses; and an information management unit that instructs the information generation unit to generate the information designated in accordance with a request for generating the information. |
| US08959113B2 |
System, method and computer program product for managing tabulated metadata
Embodiments disclosed herein provide systems and methods for managing metadata, including scalar, text, drop-down, type ahead, and tabular metadata related to digital assets. Restrictions may be set at the metadata field level to allow users of different user groups to view fields based on restriction classes. A metadata management tool may allow an administrator to restrict one or more metadata fields associated with a digital asset in a network with a restriction class. The restricted fields may be associated with one or more user groups in the network. Only users in the user groups associated with the restriction class can view the restricted fields, in addition to the digital asset and any unrestricted fields associated therewith. When searching tabular metadata, a ‘row oriented’ search function may retrieve only assets where the search criteria are matched by a single row. |
| US08959108B2 |
Distributed and tiered architecture for content search and content monitoring
An efficient large scale search system for video and multi-media content using a distributed database and search, and tiered search servers is described. Selected content is stored at the distributed local database and tier1 search server(s). Content matching frequent queries, and frequent unidentified queries are cached at various levels in the search system. Content is classified using feature descriptors and geographical aspects, at feature level and in time segments. Queries not identified at clients and tier1 search server(s) are queried against tier2 or lower search server(s). Search servers use classification and geographical partitioning to reduce search cost. Methods for content tracking and local content searching are executed on clients. The client performs local search, monitoring and/or tracking of the query content with the reference content and local search with a database of reference fingerprints. This shifts the content search workload from central servers to the distributed monitoring clients. |
| US08959105B2 |
Mining product recommendation from query reformulations
In various example embodiments, systems and methods to mine product recommendations from query reformulation is provided. In example embodiments, a search query is mapped to a particular product. Transition data for the particular product is accessed. The transition data includes values reflecting a number of search transitions between the particular product and other products in session sets of previous queries. One or more recommendations based on the transition data is determined and provided to the user. |
| US08959102B2 |
Structured searching of dynamic structured document corpuses
A system includes a document corpus containing structured documents, which contain both text and annotations of the text. The system also includes a search engine which is adapted to perform structured searches of the structured documents. As new types of annotations are added to the system, the search engine is updated automatically to become capable of performing structured searches for the new types of annotations. For example, if a new natural language processing (NLP) component, adapted to generate annotations of a new type, is added to the system, then the system automatically updates a query language to include a definition of the new type of annotation. The search engine may then immediately be capable of processing structured queries which refer to the new type of annotation. |
| US08959100B2 |
System and method for context enhanced mapping
A system and method for Context Enhanced Mapping. A request is received from a user over a network for a map comprising an identification of a physical location, and at least one criteria. The physical location is mapped. Spatial, temporal, topical, and social data available to the network relating to the physical location and criteria is retrieved using a global index of data available to the network and prioritized for inclusion based upon the user and context of the request. The map of the physical location and at least some of the retrieved spatial, temporal, topical, and social data is displayed on a display medium. |
| US08959098B2 |
System and method of performing location analytics
A system and method are provided for associating location data from one or more unique sources. The place and time of a unique location enabled device are associated with stored demographic information relating to the particular place and particular time. The place and time of the unique location enabled device are associated with a historical record of past locations and time of locations that the device has been. Based on the association of demographical information and historical information, the unique location enabled device is assigned to one or more groups or tribes. The location of all members of the group or tribe can be aggregated and exported for further analysis or display, thereby showing all group or tribe members at a particular time and place. |
| US08959096B2 |
Apparatus and methods for organizing data items by directed acyclic graphs
A data structure for storing items of information having a time of validity includes a validity interval for each item of information, and methods for making and using the same. The items of information are organized in a data structure having nodes and edges connecting the nodes. This data structure is preferably a directed acyclic graph structure. The data structure includes parent nodes and child nodes. The validity interval specified for any child node generally is contained within the validity interval specified for that child node's parent node, such that the data structure includes no child nodes with a validity interval that falls outside of the validity interval of its parent node. |
| US08959095B2 |
Hashing algorithm for network receive filtering
Roughly described, a network interface device is assigned a maximum extent-of-search. A hash function is applied to the header information of each incoming packet, to generate a hash code for the packet. The hash code designates a particular subset of the table within which the particular header information should be found, and an iterative search is made within that subset. If the search locates a matching entry before the search limit is exceeded, then the incoming data packet is delivered to the receive queue identified in the matching entry. But if the search reaches the search limit before a matching entry is located, then device delivers the packet to a default queue, such as a kernel queue, in the host computer system. The kernel is then responsible for delivering the packet to the correct endpoint. |
| US08959092B2 |
Providing streams of filtered photographs for user consumption
The present disclosure comprises systems and methods for providing a stream of only those photographs (including those inter-mixed with videos and hybrid types (animated gifs, animated photo bursts, etc.)) that may be of interest to particular users in a social network based on consideration of user social graphs and other external signals generated for the photographs based on predefined criteria to determine user interest levels. The systems and methods obtain photographs, retrieve social graphs for particular users, evaluate and filter photographs, rank them, and limit the number of photographs provided for viewing from a single source. Accordingly, only photographs that are determined to be most interesting to particular users are provided for display to them. |
| US08959091B2 |
Keyword assignment to a web page
A method, system and apparatus for a assigning keywords to a web page using keyword data from the web page itself, web pages having links pointing to the web page, and web pages pointed to by a link in the web page, wherein the keyword data from the multiple web pages is processed to provide a relevant set of keyword data for the web page. |
| US08959088B2 |
Log management method, log management system, and information processing apparatus
A log management method includes extracting, before deploying an application which compresses and outputs log information of the application, message format information concerning the log information from source code of the application, deploying the application, and outputting the log information in a form of a message based on the message format information when a device that is able to obtain the log information output from the deployed application obtains the log information. |
| US08959085B2 |
Playlist resolver
A real-time locater for digital media objects, related to one or more musical compositions and accessible over a network, is described. A service-provider maintains a master index of the digital media objects and a playlist-resolver server. The master index is organized by considering each media object to be an example of a primary attribute associated with the media object by a multitude of users. The reference is constructed as a data structure of primary attributes and means of locating the media objects as instances of primary attributes. The playlist-resolver works with the master index to translate a list of references to creative works into a series of successful accesses to the corresponding media object files. |
| US08959084B2 |
Identifying locations
A computer-implemented method includes receiving in a query a location identifier from a user of a remote device, parsing the input location identifier to generate one or more location-related tokens, querying a repository of location information with the one or more location-related tokens to identify locations for one or more documents having a substantial match to the tokens, scoring the one or more documents using a mass of location for each document that represents the geographical size of a location associated with the document, and presenting information relating to the one or more documents for display using the mass of location. |
| US08959083B1 |
Searching using social context
In one aspect, a system includes: an indexing engine for indexing a plurality of sources of content, receiving a search query and returning search results; a ranking engine for ranking search results to produce ranked results, the ranking engine coupled to receive search results from the indexing engine; a modification engine for generating modified results using information from additional sources and the ranked results, the modification engine coupled to receive the ranked results from the ranking engine, the modification engine coupled to receive the information from the additional sources; and a presentation engine for sending modified results and an annotation, the presentation engine coupled to receive modified results and the annotation from the modification engine, the presentation engine coupled to provide the modified results and the annotation to a client device. The present disclosure also includes a method for retrieving social videos. |
| US08959080B2 |
Search method, search apparatus and search engine system
Techniques for performing searches using models generated from data mining. These techniques may include receiving a query including a search string. If a portion of the search string matches with a category of relationship data, the portion of the search string may be replaced with a label of the category to generate a modified query. Based on the modified query and models generated from mining historical search data, intent of the query may be determined, and searches may be then performed. |
| US08959078B1 |
Identifying missing search phrases
In various embodiments, approaches for identifying missing search phrases are described. Search terms are behaviorally associated with an item in the electronic repository. If a search of the electronic repository fails to surface the item, the at least one search term can be identified as a missing search phrase for the item. |
| US08959072B2 |
Context-based multi-dimensional inquiring method of number address book
A method for context-based multi-dimensional searching of contacts in a phone address book is disclosed, the method comprises, inputting the searching field, determining if the searching field matches a certain city name, searching the full visiting card information in the address book, and sorting coordinators in the address book based on the multiple dimensions. |
| US08959067B1 |
Data storage inventory indexing
Embodiments of the present disclosure are directed to, among other things, managing inventory indexing of one or more data storage devices. In some examples, a storage service may store an index associated with archived data. Additionally, the storage service may receive information associated with an operation performed on the archived data. The storage service may also partition the received information into subsets corresponding to an identifier. In some cases, the identifier may be received with or otherwise be part of the received information. The storage service may also retrieve at least a portion of the index that corresponds to the subset. Further, the storage service may update the retrieved portion of the index with at least part of the received information. The updating may be based at least in part on the subsets. |
| US08959065B2 |
System and method for monitoring distributed asset data
A computer-based monitoring system and monitoring method implemented in computer software for detecting, estimating, and reporting the condition states, their changes, and anomalies for many assets. The assets are of same type, are operated over a period of time, and outfitted with data collection systems. The proposed monitoring method accounts for variability of working conditions for each asset by using regression model that characterizes asset performance. The assets are of the same type but not identical. The proposed monitoring method accounts for asset-to-asset variability; it also accounts for drifts and trends in the asset condition and data. The proposed monitoring system can perform distributed processing of massive amounts of historical data without discarding any useful information where moving all the asset data into one central computing system might be infeasible. The overall processing is includes distributed preprocessing data records from each asset to produce compressed data. |
| US08959063B2 |
Managing incident reports
The present disclosure describes methods, systems, and computer program products for managing incident reports can include receiving alert messages from multiple tenants and aggregating the alert messages into a reduced, correlated incident reports. For example, the method includes receiving, from a number of tenants, alert reports that represent at least one system alert incident associated with the tenants. The alert reports can be collected and analyzed for duplicate reports. The analysis for duplicate reports can include identifying a number of duplicate alert reports and correlating each identified duplicate alert reports into a correlated incident report. The correlated incident report can be aggregated into a summarized incident report for processing. |
| US08959061B1 |
Rapid restore from a prepared system image
A method, article of manufacture, and apparatus for efficiently restoring a target system are disclosed. In some embodiments, a target is analyzed. A target profile is created based on the analysis. The target profile is then compared to a source profile. A profile difference is generated based on the comparison. The source image is modified based on the profile difference, and the modified image is then stored on the target. In some embodiments, modifying the source image may include removing or adding software components. |
| US08959058B1 |
Linking dynamic computer data protection to an external state
A data backup manager links data backup robustness to an external state. The data backup manager monitors the external state. Responsive to the external state, the data backup manager adjusts parameters controlling data backup, such as backup frequency, backup content, and backup retention time. The data backup manager can increase these parameters responsive to an increase in an external distress state level, and decrease them in response to a decrease in the external distress state level. |
| US08959045B2 |
System and method for information sharing across security boundaries
A system and method for sharing information across security boundaries including a server for sharing information between networks. The method for includes receiving data structured as semantic statements, retrieving a set of rules and ontology, processing a semantic statement from data with rules and ontology, determining whether the semantic statement is consistent with rules and ontology, and determining a fact that gives rise to an inconsistency if the semantic statement is inconsistent. The method further includes removing the fact that gives rise to the inconsistency and releasing data when the semantic statement is consistent with rules and ontology. |
| US08959043B2 |
Fact checking using and aiding probabilistic question answering
A system and a computer program product for verifying a statement are provided. The system is configured to receive a statement. The system is configured to decompose the received statement into one or more sets of question and answer pairs. The system is configured to determine a confidence value of each answer in the one or more question and answer pair sets. The system is configured to combine the determined confidence values. The combined confidence values represent a probability that the received statement is evaluated as true. |
| US08959040B1 |
Spike timing dependent plasticity apparatus, system and method
A spike timing dependent plasticity (STDP) apparatus, neuromorphic synapse system and a method provide STDP processing of spike signals. The STDP apparatus includes a first leaky integrator to receive a first spike signal and a second leaky integrator to receive a second spike signal. An output of the first leaky integrator is gated according to the second spike signal to produce a first gated integrated signal and an output of the second leaky integrator is gated according to the first spike signal to produce a second gated integrated signal. The STDP apparatus further includes an output integrator to integrate a difference of the first and second gated integrated signals to produce a weighted signal. The system includes a synapse core and the STDP apparatus. The method includes integrating the spike signals, gating the integrated signals and integrating a difference of the gated integrated signals. |
| US08959035B2 |
System and method for screening and processing applicants
Disclosed are systems and methods for performing efficient job applicant screening. In particular, a network-based system is established for gathering applicant information from an applicant remotely. Analysis of the received information is performed and evaluated pursuant to a first level of screening that can be done without excessive use of resources. Upon passing the first level screening, background checks and/or interviews, which require substantial resources, are further conducted. Applicants who pass the first level of screening are scheduled for interviews, including the optional initiation of personal interviews via video chat. |
| US08959034B2 |
Transaction signature for offline payment processing system
Preventing fraud during an offline transaction by encoding a randomly-generated card verification code onto a smart card. The verification code is transmitted to a contactless device during each transaction, wherein it is cross-referenced with the account number to ensure presence of the card. Also, every transaction record is signed by an access key resident on the contactless device and certified by a signing key resident on a remote system. Funds may be deposited onto the card when the contactless device creates a deposit request, signs the request using an access key and transmits it to the remote system, which in turn processes the request and certifies it with a signing key. Funds may be withdrawn when the contactless device creates a withdrawal record and signs it using an access key. The remote system verifies the signatures and certifies the records using a signing key when the records are later transmitted. |
| US08959032B2 |
Self-authenticating peer to peer transaction
A system and method of transaction processing is provided. The system includes a central server, which, after receiving transaction and recipient information from an initiator, sends a verification code to the initiator. The server also sends instructions for the initiator to send the code to a recipient via an outside communication channel. The server receives the verification code from the recipient, and verifies the transaction. In this manner, security may be maintained. |
| US08959031B2 |
Trade execution methods and systems
One embodiment of the present invention relates to securities trading using electronic systems. Another embodiment of the present invention relates to a computer implemented trade execution method, comprising: sending from an execution venue to each of a plurality of smart order routers a notification message; receiving at each of the smart order routers the notification message sent thereto, wherein the notification message notifies each of the smart order routers about the presence of a non-displayed priced order at the execution venue; sending from at least one of the smart order routers to the execution venue at least one order to execute against the non-displayed priced order; receiving at the execution venue each order sent from each of the smart order routers; and executing at least one order received from at least one of the smart order routers against the non-displayed priced order. |
| US08959024B2 |
Visualizing, navigating and interacting with audio content
Methods and arrangements for visually representing audio content in a voice application. A display is connected to a voice application, and an image is displayed on the display, the image comprising a main portion and at least one subsidiary portion, the main portion representing a contextual entity of the audio content and the at least one subsidiary portion representing at least one participatory entity of the audio content. The at least one subsidiary portion is displayed without text, and the image is changed responsive to changes in audio content in the voice application. |
| US08959020B1 |
Discovery of problematic pronunciations for automatic speech recognition systems
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for discovery of problematic pronunciations for automatic speech recognition systems. One of the methods includes determining a frequency of occurrences of one or more n-grams in transcribed text and a frequency of occurrences of the n-grams in typed text and classifying a system pronunciation of a word included in the n-grams as correct or incorrect based on the frequencies. The n-grams may comprise one or more words and at least one of the words is classified as incorrect based on the frequencies. The frequencies of the specific n-grams may be determined across a domain using one or more n-grams that typically appear adjacent to the specific n-grams. |
| US08959018B2 |
Pulse encoding and decoding method and pulse codec
In a pulse encoding and decoding method and a pulse codec, more than two tracks are jointly encoded, so that free codebook space in the situation of single track encoding can be combined during joint encoding to become code bits that may be saved. Furthermore, a pulse that is on each track and required to be encoded is combined according to positions, and the number of positions having pulses, distribution of the positions that have pulses on the track, and the number of pulses on each position that has a pulse are encoded separately, so as to avoid separate encoding performed on multiple pulses of a same position, thereby further saving code bits. |
| US08959013B2 |
Virtual keyboard for a non-tactile three dimensional user interface
A method, including presenting, by a computer system executing a non-tactile three dimensional user interface, a virtual keyboard on a display, the virtual keyboard including multiple virtual keys, and capturing a sequence of depth maps over time of a body part of a human subject. On the display, a cursor is presented at positions indicated by the body part in the captured sequence of depth maps, and one of the multiple virtual keys is selected in response to an interruption of a motion of the presented cursor in proximity to the one of the multiple virtual keys. |
| US08959012B2 |
System and method for the automatic generation of patient-specific and grammatically correct electronic medical records
A system and method for automatically generating patient-specific and grammatically correct electronic medical records is disclosed. The system and method of an example embodiment includes retrieving a statement from a data object, the data object including the statement, at least one response option corresponding to the statement, and at least one sentence fragment corresponding to the response option; generating, using a processor, a user interface view that includes the statement; receiving a response corresponding to the statement; correlating the response to the at least one response option; retrieving the sentence fragment that corresponds to the correlated response option; and generating, using the processor, a patient-specific and grammatically correct electronic medical record using the retrieved sentence fragment. |
| US08959010B1 |
Emulation system with improved reliability of interconnect and a method for programming such interconnect
A method and apparatus for redundant communication channels in an emulation system is disclosed. A processor-based emulation system has a plurality of emulation chips on an emulation board. The emulation chips have a plurality of processor clusters. Signals are sent over one or more communication channels between processor clusters, including from a processor cluster on one emulation chip to a processor cluster on another emulation chip. Copies of the same signal may be sent in duplicate over separate communication channels. If a communication channel failure is detected, instruction memory is modified so that a processor cluster's instructions no longer address a first cluster memory location, but instead address a second cluster memory location of a non-failed communication channel. By using redundant communication channels, emulation system interconnect reliability is increased and recompilation of the design under verification may be avoided. |
| US08959008B2 |
Method for dynamically switching analyses and for dynamically switching models in circuit simulators
Performing a transient analysis with a compact FET model that is predominantly intended for DC analysis, such as an IDDQ leakage model, to enable toggling logic states in sequential logic circuits that cannot otherwise be examined in a DC analysis. An embodiment enables examining the DC or AC conditions of any logic state of any logic circuit in a DC or AC analysis, and additionally, it eliminates a potentially long execution time of a transient analysis with a DC model. Further solved is the present need to run two simulations and to maintain two netlists in order to overcome being unable to toggle certain logic states in the DC analysis. The invention achieves the aforementioned in a single simulation with a single netlist that calculates the DC operating circuit conditions with a model A on the fly at predetermined times or in certain logic states, during a transient analysis with a model B. |
| US08959004B2 |
Method and system for determining blended histogram shape identifiers
A method and system for determining blended histogram shape identifiers. A blended set of possible histogram shapes is created by selecting generated histogram shapes from a first generated set of all possible histogram shapes generated with a first method that include highest order rankings from a first pre-determined ranking order and generated histogram shapes from a second set of all possible histogram shapes generated with a second method that include highest rankings from a second pre-determined ranking order. A graphical histogram is displayed using the third blended set of all possible histogram shapes, thereby creating the graphical histogram with a new set of all possible histogram shapes based on an aggregate rakings order of histogram shapes generated with the first and second methods. |
