| Microsoft Corporation Patent applications |
| Patent application number | Title | Published |
|---|
| 20120036566 | AUTOMATIC CONFIGURATION AND CONTINUATION OF FEDERATION RELATIONSHIPS - Embodiments are directed to establishing the integrity of a portion of data on at least one level of a plurality of network stack levels and automatically continuing an established federation relationship between at least two federation computer systems. In an embodiment, a first federation computer system receives a digital signature corresponding to a computer system signed by a digital signature which includes the computer system's identity and other federation relationship information configured to establish a trusted federation relationship between a first federation computer system and a second federation computer system. The first federation computer system attempts to validate the received digital signature at a first level of a network stack and determines that the validation at the first network stack layer was unsuccessful. The first federation computer system then validates the received digital signature at a second, different level of the network stack. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036562 | Trusted License Removal in a Content Protection System or the Like - A digital license includes an identification of a removal service that can authorize removing such license. A client selects the license to be removed and the service, constructs a challenge including therein a challenge license identification block (LIB) identifying the license to be removed, and sends the challenge to the service. The service receives the challenge, stores at least a portion of the challenge in a database, constructs a response corresponding to the challenge and including therein a response LIB identifying the license to be removed and an identification of the service, and sends the response to the client. The client receives the response, employs the response LIB from the response to identify the license to be removed, and removes the identified license upon confirming that the identification of the service in the identified license matches the identification of the service in the response. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036554 | ACCESS AUTHORIZATION HAVING EMBEDDED POLICIES - A facility for receiving an embedded policy is provided. The facility checks an application program image for the presence of an embedded policy. If an embedded policy is detected, the facility extracts the policy from within the application program image. The facility may then apply the extracted policy to the application program image before the application program image is loaded and/or executed. Moreover, the facility may check the application program image's integrity prior to extracting the embedded policy. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036484 | RELATIONSHIP VISUALIZATION AND GRAPHICAL INTERACTION MODEL IN IT CLIENT MANAGEMENT - Displaying a hierarchy. A method includes identifying a set of nodes representing sites in a hierarchy. The set of nodes share one or more common characteristics not shared by any other nodes in the hierarchy. The method further includes determining that the set of nodes, as a set, meet a predetermined condition. As a result of the nodes sharing the one or more common characteristics not shared by any other nodes in the hierarchy and as a result of the set meeting the predetermined condition, the method further includes aggregating at least a portion of the set of nodes. The method further includes displaying in a graphical user interface a representation of the hierarchy including displaying the aggregated portion as a single entity in the hierarchy. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036438 | COMPUTER SYSTEM WITH ENHANCED USER INTERFACE FOR IMAGES - A computer system and method are presented that enhance a user experience when viewing images displayed on the computer. The system includes a user interface for the computer that displays a number of thumbnail images that are small representations of image files existing on the computer. The thumbnail images are arranged in alignment with one another, such as at the bottom of a viewing window. An enlarged preview image is positioned adjacent the thumbnail images. The enlarged preview image corresponds to a selected thumbnail image and is a larger representation of an image file corresponding with the selected thumbnail image. A control is displayed in the window that enables the user to iterate through the thumbnail images in at least one direction. As the user iterates through the thumbnail images, the enlarged preview image changes correspondingly. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036366 | SECURE AND VERIFIABLE DATA HANDLING - The described implementations relate to secure and verifiable data handling. One implementation can receive a request to upload information, wherein the information includes a referencing element and at least one blob of referenced data. This implementation can also receive a chunk of an individual blob. The chunk can include multiple blocks. Individual blocks can be hashed. Upon receipt of an indication that all chunks have been uploaded, this implementation can create an overall hash of the information from the block hashes rather than from the information. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036365 | COMBINING REQUEST-DEPENDENT METADATA WITH MEDIA CONTENT - An edge component receives a request for media content from a user device. The request includes both an indication of the media content and an indication of request-dependent metadata for the media content. The edge component obtains the request-dependent metadata for the media content from a content delivery service, and obtains the media content from a content delivery network. The edge component combines the request-dependent metadata and the media component, returning both the request-dependent metadata and the media content to the user device. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036326 | EFFICIENTLY SYNCHRONIZING WITH SEPARATED DISK CACHES - In a method of synchronizing with a separated disk cache, the separated cache is configured to transfer cache data to a staging area of a storage device. An atomic commit operation is utilized to instruct the storage device to atomically commit the cache data to a mapping scheme of the storage device. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036237 | DATA CONSISTENCY WITHIN A FEDERATION INFRASTRUCTURE - A primary node is elected from among a plurality of nodes in a replica set of nodes. The primary node accepts and processes client data access requests. The replica set includes the primary node and other secondary nodes. The primary node receives client data access requests and assigns a data sequence number to each client data access request that mutates state in the order the client data access requests are received. The data sequence numbers include a linearized processing order that is followed by each of the nodes in the replica set. The primary node sends the mutating client data access requests including any corresponding data sequence numbers to the secondary nodes. The primary node receives, from a threshold number of secondary nodes, an acknowledgement indicating reception of the client data access request. The primary node commits the data mutating access request. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036185 | STATE MANAGEMENT IN A DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING SYSTEM - Techniques to allow applications to propagate information to the other instances of the applications running on downstream servers are provided. An indicator, such as a token, tag, etc., is placed within or added to a message that is flowing through the distributed environment to signify that a process has been performed on the message. For example, when an instance of an application running on a server receives a message, the application instance can examine the indicator contained in the message and take appropriate action. If the application instance decides to process the message, the application instance can include an indicator in the message to signify that the application instance processed the message. The presence of the indicator signifies that the message has been processed by an upstream instance of the same application. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036141 | EXTENDED USER PROFILE - A method of extending a user profile. A user specific data related to an application is received and stored for integration with a user profile. A template for the application is received and stored. The template tailors the user specific data based on aesthetic preferences of the user to generate a tailored user specific data. The user profile is extended based on the user specific data for the application and the template for the application. The user profile comprising the tailored user specific data may be provided for rendering. Local information, e.g., geographical location, of the user may be determined to tailor the user profile based on the local information. The user specific data and/or the template may be in a markup language format. Update to the user specific data and/or template may be pushed when available. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036075 | DETERMINING MOBILE ACCOUNT TO APPLY MARKETPLACE CHARGES - Identifying a mobile operator account associated with a user to apply charges incurred by the user at a mobile marketplace service. The mobile operator provides an account identifier for the account to a billing token service associated with the mobile marketplace service. The billing token service creates a billing token including the account identifier, and provides the billing token to the user. When subsequently ordering from the mobile marketplace service, the user sends order requests with the billing token to the mobile marketplace service. The mobile marketplace service extracts the account identifier from the billing token and provides the order requests and the extracted account identifier to a mobile operator billing service. The mobile operator billing service applies a charge to the mobile operator account identified by the account identifier. Based on a charge status from the mobile operator billing service (e.g., a successful or unsuccessful charge), the mobile marketplace service allows or denies access by the user to an item identified in the order request. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120036011 | Search Personalization Using Identifiers and Authentication State - Systems, methods, and computer media for personalizing a web page and for personalizing user search query results are provided. A request to view a web page, such as a user search query that produces a search result web page, is received from a computing device. A computing device identifier is detected. Device-specific data corresponding to the detected computing device identifier is accessed. Upon detecting at least one user identifier having an authentication state, user-specific data corresponding to the detected user identifier and authentication state is accessed. The web page is personalized based on at least one of the accessed device-specific data and the accessed user-specific data. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120035989 | PERSONALIZATION OF A MOBILE COMMUNCATION DEVICE - An accessory for personalizing a mobile communication device includes an accessory body that is configured to adorn the mobile communication device and at least partially cover its exterior. At least one graphic design is disposed on the exterior surface of the accessory body to convey a theme. A data tag is secured to the accessory. The data tag stores data that facilitates personalization of at least one functionality of the mobile communication device in support of the theme. The data tag being configured so that the data is accessible via a short-range wireless protocol such as the Near-Field Communication (NFC) protocol. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120035941 | QUANTIZATION AND INVERSE QUANTIZATION FOR AUDIO - An audio encoder and decoder use architectures and techniques that improve the efficiency of quantization (e.g., weighting) and inverse quantization (e.g., inverse weighting) in audio coding and decoding. The described strategies include various techniques and tools, which can be used in combination or independently. For example, an audio encoder quantizes audio data in multiple channels, applying multiple channel-specific quantizer step modifiers, which give the encoder more control over balancing reconstruction quality between channels. The encoder also applies multiple quantization matrices and varies the resolution of the quantization matrices, which allows the encoder to use more resolution if overall quality is good and use less resolution if overall quality is poor. Finally, the encoder compresses one or more quantization matrices using temporal prediction to reduce the bitrate associated with the quantization matrices. An audio decoder performs corresponding inverse processing and decoding. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120035925 | Population of Lists and Tasks from Captured Voice and Audio Content - Automatic capture and population of task and list items in an electronic task or list surface via voice or audio input through an audio recording-capable mobile computing device is provided. A voice or audio task or list item may be captured for entry into a task application interface or into a list authoring surface interface for subsequent use as task items, reminders, “to do” items, list items, agenda items, work organization outlines, and the like. Captured voice or audio content may be transcribed locally or remotely, and transcribed content may be populated into a task or list authoring surface user interface that may be displayed on the capturing device (e.g., mobile telephone), or that may be stored remotely and subsequently displayed in association with a number of applications on a number of different computing devices. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120032982 | Manipulation of Graphical Objects - Methods of manipulating graphical objects are described. One or more graphical objects are displayed in a fixed orientation with reference to a sensed reference direction. Manipulation is achieved by fixing the orientation or position of a displayed graphical object with reference to an apparatus, such as the display itself or a proxy device, detecting a change in orientation of that apparatus and editing the orientation of the graphical object based on the detected change. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120032919 | RESOLUTION ENHANCEMENT - A method of enhancing input imaging resolution includes sequentially blocking light from different portions of an object with a series of resolution-enhancing patterns displayed between the object and an image detector. The method further includes detecting light filtered by the series of resolution-enhancing patterns and integrating light detected while different resolution-enhancing patterns of the series of resolution-enhancing patterns are displayed between the object and the detector. | 02-09-2012 |
| 20120030749 | DYNAMIC LOAD REDISTRIBUTION AMONG DISTRIBUTED SERVERS - Embodiments are directed to redistributing authentication requests among a plurality of authentication servers and to centrally managing authentication affinities among distributed servers using a secure channels affinity service. A computer system instantiates a secure channel management service configured to manage secure channel connections. The secure channel management service receives state inputs from currently deployed authentication servers. The authentication servers may be configured to queue authentication requests for transmission to authentication servers. The computer system determines that, based on the received state input, at least one of the secure channels is to be remapped to a different authentication server. The computer system also remaps the determined secure channels to distribute future authentication requests among the authentication servers. In some cases, the current state of an authentication proxy server is embedded in communications transmitted by the authentication server, such that the secure channel connections are managed using the embedded state information. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030674 | Non-Disruptive, Reliable Live Migration of Virtual Machines with Network Data Reception Directly into Virtual Machines' Memory - Techniques are disclosed for the non-disruptive and reliable live migration of a virtual machine (VM) from a source host to a target host, where network data is placed directly into the VM's memory. When a live migration begins, a network interface card (NIC) of the source stops placing newly received packets into the VM's memory. A virtual server driver (VSP) on the source stores the packets being processed and forces a return of the memory where the packets are stored to the NIC. When the VM has been migrated to the target, and the source VSP has transferred the stored packets to the target host, the VM resumes processing the packets, and when the VM sends messages to the target NIC that the memory associated with a processed packet is free, a VSP on the target intercepts that message, blocking the target NIC from receiving it. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030609 | VIRTUAL KEYBOARD TEXT REPLICATION - Text that is selected at a virtual keyboard is submitted to and displayed at an application data field and is echoed at a keyboard data field that is in relatively close proximity to virtual keys used to select the text. Thus, a user does not have to alter their field of view to the application data field to determine what was submitted to the application data field. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030473 | UNIQUE BLOCK HEADER PATTERNS FOR MEDIA VERIFICATION - Authenticating the source of digital media is performed by using unique, randomly generated variably encoded frequency patterns to create mastering specific, profiles for sets end user media which can be verified by a manufacturer. A method for verifying the authenticity of an optical storage device includes the steps of: reading a randomly generated signature key value for the optical storage device; determining manufacturing information for the optical storage device; and matching read randomly generated signature key values and manufacturing information with known valid key the to determine the authenticity of the device. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030355 | DYNAMICALLY ALLOCATING INDEX SERVER RESOURCES TO PARTNER ENTITIES - A provisioning system is described for dynamically and automatically allocating index server resources to different respective uses. For example, the provisioning system can allocate index server resources among different search-related production uses, different analysis-related uses, different testing-related uses, and so on. In one case, the provisioning system includes an allocation manager module that receives information that has a bearing on the allocation of index server resources. Based on this information, the allocation manager module determines an allocation of index server resources and sends instructions to an indexing system to carry out the allocation. In one case, the indexing system respond to the instructions by allocating rows of index server resources to different partner entities which have requested index server resources. Each row can also implement custom index information and/or custom processing functionality for use by particular partner entities. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030338 | WEB PAGE LOAD TIME PREDICTION AND SIMULATION - Embodiments of automated cloud service performance prediction are disclosed. The automated cloud service performance prediction includes extracting a parental dependency graph (PDG) for a webpage. The PDG encapsulates one or more dependency relationships for each web object in the webpage. The prediction further includes determining an original page load time (PLT) and original timing information of a webpage. The prediction also includes simulating a page loading of the webpage based on adjusted timing information of each web object and the PDG to estimate a new PLT of the webpage. The prediction additionally includes comparing the original PLT of the webpage to the new PLT of the webpage to determine whether the adjusted timing information increased or decreased the new PLT of the webpage. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030333 | Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Streaming Overlay Construction and Optimization - This document describes a directed graph model using a peer-to-peer overlay structure and a gossip-based protocol to maintain the distributed membership. A protocol suite for peers to join the live streaming session, form the P2P streaming overlay, and exchange video packets with others has also been presented. The different capabilities of the heterogeneous peers are well depicted using an adaptive out-degree mechanism. The performance of the whole system is maintained by a contribution-aware mechanism, which ensures that the peers with large contribution will get more chance to be served than those with small or no contribution. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030325 | WIRELESS SYNCHRONIZATION OF MEDIA CONTENT AND SUBSCRIPTION CONTENT - Arrangements are provided which use a host computer to configure a wireless portable device's network connection parameters. The radio on the portable device may be used to help locate nearby accessible wireless networks. Once a synchronization relationship between the portable device and a media library on a host computer is established, periodically updated content, such as podcasts, may be discovered and subscribed to using software on the host computer, and the content synchronized with the host computer. A portable device may manage episodic content, such as podcasts, using the device's own wireless connection, and may further send such content to other portable devices. A central user profile may be set up on a web server to synchronize multiple wireless or wired devices. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030317 | Capture of Content from Dynamic Resource Services - Methods are described which enable processing of resources originally accessed by a content access operation. An identifier is generated and used to augment all requests for resources which relate to a particular content access operation. A proxy stores the resources associated with the identifier and then sends the resources to the application that requested them (e.g. a browser). The resources may be requested from the proxy by applications using the identifier so that they can be processed (e.g. thumbnail generation, textual analysis) and the processed data may be stored and/or presented to the user. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030277 | PREVIEW PUBLISHING OF REPORTS - Described are embodiments directed to providing a preview feature in a report designer that allows modifications to report metadata to be made and previewed accurately. In embodiments, the feature allows a user to open a report to make changes to metadata of the report and have an accurate preview of how the report will look when published on a report publishing server. Embodiments provide for a report publishing server to allocate an in memory location that stores modified metadata of a report. The in memory location allows relative paths and references to sub-reports or data sources in the original report to be accurately reflected in a preview on the client. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030252 | MODELING RECURRING EVENTS IN A DATA STORE - Time-related properties may be modeled independent of a base object. Rather than storing time properties with the object, they may be stored independently. A given object may be stored once, even if it has a recurrent time property. The description of a “meeting,” for example, may be stored once. Each occurrence of that object over time may be stored in a “timeslot” (object occurs at time ‘t’ on day ‘d’). If it is a recurring property, recurrence information may be stored independently. “Exception” information may be stored independently as well. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030227 | SYSTEM OF PROVIDING SUGGESTIONS BASED ON ACCESSIBLE AND CONTEXTUAL INFORMATION - A system and method for offering suggestions to a user of a mobile computing device based on information relevant to the user and a context data. The mobile computing device has access to lists of data associated with the user. The mobile computing device also has a sensor for detecting data about the user's context. Based on the lists of information and the contextual data , the device generates a hypothesis as to information that may be of interest to the user. Using context data in conjunction with lists in this fashion focuses the system on information likely of interest, without requiring express user input. A search may be performed in accordance with the hypothesis. Based on the results of the search, one or more suggestions are then presented by the mobile computing device to the user. The user has the option to provide feedback input to the device resulting in an update of the suggestion. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030206 | Employing Topic Models for Semantic Class Mining - A topic modeling architecture is used to discover high-quality semantic classes from a large collection of raw semantic classes (RASCs) for use in generating responses to queries. A specific semantic class is identified from a collection of RASCs, and a preprocessing operation is conducted to remove one or more items with a semantic class frequency less than a predetermined threshold. A topic model is then applied to the specific semantic class for each of the items that remain in the specific semantic class after the preprocessing operation. A postprocessing operation is then conducted on the items of the specific semantic class to merge and sort the results of the topic model and generate final semantic classes for use by a search engine to respond to a query. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030200 | TOPICS IN RELEVANCE RANKING MODEL FOR WEB SEARCH - Described is a technology by which topics corresponding to web pages are used in relevance ranking of those pages. Topics are extracted from each web page of a set of web pages that are found via a query. For example, text such as nouns may be extracted from the title, anchor texts and URL of a page, and used as the topics. The extracted topics from a page are used to compute a relevance score for that page based on an evaluation of that page's topics against the query. The pages are then ranked relative to one another based at least in part on the relevance score computed for each page, such as by determining a matching level for each page, ranking pages by each level, and ranking pages within each level. Also described is training a model to perform the relevance scoring and/or ranking. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030178 | INTERFACES FOR HIGH AVAILABILITY SYSTEMS AND LOG SHIPPING - Architecture for replicating a database through log shipping. A replication service replicates data using one or more new internal application program interfaces (APIs), a replay configuration API which abstracts configuration information for each destination (or target) instance. APIs for log file management as part of the replication process are provided for opening communications for log shipping, tracking success of log shipping and closing out log shipping communications. Log shipping APIs are also provided for log truncation control. A ship control object is provided as a base class which includes an API for other components of the replication service to operate on log files when the log files are placed into a log directory. The ship control API is utilized by the replication service and for interaction with storage system log files. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030169 | APPLICATION INSTANCE AND QUERY STORES - An instance persistence command for an update to a state of an instance of an application can be issued. In response to the persistence command, a transaction with an instance store can be initiated. As part of the transaction, a first representation of the update can be stored in the instance store and a second representation of the update can be stored in a queue. The transaction can be committed after storing the first and second representations. After the transaction is committed, the second representation can be processed to store a third representation of the update in a query store. Application instance state information in the query store can be updated and queried without locking the instance store so that such operations in the query store can be performed asynchronously with operations in the instance store. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120030167 | DATA MIGRATION FOR SERVICE UPGRADES - Embodiments are directed to efficiently migrating data from one version of a service to another version and to temporarily transitioning a user to a different service for evaluation. A computer system pre-transfers user data from a first service to a second, different service before an indication is received that the user is to be transitioned from the first service to the second service. The user data includes identification information identifying users of the first service. The computer system receives an indication that a first service user is to be transitioned to the second service. The computer system transfers service data used by the first service to the second service and synchronizes any changes in the user data that occurred between the user data pre-transfer and the service data transfer, so that the second service is provided using the transferred service data and the synchronized user data. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120029938 | Anonymous Healthcare and Records System - Described herein is using cryptographic techniques (anonymous proof systems) to ensure the anonymity of health records when processing payment claims related to insurers and pharmacies. A patient receives a patient token from an insurer, which the patient delegates to a healthcare provider. The delegated token is processed into an anonymized token that identifies the healthcare provider and the medical service provided, without including information by which the patient is directly identifiable. The anonymized token includes data by which the insurer validates the token. For prescriptions, an anonymized token may be generated as an endorsement for the patient (e.g., a printed barcode) and an unendorsed token transmitted to the pharmacy. The pharmacy combines data of the endorsement and the unendorsed token into an anonymous combined token that is transmitted to the insurer for payment. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120029906 | Language Detection Service - Language detection techniques are described. In implementation, a method comprises determining which human writing system is associated with text characters in a string based on values representing the text characters. When the values are associated with more than one human language, the string is compared with a targeted dictionary to identify a corresponding human language associated with the string. Linguistic services are designated to be available based on service properties of the linguistic services and based on the corresponding human language associated with the string. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120028806 | Method For Planar Implementation Of PI/8 Gate In Chiral Topological Superconductors - Disclosed herein is a topologically protected π/8-gate which becomes universal when combined with the gates available through quasi-particle braiding and planar quasi-particle interferometry. A twisted interferometer, and a planar π/8-gate in CTS, implemented with the help of the twisted interferometer, are disclosed. Embodiments are described in the context of state X (CTS) supported by an ISH, although the concept of a twisted-interferometer is more general and has relevance to all anionic, i.e. quasiparticle systems. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120028687 | Alternative Inputs of a Mobile Communications Device - In an implementation, a mobile communications device includes a display device having touchscreen functionality, a keyboard having a plurality of physical keys that include a dedicated key and letter keys arranged according to a QWERTY layout, and one or more modules. The one or more modules are configured to output a user interface on the display device responsive to selection of the dedicated key, the user interface having a plurality of portions that are selectable via the touchscreen functionality to cause input of a respective one of a plurality of emoticons. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120028615 | TWO-WAY COMMUNICATION OF EVENTS BETWEEN A MOBILE DEVICE AND REMOTE CLIENT - The present application allows two-way communication between a remote client and a mobile device, such as a mobile phone. User's can be informed of phone events in real time, regardless of their proximity to the mobile device. A two-way communication link allows a remote client to communicate back to the mobile device to leverage the capabilities of the mobile device. For example, a mobile device can be controlled remotely to send a text message. In this way, third parties receive a text message from the mobile device itself, even though it is not in the user's possession. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120028610 | PRIVACY-ENABLED TELEPHONE DIRECTORY - A privacy-enabled telephone directory is disclosed that is implemented through a contact facilitator. The contact facilitator receives a contact request from a caller which includes the name of the party to be called and disambiguation information to distinguish the called party. The contact facilitator applies the disambiguation information to entries in a disambiguation database to select the mobile telephone user corresponding to the contact request information. The contact facilitator then accesses a profile database to retrieve the called party's profile which contains directions for processing the request. Possible directions include immediately connecting the caller with the called party, batching the call, or following other specific instructions regarding the contact request. Profile instructions may be changed by the mobile telephone user at any time. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120027313 | LINE AND PIXEL BASED METHODS FOR INTRA FRAME CODING - Images can be coded based on filters defined by filter coefficients or weights assigned to previously decoded pixel values of nearby lines. The filter coefficients can be selected based on evaluation of a set of predetermined filters, or filters can be adaptively generated and then evaluated. The filters generally are based on pixel values in previous rows or columns, but not values in the current row or column. In some examples, filters are adaptively generated pixel by pixel, or portions of previous rows, columns, or previously decoded portions of the current row or columns are used to provide line templates. A filter is generally selected to reduce coding error based on a least square difference between the current value and a prediction. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120027250 | DATA DIFFERENCE GUIDED IMAGE CAPTURING - Methods and apparatuses are disclosed. Previously stored images of one or more geographic areas may be viewed by online users. A new low-resolution image may be acquired and aspects of the new low-resolution image may be compared with a corresponding one of the previously stored images to determine an amount of change. A determination may be made regarding whether to acquire a new high-resolution image based on the determined amount of change and a freshness score associated with the one of the previously stored images. In another embodiment, a new image may be captured and corresponding location data may be obtained. A corresponding previously stored image may be obtained and compared with the new image to determine an amount of change. The new image may be uploaded to a remote computing device based on the determined amount of change and a freshness score of the previously stored image. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120027242 | ADJUSTABLE EARPHONE AND EARPHONE SET - An earphone comprises an inner shell, a stem and a pivot connection. The inner shell has a generally circular periphery shaped to at least partially fit in a user's concha. The stem is mounted to the inner shell at a position spaced from a rotational center of the inner shell and supports a wire leading to the inner shell. The inner shell and the stem are rotatable relative to each other by the pivot connection to configure the earphone to fit the user's ear with the shell member positioned at least partially in the user's concha and the stem positioned exteriorly along an intertragic notch of the ear. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120027011 | INTELLIGENT FORMATTING OF VOIP TELEPHONE NUMBERS - A system and method are disclosed for intelligent formatting of VoIP telephone numbers. The intelligent VoIP formatting system includes a presentation and user interface layer, an E.164 formatting engine, a location routine, and a database of telephone number data which are used to deconstruct input telephone numbers and reconstruct them as E.164 compliant telephone numbers. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120026992 | Energy-Efficient On-The-Fly Wi-Fi Hotspot Using Mobile Devices - One or more mobile devices and a cloud server computing device are utilized to provide Internet access to one or more client computing devices. One of the clients is designated as a Wi-Fi access point. The Wi-Fi access point implements a reverse-infrastructure Wi-Fi mode which tethers available mobile devices and other clients to the access point. The cloud server periodically computes an optimal number of the mobile devices to be used for data striping, and transmits a webpage to a requesting client by striping data associated with the webpage across the optimal number of the mobile devices. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120026917 | SERVER-CENTRIC HIGH PERFORMANCE NETWORK ARCHITECTURE FOR MODULAR DATA CENTERS - Disclosed are systems and methods for network architecture that is a server-centric network architectural design. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120026178 | RAW IMAGE PROCESSING - A system, a method and computer-readable media for processing raw image data with a graphics processing unit (GPU). Raw image data generated by an imaging sensor is received. A set of instructions for demosaicing the raw image data is communicated to the GPU. The GPU is enabled to demosaic the raw image data by executing the set of instructions. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120026085 | IMAGE CONTRAST ENHANCEMENT IN DEPTH SENSOR - Embodiments related to the enhancement of contrast in an image pattern in a structured light depth sensor are disclosed. For example, one disclosed embodiment provides, in a structured light depth sensor system comprising a structured light depth sensor, a method comprising projecting a light pattern onto an object, detecting via an image sensor an image of the light pattern as reflected from the object, increasing a contrast of the light pattern relative to ambient light present in the image of the light pattern as reflected from the object to form a contrast-enhanced image of the light pattern as reflected from the object, and based upon a motion of the object as detected via the contrast-enhanced image of the light pattern, controlling an application that is providing output to a display. | 02-02-2012 |