| US08959000B2 |
Integrated testing systems and methods
An exemplary method includes parsing data representative of an automated test case into at least one transaction defined in accordance with a global test language, translating the transaction into at least one command specific to an automated test tool, and providing the command to the automated test tool for execution. In certain examples, the method further includes parsing the data representative of the automated test case into at least one other transaction defined in accordance with the global test language, translating the other transaction into at least one other command specific to another automated test tool, and providing other command to the other automated test tool for execution. |
| US08958991B2 |
Analyte testing method and system
Described and illustrated herein is an exemplary method of operating an analyte measurement device having a display, user interface, processor, memory, and user interface buttons. Such method can be achieved by measuring an analyte with the analyte measurement device, displaying a value representative of the analyte, querying a user to select a predetermined flag to associate the predetermined flag with the value, and pressing only one of the user interface buttons once to store the predetermined flag with the value in the memory of the analyte measurement device. In one embodiment, the testing device is a glucose meter and the analyte being tested is glucose. |
| US08958989B2 |
Method and apparatus for removal of the double indication of defects in remote eddy current inspection of pipes
The apparatus employs the remote field eddy-current (RFEC) inspection technique to electromagnetically measure physical parameters of a metallic pipe. RFEC devices inserted into and displaced along a cylindrical pipes may be used to measure the ratio of pipe thickness to electromagnetic skin-depth and thus allow for the non-invasive detection of flaws or metal loss. Typically these RFEC thickness measurements exhibit a so-called double-indication of flaws, an undesired artifact due to a double-peaked geometrical sensitivity function of the device. The method describes a means by which this double indication artifact may be removed by an appropriate processing of RFEC measurements performed by an apparatus specifically designed for this purpose. The invention is particularly well designed for applications in the oilfield industry. |
| US08958988B2 |
Method for choosing a traffic route
A system for identifying a fastest possible travel route is disclosed. A traveler data processor collects traffic speed data and associates the traffic speed data with road segments. The road segments collectively represent one or more possible travel routes from a start point to an end point. A forecast engine determines a predicted travel time for each of the road segments based on, for example, the traffic speed data for each of the road segments. A routing engine determines the fastest possible travel route from the start point to the end point. The fastest possible travel route is the possible travel route from the one or more possible travel routes with the shortest predicted travel time. |
| US08958986B2 |
Parking assistance apparatus
A parking assistance apparatus includes a display unit that displays an image of a scene behind a host vehicle. At least when the host vehicle moves forward or when the host vehicle is stopped, the display unit displays an indication including a plurality of kinds of trajectories along which the host vehicle is able to back up from a point at which the host vehicle is currently positioned, in a manner such that the indication is superimposed on the image of the scene behind the host vehicle. |
| US08958984B2 |
Route search device, server device and navigation device
A route search device includes: map data; a derived route acquisition section that acquires a first derived route from an origin point to a destination; a route correction region acquisition section that acquires a route correction region; a place to be passed through setting section that sets a place to be passed through in the route correction region; a start point and end point setting section that sets a start point and an end point in the route correction region; a corrected route acquisition section that acquires a corrected route; and a route correction section that corrects the first derived route to a second derived route from the origin point to the destination, constituted by a route from the origin point to the start point, the corrected route, and a route from the end point to the destination. |
| US08958982B2 |
Navigation device
Disclosed is a navigation device including: a target candidate extracting unit for extracting target candidates located along a guidance route from a map database on a basis of a vehicle position, the guidance route, and intersection information about a target intersection for guidance; a target determining unit for determining a target on a basis of knowledge about target determination from among the target candidates extracted by the target candidate extracting unit; a guidance sentence generating unit for generating a guidance sentence by using the target determined by the target determining unit; and a sound output unit for outputting voice guidance on a basis of the guidance sentence generated by the guidance sentence generating unit. |
| US08958981B2 |
Near field communication mobile device and navigation device communication system
A mobile device and navigation device communication system utilizing near field communication to easily capture and transfer address data and simplify programming of the navigation device is disclosed. When a mobile device receives a text message a mobile navigation communication application determines if there is an address included in the text message and if found extracts the address and encodes the address. The user then places the mobile device in close proximity to the navigation device and the data exchange is performed via near field communication. After the data exchange is complete the navigation device decodes the data into the address and searches its database to find an address match. The navigation device then displays the address for the user to confirm. After confirmation the navigation device displays the route or driving directs from the user's current location to the destination address. |
| US08958978B2 |
Method and device for monitoring a vehicle occupant
A method, a corresponding device, and a corresponding computer program for monitoring a vehicle occupant, including the following: detecting multiple objects in the vehicle surroundings with the aid of a surroundings detection device, detecting a viewing direction of the vehicle occupant with the aid of a gaze detection device, and automatically associating the detected viewing direction with one of the detected objects with the aid of an association device for a determination regarding which object of the multiple objects the vehicle occupant has viewed. |
| US08958975B2 |
Motor-vehicle driving style estimating system and method
A motor-vehicle driving style estimating system (100) of a motor-vehicle, comprising a measuring apparatus (1) of a kinematic signal representative of a motor-vehicle motion quantity trend (v(t)). The system is characterized in that it further comprises a kinematic signal low-pass filtering module (8) configured to provide a corresponding reference filtered signal associated with a reference trend of said quantity (vF(t)). Furthermore, the system comprises a kinematic signal and reference filtered signal processing module (2) configured to provide an indication of the driving style depending on a comparison of the motor-vehicle motion trend with the reference trend. |
| US08958972B1 |
Method and systems for storing fuel for reduced usage
Various methods and systems are provided for initiating and executing a fuel routine for a vehicle. In one embodiment, a method comprises sending from a controller of a vehicle a fuel request to a fuel tender to reduce a pressure of gaseous fuel on the fuel tender and adjusting one or more vehicle operating parameters to allow consumption of the gaseous fuel at an engine of the vehicle when the pressure of the gaseous fuel is below a threshold supply pressure. |
| US08958971B2 |
System and method to control an electronically-controlled turbocharger
By providing an electrically-controlled turbocharger (ECT) on a compression-ignition (CI) engine, the engine can be provided a desired lambda and a desired EGR fraction over the range of operating conditions. When lambda in the exhaust is leaner than the desired lambda, electrical energy to the electric motor of the ECT is reduced to bring actual lambda to desired lambda. Analogously, when lambda in the exhaust is richer than the desired lambda, electrical energy to the ECT is increased. |
| US08958970B2 |
Vehicle control device and vehicle control system
A vehicle control system and a vehicle control device can switch control of a supporting device for support a drive of a vehicle between an ordinary travel in which the vehicle travels in a state that a power source for causing the vehicle to travel is operated and an inertia travel in which the vehicle travels in a state that an operation of the power source is stopped. Accordingly, since the vehicle control system and the vehicle control device switch the control of the supporting device between the ordinary travel and the inertia travel, the vehicle control system and the vehicle control device achieve an effect that the vehicle can be caused to appropriately travel by inertia. |
| US08958966B2 |
Vehicle braking control device
Each of a plurality of electric brake devices corresponds to one of a plurality of wheels and includes a motor. A brake ECU, which controls the electric brake devices, determines whether there is an overheated motor of which the temperature T is greater than or equal to a first set threshold value Tth1. Also, when there is only one overheated motor, the brake ECU reduces a current value Ix for the overheated motor at a more gradual gradient in the case where the temperature T of the overheated motor is low than in the case where the temperature is high. |
| US08958964B2 |
Method for increasing vacuum production for a vehicle
Methods and systems for providing vacuum to a vehicle are described. In one example, a method adjusts an application force of a transmission clutch in response to a request for additional vacuum. |
| US08958961B2 |
Continuously variable transmission
A CVT transmission comprising a shaft journalled to a housing, a first sheave fixed to the shaft, a second sheave moveable parallel to an axis of rotation of the shaft, the second sheave locked in rotating relation with the first sheave by a first sheave member cooperatively engaged with a second sheave receiving member, the second sheave receiving member disposed at a helical angle (HA) with respect to the axis of rotation, a sprocket journalled to the housing, the sprocket threadably engaged with a movable member, a bearing disposed between the movable member and the second sheave, the movable member engaged with the housing whereby movement of the movable member is parallel with the axis of rotation, an electric actuator engaged with the sprocket, and the second sheave is axially movable upon a rotation of the sprocket. |
| US08958952B2 |
Auxiliary power supply device and electric power steering system including auxiliary power supply device
An auxiliary power supply device includes a capacitor that is connected to a main power source, and that is able to discharge an electric current to an electric motor, the main power source supplying electric power to the electric motor; and a booster circuit that boosts a voltage of the main power source and applies the boosted voltage to the auxiliary power source. An operation of the auxiliary power supply device is controlled by a control device. When supply of the electric power from the main power source to the capacitor is started in a state where a voltage across terminals of the capacitor is equal to or higher than a voltage of the main power source, the control device increases the voltage applied to the capacitor by the booster circuit as the capacitor voltage increases. |
| US08958946B2 |
System for detecting defects on an aircraft engine impeller wheel
A method and an on-board system for detecting impact on an impeller wheel of an aircraft engine. Deflection signals representative of the deflections on the blades of the impeller wheel are acquired. Each of the deflection signals is correlated with a pulse signal typical of an impact on a sound blade at the rotation frequency of the engine, in order to identify impacts on the impeller wheel. The impact signals are extracted from among the deflection signals. The impact signals are transmitted to the ground in order that the signals are analyzed to detect defects on the blades of the impeller wheel. |
| US08958943B2 |
Method and apparatus for tracking, scheduling, and reminding about maintenance status
An apparatus and method for tracking, scheduling, and reminding about maintenance status are provided. The apparatus connects to a vehicle and retrieves state information from the vehicle. The apparatus analyzes at least the state information to determine a maintenance status of the system, and creates an alert based on at least the maintenance status of the vehicle. The alert is provided to a user, and the user can instruct the apparatus to respond to the maintenance status through selection of options provided by the alert. Through the options, the apparatus may provide the user with options for maintenance service, schedule the service, and remind the user of the scheduled service. |
| US08958940B2 |
Apparatus, method and program for vehicle mass estimation, and apparatus, method and program for detecting decrease in tire air pressure
A vehicle mass estimation apparatus includes a wheel rotation speed information detection device configured to detect rotation speed information regarding the respective wheels of the vehicle; a frequency characteristic estimation device configured to calculate wheel acceleration information based on the rotation speed information of the wheels to estimate a frequency characteristic of the wheel acceleration information; and a vehicle mass estimation device configured to estimate a vehicle mass based on the estimated frequency characteristic. The frequency characteristic estimation device calculates an integrated value of frequency gain magnitudes of the respective frequency domains of front wheels and rear wheels of the vehicle, and the vehicle mass estimation device estimates the vehicle mass based on the ratio among the respective integrated values of the front wheels and rear wheels and a relation calculated in advance between the ratio and the vehicle mass. |
| US08958935B2 |
Bicycle drive apparatus
A bicycle drive apparatus includes a bicycle transmission, a drive assistance electric motor and a microcomputer. The microcomputer includes an output control section that controls an output of the drive assistance electric motor, and that issues a motor output increasing command to increase the output of the drive assistance electric motor upon receiving a shift command for shifting the transmission. |
| US08958932B2 |
Methods and apparatus to mitigate instrument landing system overflight interference
Systems and methods to mitigate instrument landing system (ILS) overflight interference are disclosed. An example method performing a first measurement of a position of an aircraft relative to a first location based on an instrument landing system, performing a second measurement of the position of the aircraft based on inertial measurements performed over a first time period occurring prior to the first measurement, performing a third measurement of the position of the aircraft based on inertial measurements performed over a second time period greater than the first time period and occurring prior to the first measurement, and generating guidance information based on a selected one of the first, second, or third measurements of the position of the aircraft. |
| US08958929B2 |
Vehicle control apparatus
In a vehicle control apparatus which performs a remote operation of a vehicle using a remote control, a remote operation of the vehicle which is not intended by a driver is prevented.When traveling control of a vehicle is performed through a remote operation from a remote control 3, a stop position of a vehicle 2 is set by a stop position setting device 9, and a movement course of the vehicle 2 is calculated by the vehicle course calculation device 10. In addition, the vehicle 2 is moved along the calculated movement course in response to a driving operation from the remote control 3, but if a driving operation from inside of the vehicle and a driving operation from the remote control 3 come into conflict, the driving operation from the remote control 3 is canceled, and the driving operation from inside of the vehicle is prioritized. |
| US08958927B2 |
Vehicle-onboard apparatus system, portable terminal, and vehicle-onboard machine
A vehicle-onboard apparatus system, comprises a portable terminal and a vehicle-onboard machine that are configured to be coupled to each other for communication. The portable terminal and the vehicle-onboard machine each store operation logs including operation contents thereof. When an operation of the vehicle-onboard machine and an operation of the portable terminal relate to each other, an operation log resulting from the operation of the vehicle-onboard machine and an operation log resulting from the operation of the portable terminal are associated with each other by first identification information. The vehicle-onboard machine makes a user to recognize the first identification information corresponding to an operation causing detected predetermined state. When the portable terminal receives an input of the first identification information presented by the vehicle-onboard machine, the portable terminal acquires the operation log associated with the input first identification information. The portable terminal analyzes the acquired operation log. |
| US08958925B2 |
Lane curvature detection system by utilizing vehicular and inertial sensing signals
A lane curvature detection system by utilizing vehicular and inertial sensing signals, which utilizes a speed detector, a steering wheel angle sensor, and a driving direction detector, to measure vehicle signals, such as the speed information, steering wheel angle, and driving direction of a vehicle, to estimate a lane curvature for the vehicle, and transmits said lane curvature to following vehicles for reference through a wireless transmission module. The lane curvature can be used to correct a lane curvature model, to increase accuracy of estimation. |
| US08958923B2 |
Distributed power supply system and control method thereof
A distributed power supply system is configured to execute a process for determining whether or not to permit a diagnostic process in such a manner that it is determined whether or not a difference between a set upper limit value and an actual measurement current value is not less than a load current value, the set upper limit value being a predetermined upper limit value set with respect to a detected current of a current sensor, the measurement current value being detected by the current sensor in a state where the diagnostic process is not executed, and the load current value being a value of a current flowing from a commercial power utility to a power load during execution of the diagnostic process; and if it is determined that the difference is not less than the load current value, the controller permits the diagnostic process. |
| US08958922B2 |
System and method for optimized decision-making in water supply networks and/or water supply operations
A system and method are provided for optimized decision-making in water supply networks and/or water supply operations. The system includes at least one central data processing device and a control system having at least one integration device. The system also includes at least one functional unit for identifying and/or processing status information affecting the respective network or operation. The functionality of the at least one functional unit can be integrated and/or incorporated into the control system by means of the integration device such that the control system functionality is expanded by the functionality of the respective functional unit and/or control system, and the at least one function unit cooperates such that individual functions and/or the functionality of the respective functional unit can be called up and/or executed and/or utilized via the integration unit and/or the control system, and resulting additional status information can be obtained and provided for decision-making, for example, relating to a technical task or technical problem. |
| US08958921B2 |
Method for operating building climate control system using integrated temperature and humidity models
A climate control system for a building includes air conditioning systems and ventilation (HVAC) systems. The system is controlled by determining sensible cooling and heating rates using temperature differences at inlets and outlets at evaporators, as well as moisture absorption, moisture desorption, ventilation influences, human activities, and condensation at the evaporator. Humidity differences and temperature differences are determined as driving forces for moisture absorption, desorption, and temperatures and humidities of interior fabrics. The differences are obtained from a thermal circuit model. A latent cooling rate is determined using the humidity differences. The model integrates a temperature model and a humidity model for jointly predicting temperatures and humidities for operating the HVAC systems using a mass transfer process. |
| US08958911B2 |
Mobile robot
A mobile robot including a robot body, a drive system supporting the robot body, and a controller in communication with the drive system. The robot also includes an actuator moving a portion of the robot body through a volume of space adjacent the mobile robot and a sensor pod in communication with the controller. The sensor pod includes a collar rotatably supported and having a curved wall formed at least partially as a surface of revolution about a vertical axis. The sensor pod also includes a volumetric point cloud sensor housed by the collar and observing the volume of space adjacent the robot from within the collar along an observation axis extending through the curved wall. A collar actuator rotates the collar and the volumetric point cloud sensor together about the collar axis. |
| US08958909B2 |
Walking robot and control method thereof
A walking robot and a control method thereof. The control method includes storing angle change data according to time corresponding to at least one joint unit of the robot using human walking data, extracting reference knot points from the angle change data according to time, and generating a reference walking trajectory using the extracted reference knot points, calculating a walking change factor to perform change between walking patterns of the robot, generating a target walking trajectory through an arithmetic operation between the reference walking trajectory and the calculated walking change factor, calculating a control torque to track the generated target walking trajectory, and transmitting the calculated control torque to the at least one joint unit so as to control walking of the robot, thereby achieving various walking patterns through a comparatively simple arithmetic operation process. |
| US08958907B2 |
Robot arm apparatus
A robot arm apparatus includes an arm mechanism including a base member and a link pivotally connected to the base member for pivotal motion in a horizontal plane through a rotational shaft. The link holds a regular circular transport object at its distal end. The apparatus also includes an edge detector, provided on the base member, that detects two edges of the regular circular transport object as the link pivotally rotates with respect to the base member, a pivotal angle detector that detects a pivotal angle of the link with respect to the base member, and a center position calculator that calculates a center position of the regular circular transport object with respect to the link. The calculation is based on two pivotal angles detected by the pivotal angle detector when the edge detector detects the two edges of the regular circular transport object. |
| US08958903B1 |
System and method for managing reassignment of units among shipments in a materials handling facility
Various embodiments of a system and method for managing reassignment of units among shipments in a materials handling facility are described. Embodiments may include a system configured to identify a first unit of a particular item that has been picked from inventory of a materials handling facility and assigned to a first shipment. The system may also, from multiple candidate shipments, identify a second shipment that requires a given unit of the particular item in order to become a complete shipment. For each candidate shipment, at least one unit of that shipment may be stored within a defined storage area of a materials handling facility. The system may, in response to identifying both shipments, generate an instruction to reassign the first unit of the particular item from the first shipment to the second shipment in order to transform the second shipment from an incomplete shipment to a complete shipment. |
| US08958900B2 |
Control system configuration for linking to machinery monitoring system
A method for importing data from a first system into a second system includes receiving configuration information about data storage structures in the first and second systems and information about communicating with the first and second systems. Information to be used in creating an import configuration file is entered via a user interface. The import configuration file is for use in preparing the second system to receive data from the first system. Based on the information about data storage structures, the information about communicating with the first and second systems, and the information entered via the user interface, the import configuration file is created to prepare the second system to receive data from the first system. Based on the import configuration file, data is transferred from the first system into the second system. |
| US08958892B2 |
Delivery catheter systems and methods
A delivery system for implanting a leadless cardiac pacemaker into a patient is provided. The cardiac pacemaker can include a docking or delivery feature having a through-hole disposed on or near a proximal end of the pacemaker for attachment to the delivery system. In some embodiments, the delivery catheter can include first and second tethers configured to engage the delivery feature of the pacemaker. The tethers, when partially aligned, can have a cross-sectional diameter larger than the through-hole of the delivery feature, and when un-aligned, can have a cross-sectional diameter smaller than the through-hole of the delivery feature. Methods of delivering the leadless cardiac pacemaker with the delivery system are also provided. |
| US08958891B2 |
Reinforced suture sleeve
A reinforced suture sleeve designed to cover and protect a medical lead from physical damage resulting from an over tightened suture is described. The reinforced suture sleeve comprises a metallic tubular insert with at least one slot that cut through the surface of the insert in a spiraled pattern. A biocompatible and pliable polymeric body is molded over the insert. The spiraled cut slot in the metallic tubular insert provides flexibility without degrading structural integrity. An alternate embodiment comprises a polymeric body provided with an embedded fiber mesh made of polymeric fibers, metallic fibers or combinations thereof. The fiber mesh prevents an over tightened suture from cutting through the suture sleeve and damaging the medical lead. |
| US08958887B2 |
Needle structure and method of performing needle biopsies
A biopsy needle (80) having a longitudinal channel (84) formed within an inner conductor (86) of a coaxial antenna is disclosed. The coaxial antenna terminates in a rigid insertion tip (82) e.g. a ceramic cone that is insertable into biological tissue. Microwave energy (e.g. having a frequency of 1 to 100 GHz) delivered to the coaxial antenna is emitted at the insertion tip. The insertion tip may be arranged to match the impedance of the coaxial antenna to a predetermined tissue impedance. The emitted radiation can be used to measure properties of or treat (e.g. ablate) tissue at the insertion tip. Needle biopsy apparatus is also disclosed, in which a microwave energy is controllably delivered to a needle from a microwave generator. The apparatus may include an impedance tuner to dynamically match the impedance of the needle with tissue at the insertion tip. |
| US08958883B2 |
Electrical stimulation device and method for therapeutic treatment and pain management
A disposable electrical stimulation device and method for providing therapeutic treatment and pain management in a convenient, compact configuration. Electrode size and shape and relative configuration can be varied according to an intended application and use, or a universal configuration can be provided for use on almost any area of the body. The common structure of communicatively coupled dual electrodes including control circuitry and a power source accommodates a range of different sizes, configurations, stimulation treatment intensities, and other physical and electrical characteristics that can be pre-customized and packaged for specific, limited time use. The device can therefore be used in methods of providing therapy, managing pain, and achieving other treatment goals by electrical stimulation. |
| US08958882B1 |
Transcranial stimulation device and method based on electrophysiological testing
The present method and system provides for the clinical application of neurostimulation and/or neuromodulation to a patient. The method and system includes receipt and acquisition of patient data, processing of that data relative to one or more known data sets, and determination of a good-fit trigger specific treatment protocol. The method and system provides for application of the protocol to the patient, including delivery of neuromodulation and biofeedback. Based thereon, the method and system re-iterates the goodness of fit determination for further treatment to the patient. |
| US08958877B2 |
Implantable device with bias for MRI
An ambulatory or implantable device, such as a pacer, defibrillator, or other cardiac rhythm management device, can tolerate magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or other noise without turning on an integrated circuit diode by selectively providing a bias voltage that can overcome an expected induced voltage resulting from the MRI or other noise. |
| US08958873B2 |
Method and apparatus for safe and efficient delivery of cardiac stress augmentation pacing
A cardiac pacing system controls the progression of a cardiac disorder such as heart failure by delivering cardiac stress augmentation pacing to create or augment regional stress in the heart according to a delivery schedule programmed for a patient. Various events associated with the patient's conditions, activities, and other treatments may render the cardiac stress augmentation pacing risky or ineffective. The system detects such events before and during each cardiac stress augmentation pacing session and modifies the delivery schedule in response to the detection of each event to ensure patient safety and therapy efficiency. |
| US08958872B2 |
Electrical muscle controller
A method of modifying the force of contraction of at least a portion of a heart chamber, including providing a subject having a heart, comprising at least a portion having an activation, and applying a non-excitatory electric field having a given duration, at a delay after the activation, to the portion, which causes the force of contraction to be increased by a least 5%. |
| US08958870B2 |
Therapy program modification
A therapy program may be modified based on information indicative of a change in a therapy field, which may represent a region of a patient's tissue to which therapy is delivered. Upon receiving information indicative of a therapy field change, an algorithmic model of a present therapy field may be generated and compared to an algorithmic model of a baseline therapy field, which indicates a therapy field that provides efficacious therapy to the patient. If a characteristic of the present therapy field differs from the baseline therapy field model, the current therapy program may be modified. In another example, upon receiving information indicative of a therapy field change, the current therapy program may be modified, and an algorithmic model of a therapy field based on the modified therapy program may be compared to a baseline therapy field model to determine whether the modified therapy program is a suitable alternative. |
| US08958869B2 |
Electromyography system
Methods for determining structural integrity of a bone within the spine of a patient, the bone having a first aspect and a second aspect, wherein the second aspect separated from the first aspect by a width and located adjacent to a spinal nerve. The methods involve (a) applying an electrical stimulus to the first aspect of the bone; (b) electrically monitoring a muscle myotome associated with the spinal nerve to detect if an onset neuro-muscular response occurs in response to the application of the electrical stimulus to the first aspect of the bone; (c) automatically increasing the magnitude of the electrical stimulus to until the onset neuro-muscular response is detected; and (d) communicating to a user via at least one of visual and audible means information representing the magnitude of the electrical stimulus which caused the onset neuro-muscular response. |
| US08958866B2 |
System and method to analyze blood parameters using magnetic resonance imaging
A system and method for accurately producing MR images of selected vascular compartments includes employing a control scan and a tag scan, each including velocity selective modules that suppress signal from blood flowing faster than a given cutoff velocity, to acquire control and tag sets of NMR data that may be subtracted to produce a compartment-specific MR image that is substantially free of information from stationary tissues and blood outside the selective vascular compartments. Accordingly, physiological parameters, such as oxygen saturation (SaO2), oxygen extraction fraction (OEF), and cerebral metabolic rate of oxygen (CMRO2), can be generated from the compartment-specific images. Further still, kinetic curves of oxygen exchange can be created, thus providing detailed insight into oxygen exchange dynamics. |
| US08958863B2 |
Distributed medical sensing system and method
A distributed medical sensing system including a first hub configured to receive first medical characteristic data from a first body sensing device, the first body sensing device being located in a first sterile field and a second hub configured to receive second medical characteristic data from a second body sensing device, the second body sensing device being located in a second sterile field spaced from the first sterile field. The system also includes a computing device outside of the first and second sterile fields and communicatively coupled to the first and second hubs, the computing device configured to receive the first and second medical characteristic data from the respective first and second hubs, process the first and second medical characteristic data, and transmit the processed first and second medical characteristic data to the respective first and second hubs. |
| US08958860B2 |
Optical sensors for intraoperative procedures
An intra-operative sensor device for detecting tissue or body parameters includes one or more light emitting sources and one or more photo-detectors. An optical isolator ring may be placed around either the one or more light emitting sources or around the one or more photo-detectors. The intra-operative sensor device may be a stand alone device or may be operatively coupled into a surgical instrument, such as a laparoscopic device. |
| US08958855B2 |
Mobile terminal having shielding member
A mobile terminal is provided that includes front and rear cases, an intermediate case between the front and rear cases, and a printed circuit board between the intermediate cases and at least one of the front and rear cases. A shielding member having a first width, length and thickness, and being formed of a metal. Non-conductive material may have a second thickness attached to at least two edges of the shielding member. |
| US08958853B1 |
Mobile device inactive mode and inactive mode verification
A mobile device, comprising: a processor; and a memory including instructions that when executed by the processor cause it to perform the steps of: receiving a user selection to automatically enter an inactive mode in response to an action within the mobile device indicating the device is being used in a moving vehicle; receiving a communication from a wireless communication module; if the mobile device is not in inactive mode, providing a notification to the user that a communication has been received; if the mobile device is in inactive mode, transmitting an away message via the wireless module. |
| US08958851B2 |
Mobile terminal and method of displaying information therein
A mobile terminal including a communication unit configured to communicate with at least one other terminal; a memory configured to store at least first and second operating systems including at least first and second modes, respectively; a controller configured to execute the first operating system, and to activate the first mode corresponding to the first operating system; and a display unit configured to display a first information screen corresponding to the activated first mode. Further, the first information screen includes first application information corresponding to the first mode and second application information corresponding to the second mode and an identifier identifying the first and second application information. |
| US08958847B2 |
Methods and apparatuses for optimization of multiple subscription device performance
Methods and apparatus of tune away in wireless communications include receiving a master information block (MIB) from a first subscription network entity on a first subscription in a user equipment (UE). The method further includes determining system information block (SIB) scheduling information associated with the first subscription network entity. Moreover, the method includes tuning away from the first subscription to a second subscription. |
| US08958845B2 |
Dual band WLAN MIMO high isolation antenna structure
A dual band high isolation antenna structure includes a diplexer unit, a 4-port decoupling module, a first frequency band antenna assembly, and a second frequency band antenna assembly. The diplexer unit is operable to frequency domain multiplex between a first frequency band and a second frequency band. The 4-port decoupling module is operably coupled to the diplexer unit and is operable to isolate a first pair of ports from a second pair of ports. The first frequency band antenna assembly is operably coupled to the diplexer unit and is operable to transceive wireless signals in the first frequency band. The second frequency band antenna assembly is operably coupled to a port in each of the first and second pairs of ports and is operable to transceive wireless signals in the second frequency band. |
| US08958843B2 |
Method and device for managing adjacent relation among cells
A method for managing adjacent relation among cells is disclosed in the disclosure. The method includes: obtaining adjacent cell configuration information of a current cell in real time; a Network Management System (NMS), an Element Management System (EMS) and a Network Element (NE), in turn, analyzing and processing the adjacent cell configuration information and adjusting an adjacent relation list of the cell, according to a hierarchical control strategy table preconfigured or in default configuration, wherein the hierarchical control strategy table is used to specify adjacent relation list configuration ability of the NMS, the EMS and the NE. A device for managing adjacent relation among cells is also disclosed in the disclosure, the adjacent cell configuration information of the cell can be detected and obtained automatically, automatic management of the adjacent relation for an area managed by the NE, the adjacent relation for an area managed by the EMS, and the adjacent relation for the crossing EMS area is implemented, and the hierarchical processing method is adopted, thus the costs of information interaction and transmission are least, the processing bottleneck can be effectively avoided, the processing capability of the whole network can be adequately discovered especially when the payload of the network is rather heavy, the processing efficiency is also improved, and the real-time performance is best. |
| US08958839B2 |
Power control of control channels in an LTE system
In some examples, a method for power control of control channels in a radio communication system is described. The method may include transmitting, with a first transmission power, first scheduling data in a common search space of a PDCCH. The method may also include transmitting, with a second transmission power, second scheduling data in a specific search space of the PDCCH. |
| US08958838B2 |
Multi-stage transmit power control scheme for access point
Transmit power for an access point is controlled based on information received by the access point. For example, an access point may employ one or more algorithms that use messages received from nearby access terminals to maintain an acceptable tradeoff between providing an adequate coverage area for access point transmissions and mitigating interference that these transmissions cause at nearby access terminals. Here, the access point may employ a network listen-based algorithm upon initialization of the access terminal to provide preliminary transmit power control until sufficient information is collected for another transmit power control algorithm (e.g., an access terminal assisted algorithm). Also, the access terminal may employ an active access terminal protection scheme to mitigate interference the access point may otherwise cause to a nearby access terminal that is in active communication with another access point. |
| US08958833B2 |
Systems, apparatus and methods for interference management on downlink channels in wireless communication systems
Systems, methods, apparatus and computer program products to facilitate determining nominal interference from one or more interfering base stations are provided. In one embodiment, the method can include computing a nominal interference. The method can also include transmitting the nominal interference to one or more interfering base stations. The nominal interference can be transmitted to at least one of the one or more interfering base stations to compute a loss in transmission rate to a user equipment in a selected cell if at least one of the one or more interfering base stations transmits over a same set of resources on which the user equipment in the selected cell receives information. |
| US08958832B2 |
System and method for filtering long short message
The disclosure discloses a system and a method for filtering a long short-message, wherein the method comprises the following steps: step 1: a network security agent module sends a short message which is from a short message center and/or a short message gateway to a real-time monitoring service processing module (101), and the real-time monitoring service processing module sends split messages in the short message to a long message splicing module (102); step 2: the long message splicing module splices multiple split messages into an integrated long message and sends it to the real-time monitoring service processing module (103); step 3: the real-time monitoring service processing module filters the integrated long message according to a filter condition and returns a filter result to the network security agent module (104). The disclosure can filter out all key words in the long message effectively, so as to solve the problem in prior art that a long short-message that has been split up can not be filtered out effectively. |
| US08958831B2 |
Improvements to wireless communication systems and methods
Methods and devices arranged to control access to a cell in a communication network. One embodiment includes a processing system arranged to cause an apparatus to receive a plurality of Closed Subscriber Group identifiers (CSG IDs) assigned to the cell, select and transmit a first CSG ID from the plurality of CSG IDs on the basis of a first load condition on the cell, and select and transmit a second, different, CSG ID from the plurality of CSG IDs on the basis of a second, different, load condition on the cell. |
| US08958830B2 |
Location based presence and privacy management
A method and system for providing location based presence status and enhancing location privacy management in a mobile, instant messaging or social networking environment. A user specifies or saves their favorite locations (e.g. home, work, school, or particular business or point of interest locations), and specifies or selects names and/or categories to be shared for each user-specified location. In addition, the system provides multiple sharing levels for sharing multiple types of location contextual information. When user's current location corresponds to user-specified locations, location based presence status is provided to specified contacts according to the sharing level settings, and provides user the option to share location contextual information without sharing location coordinates of the user. When user is driving, location based presence status is updated accordingly, and when user is at other business or POI locations, corresponding location contextual information is shared based on user's settings for each sharing level. |
| US08958828B2 |
Self-aware profile switching on a mobile computing device
In one implementation, a computer-implemented method includes detecting, by a mobile computing device, a current context associated with the mobile computing device, the current context being external to the mobile computing device and indicating a current state of the mobile computing device in its surrounding environment. The method can also include identifying, based on at least a first portion of the current context, a location description for the mobile computing device, wherein the location description includes a textual description of the location; and determining, based on the identified location description and at least a second portion of the current context, whether to switch the mobile computing device from operating using a current profile to operating using a second profile, wherein the current profile and the second profile each define one or more settings of the mobile computing device. |
| US08958825B2 |
System, method and robot terminal apparatus for providing robot interaction service using location information of mobile communication terminal
A system and a method for providing a robot interaction service utilizing a location-based service of a mobile communication terminal. The system for providing a robot interaction service utilizing location information of a mobile communication terminal, includes: a mobile communication terminal for performing a mobile communication service through a wireless communication network, measuring a current location thereof and transmitting the measured location information to a predetermined robot terminal through a communication network; and a robot terminal for receiving the location information from the mobile communication terminal, determining a robot behavior based on the received location information, and controlling the operation thereof according to the determination result. |
| US08958822B2 |
Determining points of interest of a mobile user
Methods, systems and apparatus for tracking points of interest of a user of a mobile device are disclosed. One method includes determining points of interest of a user of a mobile device. The method includes obtaining user-related information, wherein the user-related information includes spatial information about the user, and determining at least one point of interest of the user based on the user-related information. Another embodiment includes an apparatus for determining points of interest of a user. For one embodiment, the apparatus is a mobile device. The mobile device is operative to obtain user-related information, wherein the user-related information comprising spatial information about the user, and the mobile device is operative to determine at least one point of interest of the user based on the user-related information. |
| US08958820B2 |
System and method for aggregating and associating mobile device location data
A computer-implemented method for processing mobile device location data is provided. Location data is filtered based on age and accuracy or precision of location coordinates. Location data is partitioned based on the location coordinates into a plurality of clusters including a plurality of location data instances. The plurality of clusters are filtered based on a number of data instances in a particular cluster and a period of time over which data instances of the particular data cluster are generated. A distance is determined from a location coordinate corresponding to the data instances of one or more of the plurality of clusters to a particular predetermined location, and the one or more of the plurality of clusters are correlated with the particular predetermined location in response to the distance being less than a predetermined distance. The invention further provides a location data processing system. |
| US08958819B2 |
Femto-assisted location estimation in macro-femto heterogeneous networks
The disclosed subject matter relates to a wireless communications environment. Femto-assisted location estimation schemes can determine UE location information based on information from either macro base stations or femto base stations in a LTE-A heterogeneous network. Positions information for a femto base station can be employed even though the exact positions of fBS may not be available. The femto base station position information can be depicted as a probabilistic distribution. Bayesian estimation based on TDOA and utilization of a particle filter can facilitate determining UE location information. Furthermore, a simplified scheme can reduce computational complexity. |
| US08958817B1 |
Weighted-distance spatial indexing
Provided is a process of and apparatus for spatially indexing geographic items. The process may include obtaining geographic-item data identifying geographic items, the geographic location of each item, and an attribute of each item, wherein the geographic-item data identifies values of key-value pairs to be formed in a spatial index; obtaining a plurality of geographic-location keys each corresponding to a geographic area, the geographic-location keys identifying keys of the key-value pairs to be formed in the spatial index; and pairing each geographic-location key with an item among the geographic-item data. Pairing may be performed by: calculating distances between the geographic location of each of the items and the geographic-location key; weighting each of the distances based on the attribute of the item corresponding to that distance; and selecting the geographic item having the closest attribute-weighted distance as the item to be paired with the geographic-location key. |
| US08958815B2 |
Method and system for characterizing location and/or range based on transmit power
A transmitting communication device may iteratively adjust its transmit power, and may estimate, based on iterative transmit power adjustment, relative location of a receiving communication device. The transmit power may be initialized to a maximum value, and the transmit power may be iteratively reduced until connectivity with the receiving communication device is lost. The loss of connectivity may be determined based on reception of responses to ping messages transmitted by the transmitting communication device. The transmitting communication device may authenticate the receiving communication device and/or a user of the receiving communication device. The authentication may comprises utilizing transmit power adjustment and/or relative location estimation therefrom to ensure that a separation between the devices does not exceed a maximum value. The transmitting communication device may generate location info associated with the receiving communication device based on the relative location estimation, and may communicate the location info to a location server. |
| US08958813B2 |
Cloud-based spectrum management services
A platform to facilitate transferring spectrum use rights is provided that includes a database to ascertain information regarding available spectrum for use in wireless communications. A request for spectrum use from an entity needing spectrum may be matched with available spectrum. The Cloud Spectrum Services (CSS) process allows entities to access spectrum they would otherwise not have; it allows the end user to complete their download during congested periods while maintaining high service quality; and it allows the holder of rental spectrum to receive compensation for an otherwise idle asset. |
| US08958812B2 |
Cell load balancing method and devices thereof
A cell load balancing method, a cell load measuring method, and devices thereof are provided. The cell load balancing method includes: acquiring information of the load of a current cell and information of the load an adjacent cell; determining a target cell in which a mobility parameter needs to be modified thereof according to the information of the load of the current cell and the information of the load of the adjacent cell; sending a parameter modification request to the determined target cell; and modifying parameters of the current cell according to content of the parameter modification request if the parameter modification response message is a parameter modification response indicating modification successful. With the above solution, a load balancing solution can be better implemented in a network, thereby improving a capacity of the network, improving a success rate of user access, and reducing access delay. |
| US08958810B2 |
Method and apparatus for spectrum allocation in wireless networks
The invention includes a method and apparatus for dynamically allocating spectrum available within a region including a plurality of base stations. The method includes obtaining a plurality of spectrum demands associated with at least a portion of the base stations, each spectrum demand requesting a portion of the available spectrum, and determining a plurality of spectrum allocations satisfying at least a portion of the spectrum demands. The spectrum allocations are determined by processing the spectrum demands using network information such as base station information associated with the base stations and region information such as terrain information associated with the region. The region information may include signal propagation information. |
| US08958807B2 |
Method and apparatus for providing communication service to mobile station by multiple base stations in cooperation in wireless communication system
A method and an apparatus for providing a service to a Mobile Station (MS) by a plurality of Base Stations (BSs) operating in cooperation in a wireless communication system are provided. The method includes configuring, by a master BS, a first cooperative cell including at least one slave BS, sending a resource request message for requesting resource allocation to the at least one slave BS included in the first cooperative cell, receiving, from each of the at least one slave BS, a resource request response message including resource approval control results for the resource allocation request, changing member BSs constituting the first cooperative cell based on the resource request response message, and allocating resources to an MS that is served in the first cooperative cell. |