| 20120023492 | WORKLOAD INTERFERENCE ESTIMATION AND PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZATION - Architecture that facilitates the estimation of interference among workloads (e.g., virtual machines) due to sharing of a shared resource (e.g., a shared cache of a computer processor), and optimization of a desired performance objective such as power or energy use in the presence of the interference. Estimation is to the extent of interference by characterizing the nature of shared resource usage and its effect on performance. Performance optimization is accomplished using metrics based on the above estimation, or alternatively, an explicit measurement of the interference effects. Methods are employed to estimate interference on the workload's performance with changes in availability of the shared resource or with combinations of other workloads sharing the same resource and allocating workloads to one or more physical computers or resources to workloads such that a desired performance objective is optimized. The methods can include allocating workloads on demand. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023487 | MEASURING ACTUAL END USER PERFORMANCE AND AVAILABILITY OF WEB APPLICATIONS - Techniques for monitoring web application performance are provided. A request for a web application is received at an application server. A response pipeline at the application server generates client application code corresponding to the requested web application. The client application code is intercepted in the response pipeline. Instrumentation code is inserted into the intercepted client application code to generate an instrumented client application code. The instrumentation code is configured to be executed when the instrumented client application code is rendered at the client to capture performance information at the client, and is configured to transmit the captured performance information from the client. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023456 | INTERACTIVE IMAGE MATTING - A user interface enables interactive image matting to be performed on an image The user interface may provide results including an alpha matte as feedback in real time. The user interface may provide interactive tools for selecting a portion of the image, and an unknown region for alpha matte processing may be automatically generated adjacent to the selected region. The user may interactively refine the alpha matte as desired to obtain a satisfactory result. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023442 | DYNAMIC USER INTERFACE FOR PREVIEWING LIVE CONTENT - A dynamic user interface for previewing live content includes multiple tiles. Information for multiple pieces of live content available from a gallery is obtained, and this information is presented in the multiple tiles of the user interface in accordance with a current user interface layout. In accordance with one aspect, this current user interface layout changes automatically over time as the user interface is displayed. In accordance with another aspect, one or more of the multiple tiles is displayed in the user interface more prominently than the other tiles, and which information is to be displayed in the one or more tiles is based at least in part on a received fee. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023423 | ORIENTATION FREE USER INTERFACE - A dynamically orientable graphical user interface (GUI) can include user input controls that are configured to receive user input. The GUI can be displayed as a band around a perimeter of a horizontally oriented interactive display surface. The user input can be received directly from the orientable GUI in the form of finger movement detected by the interactive display surface and the reorientation of the GUI can be controlled according to the laws of physics, based on the user input. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023251 | DYNAMIC COMPOSITION OF MEDIA - The subject disclosure relates to dynamic composition including the ability to create interoperable combinations of content by the publisher, e.g., determined to be an optimal combination, and offer such combinations to client devices in an interoperable way to allow simple selection by devices without complex programming, web pages, etc. specific to each device. Compositions are dynamic in that new audio, video, subtitle, etc. tracks can be added to a given composition without changing any of the other tracks, e.g., by updating the composition's extensible markup language (XML), and new compositions can be created or removed at any time without changing any audio or video files. Interoperable and scalable “discovery” is also enabled whereby random devices can contact a Web server, find and play a composition matched to the given devices and users, e.g., optimal composition for a given device and user. Using the content identification and description format of compositions, devices can search, sort, browse, display, etc. content that is available, determine if it is compatible at the device, decode, and determine digital rights management (DRM) level, and content level. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023162 | Executing Business Logic Extensions on a Client Computing System - A server platform exposes server-hosted application services to client applications. Calls to the server-hosted application services may be executed along with custom business logic extensions. A client platform is also provided that exposes client-hosted application services to a client application. The same business logic extensions that execute on the server platform can be utilized by the client platform. When a client application is online and connected to the server platform, the client application utilizes the server-hosted application services in the manner described above. When the client application is offline, the client application utilizes the client-hosted application services. The server platform synchronizes the business logic extensions to the client platform. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023101 | SMART DEFAULTS FOR DATA VISUALIZATIONS - Smart defaults are provided for data visualization by creating a default layout of rows, columns, filters, and comparable elements that improve a user's experience in finding relevant answers within the data. Usage history of the ways that users look at data in various data sources, user specific information, and inferred relationships between a current user and similar users are used to determine elements relevant to visualization of data for a particular user such that the visualization process may be automatically started, and a relevance model is formed/adjusted based on these factors. Queries may also be executed in a preemptive fashion based on the relevance model and results provided to a requesting user more rapidly enhancing user experience with networked data visualization. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023093 | EXTRACTION OF RICH SEARCH INFORMATION FROM INDEX SERVERS VIA AN ALTERNATIVE ASYNCHRONOUS DATA PATH - A search engine system is described herein that provides an alternative data path for collecting results provided by index servers. The alternative data path collects the results in a direct and asynchronous manner; this is in contrast to a synchronous path used to deliver search results to end users via one or more aggregator modules. An analysis system can use the alternative data path to collect a large amount of richly descriptive information regarding the performance of the search engine system, circumventing bottlenecks and other constraints that would otherwise be imposed by the synchronous data path. The analysis system can analyze the information collected from the index servers to improve the performance of the search engine system. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023081 | CUSTOMIZING SEARCH HOME PAGES USING INTEREST INDICATORS - Methods and systems for utilizing images of interest to a user, so far as they relate to recent, current or upcoming events, to generate custom search engine home pages are provided. Upon receiving a request from the user to view the search engine home page, it is determined whether any indicators of the user's interests are available. If one or more interest indicators is available, the indicator(s) are compared to interest indicators (or categories of indicators) associated with recent, current and/or upcoming events to determine if there is a common interest indicator/category there between. Upon determining that there is a common interest indicator/category between one or more events and the user, a custom image is selected for presentation in association with the search engine home page based upon the common interest indicator/category. The search engine home page with the custom-selected image is then presented to the user. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120023026 | MOBILE WALLET AND DIGITAL PAYMENT - The claimed subject matter provides a system and/or a method that facilitates securing a wireless digital transaction. A terminal component can receive a portion of data related to a payment for at least one of a good or a service. A mobile device can include at least one mobile payment card (m-card), wherein the m-card is created by establishing a link to an account associated with a form of currency. The mobile device can employ public-key cryptography (PKC) to securely and wirelessly transmit a payment to the terminal component utilizing the m-card and linked account. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120022962 | ECOMMERCE MARKETPLACE INTEGRATION TECHNIQUES - Various technologies and techniques are disclosed for integrating ecommerce marketplaces. An ecommerce integration framework has definitions for common data entities that are commonly used by multiple ecommerce marketplaces for listing items. Definitions for common operations that can manipulate the common data entities are provided. An application programming interface is provided that uses the common data entities and common operations to enable enterprise resource planning systems to exchange data in a standardized format with ecommerce marketplaces. Catalogs of items to be sold in ecommerce marketplaces can be created and managed using a customizable structure. The customizable structure enables catalogs to be created in a hierarchical manner with at least one parent catalog and zero or more child catalogs. Data values specified in a respective child catalog override data values specified in the parent catalog. A method for communicating with a particular ecommerce marketplace using an ecommerce integration framework is described. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120022948 | ADVERTISING FRAMEWORK FOR WIRELESS NETWORKS - Discovery of services between devices is provided prior to establishing a connection between devices, including wireless-enabled devices or devices that are communicatively coupled to wireless access points or other wireless communication devices. Discovering services prior to establishing a connection may facilitate finding a desired service. The services that may be discovered may be, for example, print services, camera services, PDA services or any other suitable services. Services may be discovered using 802.11, Bluetooth, UWB or any other suitable wireless technology. A graphical user interface is provided that enables a user to select a desired service. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120022850 | Statistical machine translation processing - A method of statistical machine translation (SMT) is provided. The method comprises generating reordering knowledge based on the syntax of a source language (SL) and a number of alignment matrices that map sample SL sentences with sample target language (TL) sentences. The method further comprises receiving a SL word string and parsing the SL word string into a parse tree that represents the syntactic properties of the SL word string. The nodes on the parse tree are reordered based on the generated reordering knowledge in order to provide reordered word strings. The method further comprises translating a number of reordered word strings to create a number of TL word strings, and identifying a statistically preferred TL word string as a preferred translation of the SL word string. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120021838 | Automatic Delivery of Digital Content to a Computing Device - Automatic downloading of digital content to a computing device is provided. Digital content that is available from a remote content server is checked to determine if any digital content matches criteria specified for downloading. If a match is found, and the user has not previously downloaded the digital content, or a previous version of the digital content, then the digital content is added to a download queue. The digital content specified in the download queue is transferred to the computing device. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120021815 | Motivational Deployment Mechanism For Networked Systems - The described implementations relate to networked or distributed systems and more particularly to providing motivation for deployment of networked systems. One technique gathers a solicitation hierarchy in a distributed system. This technique also tracks contribution to the distributed system of participants within the hierarchy. This technique further probabilistically determines a participant as a lottery winner based at least in part on the solicitation hierarchy and the contribution. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120020554 | VARIABLE KERNEL SIZE IMAGE MATTING - Image matting is performed on an image having a specified foreground region, a background region and an unknown region by selecting a kernel size based on a size of the unknown region. The matting processing is performed using the selected kernel size to provide an alpha matte that distinguishes a foreground portion from a background portion in the unknown region. Further, in some implementations, a trimap of the image may be segmented and matting processing may be performed on each segment using a kernel size appropriate for that segment. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120020409 | ESTIMATING SAMPLE-DOMAIN DISTORTION IN THE TRANSFORM DOMAIN WITH ROUNDING COMPENSATION - Techniques and tools are described for compensating for rounding when estimating sample-domain distortion in the transform domain. For example, a video encoder estimates pixel-domain distortion in the transform domain for a block of transform coefficients after compensating for rounding in the DC coefficient of the block. In this way, the video encoder improves the accuracy of pixel-domain distortion estimation but retains the computational advantages of performing the estimation in the transform domain. Rounding compensation includes, for example, looking up an index (from a de-quantized transform coefficient) in a rounding offset table to determine a rounding offset, then adjusting the coefficient by the offset. Other techniques and tools described herein are directed to creating rounding offset tables and encoders that make encoding decisions after considering rounding effects that occur after an inverse frequency transform on de-quantized transform coefficient values. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120019789 | REAR-PROJECTION DISPLAY - Various embodiments related to rear-projection image display are disclosed. For example, one disclosed embodiment provides a projector for projecting an image and a screen configured to display the image. The screen comprises a filter layer having a light reception side and an image display side. The filter layer includes an array of trapezoidal transmissive elements and an array of trapezoidal absorption elements, where a wider base of each of the trapezoidal transmissive elements faces the light reception side of the filter layer, and where a wider base of each of the trapezoidal absorption elements faces the image display side of the filer layer. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120019513 | 3D LAYERING OF MAP METADATA - Techniques and tools are described for rendering views of a map in which map metadata elements are layered in 3D space through which a viewer navigates. Layering of metadata elements such as text labels in 3D space facilitates parallax and smooth motion effects for zoom-in, zoom-out and scrolling operations during map navigation. A computing device can determine a viewer position that is associated with a view altitude in 3D space, then render for display a map view based upon the viewer position and metadata elements layered at different metadata altitudes in 3D space. For example, the computing device places text labels in 3D space above features associated with the respective labels, at the metadata altitudes indicated for the respective labels. The computing device creates a map view from points of the placed labels and points of a surface layer of the map that are visible from the viewer position. | 01-26-2012 |
| 20120017263 | Security Authorization Queries - In an example implementation, a bifurcated security scheme has a first level that does not allow usage of negations and a second level that does permit usage of negations. In another example implementation, an authorization query table maps respective resource-specific operations to respective associated authorization queries. In yet another example implementation, authorization queries are permitted to have negations, but individual assertions are not. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120017223 | Interface Protocol and API for a Wireless Transceiver - A wireless protocol may be implemented in a smart transceiver device that contains the physical (PHY) and media access control (MAC) layers of the wireless protocol stack. In various embodiments, a serial peripheral interface (SPI) based design may be used. Disclosed is an embodiment of a protocol which may be used to provide control and data transfer to and from the smart transceiver. In particular, an exemplary format of the protocol, the commands, and responses is disclosed. In a further embodiment, an application programming interface (API) is disclosed. The API may provide hardware independent services that can be used to establish, maintain, and transport data to and from the system and the smart transceiver device. In particular, an exemplary and non-limiting set of services, function calls, configuration methods, events, and parameters is disclosed. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120017213 | ULTRA-LOW COST SANDBOXING FOR APPLICATION APPLIANCES - The disclosed architecture facilitates the sandboxing of applications by taking core operating system components that normally run in the operating system kernel or otherwise outside the application process and on which a sandboxed application depends on to run, and converting these core operating components to run within the application process. The architecture takes the abstractions already provided by the host operating system and converts these abstractions for use by the sandbox environment. More specifically, new operating system APIs (application program interfaces) are created that include only the basic computation services, thus, separating the basic services from rich application APIs. The code providing the rich application APIs is copied out of the operating system and into the application environment—the application process. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120017172 | DISPLAY-AGNOSTIC USER INTERFACE FOR MOBILE DEVICES - Application user interfaces can be displayed on different sizes and types of displays without having to modify the application for each different display by scaling a layout of the user interface automatically for specific displays, especially smaller size displays such as mobile device displays, reducing a need to create customized versions of the application. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120017120 | MONITORING ACTIVITY WITH RESPECT TO A DISTRIBUTED APPLICATION - Techniques are described herein that are capable of monitoring activity with respect to a distributed application. A server system includes logical tiers, each including processing system(s) configured to process messages in accordance with a respective protocol (e.g., an ASP.net® protocol, WCF protocol, SQL protocol, etc.). When a user initiates an activity with respect to a distributed application, hops are performed between the logical tiers and/or between components of the distributed application to complete the requested activity. A hop is a transfer of a message or a procedure call from one processing system to another processing system. A common identifier may be assigned to each of the hops that are performed with regard to the activity. If a failure occurs with respect to the activity, the common identifier may be used to gather information regarding the hops. For instance, the information may be used to determine a source of the failure. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016903 | IDENTITY MANAGEMENT USER EXPERIENCE - Upon requesting to share one or more types of identity information, a user is automatically presented with an interface through which the user can interact in selecting an amount of identity items to share. A subset of the total identity items selected may then be shared with specified entities. Interfaces can also be used to assist the user in managing identity information that has been shared with others by providing the user with a visual list of entities for which the user has shared specified identity information and to whom updated information can be sent. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016869 | Collecting and Presenting Temporal-Based Action Information - Functionality is described for collecting and presenting action information. The action information describes actions that take place on items at specified times. Among other applications, the functionality assists a user in identifying and accessing relevant items. In one illustrative case, the functionality can display action information in a timeline presentation. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016866 | SCALED MANAGEMENT SYSTEM - An exemplary system for managing an applications and data space includes a strategy layer configured to receive a query statement and to formulate one or more custom queries based on the query statement and a query scheduler layer configured to schedule issuance of the one or more custom queries to one or more query response modules associated with the applications and data space. Other methods, devices and systems are also disclosed. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016864 | HIERARCHICAL MERGING FOR OPTIMIZED INDEX - Methods, systems, and media are provided for an optimized search engine index. The optimized index is formed by merging small lower level indexes of fresh documents together into a hierarchical cluster of multiple higher level indexes. The optimized index of fresh documents is formed via a single threaded process, while a fresh index serving platform concurrently serves fresh queries. The hierarchy of higher level indexes is formed by merging lower and/or higher level indexes with similar expiration times together. Therefore, as some indexes expire, the remaining un-expired indexes can be re-used and merged with new incoming indexes. The single threaded process provides fast serving of fresh documents, while also providing time to integrate the fresh indexes into a long term primary search engine index, prior to expiring. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016863 | ENRICHING METADATA OF CATEGORIZED DOCUMENTS FOR SEARCH - Methods for enriching metadata associated with a document that is categorized in a document category are described. Documents are pre-categorized within a document category. Uniform resource locaters (URL) that are related to a document category are identified and linked to the document category. Indications of tokens and relationships between the tokens and the URLs are received. The tokens are linked to the URLs. The tokens are propagated to the document categories and to the documents therein based on linking between the token, URL, and document category. As such the document category, and documents therein, are provided with metadata that is descriptive thereof. The documents and their associated metadata tokens are useable to generate a searchable index of the documents. The linking between the tokens, URLs, and categories is also useable to identify tokens that are too specific, too general, or documents that are miscategorized. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016743 | USING A DIRECTED GRAPH AS AN ADVERTISING SYSTEM TAXONOMY - Embodiments relate to generating and using a directed graph as an advertising network taxonomy. Individual delivery locations provided by publishers for presenting advertisements are identified. A directed graph is generated that includes specific advertising opportunities that each correspond with an individual delivery location. The directed graph also includes multiple general advertising opportunities that correspond with aggregations of delivery locations. Multiple aggregations may each include all or part of the same set of delivery locations. Advertisers may then use the directed graph to purchase advertising opportunities, and advertisements may be served to delivery locations based on the advertiser selections. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016673 | SPEAKER RECOGNITION VIA VOICE SAMPLE BASED ON MULTIPLE NEAREST NEIGHBOR CLASSIFIERS - A speaker recognition system generates a codebook store with codebooks representing voice samples of speaker, referred to as trainers. The speaker recognition system may use multiple classifiers and generate a codebook store for each classifier. Each classifier uses a different set of features of a voice sample as its features. A classifier inputs a voice sample of an person and tries to authenticate or identify the person. A classifier generates a sequence of feature vectors for the input voice sample and then a code vector for that sequence. The classifier uses its codebook store to recognize the person. The speaker recognition system then combines the scores of the classifiers to generate an overall score. If the score satisfies a recognition criterion, then the speaker recognition system indicates that the voice sample is from that speaker. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016586 | VISUAL ASSESSMENT OF LANDMARKS - Visual images may be used to detect, or verify the existence of, landmarks. In one example, the landmarks may be used to provide driving or walking directions. A set of records may be examined to identify the street addresses of businesses or other entities. Additionally, street-level images may be captured with a camera, and the locations at which the images were captured may be recorded. The images may be evaluated with an Optical Character Recognition (OCR) process to determine what words appear in the images. The words in the image are compared with the names of entities whose addresses are near where the image was captured. If the words match the entity name, then a sign identifying the entity is presumed to be visible along a particular route, and the entity may be used as a landmark in a set of walking or driving directions. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120016583 | MULTIPLE DIRECTIONS TO A DESTINATION WITHOUT PROVIDING A SPECIFIC ORIGIN - The automatic generation of multiple sets of directions for navigating geographically to a specific destination without specification of an origin. Based on the destination, candidate roads or other transportation conduits are selected for analysis. Candidate meta-departure points are analyzed and selected along the roads based on distribution about the destination, cardinal directions relative to the destination, road metadata, distance to the destination, driving time, and other factors. The number of departure points generated to represent routes to the destination from the several logical cardinal directions is minimized. The generated departure points also represent routes that a majority of people would likely take to the destination. Additionally, the generated departure points originate from places that users are likely to be familiar with and can get to without additional guidance. The final instruction sets for navigating to the destination are presented along with a map that identified the departure points. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120014540 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR AUDIO NORMALIZATION - A request is received to play an audio file. A determination is made regarding whether volume normalization parameters associated with the audio file are stored in a media library. If the volume normalization parameters associated with the audio file are stored in the media library, the volume normalization parameters are retrieved from the media library. If the volume normalization parameters associated with the audio file are not stored in the media library, retrieving the volume normalization parameters from the audio file. The volume normalization parameters are applied while playing the audio file. The volume normalization process can be applied across multiple audio files during playback. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120014363 | SIMULTANEOUS WIRELESS SUPPORT IN SOFTWARE DEFINED RADIO - A system and method for providing the ability to discover the capabilities of a user's computer to determine whether it is capable of supporting more than one wireless protocol simultaneously is provided. A computing device's capabilities (including, for example, hardware and/or software capabilities) is checked to determine if it supports at least two specific wireless protocols and checking a computing device's capabilities (including, for example, hardware and/or software capabilities) is checked to determine if it supports both wireless protocols simultaneously. The techniques for determining the computing device's compatibility may include comparing lists of protocol requirements to lists of system capabilities and/or generating test signals by the system according to the protocol. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120014313 | OPPORTUNISTIC USE OF WIRELESS NETWORK STATIONS AS REPEATERS - Implementation of opportunistic use of stations in a wireless network as repeaters is described. In one implementation, a station detects the existence of rate anomaly in a wireless network. In response to the rate anomaly, the station may transform into a software repeater for certain other neighboring stations. The repeater function allows for the relaying of packets sent by these neighboring stations to the access point and vice versa. The other neighboring stations, owing to their relative proximity to the repeater station, transmit data at a higher rate to the repeater station. Thus, the removal of the slower stations reduces clogging of the access point and increases the overall data rate within the wireless network. Further, a zero-overhead network coding protocol may be implemented in conjunction with the repeater function to increase capacity of the wireless network. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120013932 | PRINT PLUG-IN ISOLATION - In embodiments of print plug-in isolation, a print system input can be received at a print system, and the print system input can be redirected from the print system to an isolation module that isolates one or more print plug-ins from the print system. The print system input can be processed at the isolation module with the one or more print plug-ins to generate print plug-in output, and the print plug-in output can then be communicated back to the print system from the isolation module. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120013887 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR MULTI-PHASE DYNAMIC CALIBRATION OF THREE-DIMENSIONAL (3D) SENSORS IN A TIME-OF-FLIGHT SYSTEM - A phase-based TOF system preferably generates an optical waveform with fast rise and fall times, to enhance modulation contrast, notwithstanding there will be many high order harmonics. The system is preferably operated with an odd number of phases, to reduce system bias error due to the higher order harmonics, while maintaining good modulation contrast, without unduly increasing system memory requirements. Preferably the system can dynamically calibrate (and compensate for) higher order harmonics in the TOF generated optical energy waveform, over time and temperature. Within the optical energy transmission channel, or within the optical energy detection channel, detection amplifier gain may be modified, and/or detector signal integration time may be varied, and/or digital values may be employed to implement calibration and error reduction The resultant TOF system can operate with improved phase-vs-distance characteristics, with reduced calibration requirements. | 01-19-2012 |
| 20120011511 | METHODS FOR SUPPORTING USERS WITH TASK CONTINUITY AND COMPLETION ACROSS DEVICES AND TIME - Concepts and technologies are described herein for providing task continuity and supporting task completion across devices and time. A task management application is configured to monitor one or more interactions between a user and a device. The interactions can include the use of the device, the use of one or more applications, and/or other tasks, subtasks, or other operations. Predictive models constructed from data or logical models can be used to predict the attention resources available or allocated to a task or subtask as well as the attention and affordances available within a context for addressing the task and these inferences can be used to mark or route the task for later reminding and display. In some embodiments, the task management application is configured to remind or execute a follow-up action when a session is resumed. Embodiments include providing users with easy to use gestures and mechanisms for providing input about desired follow up on the same or other devices. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011493 | BINARY CODE CHANGE VULNERABILITY PRIORITIZATION - A human-readable list of patch differences ranked by weight helps vulnerability analysts allocate their time. From binary code, identified source functions and recognized sink functions are used when assigning relative weights to changes caused by a patch. Source functions are identified using an export table, import table, and remote procedure call interface. Sink functions are recognized using blacklisted functions, patch-targeted functions, memory functions, string functions, and functions called with mismatched parameters. A change prioritizer assigns weights based on an architectural graph and a set of prioritization rules that specify what kind of change is made by a patch, and what kind of function is changed. Weight assignments may be additive. Rules may assign certain kinds of change a higher priority for subsequent scrutiny by an analyst. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011259 | User Authentication Across Multiple Network Stacks - A computing device provides an application that uses multiple protocol stacks to communicate with a server. The server requires messages from each of the protocol stacks to include a credential for a user of the computing device. The credential is a set of information that includes identification and proof of identities that is used to gain access to a resource. However, the user is not prompted for the credential more than once. In some embodiments, this is accomplished by storing the credential at the computing device for retrieval by the protocol stacks when the application uses the protocol stacks to communicate with the server. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011242 | GENERATING ALERTS BASED ON MANAGED AND UNMANAGED DATA - Concepts and technologies are described herein for generating informational alerts. Notifications are received from both unmanaged devices and managed services. The received notifications may be annotated to create annotated notations. The notifications may be annotated with privacy data that defines the terms under which the notifications may be provided to others. The notifications may also be annotated with compensation data that defines the financial terms under which the notifications may be provided to others. Standing and ad-hoc queries may be performed against the annotated notifications. The results of the queries may be provided to one or more user devices as an informational alert. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011212 | Cluster-Based Friend Suggestion Aggregator - Techniques are described to generate a list of suggested friends for a client of a social networking service. In an implementation, a cluster of clients is identified from among the clients of the social networking service. The cluster of clients includes the client for which the list of suggested friends is to be generated. The list of suggested friends for the client may then be generated and may include one or more clients of the social networking service selected based on connections with the cluster of clients. The list indicates at least one other client of the social networking service that is suggested as a friend. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011209 | INTERNET E-MAIL BRIDGE - An Internet mail bridge is provided for downloading e-mail messages from Internet mail servers supporting different email protocols, such as the Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3) and Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning (Web DAV) protocol, and delivering the downloaded messages, which are in different formats, to a mail server on a local area network. The Internet mail bridge has a mail manager that is independent from particular e-mail protocols or e-mail formats. For each e-mail account, the mail manager instantiates a mail connector object that contains logic for downloading e-mail according to the e-mail access protocol of that account, and invokes the mail connector object to download e-mail messages from that account. The mail manager then instantiates and invokes mail deliverer objects tailored for handling different message formats to deliver the downloaded messages to the local mail server. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011199 | PROVIDING WEB-BASED IMAGING SERVICES WITHIN A CLIENT-BASED APPLICATION - Embodiments are directed to a computer-implemented system and method for providing web-based features in a client-based digital imaging application. A location on a client is provided for storing a number of possible, future web-based features. The location has the capacity to accept a number of name-value pairs that define a web-based imaging feature. When a web-based feature is to be added, the name-value pairs that define the web-based imaging feature are added to the location. After a feature has been added, it is displayed for selection by a user. Upon selection of the web-based imaging feature, image data about a selected one or more images is recorded in a known location. The web-based service that is providing the web-based imaging feature is granted access to the image data in the known location. The image data in the known location is then deleted when the web-based imaging feature is closed. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011195 | URL-FACILITATED ACCESS TO SPREADSHEET ELEMENTS - Embodiments are directed to providing URL-facilitated access to spreadsheet component elements. In embodiments, a client may discover and then access elements of an existing workbook directly through a URL. In embodiments, a client may also provide, through a URL, value(s) for parameter(s) defined by the existing workbook. If value(s) are provided by the client, the workbook may be recalculated using the value(s) before a requested element of the workbook is returned to the client. In embodiments, the workbook is recalculated using a transient copy of the workbook, which is then discarded and the original workbook remains unchanged. Data changed in the workbook is automatically reflected in returned elements of the workbook when a request for such element is refreshed. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011179 | FAT DIRECTORY STRUCTURE FOR USE IN TRANSACTION SAFE FILE SYSTEM - Directories in a file system are defined with a dummy cluster in a file allocation table as the initial entry. Subsequent clusters in a directory's definition may define any data for the directory that can be changed in a transaction-safe mode. A directory may be modified in a transaction-safe mode by modifying any of the subsequent clusters while tracking changes in a second file allocation table. When the changes have been made to the directory, a pointer to the second file allocation table may be switched to indicate that the second file allocation table is now last known good. The first file allocation table may then be synchronized with the second. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011177 | TRANSACTION-SAFE FAT FILE SYSTEM IMPROVEMENTS - Concepts for enhancing operation of transaction-safe file allocation table systems are described. The concepts include writing a file to non-volatile memory media and rendering an update of file size to the TFAT storage medium; and receiving a request to locate data in a non-volatile memory having a TFAT file management system, selecting a sector of the memory to parse to locate the data, determining when the selected sector is a first sector of a directory or subdirectory of the memory and when determining reveals that the selected sector is a first sector, skipping reading data from the selected sector. The concepts also include flushing a cache and synchronizing FATs. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011152 | Generating Programs Based on Input-Output Examples Using Converter Modules - A program generation system is described that generates a program based on a plurality of input-output examples. The input-output examples include input items and corresponding output items. The program generation system can include three component modules. A parsing module processes the input items and output items to provide a plurality of input parts and output parts, respectively. A transformation module determines, for each output part, whether the output part can be produced from a corresponding input part using one or more converter modules selected from a collection of candidate converter modules. A formatting module generates formatting instructions that transform selected output parts into a form specified by the output items. These three modules provide a generated program that embodies logic learned from the input-output examples; the generated program can be subsequently used to transform new input items into new respective output items. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011106 | SHARED LOG-STRUCTURED MULTI-VERSION TRANSACTIONAL DATASTORE WITH METADATA TO ENABLE MELDING TREES - Architecture that includes an ordered and shared log of indexed transaction records represented as multi-version data structures of nodes and node pointers. The log is a sole monolithic source of datastore state and is used for enforcing concurrency control. The architecture also includes a transaction processing component that appends transaction records to the log from concurrent transactions executing on different processors. Each node of a record is assigned a log address. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011084 | SEMANTIC ENTITY MANIPULATION USING INPUT-OUTPUT EXAMPLES - Semantic entity manipulation technique embodiments are presented that generate a probabilistic program capable of manipulating character strings representing semantic entities based on input-output examples. The program can then be used to produce a desired output consistent with the input-output examples from inputs of a type included in the examples. The probabilistic program is generated based on the output of parsing, transform and formatting modules. The parsing module employs a probabilistic approach to parsing the input-output examples. The transform module identifies a weighted set of transforms that are capable of producing the output item from the input items of an input-output example to a likelihood specified by their assigned weight. The formatting module generates formatting instructions that transform selected output parts into a form specified by the output items in the input-output examples. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120011014 | MEDIA PURCHASE TECHNIQUES - Media purchase techniques are described. In an implementation, an indication is received that an item of media was successfully purchased through a single transaction that includes rights for access to the item of media in different forms that are optimized, respectively, for different classes of computing devices. Responsive to the receipt of the indication, the item of media is permitted to be streamed to at least one of the computing devices to enable output of the item of media for playback as the item of media is streamed and storage of the item of media to local storage of the computing device. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120010996 | RECOMMENDATIONS AND TARGETED ADVERTISING BASED UPON DIRECTIONS REQUESTS ACTIVITY AND DATA - Concepts and technologies are described herein for providing recommendations and/or advertisements based upon route query activity. A web server is configured to receive queries from an entity. The queries and contextual data associated therewith can be analyzed, and data relating to the queries can be stored by the web server as route activity logs. Adjacent routes and explicit waypoint routing can be abstracted via address directories and ontologies to higher-level goals and the route activities and goals. Such data can serve as case libraries for the construction via machine learning of models that predict interests and preferences with visits to locations and the sequencing of such visits. Training data can include correlated contextual data such as the time and day, prior route queries, and weather, to learn predictive models. Predictions about context- and destination-centric goals and interests can be harnessed to predict preferences, target advertising about waypoints and alternative destinations of potential interest, or advertisements about location-centric or location-independent products or services, all of which can drive recommendations in the present or at a future time. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120009999 | UBIQUITOUS UNIFIED PLAYER IDENTITY TRACKING SYSTEM - Systems and method for providing a single sign in a gaming console that associates online activity that is out-of-game/cross game, and/or online activity that is in-game, and/or activity that is offline and in-game with that account. While online, a service tracks activity of gamers and provides usage statistics in a profile. While offline, the game console tracks the player's activity via a mechanism to collect detailed information about a specific player's in-game statistics and accomplishments. The offline activity is cached and uploaded when the console connects to the online service. Players can accumulate achievements offline that are credited towards online activities. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120009896 | ABOVE-LOCK CAMERA ACCESS - Apparatus and methods are disclosed for allowing smart phone users to “capture the moment” by allowing easy access to a camera application when a mobile device is in an above-lock (or locked) mode, while also preventing unauthorized access to other smart phone functionality. According to one embodiment of the disclosed technology, a method of operating a mobile device having an above-lock state and a below-lock state comprises receiving input data requesting invocation of an camera application when the mobile device is in the above-lock state and invoking the requested camera application on the device, where one or more functions of the requested application are unavailable as a result of the mobile device being in the above-lock state. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120008535 | SOFT HANDOFFS IN NETWORKS - Various embodiments enable a device to maintain a plurality of connections to a plurality of wireless networks simultaneously using one radio. For instance, a device can partition in time, or “time-slice”, when it transmits and receives data such that a device can maintain a plurality of connections with a plurality of networks concurrently. With the plurality of connections, the device can receive multiple copies of data. In some embodiments, a device can compare multiple copies of data and determine which copy of data is a best representation. Once a best representation has been determined, it can be selected for further usage. | 01-12-2012 |
| 20120005722 | Application Context Based Access Control - Access control for an application is described. An exemplary method includes receiving a first command of an application to invoke a function of a user interface, identifying a first authorization context based on a first user context and the function of the user interface invoked, retrieving a first access policy providing access criteria associated with the first authorization context, and applying the first access policy to the accessibility of the function. The method includes receiving a second command to invoke the function in a second instance of the application and identifying a second authorization context based on a second user context and the function of the user interface invoked. The second authorization context is different than the first authorization context. The method includes retrieving a second access policy providing second access criteria associated with the second authorization context and applying the second access policy to the accessibility of the function. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005662 | INDEXABLE TYPE TRANSFORMATIONS - A high level programming language provides an extensible set of transformations for use on indexable types in a data parallel processing environment. A compiler for the language implements each transformation as a map from indexable types to allow each transformation to be applied to other transformations. At compile time, the compiler identifies sequences of the transformations on each indexable type in data parallel source code and generates data parallel executable code to implement the sequences as a combined operation at runtime using the transformation maps. The compiler also incorporates optimizations that are based on the sequences of transformations into the data parallel executable code. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005608 | SMART COPY/PASTE OF GRAPHICAL NODES - When using graphical diagrams, cutting and pasting operations may take advantage of predefined relationships to intelligently insert and remove items from the diagram. A text data model may be interpreted sequentially or hierarchically to construct various diagrams. Pasting operations will bring new data into the diagram and data model while conforming the new data to the diagram definition. Cutting operations may cause the data model and diagram to be healed to conform to the diagram definition. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005565 | Small Form Factor Web Browsing - A large web page is analyzed and partitioned into smaller sub-pages so that a user can navigate the web page on a small form factor device. The user can browse the sub-pages to find and read information in the content of the large web page. The partitioning can be performed at a web server, an edge server, at the small form factor device, or can be distributed across one or more such devices. The analysis leverages design habits of a web page author to extract a representation structure of an authored web page. The extracted representation structure includes high level structure using several markup language tag selection rules and low level structure using visual boundary detection in which visual units of the low level structure are provided by clustering markup language tags. User viewing habits can be learned to display favorite parts of a web page. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005490 | PREDICTIVE COMPUTING DEVICE POWER MANAGEMENT - The described implementations relate to predictive computing device energy management. One implementation measures resource usage of a computing device that employs a power policy. This implementation also estimates resource usage of the computing device having at least one different power policy without actually running the at least one different power policy on the computing device. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005422 | Non-Volatile Memory Cache Performance Improvement - In order to provide a more efficient persistent storage device, one or more long-term storage media are included along with a non-volatile memory. In one embodiment, one portion of the non-volatile memory is used as a write buffer and a read cache for writes and reads to the long-term storage media. Interfaces are provided for controlling the use of the non-volatile memory as a write buffer and a read cache. Additionally, a portion of the non-volatile memory is used to provide a direct mapping for specified sectors of the long-term storage media. Descriptive data regarding the persistent storage device is stored in another portion of the non-volatile memory. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005282 | COLLABORATIVE RANKING AND FILTERING OF ELECTRONIC MAIL MESSAGES - Electronic mail messages may be collaboratively ranked and filtered. User actions on an electronic mail message received from a sender by one or more recipients may be monitored. Statistics may be generated based on the user actions. The generated statistics may be utilized to provide a quality ranking of the electronic mail message based on the generated statistics. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005261 | MANAGING RECURRING APPOINTMENTS - Concepts and technologies are described herein for managing recurring appointments without losing historical data associated with the recurring appointments. In accordance with the concepts and technologies disclosed herein, a recurring appointment definition can be modified without deleting the recurring appointment definition and/or losing exceptions, notes, and/or other data associated with the recurring appointment definition. Additionally, the concepts and technologies disclosed herein allow the modification of an existing recurring appointment definition without creating a new recurring appointment definition. Thus, synchronization between rules-based calendaring applications and expansion-based calendaring applications can be accomplished without creating multiple instances of related recurring appointments created due to modifications of the recurring appointment definition. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005254 | USING DISTRIBUTED QUEUES IN AN OVERLAY NETWORK - The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for using distributed queues in an overlay network. Embodiments of the invention can be used to replicate queue state (e.g., inserted and/or deleted messages) within an overlay network and can be used to continue a process at a different node within the overlay network based on replicated queue state. Accordingly, embodiments of the invention can be used to increase the availability of queue state, compensate for node failures within an overlay network, and promote replication of consistent queue state between nodes within an overlay network. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005221 | EXTRACTING FACTS FROM SOCIAL NETWORK MESSAGES - Within a social network, users may submit various types of messages, such as personal messages to other users and status messages to be shared with all associated users. While these messages often relate to highly personal information such as opinions and personal emotions, such messages may also comprise one or more facts about a particular topic, such as a report of a weather condition in a particular location at a particular time. These facts may be identified in various messages, and may be stored in a fact store, such that when a user submits a query specifying a topic may receive from the fact store one or more facts that are responsive to the topic of the query. Additionally, user interfaces may be devised and provided to users submitting such messages, e.g., in order to reduce ambiguity and improve the reliable extraction of facts from messages. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005220 | DYNAMIC ASSET MONITORING AND MANAGEMENT USING A CONTINUOUS EVENT PROCESSING PLATFORM - The disclosed architecture leverages realtime continuous event processing (CEP) to address using a general input interface framework to import a dynamic set of event types (e.g., assets), and using a declarative, expressive query model to implement monitoring and management tasks on an asset level. This is in contrast to looking separately at single values from static databases and/or realtime streams as is common conventionally. The architecture uses the CEP data model to model assets as realtime event types. Thus, queries can be formulated per asset and not just per single stream. The architecture uses the query capabilities of CEP to formulate asset management and monitoring tasks as standing, declarative queries, and uses the input interface of a CEP platform to correlate data from different data sources with different dynamic properties. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005219 | USING COMPUTATIONAL ENGINES TO IMPROVE SEARCH RELEVANCE - An “Iterative Query Reformulator” provides various techniques for using a computational engine to reformulate initial queries through one or more iterations. This query reformulation process ensures that results returned from search engines or recommendation systems using a reformulated query have improved relevance relative to results that would have been returned using only the initial query. More specifically, the Iterative Query Reformulator provides an end to end solution that uses computations from one or more knowledge databases or knowledge sources to find “partial answers” to subqueries derived or extracted from an initial query. These partial answers are then used to reformulate the initial query, with the reformulated query being used by the search engines or recommendations systems to provide results that are highly relevant to the initial query. Determinations of whether to continue reformulation iterations are based on evaluating user metrics from historical search logs having queries that match reformulated queries. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005168 | Logical Recovery with Unbundled Transaction Services - This patent application relates to enhanced logical recovery techniques for redo recovery operations of a system with an unbundled storage engine. These techniques can be implemented by utilizing an enhanced logical recovery approach in which a dirty page table (DPT) is constructed based on information logged during normal execution. The unbundled storage engine can include a transaction component (TC) that is architecturally independent of a data component (DC). These techniques can enhance redo recovery operations by mitigating the resources needed to determine whether previously executed operations sent from the TC to the DC are to be repeated in response to a recovery-initiating event. This can include using the DPT to avoid fetching every data page corresponding to every previously executed operation received by the DC during recovery and/or pre-fetching data pages and/or index pages that correspond to PIDs in the DPT | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005148 | INTEGRATING SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE SOURCES INTO A GENERAL SEARCH SERVICE - Embodiments are described for a system for integrating expert sources of knowledge into a general search service. The method can include a general search engine interface to receive a search query with at least one search term from a user. An expert knowledge engine can enable retrieval of expert information and analyses. A predictive model module can be used to determine a probability that an expert knowledge engine may provide a valuable response to the query. The search query can be routed to the expert knowledge engine based on a cost-benefit analysis. A query reformulation module can reformulate a query for use by the expert knowledge engine. A display module can be employed to combine the expert search results with other search results. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005132 | PREDICTING ESCALATION EVENTS DURING INFORMATION SEARCHING AND BROWSING - One or more techniques and/or systems are disclosed for predicting escalations in users' goals or concerns in web-based searching and browsing. One or more escalation features are extracted from a webpage. The one or more escalation features are run through a classifier trained to estimate a likelihood of escalation. An escalation likelihood result is generated from running the trained classifier using the extracted features. The escalation likelihood result can comprise an estimation that a subsequent search query will comprise an escalation when compared to a previous search query. The escalation likelihood result can also comprise an estimation that a subsequent webpage selection will comprise an escalation when compared to a previous webpage selection. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120005131 | Combining Human and Machine Intelligence to Solve Tasks With Crowd Sourcing - Methods are described for ideally joining human and machine computing resources to solve tasks, based on the construction of predictive models from case libraries of data about the abilities of people and machines and their collaboration. Predictive models include methods for folding together human contributions, such as voting, with machine computation, such as automated visual analyses, as well as the routing of tasks to people based on prior performance and interests. An optimal distribution of tasks to selected participants of the plurality of participants is determined according to a model that considers the demonstrated competencies of people based on a value of information analysis that considers the value of human computation and the ideal people for providing a contribution. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120004925 | HEALTH CARE POLICY DEVELOPMENT AND EXECUTION - Technology is described for developing health care policies for use in a health care facility. In one example method, a health care policy can be applied in a health care software application and stored in a health care database. A correlated feature set can be correlated to the health care policy being developed. A selection of health care cases can be obtained from the health care database for testing the health care policy. A model can predict a defined effect of the health care policy based on the correlated feature set. A cost of implementing the health care policy on a defined percentage of patients can be predicted using the defined effect by the model and a specified predictor by applying statistical analysis. The system can guide the allocation of resources in a patient-specific manner. The policies can also be applied in conjunction with user models to guide alerting. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120004802 | MEDIATION OF TASKS BASED ON ASSESSMENTS OF COMPETING COGNITIVE LOADS AND NEEDS - Among other things, one or more techniques and/or systems are disclosed for mediating tasks in real-time for safety-related concerns. A nature for a safety-related primary task, such as contextual elements of the task, is determined; and a nature of a secondary task that draws attention away from the primary task is also determined. A risk factor for a potential lack of cognitive resources which may be needed by the primary task is determined by applying the nature of the primary task and the nature of the secondary task to a trained risk factor model. The risk factor is applied to one or more safety-related systems in real-time, for example, to mitigate potential safety concerns. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20120001861 | Unintentional Touch Rejection - A method for rejecting an unintentional palm touch is disclosed. In at least some embodiments, a touch is detected by a touch-sensitive surface associated with a display. Characteristics of the touch may be used to generate a set of parameters related to the touch. In an embodiment, firmware is used to determine a reliability value for the touch. The reliability value and the location of the touch is provided to a software module. The software module uses the reliability value and an activity context to determine a confidence level of the touch. In an embodiment, the confidence level may include an evaluation of changes in the reliability value over time. If the confidence level for the touch is too low, it may be rejected. | 01-05-2012 |