| US08958804B2 |
Communication system and communicating connection method thereof
A communication system and a communicating connection method are disclosed. The communication system comprises a first user side, a second user side and a cloud platform. The first user side has a first identity identification code, a first space identification code or a combination thereof. The second user side has a second identity identification code, a second space identification code or combination thereof. The cloud platform comprises a cloud database and a cloud processing module. When the first user side is positioned, the cloud processing module matches and establishes the first user side and the second identity identification code, the second space identification code or the combination thereof, to connect the first user side and the second user side by a VoIP technology. |
| US08958801B2 |
Apparatus and method for managing neighbor list in mobile communication system
An apparatus and method for efficiently manage a neighbor cell list in a mobile communication system. A method for operating a base station in a mobile communication system includes generating a neighbor cell list including at least one cell, including at least one cell among the at least one cell in a first list disallowing a handover, and disallowing a handover to the at least one cell included in the first list. |
| US08958799B2 |
Wireless device based inter radio access technology handover initiation
User Equipment (UE) based forced inter radio access technology (iRAT) handover. A connection to a network may be established via a first cell operating according to a first radio access technology (RAT). It may be determined to initiate a handover of the UE from the first cell to a second cell operating according to a second RAT. An indication may be transmitted to the network to initiate a handover of the UE from the first cell to the second cell. An indication may be received from the network to perform handover of the UE from the first cell to the second cell in response to the indication to initiate the handover. Handover of the UE from the first cell to the second cell may be performed in response to the indication to perform the handover. Handover may include releasing the connection to the network via the first cell and establishing a connection to the network via the second cell. |
| US08958797B2 |
Mechanism to update the CSG cell access check upon PLMN change at handover
Various combinations of these teachings solve dual errors for a user equipment UE checking whether a private cell is allowed when handing over between serving and target cells, where the PLMN and/or list of EPLMNs of the serving and target cells may differ. The serving cell may send a one-bit indication that there is a change in a handover command or a system information SI6 message after which the UE may or may not refrain from reporting new cells until it performs a registration/location area update in the target cell. The target cell may trigger in the UE a registration update then provide the UE with the PLMN of the target cell. The serving cell can provide the PLMN of the target cell in a SI6 message or handover command, which the UE may use in place of or in addition to the PLMN/EPLMN of the serving cell when checking whether a private/closed subscriber group cell is allowed. |
| US08958796B2 |
Method and system for connecting a user equipment to a network device via a mobile communication network
A method for connecting a user equipment to a network device via a mobile communication network, applicable to devices that must always be reachable while saving bandwidth of the mobile communication network, where the user equipment operates in a passive state capable of responding to a page signal by switching to an attempting-to-attach state, and at least an information of a current tracking area and an identifier of the user equipment is stored in an entity of the mobile communication network and/or a network device, this information being used for sending the paging signal to the equipment. |
| US08958794B2 |
Efficient reselections in the presence of closed subscriber group cells
A method in a mobile station for avoiding interference to restricted access cells, including detecting presence of a restricted access cell, determining that a measured path-loss is larger than a path-loss threshold, determining that the mobile station is not allowed to access the restricted access cell, and barring a carrier frequency on which the restricted access cell is deployed when the measured path-loss is larger than the path-loss threshold and when the mobile station is not allowed access to the restricted access cell. |
| US08958793B2 |
Method and apparatus for managing common measurement gaps in multimedia broadcast multicast service cells
A method and apparatus for managing common measurement gaps in multimedia broadcast multicast services (MBMS) cells are described. In one embodiment, a broadcast channel (BCH) common measurement gap is determined for use by a plurality of wireless transmit/receive units (WTRUs) in an MBMS cell. The BCH common measurement gap is assigned to the WTRUs, and the BCH common measurement gap is transmitted to the WTRUs. In another embodiment, a paging channel (PCH) common measurement gap is determined for use by a plurality of WTRUs in an MBMS cell. The PCH common measurement gap is assigned to the WTRUs, and the PCH common measurement gap is transmitted to the WTRUs. |
| US08958790B2 |
Management of macro network KPI impacts for a mass deployment of femtocells
Power management is provided in a femtocell basestation in a cellular communications network, in order to ensure that the effect of a mass deployment of femtocells on the key performance indicators of the surrounding macro network is bounded, for all femtocell traffic profiles. An expected area density of femtocells is determined; a macro layer quality criterion is set; a network performance indicator impact level is set; a maximum impact area allowed for the femtocell is calculated, based on the expected area density of femtocells, the macro layer quality criterion, and the network performance indicator impact level; a distance of a macro layer user from the femtocell is estimated; and the downlink power in the femtocell is controlled, based on the estimated distance of the macro layer user from the femtocell and based on the calculated maximum impact area. |
| US08958789B2 |
Distributed digital antenna system
An optical medium, such as fiber, is tapped to provide an antenna port wherever radio service coverage is desired. Each antenna port is a bi-directional remote unit that receives a digital optical signal from a host unit and transforms the signal to a radio frequency signal for transmission by the remote unit. The remote unit receives radio frequency signals that are converted to digital signals and summed with signals from other remote units and converted to an optical signal for transmission to the host unit. |
| US08958781B2 |
Sending caller identification information using a joint services account
A first network device receives a message that identifies a relationship between a wireless user device and a client device, the relationship is to allow for caller identification information, for calls associated with the wireless user device, to be sent to the client device. The first network device stores the information identifying the relationship. The first network device receives caller identification information for a call associated with the wireless user device. The first network device determines to send the caller identification information to the client device, based on the information identifying the relationship stored by the first network device; and the first network device sends the caller identification information to the client device. |
| US08958780B2 |
Provisioning based on application and device capability
A user equipment (UE) is disclosed comprising an agent configured to monitor and report UE configuration and capability information, wherein the UE is further configured to provide the UE configuration and capability information, and subsequently receive an application based on the configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a network comprising a provisioning server configured to receive UE configuration and capability information, and subsequently provide an application based on the UE configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a method comprising providing UE configuration and capability information from a UE, and receiving an application at the UE based on the configuration and capability information. Also disclosed is a method comprising receiving UE configuration and capability information at a provisioning server, and providing an application from the provisioning server based on the UE configuration and capability information. |
| US08958776B2 |
Apparatus, and associated method, for assigning policy settings to a mobile station
An apparatus, and an associated method, automatically calculates and assigns policy settings to be implemented at mobile stations. Information is collected relating to groups, such as groups within an enterprise, to which users of the mobile stations are members. Policy-setting conflicts between different groups, if the user is a member of more than one group, are reconciled, and the policy settings that are assigned are of reconciled settings. |
| US08958770B2 |
Dynamic usage inequity detection and/or remedy
The described subject matter relates to an architecture that can dynamically detect and/or automatically remedy service usage inequities in a communications network. In particular, based upon a comparison of incoming call detail records (CDRs) to various subscriber information (e.g., service plan, blacklisted devices for the service plan, historic or current billing cycle usage, etc.), the architecture can identify when a usage inequity occurs or is likely to occur, substantially in real time. |
| US08958769B1 |
Direct conversion receiver for angle modulated signals
A direct conversion receiver including an input stage, a frequency modulated local oscillator, a mixer stage, an output stage, and a DC blocker stage coupled between the mixer stage and the output stage. The input stage is receptive to a frequency modulated transmission having a carrier frequency fc and the frequency modulated local oscillator provides a frequency modulated local oscillator signal. In an embodiment, the frequency modulated local oscillator includes a local oscillator having an output with a frequency approximately equal to fc, a modulation source having a modulation signal output, and a frequency modulator coupled to the outputs of the local oscillator. |
| US08958767B2 |
Radio apparatus
A radio apparatus includes an antenna; an amplifier that amplifies a radio signal, received via the antenna; a first mixer that frequency converts the amplified radio signal to generate a first analog signal; a first A/D converter that converts the first analog signal to generate a first digital signal; a second mixer that frequency converts the amplified signal to generate a second analog signal; a second A/D converter means that converts the second analog signal to generate a second digital signal; a demodulator means that demodulates the first and second digital signals to generate a demodulated signal; a detector that detects a preamble from the first digital signal; and a control means that halts the second mixer and second A/D converter during the wait for the radio signal and that activates the second mixer and second A/D converter when the detector detects the preamble. |
| US08958765B2 |
Multifunction control indicator for a vehicular mobile radio
An improved user interface is provided for a front control panel (104) of a vehicular mobile radio (100) operating in a public safety environment. A multifunction control indicator is formed of a mode indicator light ring (126) co-located about a perimeter of a multifunction control knob (124). The multifunction control knob (124) controls two or more radio functions, such as volume and channel change. The mode indicator light ring (126) generates different lighting configurations in response to the multifunction control knob (124) being pressed to change radio functions. Numerous radio functions can be monitored and controlled via the multifunction control knob (124) and mode indicator light ring (126). |
| US08958764B1 |
Method and apparatus for detecting amplitudes and/or phases of recognizable signals in a frequency band or spectrum of interest
A method of and apparatus for detecting signal features including amplitude, phase and timing of recognizable input signals in a frequency band or spectrum of interest. One or more super-regenerative oscillators are provided, each having a center frequency and each detecting signal features of recognizable input signals in the frequency band or spectrum of interest during multiple, successive time slots. The center frequency of each of the one or more super-regenerative oscillators is varied between time slots in a selected sequence, preferably according to a Segmentlet algorithm. The one or more super-regenerative oscillators extract the signal features of each the recognizable input signals in different time slots and/or in different super-regenerative oscillator and with a different time-slot associated center frequency associated with the one or more super-regenerative oscillators, thereby providing a time-frequency-amplitude map of the frequency band or spectrum of interest. |
| US08958759B2 |
Method and storage medium for adjusting working frequency of electronic device, and electronic device
A method for adjusting a working frequency of an electronic device includes the following. First, determining a current working frequency of the electronic device, a minimum average frequency among the average frequencies of different channels, and a frequency range of one channel used for transmitting/receiving wireless signals. Second, calculating an interference frequency generated by the electronic device, and selecting another antenna to transmit/receive wireless signals when the interference frequency falls within the frequency range of the determined channel. Third, calculating a first time interval between transmitting and receiving wireless signals before switching to the other antenna, and a second time interval between transmitting and receiving wireless signals after switching to the other antenna. Fourth, determining a difference between the first and second time intervals. Fifth, adjusting the current working frequency to decrease the influence on the transmission/receipt of wireless signals when the calculated difference is greater than a predetermined threshold. |
| US08958758B2 |
Communication apparatus performing automatic gain control and field length selection for a communication frame
According to one exemplary embodiment, a communication apparatus includes: a measurement module which measures reception power of each field; a determination module which determines whether the reception power is within a range; a calculator which calculates a gain using the reception power if the reception power is not within the range; an adjuster which adjusts a field according to one of an initial gain and the calculated gain; a selector which selects a field length according to the number of field adjustments by the adjuster; and a transmitter which transmits information regarding the field length. When the number of the adjustments is lower than a first threshold value, the selector selects a first value, and when the number of the adjustments is equal to or higher than the first threshold value, the selector selects a second value that is higher than the first value, as the field length. |
| US08958753B2 |
Signaling of other-cell signal's configuration information to facilitate interference cancellation at a mobile terminal
In MU-MIMO scenarios, a target mobile terminal can be exposed to data streams intended for other mobile terminals. If the target mobile terminal is capable of interference cancellation, then a serving base station can provide the target mobile terminal with interference information so that the target mobile terminal can efficiently cancel interferences due to these interfering data streams. The interference information includes one or more configuration information, each of which characterizes a related interfering data stream. The serving base station provides the interference information over one or more radio resources that are exclusive allocated to the target mobile terminal or are allocated for common listening. The serving base station exchanges configuration information with neighboring base stations over inter-BS links. The inter-BS links use resources that are different from the radio resources used between the base stations and the mobile terminals. |
| US08958751B2 |
Frequency band adaptive wireless communication
A system, apparatus and method is disclosed for multiband wireless communication. Frequency bands and/or transmission formats are identified as available within a range for wireless communication. The system evaluates signal quality metrics for each frequency band and selects a communication method based on the evaluation. Multiple frequency bands and communication methods can be utilized by the system such that a combination of licensed, unlicensed, semilicensed, and overlapped frequency bands can be simultaneously used for communication. The system monitors communications and can report link performance for adaptive control of the selected communication methods. |
| US08958750B1 |
Peak detection method using blind source separation
The peak detection method using blind source separation extracts true peaks from noisy peaks in a more robust way that does not require any a priori information. Information regarding true peak location is obtained by thresholding the output of a wavelet transform. The value of the threshold is dependent on noise variance. While noise variance is normally unknown, the present method implements a blind source separation technique to calculate the noise variance. The blind source separation technique does not require information of the incoming signal or the channel noise, and hence is suitable for CR (cognitive radio) peak detection. |
| US08958749B2 |
Communication apparatus and communication system
A communication apparatus including a first communicator which communicates with a first other communication apparatus, a detector which detects, with respect to each of the frequency channels, a value of a parameter for evaluating a quality of a communication between the communication apparatuses, a determiner which determines, on the basis of the value of the parameter detected with respect to a corresponding one of the frequency channels by the detector, whether the quality of the communication between the communication apparatuses made by using each of the frequency channels is not less than a first threshold, and a communication controller which sends the first other communication apparatus data by means of the first communicator, once when a good-quality frequency channel is used, and repeatedly a plurality of times when a poor-quality frequency channel is used. |
| US08958742B2 |
Mobile terminal and method for operating the same
A mobile terminal and a method for operating the same are discussed. The method for operating the mobile terminal includes displaying on the mobile terminal a remote control screen for remotely controlling an image display apparatus, entering a wireless audio reception mode if a wireless audio reception mode start signal is received during the displaying of the remote control screen, and displaying on the mobile terminal a wireless audio reception mode screen. Accordingly, it is possible to improve user convenience. |
| US08958741B2 |
Education monitoring
Group-based, periodic education intervention that provides a targeted curriculum selected specifically for each period based on current skill assessment data is described. For example, candidates' skill levels in multiple skills are assessed, and groups are formed based on commonality of skill level. A period-specific curriculum is generated for each group to address the specific needs of the individuals of the respective group. After delivery of the period-specific targeted curriculum over the period, re-assessments of the current skill of the group members are made, and a period-specific curriculum for the subsequent period is generated and delivered. Fidelity of an implementation of the curriculum is analyzed, and alerts, reminders, and reports are provided to improve fidelity of an implementation of the curriculum. |
| US08958728B2 |
Image forming apparatus and toner case
An image forming apparatus includes a toner case and an attachment member. The toner case has a transmission coupling. The attachment member has a drive coupling, an advance/retreat member and a lever. The advance/retreat member advances and retreats between a first position and a second position being closer to the drive coupling than the first position. The lever is moved between a first operation position to move the advance/retreat member to the first position and a second operation position to move the advance/retreat member to the second position. When the toner case is attached to the attachment member, the toner case engages with the advance/retreat member. In this time, when the lever is moved from the first operation position to the second operation position, the toner case together with the advance/retreat member approaches to the drive coupling and the transmission coupling is connected to the drive coupling. |
| US08958725B2 |
Powder container having shield for shutter and image forming apparatus mounted with the same
A powder container includes a body and a pair of walls that blocks one longitudinal end of the body and the other longitudinal end of the body. Powder is accommodated within the powder container which is mounted to an apparatus using the powder in a posture where a longitudinal direction of the body is a transverse direction of the apparatus. The powder container has an opening, through which the powder is supplied to the apparatus, formed in a lower position of the body in a posture where the powder container is mounted to the apparatus. The powder container includes a shutter and a shield. The shutter is, prior to mounting the powder container to the apparatus, in a closed location to block the opening and, when the powder container is mounted, is moved along an outer peripheral surface of the body to an opened location to open the opening. |
| US08958724B2 |
Developing device and image forming apparatus
A developing device of this disclosure has: a housing, a developing roller, a developer conveying path, a partition board, a second communication path, a developer receiving port, a first conveying member, a second conveying member, and a conveyance capability inhibition part. A toner is cyclically conveyed in a first conveying path and a second conveying path. A first stirring screw is disposed in the first conveying path and driven into ration around a first rotation axis for toner conveyance. Formed downstream of the first stirring screw by the conveyance capability inhibition part is a toner accumulation part, and the amount of toner refilled from a toner refill port is adjusted. Where an aperture area of the first communication path is A1 and a circular area formed by an outer circumferential edge of the first stirring screw in section orthogonal to the first rotation axis is A2, relationship 0.5×A2 |
| US08958723B2 |
Systems and methods for ink-based digital printing using liquid immersion development
Ink-based digital printing systems useful for ink printing include a photoreceptor layer configured to receive a layer of liquid immersion fluid. The liquid immersion fluid includes dampening fluid, dispersed solid particles, and charge directors that impart charge to the solid particles. The photoreceptor surface is charged to a uniform potential, and selectively discharged using an ROS according to image data to form an electrostatic latent image. The charged liquid immersion fluid adheres to portions of the photoreceptor surface according to the electrostatic latent image to form a liquid immersion fluid image. The fluid portion of the liquid immersion fluid image is partially transferred to an imaging member and/or transfer member to form a dampening fluid image, either or both of which may be electrically biased. The dampening fluid image is inked on the transfer member, and the resulting ink image transferred to a recording medium. |
| US08958722B2 |
Extractor for extracting a dispersoid and a dispersion medium and imaging forming apparatus employing this extractor
An extractor separates a dispersoid (toner) and a dispersion medium (carrier liquid) from a liquid sample (liquid developer) containing the dispersoid and the dispersion medium and extracts these. The extractor has a first roller that carries a thin layer of the liquid sample containing the dispersoid and the dispersion medium on a circumferential surface thereof and rotates about a shaft. A separating member is in contact with the first roller and separates the dispersion medium from the thin layer carried on the first roller. A charger charges the dispersoid in the thin layer carried on the first roller at a position upstream of a contact position of the separating member with the first roller with respect to a rotating direction of the first roller. An electric field generator generates an electric field for causing the charged dispersoid to be attracted to the circumferential surface of the first roller. |
| US08958721B2 |
Image forming apparatus
Image forming apparatus includes: main body casing having first and second side walls opposite to each other, and upper portion having opening; top cover swingably supported on the upper portion of the main body casing at a position near the second side wall and configured to openably close the opening; endless belt disposed below the top cover and having first end portion closer to the first side wall and second end portion closer to the second side wall; photoconductor drum disposed under the endless belt; development unit disposed under the photoconductor drum and configured to supply developer to the photoconductor drum; and fixing device disposed above the second end portion of the endless belt. The endless belt is configured to be swingable about axis of rotation provided near the second side wall such that the first end portion of the endless belt is swingable in an upper-lower direction. |
| US08958720B2 |
Photosensitive member cartridge and process cartridge provided with positioning shaft for improved positioning accuracy
The photosensitive member cartridge includes: a photosensitive member; a mounting portion; and a shaft. The photosensitive member has an axis extending in an axial direction. The mounting portion is configured to accommodate a developing cartridge therein. The shaft extends in the axial direction. The shaft includes: a first abutment portion configured to be abuttable on the developing cartridge when the developing cartridge is mounted in the mounting portion; and a positioned portion configured to be subjected to positioning with respect to a main casing of an image forming apparatus when the photosensitive member cartridge is mounted in the main casing of the image forming apparatus. |
| US08958716B2 |
Image forming apparatus and cooling apparatus
An image forming apparatus, includes: an image heating device for heating an image on a sheet; a cooling belt for cooling the sheet in close contact with the sheet heated by the image heating device; a heat sink for cooling the cooling belt; a first fan for forming airflow in the heat sink; and a second fan for forming airflow in a space between the image heating device and the cooling belt. |
| US08958710B2 |
Fixing device, image forming apparatus incorporating same, and fixing method
A fixing device includes a controller connected to a heater and at least one of a pressing rotary body and an endless rotary body. The controller performs a first fixing operation, a first transition operation, a second fixing operation, and a second transition operation. The first fixing operation fixes a toner image on a first recording medium after the fixing device is powered on. The first transition operation rotates the pressing rotary body and the endless rotary body while controlling the heater to maintain the endless rotary body at a predetermined temperature for a first duration time. The second fixing operation fixes a toner image on a second recording medium. The second transition operation rotates the pressing rotary body and the endless rotary body while controlling the heater to maintain the endless rotary body at the predetermined temperature for a second duration time smaller than the first duration time. |
| US08958709B2 |
Image forming apparatus having a second resistor portion with a higher electrical resistance than a first resistor portion
In an image forming apparatus, one of a plurality of support members supporting an intermediate transfer belt is a guide member configured to regulate the rotational direction of the intermediate transfer belt while being held in sliding contact with the intermediate transfer belt at a position opposite the secondary transfer member across the intermediate transfer belt. This guide member is equipped with a first resistor portion in sliding contact with the intermediate transfer belt and a second resistor portion of a higher electrical resistance than the first resistor portion, with the second resistor portion provided upstream of the first resistor portion in the rotational direction of the intermediate transfer belt. |
| US08958708B2 |
Image forming apparatus having variable potential setting
An image forming apparatus includes a first image forming portion including a first photosensitive member, a first charging member to electrically charge the first photosensitive member, and a first exposure member to expose to light the charged first photosensitive member to form an electrostatic latent image, and a second image forming portion including a second photosensitive member, a second charging member to electrically charge the second photosensitive member, and a second exposure member to expose to light the charged second photosensitive member to form an electrostatic latent image. In addition, a power source applies a common voltage to a first transfer portion and a second transfer portion, and a setting portion variably sets, for a period in which a transfer operation is performed, a potential of the exposed portion or the charged portion of the first photosensitive member and a potential of the exposed portion or the charged portion of the second photosensitive member on the basis of a plurality of currents passing through the first transfer portion and a plurality of currents passing through the second transfer portion, respectively, when the plurality of common voltages are applied to the first transfer portion and the second transfer portion in a period other than the period in which the transfer operation is performed. |
| US08958707B2 |
Cartridge detection
A cartridge which may include a housing, a driving input member provided at the housing and configured to be rotated by an externally supplied rotation driving force, and a rotational member configured to receive the rotation driving force, which is transmitted from the driving input member, and be rotated thereby. The cartridge may also include a detection protrusion including an elastic body and which is disposed at a position away from a rotational center of the rotational member. The detection protrusion may protrude from the rotational member away from the housing. The cartridge may also include a cover attached to the housing, the cover having an opposite part that faces a portion of the rotational member from which the detection protrusion protrudes. At an initial position, which is a position before the rotational member is rotated, the detection protrusion may abut the opposite part of the cover. |
| US08958705B2 |
Methods and systems for a pulsed laser source emitting a predetermined output pulse profile
A method of operating an optical amplifier includes determining a gain of the optical amplifier and providing a modulator drive signal to an optical signal source. The modulator drive signal is a function of the gain of the optical amplifier. The method also includes producing an input optical signal using the optical signal source. The input optical signal includes a first plurality of pulses, each of the first plurality of pulses having an amplitude related to the modulator drive signal. The method further includes coupling the input optical signal to the optical amplifier and amplifying the input optical signal using the optical amplifier to produce an output optical signal including a second plurality of pulses. |
| US08958704B2 |
Generation of a feedback signal for a polarization mode dispersion compensator in a communication system using alternate-polarization
The invention relates to a method of generating a feedback signal for adjusting a polarization mode dispersion compensator (PMDC, 21) in a transmission system with alternate-polarization. A first signal (37) is determined by measuring a spectral component of the radio frequency modulation of an optical signal (33) at a particular radio frequency. Preferably, the radio frequency essentially corresponds to half the symbol rate of the optical signal (33). Also a second signal (35) is determined by coupling the optical signal (33) into a delay line interferometer (DLI, 50) having a delay essentially corresponding to the symbol period or an odd multiple of the symbol period between its arms (51, 54). Downstream of the DLI (50), the signal is optical-to-electrically converted. Downstream of the optical-to-electrical conversion, an intensity measurement is performed. The first (37) and second (35) signals are then combined to generate the feedback signal (28). |
| US08958700B2 |
Spatial light communication device
The spatial light communication device is constituted with a spatial light transmitter which is installed in a fixed manner in a plurality of places, stores preset ID information of its own and has a light emitting portion for emitting spatial light on which the ID information is superimposed, and a spatial light receiver which is connected to a handheld terminal, has a light receiving portion for receiving spatial light emitted from the light emitting portion of the spatial light transmitter and also has a light receiving circuit for amplifying and outputting a light receiving signal of the light receiving portion. The spatial light receiver is provided with a connector portion which is connected to a microphone input terminal of the handheld terminal as a terminal for outputting a light receiving output signal of the light receiving circuit to the handheld terminal. |
| US08958699B2 |
ONU with wireless connectivity capability
The embodiments herein relate to a method in an optical network unit (103), referred to as an ONU, for providing wireless connectivity capability to the ONU (103). The ONU (103) is comprised in a communications network (100). The ONU (103) is interconnected to an optical line terminal (101), referred to as an OLT, via a wireline communications link (104) and a wireless communications link (113). The ONU (103) is configured to support a sleep mode. The ONU (103) obtains information about entry into the sleep mode. The ONU (103) identifies whether the wireless communications link (113) is activated or deactivated, and activates the wireless communications link (113) if the wireless communications link (113) is identified as deactivated. The ONU (103) enters sleep mode, and provides wireless connectivity capability to the ONU (103) by means of the wireless communications link during the sleep mode. |
| US08958698B2 |
Versatile remote control device and system
A radio-frequency (RF) remote control (10) has a user interface and transmits an RF signal (11) which designates a device (14) to be controlled and a command for that device. The RF signal is received by an intermediary device (12). The intermediary device, in turn, generates and broadcasts a plurality of high-power IR signals (13A-13F). These signals may be received directly by a controlled device (14A) or may be received indirectly by a controlled device (14B, 14C) after one or more reflections from objects (16A, 16B) and/or room surfaces (18). Thus, reliable control of the devices (14) is obtained even in situations where merely transmitting a typical IR signal may not provide reliable control of the device (14). |
| US08958696B2 |
Coherent augmented optical add-drop multiplexer
In an Optical Add-Drop Multiplexer, a drop section comprises a Wavelength Selective Switch (WSS) having at least one drop-port, the WSS being operative to couple a respective set of w (where w>1) wavelength channels from a received Wavelength Division Multiplexed (WDM) signal to each drop port. A respective 1:s power splitter is associated with each drop port. Each power splitter supplies the respective set of channels received from its drop port to each one of a corresponding set of coherent receivers. Each coherent receiver operates to receive a selected one of the respective set of channels. |
| US08958694B2 |
Architecture to communicate with standard hybrid fiber coaxial RF signals over a passive optical network (HFC PON)
One or more overlay wavelengths are applied to a GPON architecture to provide sufficient, cost-effective forward bandwidth per home for targeted, unique narrowcast services to allow traditional HFC operators to use a PON architecture with their existing HFC equipment. A separate return path capability using a separate coaxial cable with RF signals to the GPON may also be used. This return capability may be provided either by a fiber optic link or coaxial link from the home. |
| US08958691B2 |
Method and system for providing fault recovery using composite transport groups
An approach is provided for performing fault recovery using composite transport groups (CTGs). A first logical channel is established within a composite transport group, wherein the first logical channel is established over a first link associated with a first service provider to a customer premise equipment (CPE) node configured to transport packets. A second logical channel is established within the composite transport group, wherein the second logical channel is established over a second link associated with a second service provider to an optical node. Packets are received over the first logical channel. Packets are received over the second logical channel if the first logical channel experiences a fault condition, wherein switching to the second logical channel is transparent to the CPE node. |
| US08958684B2 |
Screening management system, screening management method and program product
There is provided a screening management system including a content accumulation unit for accumulating a plurality of video contents to be screened, a playlist management unit for managing a playlist defining an order of screening the video contents accumulated in the content accumulation unit and managing a file indicating one or a plurality of video contents to be screened in a specific place in the playlist, and a schedule management unit for managing the playlist according to a screening time. The playlist is a list in which a plurality of frames are arranged, and video content to be screened is indicated by a first frame among the plurality of frames, and the file is indicated by a second frame among the plurality of frames. |
| US08958682B2 |
Imaging device
A imaging device (10) includes an imaging section (101) for imaging a subject at either one of a first period (high speed) and a second period (ordinary speed) of longer than the first period, an operating section (110) for setting the imaging period of the imaging section, a storing section (105) for storing the video signal imaged at the first period, a converting section (104) for converting the video signal of the first period imaged by the imaging section into a video signal of the second period, a recording section (107) for recording therein the video signal from the converting section or the storing section with the recorded video signal divided and managed in a plurality of reproducing regions, and a reproduction sequence generating section (112) for generating a reproduction sequence signal showing the reproduction sequence of each reproducing region of the video signal recorded in the recording section. After the video signal from the converting section (104) is recorded in the recording section, the video signal recorded in the storing section (105) is recorded in the recording section. |
| US08958681B2 |
Cable roller
A cable roller for use in positioning a cable relative to a cable tray or relative to a ceiling of a building includes a mounting channel, a support assembly attached thereto which is moveable relative to the mounting channel, and at least one roller attached to the support assembly for allowing the cable to roll thereover. The support assembly can be moved from a closed position to an open position to allow for the easy removal of the cable from the cable roller. |
| US08958676B2 |
Birefringent micro-structured optical fiber for sensor application
Fiber structure including a core and a cladding, a central microstructure having a first plurality of longitudinal holes and which is adapted for guiding optical radiation and for birefringence in the core. Also included is a side microstructure having a second plurality of longitudinal holes is provided, wherein the side microstructure partly surrounds the central microstructure and provides a predetermined mechanical anisotropy, a pressure responsive unit for converting an isotropic pressure force to birefringence changes on the core, a lateral force responsive unit for converting a directional pressure force to birefringence changes on the core, a temperature responsive unit for converting temperature to birefringence changes on the core, and a birefringence responsive unit for converting birefringence in the core to wavelength information. |
| US08958669B2 |
Method for manufacturing a network of microlenses at the ends of a bundle of optical fibres, related optical fibres and related use
The present disclosure relates to a method for manufacturing end microlenses of individual optical fibers which are part of a bundle or a multi-core fiber, including depositing a drop of a photopolymerizable solution on a first end of the bundle; adapting the size of the drop; applying light centered on a predetermined wavelength onto a second end of the bundle in order to selectively polymerize the drop; rinsing the first end using a methanol solution in order to obtain a network of individual optical fibers, each one of which is provided with a microlens at the first end of the multi-core fiber, the microlenses being physically separated from one another. The disclosure additionally relates to a bundle of microlensed fibers obtained by the method, as well as to the use of such a bundle, for example in medical or multiplexed imaging and/or in the coupling of optical fibers. |
| US08958667B2 |
Optical bus in 3D integrated circuit stack
An optical bus (130) of an integrated circuit (100) comprises: a polymer waveguide (112), a micromirror (114, 116), and an optical coupler (120). The polymer waveguide (112) is disposed in a via (110) formed through at least one die layer (102, 104, 106) of the integrated circuit (100) comprising an active circuit (210). The micromirror (114) is disposed adjacent to the via (110) and optically coupled to the polymer waveguide (112). The optical coupler (120) is connected to the polymer waveguide (112) to couple the active circuit (210) to the optical bus (130). A stacked integrated circuit (100) is described comprising such an optical bus (130). A method (800) of fabricating a rear 45° micromirror on a silicon substrate that can be used in the optical bus (130) is also described. Furthermore, alignment/lock mechanisms for use in a stacked integrated circuit comprising first and second silicon substrates are described. |
| US08958666B2 |
Methods of achieving optimal communications performance
A system includes an optical transmitter that outputs an optical signal having a substantially Gaussian waveform and an optical receiver that is optically coupled to the optical transmitter and has an impulse response essentially matching the waveform. The impulse response and waveform preferably match in the time domain. The transmitter and receiver may be average-power-limited, using, for example, an erbium-doped fiber amplifier. To achieve a high signal-to-noise ratio, the waveform may be designed to minimize jitter, sample duration, matching parasitics, and inter-symbol interference (ISI). Such a waveform may be a return-to-zero (RZ) Gaussian or Gaussian-like waveform and may be transmitted in a variety of modulation formats. Further, the system may be used in WDM or TDM systems. A method for characterizing the time domain impulse response of an optical element used in the optical receiver is provided, where the method is optionally optimized using deconvolution and/or cross-correlation techniques. |
| US08958661B2 |
Learning concept templates from web images to query personal image databases
Methods and apparatus to generate templates from web images for searching an image database are described. In one embodiment, one or more retrieved images (e.g., from the Web) may be used to generate one or more templates. The templates may be used to search an image database based on features commonly shared between sub-images of the retrieved images. Other embodiments are also described. |
| US08958657B2 |
Frame rate conversion image processing apparatus, control method, and computer-readable storage medium
An image processing apparatus that converts a frame rate by creating a sub-frame from an input frame and outputting the sub-frame, the image processing apparatus includes a generation unit configured to generate the sub-frame from the input frame, a calculation unit configured to calculate a feature amount of brightness of the input frame, and a control unit configured to perform control so as to reduce luminance of the sub-frames generated by the generation unit based on the feature amount calculated by the calculation unit. |
| US08958655B2 |
Image processor, image processing method, and computer readable medium
An apparatus includes an attention region determining unit and a blurring unit. The attention region determining unit is configured to determine an attention region of an image that includes an intended subject of the image. The blurring unit is configured to blur all of the image regions outside of the attention region. |
| US08958650B1 |
Device and computer readable medium for sharing image content based on collection proximity
Apparatus are described for performing an action based on determining that the contents of a first image collection and a second image collection are similar. In one aspect, the present disclosure relates to comparing digests representing the two image collections to determine proximity. The digest may be obtained and the comparison made at a server. The actions performed based on a proximity determination may comprise notifying a user of a first collection sharing device of the availability of a second collection sharing device, and/or the retrieval of one or more images from the second image collection. In another aspect of the present disclosure, proximity may be measured by comparing subject faces present in a first image collection to subject faces present in the second image collection. |
| US08958644B2 |
Creating tables with handwriting images, symbolic representations and media images from forms
A system and method for creating a table from one or more form images is described. An Image Based Document Management (IBDM) server includes a stroke identification module, an image generator, a table generator and a preference module. The stroke identification module receives completed form data from one or more forms with handwriting fields, media fields and symbolic fields. The image generator generates field images that are a combination of handwriting fields, media fields and symbolic fields. The user preference module determines a user preference for displaying the table. The table generator generates a table from the field images based on the user preference. |
| US08958643B2 |
Recognition of numerical characters in digital images
Recognition of numerical characters is disclosed, including: extracting a subimage from a received image comprising information pertaining to a plurality of numerical characters, wherein the extracted subimage is associated with one of the plurality of numerical characters; and performing recognition based at least in part on a set of topological information associated with the subimage, including: processing the subimage to obtain the set of topological information associated with the subimage; comparing the set of topological information associated with the subimage with a preset set of stored topological information; determining that in the event that the set of topological information associated with the subimage matches the preset set of stored topological information, the subimage is associated with a recognized numerical character associated with the preset set of stored topological information. |
| US08958637B2 |
Image processing apparatus, image processing method, and computer readable medium
An image processing apparatus includes the following elements. A receiving device receives an image. An estimating device estimates, for each of pixels within the image received by the receiving device, on the basis of the received image, an amount of fog, which is a difference between a luminance value of the pixel and an original luminance value of the pixel. A measuring device measures, for each of the pixels within the received image, a chroma value of the pixel. A determining device determines a correction target value for luminance values of pixels of a background portion within the received image. A correcting device corrects the chroma value of the pixel measured by the measuring device on the basis of the amount of fog estimated by the estimating device, the correction target value determined by the determining device, and a distance from the chroma value to an achromatic color. |
| US08958634B2 |
Image processing device that displays retrieved image similar to target image
The image acquisition unit 41 acquires an image including an object. By comparing information related to the shape of a relevant natural object that is included as the object in the target image acquired by the image acquisition unit 41, and information related to respective shapes of a plurality of types prepared in advance, at least one flower type for the natural object in question is selected. The secondary selection unit 43 then selects data of a representative image from among data of a plurality of images of different color, of the same flower type as prepared in advance, for each of at least one flower type selected by the primary selection unit 42, based on information related to color of the relevant natural object included as the object in the image acquired by the image acquisition unit 41. |
| US08958631B2 |
System and method for automatically defining and identifying a gesture
A system and method for creating a gesture and generating a classifier that can identify the gesture for use with an application is described. The designer constructs a training set of data containing positive and negative examples of the gesture. Machine learning algorithms are used to compute the optimal classification of the training data into positive and negative instances of the gesture. The machine learning algorithms generate a classifier which, given input data, makes a decision on whether the gesture was performed in the input data or not. |
| US08958629B2 |
Method and system for matching an image using image patches
A method, system and computer program product for encoding an image is provided. The image that needs to be represented is represented in the form of a Gaussian pyramid which is a scale-space representation of the image and includes several pyramid images. The feature points in the pyramid images are identified and a specified number of feature points are selected. The orientations of the selected feature points are obtained by using a set of orientation calculating algorithms. A patch is extracted around the feature point in the pyramid images based on the orientations of the feature point and the sampling factor of the pyramid image. The boundary patches in the pyramid images are extracted by padding the pyramid images with extra pixels. The feature vectors of the extracted patches are defined. These feature vectors are normalized so that the components in the feature vectors are less than a threshold. |
| US08958627B2 |
System and method of distributed processing for machine-vision analysis
A computer-implemented method for designating a portion of a machine-vision analysis to be performed on a worker. A set of machine-vision algorithms is obtained for analyzing a digital image of a product. An overall time estimate is determined that represents the processing time to analyze the digital image using the entire set of machine-vision algorithms. If the overall time estimate is greater than a threshold value, then an algorithm time estimate for each of two or more algorithms of the set of machine-vision algorithms is obtained. A rank associated with each of the two or more algorithms is computed based on the algorithm time estimates. A designated algorithm to be performed on the worker is selected based on the rank associated with each of the two or more algorithms. The digital image may then be analyzed on the worker using the designated algorithm. |
| US08958624B2 |
Method and apparatus for stitching a plurality of images
A method and apparatus for stitching a plurality of images. The method includes capturing a first image and a second image; variably setting a position and size of a template for image stitching with respect to the captured first image or the captured second image, and determining stitch positions of the first image and the second image, based on the template that is variably set. In addition, the method includes stitching the first image and the second image, based on the determined stitch positions. |
| US08958615B2 |
System and method for weighted atlas generation
A system and method for generating a patient-specific anatomical atlas, e.g., includes, for each patient of a patient population: obtaining a respective anatomical atlas, and registering, by a computer processor, the respective anatomical atlas to an anatomical image of a current patient to obtain a respective registered anatomical atlas, and further includes, determining, by the processor, an average of the registered anatomical atlases. |
| US08958612B2 |
Information processing apparatus and information processing method
This invention is directed to appropriately searching for case data similar in the process of a disease. A similar case search apparatus (100) according to this invention includes a disease progress model building function of building a disease progress model by extracting feature amounts from a plurality of medical images obtained by imaging the same object in different periods, a unit configured to read out case data, a unit configured to acquire inspection data, a similar case search function of interpolating, by using the model, feature amounts extracted from the plurality of medical images contained in the inspection data, and calculate a similarity between the inspection data and the case data by using the interpolated feature amounts, and a monitor (111) which displays case data selected based on the calculated similarity. |
| US08958611B2 |
Interactive CSG subtraction
A system and method for surgical visualization transform a cut procedure into a visual representation, e.g., during resection via a cutting tool. The system and method obtain shape data, e.g., bone shape data for the bone to be resected, and generate a CSG object model such as a bone model. Another CSG model is also generated, based, for example, on the cutting tool shape. During resection, tool position data is collected and multiple CSG subtraction models are generated based on the cutting tool model and the position data. The CSG bone model and subtraction models are used to create an image space visual representation by merging the CSG subtraction models into a single merged CSG subtraction model and subtracting the single merged CSG subtraction model from the CSG bone model. |