| 20110321152 | TRUSTED INTERMEDIARY FOR NETWORK LAYER CLAIMS-ENABLED ACCESS CONTROL - Embodiments of the invention provide a trusted intermediary for use in a system in which access control decisions may be based at least in part on information provided in claims. The intermediary may request claims on behalf of a network resource to which access is requested, and submit the claims for a decision whether to grant or deny access. The decision may be based at least in part on one or more access control policies, which may be pre-set or dynamically generated. Because the intermediary requests the claims and submits the claims for an access control decision, the network resource (e.g., a server application) need not be configured to process claims information. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321130 | NETWORK LAYER CLAIMS BASED ACCESS CONTROL - Embodiments of the invention provide techniques for basing access control decisions at the network layer at least in part on information provided in claims, which may describe attributes of a computer requesting access, one or more resources to which access is requested, the user, the circumstances surrounding the requested access, and/or other information. The information may be evaluated based on one or more access control policies, which may be pre-set or dynamically generated, and used in making a decision whether to grant or deny the computer access to the specified resource(s). | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321129 | DISAMBIGUATING ONLINE IDENTITIES - Described herein are technologies pertaining to disambiguating identities/accounts over a plurality of online services. Public data streams pertaining to accounts of different online services are analyzed, and a determination is made that the accounts are owned by a same user. A searchable profile is generated for the user that comprises data that indicates that the user represented by the profile owns the accounts. The profile is claimable by the user such that the user is enabled to customize contents of the profile. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321128 | PUBLIC ACCESS POINT - The invention instantiates a Personal VLAN bridge, using IEEE Std. 802.11 elements. The result is a bridge, referred to as a public access point, that is better suited for implementing public wireless data networks than the IEEE Std. 802.11 architecture. The invention also provides a location-update protocol for updating the forwarding tables of bridges that connect public access points together. The invention further provides a method for more controlled bridging, which is referred to as fine bridging. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321063 | APPLICATION SETTINGS MIGRATION USING VIRTUALIZATION - Application setting virtualization for a user. Application settings from a source computer are copied to a user-specific location on a destination computer and layered under corresponding application settings associated with one or more applications installed on the destination computer. In response to receiving a request from an application for an application setting, the requested application setting is retrieved from the layered application settings such that the layers are searched in order for the requested application setting and the first application setting found is retrieved and returned to the requesting application. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321059 | STACK OVERFLOW PREVENTION IN PARALLEL EXECUTION RUNTIME - A parallel execution runtime prevents stack overflow by maintaining an inline counter for each thread executing tasks of a process. Each time that the runtime determines that inline execution of a task is desired on a thread, the runtime determines whether the inline counter for the corresponding thread indicates that stack overflow may occur. If not, the runtime increments the inline counter for the thread and allows the task to be executed inline. If the inline counter indicates a risk of stack overflow, then the runtime performs additional one or more checks using a previous stack pointer of the stack (i.e., a lowest known safe watermark), the current stack pointer, and memory boundaries of the stack. If the risk of stack overflow remains after all checks have been performed, the runtime prevents inline execution of the task. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321037 | DATA ONLY SOLUTION PACKAGE - Technologies are described herein for deploying a data only solution package separate from custom code. In this way, lifecycles of the data only solution package and the custom code can be separately controlled. In an illustrative implementation, the data only solution package is received at a computer. A data specification is installed at the computer through the data only solution package. The data specification may specify a location of an external system storing external data. A data subscription may also be installed at the computer through the data only solution package. The data subscription may include queries for retrieving the external data from the external system and frequency information specifying a frequency at which to retrieve the external data. The external data is retrieved from the external system utilizing the location information, the queries, and the frequency information. A data cache at the computer is populated with the external data. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321031 | UPDATING NODES CONSIDERING SERVICE MODEL CONSTRAINTS - Methods, systems, and computer-readable media for deploying an update to nodes propagated throughout a data center are provided. Launching new upgrade to hosting environment residing on the nodes typically invokes a mechanism (e.g., fabric controller) to form a group of nodes that are independent of one another with respect to upgrade domains, which are assigned to tenants (e.g., program components of service applications running within the data center) presently hosted by the nodes. The constraints of the update domains are articulated by service level agreements established for the service applications, respectively. Forming the group involves identifying independent nodes for membership, where no two members of the group host analogous tenants (belonging to a common service application) that are assigned to distinct update domains. However, it is acceptable to join to the group those nodes hosting analogous tenants that are each assigned to the same update domain. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321029 | UPGRADE MANAGEMENT OF APPLICATION COMPONENTS - Architecture that enables separation of a user interface (UI) upgrade from the content and application logic upgrade. Administrators can upgrade to take advantage of new infrastructure features, and independently schedule the UI upgrade, for example, to accommodate customization work or to ensure user training. Furthermore, administrators can now allow users to choose when to switch to the new UI. More specifically, the architecture facilitates the separation of a UI upgrade from content and application logic upgrade, the ability to control the UI upgrade at multiple levels of precision, the ability for application logic and UI components to change behaviors based on the UI version of the context, and the ability to “preview” the updated UI before permanently switching to it. Additionally, UI components can be filtered to only appear in the appropriate UI version, and the site's UI version can be compared to versions that a component is compatible with. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321028 | APPLICATIONS INCLUDING MULTIPLE EXPERIENCE MODULES - An application on a device includes multiple experience modules that each implement a set of features when the application is running on the device. Each of the multiple experience modules includes a first component that includes code specific to a particular type of the device, and a second component that includes code that is common across multiple types of devices. Update packages changing individual ones of the multiple experience modules can be received from a deployment service and installed on the device. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321027 | REBOOTLESS DISPLAY DRIVER UPGRADES - Systems and methods for rebootless updating of a IHV display driver are disclosed. According to such a method, first, the operating system stops the driver from running Second, the system switches over to an interim or temporary display driver, which be a default driver provided with the operating system. Third, the new hardware-specific driver is started. Thus, a hardware-specific display driver may be updated without rebooting. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110321001 | VISUALIZATION OF RUNTIME ANALYSIS ACROSS DYNAMIC BOUNDARIES - The formulation of an architectural diagram of a software program having multiple components. A static model identifying at least some of the components and a relationship between the components is accessed by perhaps performing a static code analysis of the code of the software program. A dynamic analysis is also performed by executing the software program, and observing the execution to derive dynamic behaviors of the software program. These dynamic behaviors may perhaps be information that is not readily available based on a static code analysis of the computer program alone, such as parameter values exchanged, paths of execution, and additional components invoked. The architectural diagram is then formulated using the static model and the dynamic behaviors to generate a more complete representation of the computer program. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320981 | STATUS-ORIENTED MOBILE DEVICE - One or more techniques and/or systems are disclosed for providing a status-oriented mobile device. A user interface (UI) is provided that concurrently presents a plurality of user-related status-oriented sections in a display of the mobile device. The respective status-oriented sections are provided to be organized in a cylindrical representation as a cylinder, where the UI presents elements of the sections in the display as views of the cylinder. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320956 | INTERACTION BETWEEN ADS AND APPLICATIONS - Various technologies, methods, systems, processes, and compositions of matter pertaining to advertisements, and advertisement interactions with users and applications may be described. A single advertisement may be selected for a user based on a single lookup of the user profile at an advertisement server. The advertisement server may send a single adget to the user. This single adget is then seamlessly used on multiple devices. Each device may automatically select a different View of the advertisement. Each device may automatically render a different Actions as supported by a device. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320924 | HANDWRITTEN PAPER-BASED INPUT DIGITAL RECORD MANAGEMENT - A handwritten paper-based input digital record management system and method to facilitate record management by directly accepting handwritten pen-based data input on ordinary paper forms. A user places a paper form on the digitizing surface of a digital computing device and then fill outs the form using handwritten input. A digital version of the handwritten form is simultaneously generated and presented on the screen of the computing device. Embodiments of the system and method also provide instantaneous form updating for any current data and reports any upcoming information that may be needed in the future. This mitigates the need for remote processing of the form. Moreover, embodiments of the system and method enforce completeness of the form and ensure that all necessary sections of the form are completed. Embodiments of the system and method also provide error correction by reconciling any invalidated data found during verification. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320889 | Server Reachability Detection - An application attempts to use a first protocol stack to send a first message to a server. After attempting to send the first message to the server, the application attempts to use a second protocol stack to send a second message to the server. After attempting to send the second message to the server, the application performs a timeout activity before a timeout period for the second message expires when the first message timed out. Alternatively, when the timeout period for the second message expires and the first message did not time out, the application performs the timeout activity. When the client device received a response to the second message from the server before the timeout period for the second message expires, the application performs a different activity. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320823 | TRUSTED SENSORS - Architecture that provides trusted sensors and trusted sensor readings on computing devices such as mobile devices. The architecture utilizes a trustworthy computing technology (e.g., trusted platform module (TPM). In the context of TPM, one implementation requires no additional hardware beyond the TPM and a virtualized environment to provide trusted sensor readings. A second implementation incorporates trusted computing primitives directly into sensors and enhances security using signed sensor readings. Privacy issues arising from the deployment of trusted sensors are also addressed by utilizing protocols. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320822 | KEYED HUMAN INTERACTIVE PROOF PLAYERS - A human interactive puzzle (HIP) authorization architecture where keyed and animated puzzles are executed by HIP players which are distinct and obfuscated to the point where breaking a single player is a relatively costly operation. A key is created in response to a request for a service, a HIP player is created based on the key, and a small installation executable is created that expands during installation to produce a computationally expensive data structure on the client relative to verification of the solution at the server. Thus, copying of the player or relay of the puzzle to a third system requires more time than allowed to receive the solution at the server. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320821 | FEDERATION AMONG SERVICES FOR SUPPORTING VIRTUAL-NETWORK OVERLAYS - Computerized methods, systems, and computer-readable media for promoting cooperation between a first and second virtual network overlay (“overlay”) are provided. The first overlay is governed by a first authority domain and includes members assigned virtual IP addresses from a first address range. The second overlay is governed by a second authority domain, which is associated with a second federation mechanism, for negotiating on behalf of the second overlay. The second federation mechanism is capable of negotiating with, or soliciting delegation of authority from, a first federation mechanism that is associated with the first authority domain. When negotiations are successful or authority is delegated, the second federation mechanism establishes a communication link between the second overlay and the first overlay or joins a member of the second overlay to the first overlay. Joining involves allocating a guest IP address from the first address range to the member. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320767 | Parallelization of Online Learning Algorithms - Methods, systems, and media are provided for a dynamic batch strategy utilized in parallelization of online learning algorithms. The dynamic batch strategy provides a merge function on the basis of a threshold level difference between the original model state and an updated model state, rather than according to a constant or pre-determined batch size. The merging includes reading a batch of incoming streaming data, retrieving any missing model beliefs from partner processors, and training on the batch of incoming streaming data. The steps of reading, retrieving, and training are repeated until the measured difference in states exceeds a set threshold level. The measured differences which exceed the threshold level are merged for each of the plurality of processors according to attributes. The merged differences which exceed the threshold level are combined with the original partial model states to obtain an updated global model state. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320745 | DATA-SCOPED DYNAMIC DATA RACE DETECTION - A dynamic shared-memory data race detection tool with data-scoping capabilities to reduce runtime overheads is disclosed. The tool allows users to restrict analysis of memory locations to heap and/or stack variables that are of interest to them using explicit calls to functions provided in a library that is part of the race detection tool. The application code is instrumented to insert probes at all memory instructions and linked with the data race detection library to perform data-scoped race detection. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320715 | IDENTIFYING TRENDING CONTENT ITEMS USING CONTENT ITEM HISTOGRAMS - Within a content item set, particular content items may be identified as trending, based on changes in a frequency of references to the content items. For example, users of a social network may reference web resources by posting the uniform resource locators (URLs) thereof in messages, and trending web resources may be identified by detecting changes in the frequencies of such references. These trends may be tracked by counting such references in content item histograms, and by computing trend scores at the time of detecting each reference to a content item. Trending content items may then be identified at a second time by comparing the trend scores after decaying the trend scores of respective content items, based on the period between the second time and the last reference time of the last detected reference to the content item. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320603 | APPLICATION INTEGRATION OF NETWORK DATA BASED ON RESOURCE IDENTIFIERS - A resource identifier parser can derive information from resource identifiers that are provided to non-browser application programs or the operating system, such as through the desktop area of a windows-based user interface. The resource identifier parser can understand the formatting of resource identifiers of specific domains and can derive therefrom information such as coordinates of a map page, the title of classified listings, and other like information. If the resource identifier cannot be parsed, the identified data page can be referenced to identify services offered by the page, such as data feed services, which can then be presented to the non-browser application program or the operating system to which the resource identifier was provided. As yet another alternative, the domain can provide a customized resource identifier parser to parse its resource identifiers. Such a customized parser can be either downloadable and locally executable or it can be a network service. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320586 | Flexible and Safe Monitoring of Computers - Described is a server monitoring technology that is scalable to large numbers of servers, e.g., in a datacenter. Agents on servers run queries to monitor data sources for that server, such as performance counters and other events. The agents monitor their resource usage and those of monitored events to stay within an administrator-specified resource budget (policy), e.g., by modifying the running queries and/or monitoring parameters. A controller receives results of the monitoring, analyzes the results, and takes action as needed with respect to server operation and monitoring. The controller may dynamically update an agent's queries, monitoring parameters and/or monitored data post-processing operations. The controller may issue alerts and reports, including alerts indicative of inter-server problems between two or more servers. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320564 | HEALTH-RELATED OPPORTUNISTIC NETWORKING - A wireless opportunistic network that can facilitate data transfer by way of interconnected devices is disclosed. In accordance with this opportunistic network, each of the devices effectively contributes to the transfer of the information thereby obviating the need for an external carrier. In this manner, the carrier infrastructure is embodied and distributed throughout the individual devices of the network. In a particular aspect, the opportunistic network is employed to transfer and make available health-related data. This functionality can be used in many scenarios related to heath from, monitoring patients and conveying basic diagnostic data to identifying bioterrorism by way of collaborating data between a number of devices within the network. Essentially, the innovation provides for at least two core functional ideas, the opportunistic network infrastructure and the use of the network in health related scenarios. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320560 | CONTENT AUTHORING AND PROPAGATION AT VARIOUS FIDELITIES - Content may be authored on a device using various types of information, and may be propagated at various different fidelities. In one example, a user enters or captures information on a mobile device, such as a smart phone. The entered and/or captured information may be sent to a remote service, which provides information based on the entered and/or captured data. An application on the device then allows the user of the device to author rich content based on the entered and/or captured data, and based on the information returned from the service. The application may allow the user to include text, photos, video, audio, links, or any other type of content. The entire content object that the user creates may be stored in a structured form, and may be propagated at various different fidelities (e.g., text only, etc.) in order to accommodate the limitations of the propagation channel. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320556 | Techniques For Migrating A Virtual Machine Using Shared Storage - Techniques for providing the ability to live migrate a virtual machine from one physical host to another physical host employ shared storage as the transfer medium for the state of the virtual machine. In addition, the ability for a virtualization module to use second-level paging functionality is employed, paging-out the virtual machine memory content from one physical host to the shared storage. The content of the memory file can be restored on another physical host by employing on-demand paging and optionally low-priority background paging from the shared storage to the other physical host. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320539 | WiFi Proximity Messaging - Techniques for utilizing APs and messaging service for delivering personalized message to individual mobile devices connected to internet through APs. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320538 | DELIVERING MESSAGES FROM MESSAGE SOURCES TO SUBSCRIBING RECIPIENTS - Many scenarios involve the delivery of messages received from various message sources to recipients, based on subscriptions established between various recipients and message sources. The recipients may be distributively assigned to one or more message servers, either operating independently or as part of an interoperating message server set. Respective message servers may generate a subscription filter indicating whether at least one assigned recipient subscribes to respective message sources, and may utilize the subscription filter to determine, upon receiving a message from a message source, whether to discard the message or store the message for delivery. Interoperating message servers may also exchange subscription filters, and upon receiving a message from any message source, a message server may utilize the subscription filters of the other message servers to determine which other message servers are assigned at least one subscribing recipient, and may retransmit the message only to such message servers. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320536 | ACCELERATION OF SOCIAL INTERACTIONS - A system and method for facilitating social interactions between different individuals. Information available about each of the individuals engaged in a social interaction is used to provide a “social accelerator” for an interaction between the individuals. Social interactions are improved or accelerated by aggregating available information about individuals participating in an information system. When an interaction event trigger is received, the context of context for possible social interaction between the users around the trigger event is determined. A social accelerator is selected from available interest information common to the participating user and the target user, and the social accelerator is provided to one of the individuals. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320522 | CONTEXT-SPECIFIC NETWORK RESOURCE ADDRESSING MODEL FOR DISTRIBUTED SERVICES - A back-end locator service can be utilized to identify a specific computing device, from among multiple computing devices in a domain, that is the most appropriate computing device to handle a particular type of request for data or other resources. The data or resources hosted by the domain can be divided among multiple computing devices. The domain can expose a network-based application program interface where successive requests by a client computing device become more specific as to the data or resources requested. Responses from the computing devices in the domain can, at some point in time, be informed by the back-end locator service and can comprise location-specific resource identifiers. The client computing device can utilize such location specific resource identifiers to direct further communications to the appropriate, specific computing device without having to incur redirection inefficiencies. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320520 | DYNAMIC PARTITIONING OF APPLICATIONS BETWEEN CLIENTS AND SERVERS - Optimization mechanism that dynamically splits the computation in an application (e.g., cloud), that is, which parts run on a client (e.g., mobile) and which parts run on servers in a datacenter. This optimization can be based on application characteristics, network connectivity (e.g., latency, bandwidth, etc.) between the client and the datacenter, power or energy available at the client, size of the application objects, load in the datacenter, security and privacy concerns (e.g., cannot share all data on the client with the datacenter), and other criteria, as desired. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320496 | CONCURRENCY CONTROL FOR CONFLUENT TREES - Architecture that addresses the efficient detection of conflicts and the merging of data structures such as trees, when possible. The process of detecting conflicts and merging the trees is a meld operation. Confluent trees offer transactional consistency with some degree of isolation, and scaling out a concurrent system based on confluent trees can be accomplished where the meld operation is more efficient than the transaction computations. Transactions execute optimistically using lazily versioned “intention trees” that efficiently describe dependencies and effects using structure and content version information for each intention subtree. The data structure is modified by melding the intention trees in sequence, which causes each transaction to either commit (producing an incremental new version of the data structure) or abort (identifying a conflict which prevents the intention tree from being melded). The architecture is computationally efficient and completes without needing to access much of each tree. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320467 | Using Message Sampling To Determine The Most Frequent Words In A User Mailbox - A method is presented for generating a list of frequently used words for an email application on a server computer. When a request is received for a word frequency list for emails stored in a user's mailbox, a word frequency list is returned if one exists. If the word frequency list does not exist, an asynchronous process is started on the server computer to generate a word frequency list. If the word frequency list exists but it is older than an aging limit, an asynchronous process is started on the server computer to regenerate the word frequency list. The word frequency list is stored in the user's mailbox along with a timestamp indicating the date and time that the list was created or updated. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320446 | Pushing Search Query Constraints Into Information Retrieval Processing - This patent application relates to interval-based information retrieval (IR) search techniques for efficiently and correctly answering keyword search queries. In some embodiments, a range of information-containing blocks for a search query can be identified. Each of these blocks, and thus the range, can include document identifiers that identify individual corresponding documents that contain a term found in the search query. From the range, a subrange(s) having a smaller number of blocks than the range can be selected. This can be accomplished without decompressing the blocks by partitioning the range into intervals and evaluating the intervals. The smaller number of blocks in the subranges(s) can then be decompressed and processed to identify a doc ID(s) and thus document(s) that satisfies the query. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320443 | Navigation to Popular Search Results - Systems, methods, and computer media for enhancing search results, as well as user interfaces for performing search queries and navigating search results, are provided. A search query is received from a user. A plurality of web pages relevant to the search query are identified. At least one of the relevant web pages is identified as popular. A search result page is generated including a search result listing and a search result page header. The search result page header includes a link to the popular web page to provide the user with a quick and easy way to select a popular web page relevant to the user's search query. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320441 | ADJUSTING SEARCH RESULTS BASED ON USER SOCIAL PROFILES - Many contemporary computing scenarios involve the submission by a user of a search query to be applied to a data set (such as a set of web pages indexed by a web search engine.) Additionally, many users participate in social networking and have generated a social profile, including demographic information, interests, and associations with other users who also have social profiles. It may be advantageous to improve the presentation of search results from search queries by adjusting the search queries according to a prediction of user interest of the user in the topics associated with respective search results, based on the information in the social profile of the user. For example, search results relating to topics in which the user or the user's friends have expressed an interest within the social network may be presented before other search results, thereby improving the relevance of the search results to the user. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320440 | PLACEMENT OF SEARCH RESULTS USING USER INTENT - Technologies are described herein for placing search results on a search engine results page (SERP). A query may be received. The query may be transmitted to a plurality of search result providers. A first set of search results and a second set of search results may be received from the search result providers. Intent features may be extracted from the first set of search results. User intent of the second set of search results may be inferred based on the extracted intent features. The first set of search results and the second set of search results may be ranked based on the inferred user intent. The SERP may be rendered according to the ranked first set and second set of search results. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320433 | Automated Joining of Disparate Data for Database Queries - Described is associating metadata with different sources of data (e.g., database tables) that allows a single view of data from the sources to be created. An administrator creates baseviews corresponding to database tables and associates metadata with the baseviews, including primary key metadata for the baseviews and meta-tags for one or more of the columns of each baseview. A user selects fields (corresponding to table columns) from a starting baseview, along with fields from any other baseview that has metadata that matches the starting baseview's metadata. A join mechanism automatically creates the view if a metadata match is detected. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320431 | STRONG TYPING FOR QUERYING INFORMATION GRAPHS - Described herein is using type information with a graph of nodes and predicates, in which the type information may be used to determine validity of (type check) a query to be executed against the graph. In one aspect, each node has a type, and each predicate indicates a valid relationship between two types of nodes. A type checking mechanism uses the type information to determine whether a query is valid, which may be the entire query prior to query processing/compilation time, or as the query is being composed by a user. One or more valid predicates for a given node may be discovered based upon the node type, such as discovered to assist the user during query composition. Also described is using the type information to optimize the query. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320426 | RICH SITE MAPS - Providing a website map to a user. A method includes gathering information about web pages in a website, including information related to web page relationships, controls, and executable code underlying one or more web pages in the website. A relationship map is created. The relationship map includes representations of relationships between the web pages, the controls and the executable code underlying one or more web pages in the website. The method further includes graphically displaying at least a portion of the relationship map in a graphical user interface at the computing system. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320423 | INTEGRATING SOCIAL NETWORK DATA WITH SEARCH RESULTS - A user of a social network may submit a search query relating to one or more topics to a search engine indexing a set of data items, but the search results, while authoritative and informative, may be highly impersonal with respect to the user. Conversely, the user may search for social data items within the social network relating to the topics, and such social data items may be more highly personalized to the user, but may also be inaccurate or incomplete. Instead, the search query may be applied to both the search engine and the social network, and the selected search results and social data items may be integrated into a presentation featuring both authoritative and personalized information about the topics associated with the search query. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320407 | SHARED DATA COLLECTIONS - A data sharing mechanism may allow programs to share access to data collections. The mechanisms that implement the sharing may allow programs written in any language to read and write a shared collection. The mechanisms may make the shared nature of the collection relatively transparent to the program and to the programmer, by allowing a program to operate on the data more or less as if it were purely local data. The sharing of collections may be managed by a shared object runtime on each machine on which a collection is used, and by a shared object server. The shared object server maintains the true state of the collection, and deterministically resolves collections when programs operate on the same collection without knowledge of each other's operations. The mechanisms by which collections are shared may be implemented so as to be agnostic as to the kind of data in the collection. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320405 | DETACHABLE COMPUTER WITH VARIABLE PERFORMANCE COMPUTING ENVIRONMENT - Computing devices are often designed in view of a particular usage scenario, but may be unsuitable for usage in other computing scenarios. For example, a notebook computer with a large display, an integrated keyboard, and a high-performance processor suitable for many computing tasks may be heavy, large, and power-inefficient; and a tablet lacking a keyboard and incorporating a low-powered processor may improve portability but may present inadequate performance for many tasks. Presented herein is a configuration of a computing device featuring a display unit with a resource-conserving processor that may be used independently (e.g., as a tablet), but that may be connected to a base unit featuring a resource-intensive processor. The operating system of the device may accordingly transition between a resource-intensive computing environment and a resource-conserving computing environment based on the connection with the base unit, thereby satisfying the dual roles of workstation and portable tablet device. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320380 | VIDEO CONTENT RECOMMENDATIONS - Video content recommendations are described. In embodiments, a request for a recommendation of video content is received from a client device, and the recommendation includes identifiers of video assets for an optimal viewing schedule for a user. A utility of each video asset can be determined that indicates a social value of a video asset to the user. A time relevance of each video asset can also be determined that indicates how soon the user may select to watch the video asset, based at least in part on the social value of the video asset. The optimal viewing schedule can then be generated based on the utility of each video asset and the time relevance that is associated with each video asset. The optimal viewing schedule includes recommended video assets that, when watched by the user, provide the most social value in the shortest amount of viewing time. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320373 | PRODUCT CONVERSATIONS AMONG SOCIAL GROUPS - Conversations about products and product areas arise among users who also participate in social networks. These conversations often occur over generalized communications channels, such as email or social network messages, which may be unstructured and ephemeral. Such conversations may be promoted among the users of a social group (such as a highly interconnected set of users), and may be restricted to the members of the social group in order to promote reliable discussion and personalized recommendations. The social network may also store such conversations as a product review database that is searchable by members of the social group, evaluate the conversation to identify a consensus recommendation of a product in a product area or a consensus opinion of the social group about a product or recommendation, and compute an aggregated user rating of a product based on the user ratings of the product by various members of the social group. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320284 | Market for Social Promotion of Digital Goods - A social network marketplace may monitor communications between an advertiser and a consumer by generating signatures for communications and tracking those signatures through social network communications until a sale may be consummated. The marketplace may monitor the transactions to determine a user's influence on other users. A user's influence may also be determined or supplemented by monitoring formal or informal social interactions performed on a computer when those communications are able to be monitored. The influence information may be used to select outbound advertisements to those users who may benefit from an advertisement, as well as to filter inbound advertisements to suit a user or a user's situation. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320273 | SERVING CONTENT BASED ON CONVERSATIONS - Keywords may be extracted from conversations, such as Instant Messaging (IM) conversations, and content may be served based on the extracted keywords. In one example, an analysis component runs on a machine alongside a conversation application, such as an IM client. The analysis component compares words in the conversation with a dictionary of keywords. When keywords are detected, the keywords are sent to a server. Analysis components also run on other machines that participate in the conversation and, likewise, send keywords to the server. The server selects ads based on the detected keywords, and provides the ads to the machines that the participants are using to participate in the conversation, so that the ads can be displayed to the participants. The ads may be synchronized, so that all of the participants see the same ad impressions (or similar or related ad impressions). | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320250 | ADVERTISING PRODUCTS TO GROUPS WITHIN SOCIAL NETWORKS - Within a social network, users may form social groups based on shared traits, such as experiences and interests. The social network may be able to detect a user interest among the users of a social group in one or more products offered by one or more vendors (e.g., by evaluating conversations within the social group and search queries executed by users of the social group), and to notify the vendors of the detected user interest. The vendors may be willing to extend an offer to the users of the social group regarding the product, and the social network may present the offer to the users of the social group. The social network may also track acceptances of the offer by users of the social group, and may provide an e-commerce infrastructure to allow users to complete purchases of the product and to provide the rewards featured in the offers. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320119 | LOCATION BROKERAGE SYSTEM - A location brokerage system is described herein. A plurality of computing devices that are configured to output data that is indicative of a geographic location of a user are registered with the location brokerage system, and a plurality of location-based applications are registered with the location brokerage system. The location brokerage system collaborates with the computing devices to obtain location data pertaining to the user that satisfies requests for location data from the location-based application while enforcing operating restrictions/parameters imposed by the user and/or the location-based applications. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320116 | PROVIDING AN IMPROVED VIEW OF A LOCATION IN A SPATIAL ENVIRONMENT - Technologies are described herein for providing an improved view of a location in a spatial environment. A current image associated with a current location of a geographic area is displayed. A user-selected point on the current image is received. A target location of the geographic area is determined based on the user-selected point. A distance between the current location and the target location is determined. A determination is made as to whether the distance between the current location and the target location is greater than a distance threshold. If this distance is greater than the distance threshold, then a far distance process configured to determine and display a first target view of the target location is performed. If this distance is not greater than the distance threshold, then a near distance process configured to determine and display a second target view of the target location is performed. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320114 | Map Annotation Messaging - A map annotation message including map annotation data that represents a route is received by a receiving device. The map annotation data is analyzed to determine a route represented by the map annotation message, and the determined route is presented by the receiving device. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110320018 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONFIGURING GAME DATA ABOUT PLAYERS - Information is shared among users in a system by the use of a service. The service receives information from at least two different game applications that each have a configuration file (defined with a common schema) that defines information from the game application to share with a service. An intermediary program executing on a computer that is also executing one of said game applications receives information from the application as defined by said configuration files and stores at least a portion of the information received from the application. At least a portion of the information is sent to the service when the intermediary is in communication with the service over a network wherein the service provides information about a user of said at least two game applications based on information received by said service. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110319174 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONFIGURING GAME DATA ABOUT PLAYERS - Information is shared among users in a system by the use of a service. The service receives information from at least two different game applications that each have a configuration file (defined with a common schema) that defines information from the game application to share with a service. An intermediary program executing on a computer that is also executing one of said game applications receives information from the application as defined by said configuration files and stores at least a portion of the information received from the application. At least a portion of the information is sent to the service when the intermediary is in communication with the service over a network wherein the service provides information about a user of said at least two game applications based on information received by said service. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110319166 | Coordinating Device Interaction To Enhance User Experience - A method for coordinating interaction between one or more computing devices for users participating in an interactive activity is provided. A reference point is identified on a physical surface via a primary computing device. The primary computing device may include a mobile computing device. The physical surface is utilized to render an interactive activity for one or more users. The reference point is communicated to one or more secondary computing devices, via the primary computing device. An interaction between the primary computing device and the secondary computing devices is coordinated utilizing the reference point. A user perspective image of the interactive game relative to the reference point is rendered on the physical surface via the primary computing device and the secondary computing devices to the users. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110319148 | VIRTUAL AND LOCATION-BASED MULTIPLAYER GAMING - A system and method combining real-world actions and virtual actions in a gaming environment. In one aspect, a massively multiplayer environment combines the real world actions and virtual actions of a participant to influence both character metrics and game play within one or more games provided by the service. In the real world or location-based events, game play occurs in and around links explicitly created between real world locations and virtual representations of those locations within the game. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110319019 | CAPACITIVE BONDING OF DEVICES - Various embodiments relate to systems and methods that facilitate wireless device communications and configuration. A detection component identifies N devices that are coupled together via a biological medium, N being an integer, wherein the medium includes direct or indirect touching to a device or devices. After biological contact, a configuration component initiates a configuration between a subset of the devices. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317914 | TECHNIQUES FOR ROBUST COLOR TRANSFER - Techniques and systems to transfer color robustly between images are described. In an embodiment, a technique for transferring color includes separating color information of a registered source image into a one dimensional luminosity channel and multi-dimensional chromatic channels. The technique further includes building a voting table, where each table cell is indexed by the chromatic coordinates from the source image and from the destination image. The table is built by adding to a count stored in a table cell indexed by the chromatic coordinates of the source pixel and the chromatic coordinates of its related destination pixel for each occurrence of such a pairing. The voting table values are used to identify a transfer color, and to adjust the colors of the source image to the colors of the destination image. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317871 | SKELETAL JOINT RECOGNITION AND TRACKING SYSTEM - A system and method are disclosed for recognizing and tracking a user's skeletal joints with a NUI system and further, for recognizing and tracking only some skeletal joints, such as for example a user's upper body. The system may include a limb identification engine which may use various methods to evaluate, identify and track positions of body parts of one or more users in a scene. In examples, further processing efficiency may be achieved by segmenting the field of view in smaller zones, and focusing on one zone at a time. Moreover, each zone may have its own set of predefined gestures which are recognized. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317633 | FINE-GRAINED CHANNEL ACCESS IN WIRELESS NETWORKS - A fine-grained channel access system and method to facilitate fine-grained channel access in a high-data rate wide-band wireless local-area network (WLAN). Embodiments of the system and method divide an entire wireless channel into proper size subchannels commensurate with the physical layer data rate and typical frame size. Once the subchannels are defined, each node on the WLAN contends independently for each of the fine-grained subchannels. A first orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) technique is used to signal an access point on the WLAN that the node desires one or more of the subchannels. A second OFDM technique (which is different from the first OFDM technique) is used for data transmission. Sometimes there is contention between nodes that want the same subchannel. The access point resolves any contention between the nodes using a frequency domain contention technique that includes a frequency domain backoff technique. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317632 | Integrating White Space Support into a Network Stack - Described is incorporating white space networking components into a network stack. A user mode spectrum access control component determines which white space channels are currently allowed for use based upon policy, current operating status and availability information obtained from one or more sources. A white space service (e.g., in the WLAN service) receives the availability information. The white space service includes a discovery module that discovers other nodes, and a channel migration module that changes from the current channel to another channel if the current channel is no longer allowed for use. A kernel mode (NDIS layer) white space driver through a miniport driver controls the channel in use as the current channel. An automatic configuration module is provided that switches to Wi-Fi network communication when a Wi-Fi network is present, and switches back when a Wi-Fi network is not present. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317631 | SCHEDULING COMMUNICATIONS IN A MOBILE DEVICE - A method scheduling outgoing communication in a mobile device is provided. The method includes receiving a signal quality profile for an area in which the device is located. The method further includes receiving a signal from a user application stored on the device that requests the mobile device to make the outgoing communication. Additionally, the method includes determining a current location, a speed, a direction, and a signal quality associated with the device and determining whether the signal quality is above a certain threshold. If not, the method includes predicting a future time at which the signal quality will be above the threshold based at least on the current location, the speed, the direction, the signal quality, and the signal quality profile. Finally, the method includes scheduling the outgoing communication from the mobile device at the future time. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317554 | Distributed and Scalable Network Address Translation - A method of enabling an electronic privately addressable source to be publicly addressable starts at a receiver where an electronic message is received. It is communicated from a sender with a private address outside a subnet of the receiver through a translator. The translator retrieves a lease to at least one of a public address or a port from a lease manager, translates the private address and the private port into a public address and a public port and communicates identifying data such as the public address and the public port to the receiver. If a response is communicated to the private sender, the response may be communicated to the private sender through the network. The public address and the public port on the message may be translated to the private address and the port of the private sender and the private address and the private port may be used to properly route the response to the private sender. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317522 | SOUND SOURCE LOCALIZATION BASED ON REFLECTIONS AND ROOM ESTIMATION - Described is modeling a room to obtain estimates for walls and a ceiling, and using the model to improve sound source localization by incorporating reflection (reverberation) data into the location estimation computations. In a calibration step, reflections of a known sound are detected at a microphone array, with their corresponding signals processed to estimate wall (and ceiling) locations. In a sound source localization step, when an actual sound (including reverberations) is detected, the signals are processed into hypotheses that include reflection data predictions based upon possible locations, given the room model. The location corresponding to the hypothesis that matches (maximum likelihood) the actual sound data is the estimated location of the sound source. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317399 | DISPLAY BACKLIGHTS WITH ADJUSTABLE NARROW VIEWING ANGLE - Display components (e.g., liquid crystal displays (LCDs)) are viewable at different viewing angles, such as by a first user positioned directly in front of the display and by a second user positioned to one side of the display. Many displays present a consistent display across a wide range of viewing angles, but these displays may consume energy and/or compromise user privacy. Presented herein are configurations of backlights for display devices featuring an adjustable viewing angle, such that a user may select a narrower viewing angle in usage scenarios involving power consumption or privacy, and may select a wider viewing angle in usage scenarios involving plentiful power and fewer privacy concerns. Such configurations may include multiple banks of backlight lamps generating backlight at different viewing angles; an electrowetting electrode as an adjustable collimator; adjustable diffusers that may adjustably scatter light passing therethrough; and/or a combination of such adjustable elements. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317120 | LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY (LCD) - A liquid crystal display (LCD) is provided that comprises a rearward LCD substrate sheet that has an array of vias formed, where the vias provide electrical conduction between both sides of the rearward LCD substrate sheet. The number of vias in the array is substantially equal to or at least equivalent to a combination of a number of column drive lines and a number of row drive lines. The respective drive lines are connected to a corresponding via, such as on one side of the rearward LCD substrate sheet, and respective patterned conductors are connected to a corresponding via, such as on the other side of the rearward LCD substrate sheet. The patterned conductors provide a connection between respective drive lines and one or more corresponding drivers. In one example, this allows a “full bleed” display to be generated. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110317019 | ENABLING WHITE SPACE NETWORKS INDEPENDENT OF LOW-THRESHOLD SENSING - Described is a technology by which a remote or local geo-location service provides white space information that one or more client devices and/or base stations may use to determine which white spaces are available for use, e.g., for wireless networking. Because of the information, low-threshold sensing is not needed by the client devices and/or base stations to know which white spaces are available. The service computes the available white spaces for a given location based upon television transmitter parameters, elevation data, and information received regarding any operational wireless microphones. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316984 | ADAPTIVE ADJUSTMENT OF DEPTH CUES IN A STEREO TELEPRESENCE SYSTEM - Described is a stereoscopic display (telepresence) system that includes a depth cue adjustment mechanism for changing screen disparity to move a fixation distance of a viewer (subject) closer to a focus distance, thereby providing more desirable viewing conditions. In one aspect, the depth cue adjustment mechanism adjusts a depth cue by moving the fixation distance forward, and/or by moving the focus distance backward. Also described is detecting encroachment, where the object is perceived as being too close to the subject viewer for comfort, and adjusting one or more depth cues (e.g., object scale) to counteract the sensation of the encroachment. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316965 | COMBINING DIRECT AND ROUTED COMMUNICATION IN A VIDEO CONFERENCE - A video conference cross-links at least a portion of the clients for point to point communication while still using a video conference server. The video conference server continues to manage some aspects of the video conference for the cross-linked clients and may be configured to perform audio/video processing for some of the clients in a video conference. For example, the video conference server may perform audio/video processing and routing of streams for clients that do not have the capabilities to perform the processing directly. Clients that are able to process their audio/video needs may directly connect to other clients through cross-links while still using the video conference server for management. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316884 | ALTERNATIVE SEMANTICS FOR ZOOM OPERATIONS IN A ZOOMABLE SCENE - A scene comprising a set of visual elements may allow a user to perform “zoom” operations in order to navigate the depth of the scene. The “zoom” semantic is often applied to simulate optical visual depth, wherein the visual elements are presented with different visual dimensions and visual resolution to simulate physical proximity or distance. However, the “zoom” semantic may be alternatively applied to other aspects of the visual elements of a scene, such as a user selection of a zoomed-in visual element, a “drill-down” operation on a data set, or navigation through a portal in a first data set to view a second data set. These alternative “zoom” semantics may be achieved by presenting the effects of a “zoom” operation within the scene on the visual presentation of the visual element in a manner other than an adjustment of the visual dimensions and resolution of the visual element. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316871 | FAST RECONFIGURATION OF GRAPHICS PIPELINE STATE - Techniques and technologies are provided for binding resources to particular slots associated with shaders in a graphics pipeline. Resource dependencies between resources being utilized by respective shaders can be determined, and, based on these resource dependencies, common resource/slot associations can be computed. Respective common resource/slot associations identify a particular one of the resources to be associated with a particular one of the slots. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316853 | TELEPRESENCE SYSTEMS WITH VIEWER PERSPECTIVE ADJUSTMENT - Described herein is a telepresence system where a real-time a virtual hologram of a user is displayed at a remote display screen and is rendered from a vantage point that is different than the vantage point from which images of the user are captured via a video camera. The virtual hologram is based at least in part upon data acquired from a sensor unit at the location of the user. The sensor unit includes a color video camera that captures 2-D images of the user including surface features of the user. The sensor unit also includes a depth sensor that captures 3-D geometry data indicative of the relative position of surfaces on the user in 3-D space. The virtual hologram is rendered to orientate the gaze of the eyes of the virtual hologram towards the eyes of a second user viewing the remote display screen. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110316338 | Hierarchical Power Smoothing - Power is provided to one or more devices in a system that includes a hierarchical power smoothing environment having multiple tiers. In response to a peak in power usage by the one or more devices, power is provided from a first power smoothing component in a first tier of the multiple tiers. Additionally, power is provided to the one or more devices from power smoothing components in each of other tiers of the multiple tiers if the power smoothing component in a next lower tier of the multiple tiers is unable to provide sufficient power for the peak in power usage. If the power smoothing components in the multiple tiers are unable to provide sufficient power for the peak in power usage, then performance of at least one of the one or more devices is reduced in response to the peak in power usage. | 12-29-2011 |
| 20110314555 | ABSTRACTIONS AND AUTOMATION FOR ENHANCED SHARING AND COLLABORATION - The present invention provides methods for using abstractions of people, including dynamic and static groups of people, to enhance the efficiency of the specification and automation of policies for sharing information between users with a “need-to-know.” An instance of the present invention can also provide these users information based on a “time-to-know.” By providing access to information based on group affiliation and properties of the content of the information, the present invention maintains optimal information privacy while minimizing encumbrances to sharing data with appropriate users and even at appropriate times. The present invention can be integrated with other communication technologies to facilitate access to information in a time appropriate manner. Other instances of the present invention employ automated and semi-automated, mixed-initiative techniques, to make information-sharing decisions. Additional instances of the present invention include the employment of machine-learning techniques to facilitate construction of access policies from the actions or profile of a single user or a community of users, including the construction of automated sharing agents that work in an automated or mixed-initiative manner to respond to real-time requests for information. | 12-22-2011 |
| 20110314553 | LOCATION ENABLED BOOKMARK AND PROFILE - Location based profiles are used to modify the configuration of a computing device based on a detected location. The location based profiles allow features such as cameras to be enabled and disabled. Physical and logical data storage partitions can also be mounted and unmounted, and the home screen displayed by a device can be modified. Location bookmarks can be used to further customize the appearance and function of a computing device. | 12-22-2011 |