| US08958610B2 |
System, method and apparatus for sensing biometric information
An apparatus, method and system are provided for sensing at least one biometric measure of an individual. A low voltage pulsed electrical charge is applied to a transparent electrode plate, which is dimensioned to receive a portion of an individual's dermal surface having molecules associated therewith. The pulsed electrical charge stimulates and excites the molecules and causes molecular compounds to fluoresce. An image of the fluoresced dermal surface is obtained and a biometric function is performed with data derived from the image. |
| US08958607B2 |
Liveness detection
An image of a portion of a person's body is accessed, the image having been captured by an image capture device. Using the image, measurements of characteristics in the image are obtained, the characteristics in the image having been selected based on a statistical analysis of characteristics (i) in a plurality of first images taken directly of a person and (ii) in a plurality of second images taken of an image of a person. Based on a liveness function, a score for the image is determined using the obtained measurements of the characteristics in the image. A threshold value is accessed. The score of the image is compared to the accessed threshold value. Based on the comparison of the score of the image to the accessed threshold value, the image is determined to be have been taken by the image capture device imaging the portion of the person's body. |
| US08958601B2 |
Optical navigation method and device using same
The invention provides an optical navigation method, which includes: sequentially obtaining plural images including a first image, a second image, and a third image; choosing a main reference block in the first image; comparing the main reference block and the second image by block matching comparison to determine a first motion vector; resizing the main reference block according to the first motion vector to generate an ancillary reference block having a size smaller than the main reference block; and comparing the ancillary reference block and the third image by block matching comparison to determine a second motion vector. |
| US08958598B2 |
System and method for detecting moving objects using video capturing device
Provided is a system for detecting moving objects. The system includes a video capturing device and a detection unit. The video capturing device captures “n” pieces of consecutive images during a time period, where “n” represents a positive integer. The detecting unit selects one of the images as a reference images and processes the other n−1 pieces of images. The detecting unit differentiates the n−1 pieces of images relative to the reference image, grays the differentiated n−1 pieces of images, binarizes the grayed n−1 pieces of imaged, blurs the binarized n−1 pieces of images, dilates the blurred n−1 pieces of images, and detects edges from the dilated n−1 pieces of images. |
| US08958596B2 |
Vibration system and speaker using the same
A vibration system is disclosed. The vibration system includes a diaphragm and a voice coil that drives the diaphragm to vibrate. The diaphragm includes a fixing part for fixing the voice coil, and a heat sink is disposed on and fixed to the fixing part. A speaker using the vibration system is also disclosed. By disposing the heat sink on the diaphragm, heat can be dissipated from the voice coil effectively to ensure stability of the speaker. |
| US08958594B2 |
Speaker device
A speaker device includes: a first speaker unit (10) provided with a groove part (11); a second speaker unit (20) provided with a groove part (21); and a joining component (30) including a first protrusion (31) and a second protrusion (32). The first protrusion (31) of the joining component (30) is fitted into the groove part (11) of the first speaker unit (10). The second protrusion (32) of the joining component (30) is fitted into the groove part (21) of the second speaker unit (20). |
| US08958591B2 |
Speaker system method and apparatus
The disclosure relates to several embodiments of a concealed speaker system, The concealed speaker system further has a speaker assembly mounted to the base frame and an active member which may be formed of PVC, expanded PVC, hardened fibrous materials, foam core, or equivalents that has an outer surface which in some embodiments is substantially coplanar with the surrounding wall section, and in other embodiments extends slightly outward therefrom. The base frame, speaker assembly, and the active member cooperate to form an acoustic chamber that is positioned behind the inner surface of the active member. Acoustic energy is transferred from the speaker assembly to the active member where the sound is produced therefrom to the room. |
| US08958590B2 |
Listening device with a rechargeable energy source adapted for being charged through an ITE-unit, or a connector connectable to, or a connector of, a BTE-unit
A listening device including an ITE part adapted for being located in an ear canal of a user and a BTE part adapted for being located behind an ear of the user, the ITE and BTE parts being at least mechanically connected by a connecting element, the listening device including a rechargeable energy source and electric charge terminals for allowing the charging of the rechargeable energy source when electrically connected to charging terminals of a charging station, wherein the electric charging terminals of the listening device are located: in or on the ITE part; in or on the connecting element; in an electrical connector of the connecting element connectable to the BTE part; or in an electrical connector of the BTE part connectable to the electrical connector of the connecting element, wherein the ITE part includes a receiver, wherein the BTE part includes a hermetically closed outer housing. |
| US08958586B2 |
Sound environment classification by coordinated sensing using hearing assistance devices
Techniques are disclosed for classifying a sound environment for hearing assistance devices using redundant estimates of an acoustical environment from two hearing assistance devices and accessory devices. In one example, a method for operating a hearing assistance device includes sensing an environmental sound, determining a first classification of the environmental sound, receiving at least one second classification of the environmental sound, comparing the determined first classification and the at least one received second classification, and selecting an operational classification for the hearing assistance device based upon the comparison. |
| US08958583B2 |
Spatially constant surround sound system
An audio processing system may modify an input surround sound signal to generate a spatially equilibrated output surround sound signal that is perceived by a user as spatially constant for different sound pressures of the surround sound signal. The audio processing system may determine based on a psychoacoustic model of human hearing, a loudness and a localization for a combined sound signal. The loudness and the localization may be determined by the system for a virtual user located between the front and the rear loudspeakers that has a predetermined head position in which one ear of the virtual user is directed towards one of front or rear loudspeakers and the other ear of the virtual user being directed towards the other of the front or rear loudspeakers. The audio processing system may adapt the front and/or rear audio signal channels based on the determined loudness and localization. |
| US08958582B2 |
Apparatus and method of reproducing surround wave field using wave field synthesis based on speaker array
Disclosed are an apparatus and method of surround wave field synthesizing a multi-channel signal excluding sound image localization information. A wave field synthesis and reproduction apparatus may include a signal classification unit to classify an inputted multi-channel signal into a primary signal and an ambient signal, a sound image localization information estimation unit to estimate sound image localization information of the primary signal and sound image localization information of the ambient signal, and a rendering unit to render the primary signal and the ambient signal based on the sound image localization information of the primary signal, the sound image localization information of the ambient signal, and listener environment information. |
| US08958579B2 |
Thermoacoustic device
A thermoacoustic device includes a substrate, a sound wave generator and a signal device. The substrate has a net structure and includes a number of first wires and a number of second wires. The first wires and the second wires are crossed with each other. Each of the first wires includes a composite wire. The composite wire includes a carbon nanotube wire structure and a coating layer wrapping the carbon nanotube wire structure. The sound wave generator is located on a surface of the substrate and includes a carbon film. The signal input device is configured to input signals to the sound wave generator. |
| US08958577B2 |
System, method, and apparatus for adjusting an output of a transducer
A system and method for modulating the sound pressure that is output from an audio transducer is disclosed. In one embodiment, the method includes receiving an audio signal and placing the audio signal across a voice coil of the transducer. In addition, a voltage is applied across a field coil of the transducer, the field coil being separate from the voice coil. And the voltage that is applied across the field coil is adjusted so as to modulate the sound pressure output from the audio transducer. |
| US08958572B1 |
Adaptive noise cancellation for multi-microphone systems
Null processing noise subtraction is performed per sub-band and time frame for acoustic signals received from multiple microphones. The acoustic signals may include a primary acoustic signal and one or more additional acoustic signals. A noise component signal may be determined for each additional acoustic signal in each sub-band of signals received by N microphones by subtracting a desired signal component within every other acoustic signal weighted by a complex-valued coefficient σ from the secondary acoustic signal. The noise component signals, each weighted by a corresponding complex-valued coefficient α, may then be subtracted from the primary acoustic signal resulting in an estimate of a target signal (i.e., a noise subtracted signal). |
| US08958571B2 |
MIC covering detection in personal audio devices
A personal audio device, such as a wireless telephone, includes noise canceling circuit that adaptively generates an anti-noise signal from a reference microphone signal and injects the anti-noise signal into the speaker or other transducer output to cause cancellation of ambient audio sounds. An error microphone may also be provided proximate the speaker to estimate an electro-acoustical path from the noise canceling circuit through the transducer. A processing circuit uses the reference and/or error microphone, optionally along with a microphone provided for capturing near-end speech, to determine whether one of the reference or error microphones is obstructed by comparing their received signal content and takes action to avoid generation of erroneous anti-noise. |
| US08958567B2 |
Method and system for split client-server reverberation processing
In some embodiments, a method applying reverberation to audio from at least one client of a set of clients which share a virtual environment, including by asserting position data and at least one input audio stream to a server, selecting (in the server) a reverberation filter for each input audio stream in response to the position data and generating wet audio by applying to the input audio an early reverberation part of the selected reverberation filter. Typically, a client applies a late reverberation filter to the wet audio using metadata from the server. In other embodiments, a server selects a reverberation filter for application to audio in response to position data, asserts the audio and metadata indicative of the filter, and a client applies the filter to the audio using the metadata. Other aspects are systems, servers, and client devices configured to perform any embodiment of the method. |
| US08958566B2 |
Audio signal decoder, method for decoding an audio signal and computer program using cascaded audio object processing stages
An audio signal decoder for providing an upmix signal representation in dependence on a downmix signal representation and an object-related parametric information includes an object separator configured to decompose the downmix signal representation, to provide a first audio information describing a first set of one or more audio objects of a first audio object type and a second audio information describing a second set of one or more audio objects of a second audio object type, in dependence on the downmix signal representation and using at least a part of the object-related parametric information. |
| US08958562B2 |
Format-preserving cryptographic systems
Key requests in a data processing system may include identifiers such as user names, policy names, and application names. The identifiers may also include validity period information indicating when corresponding keys are valid. When fulfilling a key request, a key server may use identifier information from the key request in determining which key access policies to apply and may use the identifier in determining whether an applicable policy has been satisfied. When a key request is authorized, the key server may generate a key by applying a one-way function to a root secret and the identifier. Validity period information for use by a decryption engine may be embedded in data items that include redundant information. Application testing can be facilitated by populating a test database with data that has been encrypted using a format-preserving encryption algorithm. Parts of a data string may be selectively encrypted based on their sensitivity. |
| US08958561B2 |
Systems and methods for multi layer delivery of information
Systems and methods that may be implemented to provide digital data from a remote information source to multiple local user devices using a multi-layer communication path and a local wireless server node. The multi-layer communication path may, for example, include a relatively long range secure first layer wireless communications path from the remote information source to a local wireless server node, and relatively short range second layer wireless communications path from the local wireless server node to one or more local user devices. |
| US08958558B2 |
Conditional entitlement processing for obtaining a control word
Embodiments of the invention provide an improved method and an improved receiver for obtaining a control word. Two or more subkeys are obtained in a receiver. Each subkey was encrypted under control of a key received in an entitlement message or transformed under control of a seed received in an entitlement message. After decryption or transformation, the subkeys are combined to obtain the control word. Typically at least one of the entitlement messages is a positive entitlement message and at least one of the entitlement messages is a negative entitlement message. Embodiments of the invention can be used in a conditional access system such as a Pay-TV system. |
| US08958557B2 |
Systems and methods for protecting information
Systems and methods for protecting information provided to an agent via a communication network are provided. In this regard, a representative method comprises, receiving information related to a transaction, wherein the information includes video. Additionally, the method includes initiating a recording of the video and identifying visual content in the video that is to be protected. The method further comprises preventing unauthorized access to the visual content during replay of the recording of the video. |
| US08958556B2 |
Method of secure cryptographic calculation, in particular, against attacks of the DFA and unidirectional type, and corresponding component
A method of secure cryptographic calculation includes formulating a first list of first random quantities, formulating a first non-linear substitution operator masked with at least part of the first list, and formulating a second list determined from the first list. The second list includes second random quantities respectively determined from the first random quantities. A second non-linear substitution operator masked with at least part of the second list is formulated. At least two successive implementations of a cryptographic calculation algorithm are performed that includes N rounds of calculations carried out successively to obtain output data based on input data and of a secret key, with a data path of the cryptographic calculation algorithm being masked. |
| US08958552B2 |
Data processing device
A certification device 101 encrypts a feature vector for registration by using a random number and a public key which is set to correspond to a secret key in a decryption device 103. The encrypted feature vector for registration is registered in an authentication device 102. In authentication, the certification device encrypts a feature vector for authentication by using the public key and a random number. With the two encrypted feature vectors being kept encrypted, the authentication device generates encrypted similarity degree information from which the decryption device can derive the similarity degree between the two feature vectors by a decryption process using the secret key. The decryption device 103 decrypts the encrypted similarity degree information to derive the similarity degree of the plaintext. The authentication device 102, if the similarity degree is equal to or larger than a threshold, determines that the user is the correct user. The similarity degree can be derived without using the feature vector of the plaintext. Thus, secure identity authentication with a lower possibility of plaintext theft can be realized. |
| US08958547B2 |
Generation of relative prime numbers for use in cryptography
The disclosed technology generates two relative prime numbers and, then, using the relative prime numbers converts a super-increasing (SI) knapsack into a non-super-increasing (NSI) knapsack. The NSI knapsack becomes a public key and the corresponding SI knapsack, along with the two relative prime numbers, becomes a private key. A message is encrypted using a subset S of the private key that totals a number N. The message, the public key and the number N are transmitted to a recipient, who knows the value of the two relative prime numbers. The recipient uses the relative prime numbers to convert the public key into the private key and, then, generates the subset S by solving the private key with respect to the number N. Using the subset, the message is decrypted. |
| US08958546B2 |
Steganographic messaging system using code invariants
A steganographic method to prevent the execution of malicious code and mitigate software piracy. The method uses invariant portions of machine instructions to create an executable watermark within unmodified code. This watermark can be verified at any stage of the software lifecycle, including dynamically and continuously during execution, to detect foreign code by verifying the integrity of the watermark prior to execution. In addition, the watermark may serve as a steganographic covert channel concealing additional information. Code invariants are not altered by binding operations such as loading and linking on different machines, and thus may be employed to consistently and repeatedly identify an unmodified instantiation of a particular program. The use of opcodes and register references as invariants avoids trivial register substitution as a means of program differentiation that eludes detection. The split key structure of the resulting cipher implies that knowledge of only the code (first key) or the cipher table (second key) alone is insufficient to derive the message. |
| US08958544B2 |
Time-alignment of crosstalk acquisition phases between multiple joining lines
In an embodiment, the access node includes first and second transceiver units for initializing first and second communication channels, respectively, over first and second communication lines, respectively. The initialization of the first and second communication channels respectively including first and second handshake phases wherein peer transceiver units exchange capabilities and select (i) a common mode of operation, (ii) first and second crosstalk channel acquisition phases from the first and second communication lines, and (iii) first and second generic initialization phases. The access node further includes a line initialization controller configured to stretch the execution of the first handshake phase with respect to the execution of the second handshake phase so as to shorten a time difference between respective entries into the first and second crosstalk channel acquisition phases. |
| US08958543B1 |
Use of inbound call as mechanism to trigger outbound calls to avoid collisions
A system and machine-implemented method for automated communication relating to configuring a communication channel, selectively configurable between receiving a new inbound communication session and initiating a new outbound communication session, for receiving a new inbound communication session, processing an inbound communication session, determining the inbound communication session has terminated, determining that an outbound communication is pending in response to termination of the inbound communication session, and reconfiguring the communication channel for outbound communication and establishing an outbound communication session in response to the determination that an outbound communication is pending. |
| US08958539B2 |
System and method for network based call transfers
A system and method for transferring calls between multiple devices. A call is communicated through a network device to a first phone utilizing a first communications service. The call is transferred from the first phone to a second phone. The call being transferred in response to a user selection associated with the second phone. The call is transferred from the second phone to a third phone. The second phone or the third phone utilizes a second communications service. The call being transferred in response to a user selection associated with the third phone. |
| US08958537B1 |
Providing call alerts using social network data
Alerts are provided for calls, where the alerts are indicative of the relationship of a caller to a call recipient in a social networking platform. An identifier for a calling device is used to access social network data that is descriptive of a relationship of the caller to the call recipient in the social networking platform. An alert option for a call is selected, from among multiple, different alert options, based on the social network data that is descriptive of the relationship of the caller to the call recipient in the social networking platform. |
| US08958534B2 |
Methods, systems and computer readable media for facilitating a remote deposit to a prepaid card account
Methods, systems, and computer readable media for facilitating a remote deposit to a prepaid card account are disclosed. In one example, the method includes receiving, via an application programming interface (API) supported by a central switch node, a web based service message containing a load request from an acquiring entity. The method further includes utilizing, at the central switch node, the load request to identify an issuing entity that hosts a prepaid card account associated with the load request from among a plurality of issuing entities and communicating the load request from the central switch node to the issuing entity. |
| US08958531B2 |
X-ray waveguide
To provide an X-ray waveguide which: shows a small propagation loss of an X-ray; has a waveguide mode with its phase controlled; does not deteriorate owing to oxidation; and can be easily produced, an X-ray waveguide, including: a core for guiding an X-ray in such a wavelength band that a real part of the refractive index of a material is 1 or less; and a cladding for confining the X-ray in the core, in which: the core has a one-dimensional periodic structure containing multiple materials having different real parts of the refractive index; the multiple materials include one of an organic material, a gas, and a vacuum, and an inorganic material; and the core and the cladding are formed so that the critical angle for total reflection at an interface between the core and the cladding is larger than a Bragg angle resulting from a periodicity of the one-dimensional periodic structure, is realized. |
| US08958524B2 |
Correction of projection data in radiation system
Among other things, one or more techniques and/or systems for correcting projection data representative of an object under examination to account for drift in a radiation system are provided. System drift is measured by performing a drift calibration on the radiation system. During the drift calibration, a temperature of the radiation system is measured and one or more calibration tables, such as an air table and/or offset table, are corrected based upon the measured temperature to derive a theoretical projection (e.g., indicative of measurements that are expected to be acquired from the radiation system during the drift calibration). The theoretical projection is compared to an actual projection acquired during the drift calibration to measure a degree of drift. Based upon the measured degree of drift, one or more correction factors are determined to correct and/or otherwise adjust for system drift in a projection respective of the object. |
| US08958523B2 |
Spacer grid
The invention relates to a final, ready to use, spacer grid for a nuclear boiling water reactor. The final spacer grid comprises: i) a spacer grid structure made of an alloy that has been formed and assembled such that it constitutes a spacer grid, and ii) an outer oxide coating on the surface of the spacer grid structure. Said alloy is a Ni base alloy that consists of the following: (table) The invention also relates to a method of manufacturing the final spacer grid according to the invention. |
| US08958520B2 |
Top nozzle for nuclear fuel assembly having spring insert hole improved in fastening stability and method of manufacturing the same
A top nozzle is provided. The top nozzle can include a coupling plate, a perimeter wall and a hold-down spring unit. The coupling plate can be coupled to a guide thimble of the nuclear fuel assembly. The perimeter wall can protrude upwards from the perimeter of the coupling plate. A spring clamp can be provided on the upper surface of the perimeter wall. The hold-down spring unit can be mounted to the upper surface of the perimeter wall in such a way to couple a corresponding end of the hold-down spring unit to the spring clamp. A fastening pin hole can be vertically formed through an upper surface of the spring clamp. A spring insert hole into which the hold-down spring unit can be inserted and formed by electro-discharge machining in an insert direction of the hold-down spring. |
| US08958518B2 |
Device for inspecting a fuel rod assembly in the pool of a nuclear plant and corresponding inspection method
The invention relates to a device for inspecting a fuel assembly in the pool of a nuclear plant, that comprises an image sensor with an observation field, and further comprising a boom with at least one removable fastener to the assembly, a reference graduation extending along an axis parallel to a longitudinal axis of the assembly, so that the image sensor can monitor within its field both the boom and the assembly. The device is designed so that the boom can be removably attached to the fuel assembly when the latter is suspended outside the pool by the hook of the machine for handling the fuel assemblies. The invention also relates to a corresponding method. |
| US08958513B1 |
Clock and data recovery with infinite pull-in range
A device and method for clock and data recovery are disclosed. For example, an integrated circuit comprises a first branch for recovering a clock signal from an input signal. The first branch includes a phase and frequency detector for detecting a phase and a frequency of the clock signal and a numerically controlled oscillator that is controlled by the phase and the frequency of the clock signal from the phase and frequency detector. The integrated circuit also includes a second branch for recovering a data signal from the input signal. The second branch includes a pre-settable numerically controlled oscillator that is pre-settable with the phase and the frequency of the clock signal from the numerically controlled oscillator. The second branch also includes a sample selector that is controlled by the pre-settable numerically controlled oscillator for recovering the data signal. |
| US08958510B1 |
Selectable bandwidth filter
A pair of M-path perfect reconstruction filter banks, one for analysis and one for synthesis avoid aliasing of channel filter band-edges by operating at an output sample rate of 2-samples per channel bandwidth. The non-maximally decimated analysis filter performs an M/2-to-1 down sample operation to obtain the 2-samples per channel output rate. The corresponding synthesis bank accepts signal samples at 2-samples per symbol and up-samples 1-to-M/2 to obtain the original and desired output sample rate matched to the input sample rate. Changes in composite system bandwidth are achieved by enabling or disabling the connection between the analysis filter bank and the corresponding synthesis filter bank. |
| US08958507B2 |
Reuse of digital interface for multiple components
In one embodiment, a circuit can selectively adjust a current for driving a load. The circuit includes a sensor configured to measure a magnetic field associated with the current and provide a sensor voltage representative thereof. A control circuit is configured to selectively adjust the current as a function of the sensor voltage and a time-varying voltage threshold. Other methods and systems are also disclosed. |
| US08958494B2 |
Data and control multiplexing for uplink MIMO with carrier aggregation and clustered-DFT
A method and apparatus for signal processing in a wireless transmit receive unit (WTRU), including generating a plurality of data bits and a plurality of control bits, mapping the data bits and control bits to one or more codewords, multiplexing the data bits and control bits, dividing the bits into layers, allocating control bits to each layer based on a channel quality of each codeword and a channel quality of each layer, and channel interleaving each layer for output to one or more antennas. |
| US08958493B2 |
Operation for backward-compatible transmission
The present invention relates to a transmitter in a transmission system operable to optimize estimates of a quantity at a receiver for improved operation. The transmission system includes a transmitting unit connected to a number of antennas (Txm), and to control unit. The control unit controls the transmitting unit to initially transmit an initial training/quantity estimation sequence during an initial training/quantity estimation phase and subsequently transmit a sequence of data symbols such that the information rate of the data symbols is progressively increased. |
| US08958488B2 |
Reference signal transmitting method and device in a multi-antenna system
Provided are a reference signal transmitting method and device in a multi-antenna system. A terminal generates a plurality of reference signal sequences to which different cyclic shift values are allocated, respectively, generates an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol to which the plurality of reference signal sequences are mapped, and transmits the OFDM symbol to a base station through a plurality of antennas. Each cyclic shift value allocated to each reference signal sequence is determined on the basis of a parameter n indicated by a cyclic shift field transmitted from a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH). |
| US08958487B2 |
Power line communication transmitter with amplifier circuit
In one embodiment, a transmitter circuit is provided for data transmission from endpoint devices to collector devices over power distribution lines. The transmitter includes an amplifier circuit configured to receive and convert a first data signal to a pulse density modulation (PDM) encoded signal using high frequency pulses that introduce high frequency components. A low-pass filter of the transmitter is configured to filter the high frequency components of the PDM encoded signal to produce a second data signal, which is an amplification of the first data signal. A coupling circuit of the transmitter is configured to communicatively couple the second data signal from the low-pass filter to the power distribution lines. The coupling circuit filters the frequency of the AC and prevents high voltage of the power distribution lines from damaging the transmitter. |
| US08958483B2 |
Audio/video content synchronization and display
In one embodiment, a method is illustrated as including generating tagging data using a computer system to tag certain portions of digital content for playing at a normal rate and inserting the tagging data into a field of a data packet to create tagged digital content. In another embodiment, a further method is illustrated as including generating a metadata file using a computer system to denote certain portions of digital content for playing at a normal rate and inserting the metadata file into a media stream containing the certain portions of digital content. Additionally, in a further embodiment, a system is illustrated as including a generator residing on a device to generate tagging data to tag certain portions of digital content for playing at normal rate and an inserter residing on the device to insert the tagging data into a field of a data packet to create tagged digital content. |
| US08958477B2 |
Multiple reference layer prediction signaling techniques
The disclosed subject matter, in one embodiment, provides techniques to signal inter-layer texture and motion prediction from different direct dependent reference layers. In certain exemplary arrangements, techniques are provided which include one or more syntax elements in a high level syntax structure, e.g., the slice segment header, indicating such different direct dependent reference layer(s). |
| US08958475B2 |
Transmitter quieting and null data encoding
A method comprises encoding a set of frames of multimedia data, encoding null data for a period following the set of frames of multimedia data, modulating the encoded set of frames and the null data, wherein modulating the null data creates a null interval over the period, transmitting the encoded set of frames via a transmitter, and blanking the transmitter during the null interval. |
| US08958469B1 |
Digital receiver equalization system
A digital receiver equalization system has a digitized signal input derived from an analog front-end of a digital receiver and having a relatively wide bandwidth. A synthesis channelizer decomposes the digitized signal input into a plurality of time domain synthesis channels each having a relatively narrow bandwidth. An analysis channelizer recomposes the synthesis channels after digital signal processing is performed on at least a portion of the synthesis channels so as to generate a digitized output signal. A channelizer domain defines digital signal processing between the synthesis channelizer and the analysis channelizer. A least a portion of the channelizer domain digital signal processing is a cascade of multiplier arrays, and at least one of the multiplier arrays has inputs that compensate for channel distortion. |
| US08958462B2 |
Zero correlation zone sequences for communication system
The present disclosure provides for the construction and use of a set of Zero-Correlation-Zone (ZCZ) Concatenated Complementary Pair (CCP) sequences with zero-correlation-zone range greater than one or with zero-correlation-zone range equal to one and the sequence set size greater than two. Complementary pair sequences A and B are selected and, for each member of the set of ZCZ CCP sequences, sign sequences pA and pB are combined with the complementary pair sequences to form a member ZCZ CCP sequence of the set. A ZCZ CCP sequence modified by propagation over a communication channel may be identified by cross-correlation with ZCZ CCP sequences of the set. A set of sign sequences may be constructed by recursive expansion from an initial set or found by a computer search. The sequences may be used in a transceiver of a portable electronic device or other communication device. |
| US08958455B2 |
Low energy signaling scheme for beacon fencing applications
Systems, methods, and devices of the various embodiments provide modified frequency hopping patterns that enable synchronization of a wireless tracking device with a beacon signal that defines a predetermined area (i.e., beacon fence). In an embodiment, a beacon may transmit a beacon signal according to a modified frequency hopping pattern and a wireless tracking device may receive the beacon signal by tuning a receiver according to the frequency hopping pattern. In an embodiment, the modified frequency hopping pattern may include a reference frequency generated at a high redundancy pattern multiplexed with a pseudo random sequence of frequencies. In an embodiment, the packets of the beacon signal transmitted at the reference frequency may include an indication of the next frequency according to the modified frequency hopping pattern. |
| US08958452B2 |
System, apparatus and method employing a dual head laser
A system, apparatus and method employing a laser with a split-head, V-assembly gain material configuration. Additionally, the present invention is directed to techniques to better dissipate or remove unwanted energies in laser operations. The present invention is also directed to techniques for better collimated laser beams, with single spatial mode quality (TEM00), with improved efficiency, in extreme environments, such as in outer space. |
| US08958445B2 |
DC-coupled laser drive circuit and method for driving laser diode device
A DC-coupled laser drive circuit (1) includes (i) a voltage drop section (14) provided between a power source and a pre-driver (12) and (ii) a voltage drop amount controlling section (16) for controlling, according to an output of the pre-driver (12), an amount of a voltage drop in the voltage drop section (14). |
| US08958444B2 |
Device and method for generating coherent smith-purcell radiation
A device (100) for generating a coherent Smith-Purcell radiation including an electrically conducting diffraction grating (102), laterally delimited by two electrically conducting external sidewalls (104); and a source (101) for generating an electron beam (103) and for emitting it so that it passes above the diffraction grating (102). The device (100) also includes one electrically conducting intermediate wall (105), parallel to the external sidewalls (104), located inside the diffraction grating (102) to form several similar elementary diffraction gratings (1061,1062). The source (101) emits an electron beam (103) with a speed and a current density adapted such that each elementary diffraction grating (1061,1062) emits a Smith-Purcell radiation on the fundamental mode. The elementary diffraction gratings (1061,1062) interact with each other to reduce the saturation time necessary for the Smith-Purcell radiation to be produced. |
| US08958441B2 |
System and method of an in-band modem for data communications over digital wireless communication networks
A system is provided for transmitting information through a speech codec (in-band) such as found in a wireless communication network. A modulator transforms the data into a spectrally noise-like signal based on the mapping of a shaped pulse to predetermined positions within a modulation frame, and the signal is efficiently encoded by a speech codec. A synchronization sequence provides modulation frame timing at the receiver and is detected based on analysis of a correlation peak pattern. A request/response protocol provides reliable transfer of data using message redundancy, retransmission, and/or robust modulation modes dependent on the communication channel conditions. |
| US08958439B2 |
Mediating method and system between signaling network peers
The present invention disclose a system and method for mediating between signaling network peers of diameter type, where each peer is associated with different telecommunication service providers network or different application vendors. The method comprise the steps of: identifying equipment application type and release version of each provider based on pre-defined automatic identification classification rules and profile, classifying the vendor of the implemented diameter application in each signaling peer, retrieving a first set of rules adapted for the identified source equipment type, intercepting messages of communication session between signaling peers of different providers, applying steering rules on outgoing requests for selecting the destination route of target peers, retrieving a second set of conversion rules adapted for the identified destination equipment type vendor application relating to messages structure, content types and content values and applying all conversion rules on intercepted messages for translating between messages formats of the different signaling peers. |
| US08958438B2 |
Systems and methods for network monitoring and testing using a generic data mediation platform
Embodiments are directed to systems and methods for network monitoring and testing using a generic data mediation platform between one or more probes and one or more dashboards. The generic data mediation platform performs data correlation, filtering enrichment and aggregation of events obtained from monitored networks. |
| US08958436B2 |
Wireless network with simultaneous uplink transmission of independent data from multiple client stations
A wireless network comprises R client stations that respectively generate simultaneous uplink transmission (SUT) data, where R is an integer greater than one. An access point (AP) receives SUT data from each of the R client stations during an SUT period. |
| US08958435B2 |
Information management method and information processing device
An information management method and an information processing device functioning as a node are provided to enable an effective use of information distributed to, and shared with, a plurality of nodes on a network and to enable maintenance of security against leakage of information by controlling information retention. This management method of information gathers information distributed to, and shared with, a plurality of the nodes on a network and holds the information in a state accessible from other nodes to a temporary information memory unit when generating restored information. The information management method is also characterized in setting a flag for showing a history of the information and immediately discarding the information in the case that the retention of restored information becomes improper from a view point of contents of the flag. |
| US08958425B2 |
Decoupling functionality related to providing a transparent local area network segment service
A transport LAN segment service is provided over a transport network. Responsibilities for configuring, provisioning and forwarding over a transport LAN segment are divided between layer 2 and 3 service provider edge devices, where the layer 3 edge device handles discovery and tunneling responsibilities, the layer 2 edge device handles learning and flooding responsibilities, and information can be exchanged between the layer 2 and 3 edge devices. Configuration is simplified by advertising TLS-label information, layer 2 address learning, and flooding when the needed configuration information has not yet been learned or discovered. |
| US08958424B2 |
Tri-colour data packet counting for tri-colour marking policies
The invention is directed to counting data packets marked according to tri-color marking techniques. Packets of a packet flow that are marked according to a three color (or tri-color) marking scheme are counted using a counter implemented on a ternary content addressable memory (TCAM). Advantages of some embodiments of the invention are to enable the use of generic and cost-efficient TCAMs to quickly obtain the counts of all three colors of packets in such a packet flow. These counts can be used to provide detailed statistics on characteristics of the packet flow, which can be useful for debugging and accounting purposes. |
| US08958420B1 |
Methods and apparatus for virtualizing switch control plane engine
In some embodiments, an apparatus includes a scheduler disposed at a control device of a switch fabric system. The scheduler is configured to receive a control plane request associated with the switch fabric system having a data plane and a control plane separate from the data plane. The scheduler is configured to designate a control plane entity based on the control plane request and state information of each control plane entity from a set of control plane entities associated with the control plane and instantiated as a virtual machine. The scheduler is configured to send a signal to a compute device of the switch fabric system in response to the control plane request such that the control plane entity is instantiated as a virtual machine at the compute device. |
| US08958419B2 |
Switch fabric primitives
Techniques are described for optimizing broadcast and collect primitives in switch fabrics. A switch is described for use in a switch fabric that includes a plurality of switches configured to interconnect a plurality of host devices. The switch includes a plurality of ports configured to receive and transmit data, and switch logic configured to facilitate transfer of the data among the ports. The switch logic is configured to implement a collect function in which responses from multiple destination host devices are collected and aggregated for transmission to a source host device. A first portion of the switch logic is configured to identify, count, and discard the responses in a data plane of the switch. A second portion of the switch logic is configured to generate an aggregated response in a control plane of the switch and introduce the aggregated response into the data plane for transmission toward the source host device. |
| US08958414B1 |
Intelligent chassis management
A modular system uses point-to-point communication between field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) on a control module and each port module, respectively, to manage basic module functions, such as power, environmental monitoring, and health checks on the modules and their components. This allows a chassis to be managed without fully powering each card first, frees processors on the modules from having to perform health checks, allows dedicated resources to rapidly monitor the health of each card, and prevents one bad card from disabling management of all cards. |
| US08958413B2 |
IP-PBX system and method for linking VoIP terminal therewith
An Internet protocol (IP)-private branch exchange (PBX) system and a method for linking the system with a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) terminal. The IP-PBX system and method allow the VoIP terminal to be registered at an extension of the IP-PBX system, the VoIP terminal supporting a protocol, e.g., H.323 or session initiation protocol (SIP), standardized by a standardization organization, e.g., the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), or the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). |
| US08958412B2 |
Methods and apparatus for uplink timing alignment in system with large number of antennas
A mobile station is configured to perform a method for uplink timing alignment in a wireless network. The method includes receiving a first downlink synchronization signal from a base station on a first beam pair at a first time associated with a first propagation delay. The method also includes receiving a second downlink synchronization signal from the base station on a second beam pair at a second time associated with a second propagation delay. The method further includes determining a second timing advance for the second beam pair based on a known first timing advance for the first beam pair and a time difference between the first time and the second time. |
| US08958411B2 |
Method of transmitting RLC data
A method of transmitting data is performed by detecting a triggering of a first event, further detecting a triggering of a second event until a third event occurs, and performing a first action if the triggering of the second event is not detected, wherein the first action is based on the detected first event. The first event may be the expiry of a poll retransmit timer, the second event may be a detecting whether a ACK or NACK is not received, the third event may be a next transmission opportunity, and the first action may be setting a polling bit of a data PDU to be transmitted. |
| US08958409B2 |
Method for transmitting and receiving signals using multi-band radio frequencies
A method for transmitting an information unit of a specific layer above a physical layer through a plurality of frequency allocation bands managed by the specific layer and transmitting control information identifying each of the plurality of frequency allocation bands. The control information includes a second ID into which a first ID has been converted, the first ID identifying each of the plurality of frequency allocation bands in the physical layer, the second ID identifying each of the plurality of frequency allocation bands managed by the specific layer in the specific layer. To accomplish this, a timing offset is applied to the entirety of a frame or to a preamble (synchronous channel) so that the timing offset is used as the ID. Applying a timing offset to the entirety of a frame or to a preamble (synchronous channel) can achieve an advantage of PAPR reduction. |
| US08958408B1 |
Coded aperture scanning
A particular method includes splitting a signal into multiple portions corresponding to elements of an array. The method also includes coding and phase adjusting the multiple portions of the signal to form phase adjusted, coded portions of the signal by coding each portion of the multiple portions with a different code and by applying phase adjustments associated with the corresponding elements of the array to the portions. The method also includes transmitting the phase adjusted, coded portions of the signal via the corresponding elements of the array. |
| US08958407B2 |
Method for allocating frequency subchannels on an air interface of a wireless communication system and corresponding radio resource allocation module
The present invention relates to a method for allocating frequency subchannels on an air interface of a wireless communication system to users for a predefined time period, a plurality of frequency subchannels being available for communicating between a base station belonging to a cell and users under the coverage of said cell requiring a frequency subchannel allocation.According to the present invention, the method comprises the steps of: determining an angular position of the users under the coverage of a cell relative to a base station in said cell; selecting at least one frequency subchannel to be assigned to a user depending on its angular position and the angular position of at least one other user. |
| US08958406B2 |
Method and apparatus for enabling coexistence of plurality of communication technologies on communication device
A method and apparatus for enabling coexistence of a plurality of communication technologies on a communication device is provided. The method includes receiving one or more first communication events from a first communication technology of the plurality of communication technologies. The method further includes converting the one or more first communication events to one or more second communication events for one or more second communication technologies of the plurality of communication technologies. Converting emulates one or more first peer to peer communication links of the one or more first communication technologies as one or more second peer to peer communication links of the one or more second communication technologies. |
| US08958405B2 |
Wireless network host in silent mode
An access point that implements operating modes in which beacons may be selectively disabled. Beacons may be disabled when no device is actively associated through the access point. Beacons may be enabled in response to one or more triggers, which may include events such as a client forming an association through the access point following a probe request message identifying the access point. In addition, active beaconing may be triggered by user input or may occur during periodic brief intervals that allow client devices to discover the network identifier for the access point. Selective control of beaconing may lead to more effective wireless communication, particularly in areas where users congregate with computers implementing soft APs for personal networks. |
| US08958403B2 |
Wide area network (WAN) and local area network (LAN) communications for a fixed wireless CPE
An outdoor broadband unit includes a wide area network (WAN) side device, and a local area network (LAN) side device. The LAN side device provides a first stay alive communication to the WAN side device, and the WAN side device performs a soft reset based on the stay alive communication. The LAN side device also receives, based on the stay alive communication, a soft reset result from the WAN side device, and determines, based on the soft reset result, whether the soft reset of the WAN side device is successful or unsuccessful. The LAN side device further provides a second stay alive communication to the WAN side device when the soft reset of the WAN side device is successful. |
| US08958402B2 |
Wireless communication system, wireless communication device, projector, and wireless communication method
A wireless communication system performs ad-hoc mode communication, wherein a first terminal includes an identification information storing section, an IP address storing section, an SSID generating section generating a service set identifier, a beacon signal generating section generating a beacon signal including an SSID, and a priority information updating section updating priority information, and the second terminal includes an SSID acquiring section acquiring the SSID from the beacon signal, memory storing the SSID, an SSID selecting section selecting one SSID based on the priority information, an IP address acquiring section acquiring the IP address of the first terminal from the selected SSID, and a communicating section making a connection to the first terminal by using the acquired IP address. |
| US08958400B2 |
Wireless device with opportunistic band access
A wireless communication network system includes a plurality of nodes. Each node from the plurality of nodes includes a plurality of communication modules. Each module includes a modem and is configured to operate according to a communication protocol. Each communication module is configured to monitor its own communication parameter data and to cooperate with companion modules of a node by sharing communication parameter data, for instance through a coordination unit. Each communication module is further configured to allow, preferably according to a predefined set of rules, communication using a protocol of one communication module by utilizing a band associated with a companion module. The sharing of communication parameter data between modules may be continuous sharing or periodic sharing. |
| US08958399B1 |
Method and apparatus for providing connectivity control
A method and apparatus for controlling connectivity within a wireless network. In one embodiment, connectivity control device is provided within the wireless network to disrupt the communications with neighboring nodes of any computer within a protected network. In one embodiment of the invention, all of the wireless computers within a network are logged within the connectivity control device e.g., the wireless interface card identification number is logged. When a computer within the protected network attempts to connect to a neighboring wireless node, the connectivity control device transmits a signal that disrupts the communication with a neighboring wireless node. This disruption may occur by sending a disjoin frame or signal, or other form of communication, to disconnect the unauthorized access. In another embodiment of the invention, the connectivity control device may transmit disruptive communications continuously to ensure that the computers that are not authorized for access to the neighboring wireless node cannot connect to the neighborhood wireless nodes. |
| US08958397B2 |
Random access channel preamble
One out of sixteen preamble signatures is selected. A code is produced based on the selected preamble signature. The produced code is phase rotated to produce a processed preamble signature signal. The processed preamble signature signal is used in processing the CDMA RACH signal and the CDMA RACH signal is used to access a CDMA system. |
| US08958396B2 |
Train control system and handover method in train control system
A ground control apparatus is provided with: a train speed calculation unit that calculates train speed by using train present track position information notified from a train; a predicted passage time calculation unit that calculates a predicted passage time at a previously-stored H/O point based on the H/O point, the calculated train speed, and brake performance; a wireless CH reservation unit that performs processing of reserving a wireless CH of a H/O target wireless base station based on usage of a wireless channel allocated to the H/O target wireless base station and the calculated predicted passage time; and a wireless CH reservation result notification unit that notifies a reservation result of the wireless CH reservation unit to a H/O source wireless base station. |
| US08958394B2 |
Method and system for operating a multi-user multiple-input multiple output (MU-MIMO) wireless communications system
A technique for operating a wireless communications system that supports multi-user multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) communications between a base station and multiple mobile stations involves generating inter-cell interference information at the mobile stations and providing the inter-cell interference information to the base station. The base station uses the inter-cell interference information to calculate channel quality indicators (CQIs) and then makes scheduling decisions in response to the CQIs. Data is transmitted from the base station to the mobile stations according to the scheduling decisions. |
| US08958390B2 |
Reference clock calibration
An apparatus comprising: a first transceiver arranged to communicate over a wireless network, the first transceiver comprising a first clock; and a second transceiver arranged to communicate other than by said wireless network, the second transceiver comprising a second clock. The second sends a request signal to the first transceiver. In response, the first transceiver transitions from a first mode to a second mode and provides to the second transceiver a response signal for calibrating the second clock relative to the first clock. In the first mode the first transceiver performs zero or more calibrations of the first clock relative to the wireless network, and in the second mode the first transceiver performs at least one additional calibration of the first clock relative to the wireless network, the response signal being based on the at least one additional calibration. |
| US08958386B2 |
Multi-carrier communications with adaptive cluster configuration and switching
A method and apparatus for allocating subcarriers in an orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) system is described. In one embodiment, the method comprises allocating at least one diversity cluster of subcarriers to a first subscriber and allocating at least one coherence cluster to a second subscriber. |
| US08958384B2 |
Radio communication device and response signal diffusion method
Provided is a radio communication device which can suppress inter-code interference between an ACK/NACK signal and a CQI signal which are code-multiplexed. A diffusion unit (214) diffuses the ACK/NACK signal inputted from a judgment unit (208) by using a ZC sequence. A diffusion unit (219) diffuses the CQI signal by using a cyclic shift ZC sequence. By using a Walsh sequence, a diffusion unit (216) further diffuses the ACK/NACK signal which has been diffused by using the ZC sequence. A control unit (209) controls the diffusion unit (214), the diffusion unit (216), and the diffusion unit (219) so that the minimum value of the difference between the CQI signals from a plurality of mobile stations and a cyclic shift amount of the ACK/NACK signal is not smaller than the minimum value of the difference between the cyclic shift amounts of the ACK/NACK signals from the plurality of mobile stations. |
| US08958378B2 |
Multicarrier based communication method and device
Provided are a multicarrier based communication method and device. A mobile station activates a first carrier, and activates a second carrier adjacent to the first carrier. Defined within the first carrier there is a first frame comprising a legacy UL (uplink) region and an AAI (Advanced Air Interface) UL region; defined within the second carrier there is a second frame comprising an AAI UL region in the first frame occupy frequencies that differ from each other; and guard subcarriers between the AAI UL region of the first frame and the AAI UL region of the second frame are not used for data transmission. |
| US08958377B2 |
Transmission device, transmission method and transmission system
Disclosed is a transmission device that addresses the issue of alleviating the occurrence of delays in delivery, or the abandonment, of transmitted data in the transmission device when transmission capacity of the transmission device declines, as well as being easy to set up and maintain. The transmission device comprises a sorting means for assigning a first signal to either a first path or a second path on the basis of assignment information for assigning the first signal; a first transmitting means for transmitting the signal from among the first signal that is allocated to the first path upon the first path; and a second transmitting means for transmitting the signal from among the first signal that is allocated to the second path upon the second path. |
| US08958376B2 |
Scheduling data transmissions between a mobile terminal and a base station in a wireless communications network
A method of scheduling wireless data transmissions between a mobile terminal and a base station using multiple system carrier signals is disclosed. The method comprises the steps of receiving (101) the mobile terminal information from the base station indicating available system carriers; detecting (102) at least one dynamic parameter indicative of the mobile terminal's current capability to handle non-contiguous system carriers; determining (103) from the dynamic parameter whether a situation has occurred where the mobile terminal's capability to handle non-contiguous system carriers has been reduced; modifying (104), in such case, feedback information to be transmitted to the base station; and transmitting (105) the modified feedback information to the base station. By modifying the feedback information in this way the mobile terminal reduces the likelihood that the base station allocates non-contiguous system carriers to the mobile terminal in situations where it has a reduced capability of handling such system carriers. |
| US08958375B2 |
Framing for an improved radio link protocol including FEC
Framing techniques for an improved radio link protocol used in a wireless communication system, such as EV-DO. In one embodiment scheduling of the generation of repair symbols encoded to be transmitted along with source data is described. In another embodiment acknowledgment messages from a receiver are used to control the trailing edge of the protection window offered by the repair symbols. In another embodiment, non-acknowledgment messages from a receiver are used to control the generation of extra repair symbols. In another embodiment, a length field is used to avoid transmission of padding bytes over the air. In yet another embodiment, a symbol auxiliary field is appended to source symbols to indicate the padding bytes needed for symbol aligning thus avoiding the transmission of padding bytes over the air. |
| US08958366B2 |
Reducing blind decodings for communications using carrier aggregation
A method and apparatus for transmitting downlink control information when carrier aggregation is being used, by determining at least one downlink control information (DCI) format for a first carrier and at least once DCI format for a second carrier; and including padding in at least one DCI format corresponding to the second carrier such that the DCI format size of the padded DCI format equals the DCI format size of a DCI format corresponding to the first carrier. |
| US08958365B2 |
Wireless network
The invention relates to a radio network comprising a plurality of first clients which can communicate with one another by means of radio waves, wherein the first clients have at least one input unit for the input of data and/or at least one output unit for the output of data, wherein a first reference can be adjusted on one input unit and a second reference can be adjusted on one output unit, wherein the radio network is configured such that the incoming data to the input unit is communicated to the one or more output units the second reference thereof corresponding with the first reference adjusted on the input unit. |
| US08958362B2 |
Method and system for wirelessly transmitting data
A method for transmitting data from a sender to a receiver over a channel. The method includes identifying the receiver, obtaining an initiation correlated symbol sequence (CSS) associated with the receiver, transmitting the initiation CSS, where the sender and the receiver are configured to communicate over the channel, where the channel is a frequency band in a radio-frequency spectrum. The method further includes receiving a first reservation CSS from the receiver signaling that the receiver has reserved the channel in order to receive the data from the sender. In response to receiving the first reservation CSS, transmitting the data to the receiver, and receiving an acknowledgment CSS from the receiver signaling that the receiver has received the data from the sender. |
| US08958360B2 |
Coordinated communication method using multiple terminals
A method including receiving a signal from a terminal; measuring channel state information (CSI); comparing the CSI to determine whether to decode the received signal; and if it is determined to decode the received signal, removing noise by decoding the received signal, and then performing decode and forward (DAF) in which the signal is re-encoded, and if it is determined not to decode the received signal, performing amplify and forward (AAF) in which the received signal is amplified. The CSI may be at least one of a frame error rate (FER), a bit error rate (BER), a signal to noise ratio (SNR), and a signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR). Accordingly, a time delay consumed for channel decoding in hybrid DAF coordinated communication is decreased, data transmission and resource usage is more effectively achieved in coordinated communication using multiple terminals, and unnecessary power consumption is decreased. |
| US08958355B2 |
Radio base station apparatus, mobile terminal apparatus and transmission power control method
To provide a radio base station apparatus, mobile terminal apparatus and transmission power control method for enabling conventional inter-cell interference reduction techniques and ULCoMP to be used together, a radio base station apparatus of the invention is characterized by having a ULCoMP processing section (2085) that applies ULCoMP to a mobile terminal (1001) when a difference (PL2−PL1) between a pass loss PL1 between the mobile terminal (1001) and a base station apparatus (2001) connected to the mobile terminal (1001) and a pass loss PL2 between the mobile terminal (1001) and a base station apparatus (2002) with the lowest pass loss for the mobile terminal (1001) is within a predetermined range, and a transmission power control section (2089) that performs transmission power control for application of ULCoMP when the ULCoMP is applied, while performing transmission power control for non-application of the ULCoMP when the ULCoMP is not applied. |
| US08958348B2 |
Hybrid push-to-talk for mobile phone networks
A Hybrid Push-to-Talk (PTT) function for use in wireless communications networks, such as cellular mobile telephone networks. The cellular mobile telephone network includes a Real-Time Exchange (RTX) that interfaces to at least one Mobile Switching Center (MSC) in the cellular mobile telephone network to provide instant two-way half-duplex voice messaging within a group of users. In the Hybrid PTT function, first or initial talkbursts or volleys are transmitted by the RTX from an originating mobile to terminating mobiles on pre-established Internet Protocol (IP) sessions between the RTX and the mobiles. In addition, circuit channels are established by the RTX with the mobiles through the MSC in parallel with the first talkburst or volley. Thereafter, second or subsequent talkbursts or volleys are transmitted by the RTX from the originating mobile to the terminating mobiles on the circuit channels. |
| US08958347B2 |
Audio-video multi-participant conference systems using PSTN and internet networks
A multi-participant conference system and method is described. The multi-participant system includes a PSTN client, at least one remote client and a first participant client. The PSTN client communicates audio data and the remote clients communicate audio-video data. The first participant client includes a voice over IP (VoIP) encoder, a VoIP decoder, a first audio mixer, and a second audio mixer. The VoIP encoder compresses audio data transported to the PSTN client. The VoIP decoder then decodes audio data from the PSTN client. The first audio mixer mixes the decoded audio data from the PSTN client with the audio-video data from the first participant into a first mixed audio-video data stream transmitted to the remote client. The second audio mixer mixes the audio-video data stream from the first participant with the audio-video data stream from each remote client into a second mixed audio transmitted to the PSTN client. |
| US08958345B2 |
System and method for enhancing lifetime and throughput in a distributed wireless network
A system and method for enhancing lifetime and throughput in a distributed wireless network is disclosed herein. The method may include sensing, by a first machine, different parameters of at least one neighboring machine; updating, by the first machine, at least one parameter of said first machine based on said sensed parameters of said neighboring machine; generating, by the first machine, a signed-graph on the basis of the updated parameter, wherein said generated graph comprises at least two nodes representing said updated parameter and at least one edge interconnecting said two nodes; iteratively updating, by the first machine, the at least one parameter at different time-scales until convergence is achieved; and communicating, by the first machine, inter-layer updates in individual layers of a transmission protocol stack of the first machine due to said update of at least one parameter. |
| US08958344B2 |
Method and system of enhancing multiple MAC registration protocol (MMRP) for protocol internetworking
A method is disclosed to forward Ethernet frames associated with a service instance at a node (a “forwarding node”) in a network supporting an implementation of a protocol for creating logical loop-free topologies. The method starts with receiving a number of MMRPDUs at the forwarding node from links in the first network (receiving links), where each MMRPDU of the first plurality of MMRPDUs contains a first interested node list including one or more interested nodes identified by MAC addresses. Then a service instance identifier (SID) is identified for the service instance and a first set of MAC addresses interested in the service instance is formed. Then a number of MMRPDUs are sent to links associated with the service instance, where each MMRPDU contains a second set of MAC addresses interested in the service instance. The sending may be accompanied by the node installing filtering at the forwarding node accordingly. |
| US08958341B2 |
Systems and methods for selecting serving gateways to service user equipment
Some embodiments provide methods for selecting a serving gateway to service user equipment in communication with a network, including: receiving a message from a base transceiver station including a list of tracking areas handled by the base transceiver station, initiating a domain name system query for at least one tracking area in the list of tracking areas to identify information indicating a serving gateway serving the at least one tracking area, storing, in local memory, the information indicating the serving gateway serving the at least one tracking area, and upon an occurrence of a triggering event, retrieving, from the local memory, the stored information indicating the serving gateway serving the at least one tracking area. |
| US08958338B2 |
Cell for self-configuring wireless communication network
A cell, preferably a stand-alone device, arranged for wireless communication with a plurality of other cells in a communication network, e.g. a TDMA network such as a DECT based network. The cell includes a processor performing a selection algorithm which selects a reference cell among other cells. The selection algorithm bases the selection on a wireless signal, e.g. an RF signal, received from at least two other cells. Further, the cell includes a wireless receiver for receiving a first wireless signal, e.g. an RF signal, from the reference cell with time synchronization information for the reference cell. The cell includes a wireless transmitter which transmits time synchronization information for the cell itself represented in a second wireless signal, e.g. and RF signal. The selection algorithm selects the reference cell based on transmission link quality measurements and cell path information received from a number of cell candidates. The cell preferably also itself transmits cell path information, e.g. at regular intervals. Preferably, the cell can generate a random number and transmit it in wireless form as its cell identity code. A network of such cells can be self-configured, i.e. no manual action is required. Further, it allows changes in network topology, e.g. change of position of one or more cells, since each cell can automatically adapt to a new topology and select the most reliable reference cell to synchronize to. |
| US08958337B1 |
Scalable method to support multi-device link aggregation
A network device determines whether the network device has a local link for a link aggregation group (LAG), and identifies, when the network device has a local link for the LAG, the network device as a designated forwarder for the LAG. The network device also identifies, when the network device does not have a local link for the LAG, a closest network device to the network device, with a local link for the LAG, as the designated forwarder for the LAG. |
| US08958334B2 |
Differential signal-to-noise ratio based rate adaptation
Systems and methods for implementing a differential signal to noise ratio (DSNR) based rate adaptation for wireless networks are disclosed. The described methods probabilistically adapt the rate of data transmission based on an assessment of the causes of data loss. The described methods include determining a DSNR for data transmission during a predetermined window of time and adapting the transmission rate in a probabilistic manner responsive to the differential SNR and a differential SNR threshold for the data transmission. |
| US08958331B2 |
HARQ-ACK handling for unintended downlink sub-frames
Disclosed in some examples is a method for providing a HARQ response in an LTE network for a PUCCH format 1b. The method includes receiving one or more downlink assignments of a bundling window over a wireless downlink control channel; setting a reception status for each sub-frame of a downlink data channel in the bundling window based on whether the sub-frame on the downlink data channel was associated with a particular one of the received downlink assignments and based upon whether the sub-frame was successfully received; setting a reception status of sub-frames of the downlink data channel in the bundling window that did not have a corresponding downlink assignment to a predetermined value; and transmitting a response, the response based upon the reception statuses set by the response module. |
| US08958329B2 |
Fabric load balancing
In one implementation, a series of nodes in a network or a fabric communicate congestion values upstream against the flow of data packets. A current node determines average data intensity for each of a set of outputs. The average data intensity is based on recent data packet transmissions respectively to each of the set of outputs. The current node receives an output congestion value from each of the set of outputs and calculates an effective congestion value for each of the plurality of outputs as a function of the output congestion value and the average data intensity. The current node performs a comparison of the effective congestion values for the plurality of outputs and selects an output based on the comparison. |
| US08958328B2 |
Load balancing
A satellite communication system comprising a hub and plurality of terminals may be divided into multiple segments, wherein each segment may support part of the terminals. A method for decentralized balancing of traffic between the system segments is presented herein. One segment in each coverage beam may be designated as home carrier and include load balancing information. The terminals may be configured to tune on a home carrier, receive the load balancing information and then use it for selecting a least loaded segment on which they may remain operational until reset or powered off. In some embodiments of the invention, said load balancing information may be used for calculating relative probabilities for selecting segments through a weighted random selection algorithm. |
| US08958325B2 |
Fault-tolerant communications in routed networks
A method for providing fault-tolerant network communications between a plurality of nodes for an application, including providing a plurality of initial communications pathways over a plurality of networks coupled between the plurality of nodes, receiving a data packet on a sending node from the application, the sending node being one of the plurality of nodes, the data packet being addressed by the application to an address on one of the plurality of nodes, and selecting a first selected pathway for the data packet from among the plurality of initial communications pathways where the first selected pathway is a preferred pathway. |
| US08958323B2 |
Communication system with signal processing mechanism for tone estimation and method of operation thereof
A method of operation of a communication system includes: converting time-domain data to frequency-domain data based on an N-point transform size; generating K-point data based on the frequency-domain data and the N-point transform size; and determining a tone interference frequency based on the K-point data for elimination of tone interference to improve system performance. |
| US08958319B2 |
Decentralized control of interference reduction in a wireless communication system
A first base station (14) in a wireless communication system (10) operating according to a synchronised time division duplex scheme comprises an antenna (24), a radio communication unit (26) and an interference handling module (28). The interference handling module comprises an interference investigating unit (30) and a transmission control unit (34) configured to provide a sounding frame in which a variable downlink time interval has a pre-defined size long enough to provoke interference, order the interference investigating unit to obtain and analyse a link quality data parameter in a non-downlink time interval and determine whether interference from another base station is present. The transmission control unit is further configured to order the radio communication unit (26) to reduce the size of following variable downlink time intervals according to an interference reduction scheme for obtaining time intervals with a guaranteed reduced size if interference from another base station is present. |
| US08958317B2 |
Method and apparatus for performing random access in a multi-carrier system
A method of a user equipment performing random access in a multi-carrier system comprises receiving mapping information through downlink component carriers, sending a random access preamble through uplink component carriers, and receiving a random access response through a specific downlink component carriers determined based on the mapping information. |
| US08958316B2 |
Power aware scheduling and power control techniques for multiuser detection enabled wireless mobile ad-hoc networks
What is provided is a system for maintaining acceptable error rates in a MUD-enabled ad-hoc network. In this system the power spread associated with all of the nodes is maintained within the dynamic range of the system, for instance 30 dB. Also, the signal-to-noise ratio at an intended receiver is maintained above a predetermined minimum SNR, for instance above 5 dB. If the dynamic range rule is not met, then the power at the transmitting node is attenuated such that the dynamic range rule is met, checking to see that the minimum SNR rule is also met, or the transmission from this node is pulled. If there is no power control solution, then power aware scheduling is applied. Alternatively, only power aware scheduling is utilized. |
| US08958314B2 |
Data transceiver and data-transceiving method for bio-implantable medical devices
The invention relates a transmitter for transmitting data in bio-implantable medical devices, comprising: an activation unit which transmits, to a receiver, a predetermined number of frame bits which indicate the start of data transmission so as to activate the receiver; a preamble state notification unit which transmits, at the state where the receiver is activated or during data transmission to the receiver, a preamble data signal for turning the receiver into a preamble state; and a synchronization unit which transmits synchronization data for synchronization between the transmitter and the receiver in the preamble state. |
| US08958301B2 |
System and method for dynamically power and performance optimized server interconnects
A system and method for packet switching functionality focused on network aggregation that reduces size and power requirements of typical systems are provided in which the system and method also increases bandwidth and reduces latency from typical deployed systems. |
| US08958299B2 |
Power management in tunneled direct link setup
A method and apparatus of managing power save in a wireless network is provided. A direct link with a peer station (STA) is established by exchanging a Tunneled Direct Link Setup (TDLS) setup request frame and a TDLS setup response frame through an access point (AP). The peer STA enters power save mode (PSM). Traffic data that are destined for the peer STA in the PSM are buffered and a peer traffic indication (PTI) frame is transmitted to the peer STA in the PSM. The PTI frame includes a traffic identifier (TID) field and a sequence control field. Unnecessary allocation of service period can be prevented. |
| US08958298B2 |
Centralized logical L3 routing
A novel method for logically routing a packet between a source machine that is in a first logical domain and a destination machine that is in a second logical domain is described. The method configures a managed switching element as a second-level managed switching element. The method configures a router in a host that includes the second-level managed switching element. The method communicatively couples the second-level managed switching element with the router. The method causes the router to route a packet when the router receives a packet from the first logical domain that is addressed to the second logical domain. |