PDA controlling Device for desktops
An Apple white paper dated 12-20-01
Start white paper intro:
PDA Controlling Device for desktop computers
It is, therefore, an object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that has an infrared communication function for communicating with an external device such as a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), as well as a method of controlling the same.
It is another object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that is capable of smoothly transferring data, such as processed results obtained from execution of an application program, an HTML file acquired from a Web server in accordance with the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) protocol or the like, to an external device (PDA) by using an infrared communication function, as well as a method of controlling the same.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that is capable of transferring data, such as processed results obtained from execution of an application program, an HTML file acquired from a Web server in accordance with the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) protocol or the like, to an external device (PDA) by using an infrared communication function without imposing burdens on the external device, as well as a method of controlling the same.
a computer readable storage medium for storing in a tangible form a computer program executable on a computer system comprising an infrared transceiver for transmitting/receiving an infrared code, a memory for storing download data, input means for allowing a user to input user commands, and connection means for connecting to a network, said computer program comprising: (a) a routine, responsive to a data download command from the user, for entering and staying in a station search state to transmit an infrared code to search for a destination station to which data is to be downloaded; (b) a routine, responsive to receipt of an infrared code that indicates a response of station discovery from the destination station, for executing an infrared communication to transmit the download data; (c) a routine, responsive to termination of the infrared communication with the destination station, for returning to the station search state; (d) a routine, being operative without the involvement of execution of any of the routines (a) through (c), for acquiring a file from a predetermined server through the network; and (e) a routine for storing the acquired data as the download data; and (f) a routine, responsive to a direction from the user, for exiting the station search state.
a computer readable storage medium for storing in a tangible form a computer program executable on a computer system having an infrared communication function of the type which transmits by itself an exchange ID (XID) command to search for a destination station, establishes a connection with the destination station in response to receipt of an XID response from the destination station indicating station discovery, and disconnects the connection in response to transmission of a disconnection (DISC) frame by itself and receipt of an unnumbered acknowledgement (UA) frame from the destination station, said computer program comprising: a routine for attempting to disconnect the connection by transmitting a DISC frame; and a routine, responsive to disconnection of the connection, for returning to a station search state to transmit an XID command.
Typically, it takes at least several minutes in time to access a Web server on the Internet to transfer one or more Web pages, and to store the acquired file (e.g., an HTML file) into its own memory. No matter how a line speed on a network is improved in the near future, there would be no hope to shorten the time required for acquisition of a Web page less than 1 second, due to negative factors such as control of a protocol, a disk access of a Web server, and accessing time at a gateway. Thus, if a PDA is of the type that is connected to a network on its own initiative to directly acquire a Web page, it will be inevitably subject to consumption of its own internal battery during such data acquisition. Further, in order to perform works such as control of the TCP/IP protocol, any device requires to have its own intelligence (i.e., a specification of hardware/software). Where a PDA itself supports works such as control of the TCP/IP protocol, it is difficult to maintain small size/light weight/immediateness, which leads to increase of costs of the device.
it continues:
The present application is directed to systems and methods for reordering unconstrained handwriting data using both spatial and temporal interrelationships prior to recognition, and for spatially organizing and formatting machine recognized transcription results. The present invention allows a machine recognizer to generate and present a full and accurate transcription of unconstrained handwriting in its correct spatial context (i.e., the transcription output can appear to "mirror" the corresponding handwriting).
In one aspect, a handwriting recognition system comprises:
means for storing handwriting data, the handwriting data comprising a set of strokes, each stroke comprising a set of x-y coordinates;
a recognition engine; and
a system for spatially sorting handwriting data for recognition, the spatial sorting system comprising:
means for determining bounding region information for each stroke based on the x-y coordinates of the stroke;
means for clustering the strokes into groups of spatially-related strokes based on the bounding region information; and
means for ordering the clustered groups; and
means for submitting the ordered clustered groups to the recognition engine.
In another aspect, the handwriting recognition system further comprises a system for spatially formatting recognition results from the recognition engine, the spatial formatting system comprising means for positioning the recognized text on a display page in a proximate spatial location as the corresponding handwriting data is located on an ink page using the bounding region information for the corresponding handwriting data.
In yet another aspect, the handwriting recognition system further comprises:
means for tracking a recognition state comprising previous recognition results for each stored page of handwriting data; and
means for merging current recognition results from the recognition engine with a corresponding recognition state to produce the recognition results that are processed by the spatial formatting system.
These and other aspects, features and advantages of the present invention will be described and become apparent from the following detailed description of preferred embodiments, which is to be read in connection with the accompanying drawings.
MSKR
(don't ask)
[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Masker ]</p>
Start white paper intro:
PDA Controlling Device for desktop computers
It is, therefore, an object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that has an infrared communication function for communicating with an external device such as a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), as well as a method of controlling the same.
It is another object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that is capable of smoothly transferring data, such as processed results obtained from execution of an application program, an HTML file acquired from a Web server in accordance with the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) protocol or the like, to an external device (PDA) by using an infrared communication function, as well as a method of controlling the same.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide an improved information processing apparatus that is capable of transferring data, such as processed results obtained from execution of an application program, an HTML file acquired from a Web server in accordance with the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) protocol or the like, to an external device (PDA) by using an infrared communication function without imposing burdens on the external device, as well as a method of controlling the same.
a computer readable storage medium for storing in a tangible form a computer program executable on a computer system comprising an infrared transceiver for transmitting/receiving an infrared code, a memory for storing download data, input means for allowing a user to input user commands, and connection means for connecting to a network, said computer program comprising: (a) a routine, responsive to a data download command from the user, for entering and staying in a station search state to transmit an infrared code to search for a destination station to which data is to be downloaded; (b) a routine, responsive to receipt of an infrared code that indicates a response of station discovery from the destination station, for executing an infrared communication to transmit the download data; (c) a routine, responsive to termination of the infrared communication with the destination station, for returning to the station search state; (d) a routine, being operative without the involvement of execution of any of the routines (a) through (c), for acquiring a file from a predetermined server through the network; and (e) a routine for storing the acquired data as the download data; and (f) a routine, responsive to a direction from the user, for exiting the station search state.
a computer readable storage medium for storing in a tangible form a computer program executable on a computer system having an infrared communication function of the type which transmits by itself an exchange ID (XID) command to search for a destination station, establishes a connection with the destination station in response to receipt of an XID response from the destination station indicating station discovery, and disconnects the connection in response to transmission of a disconnection (DISC) frame by itself and receipt of an unnumbered acknowledgement (UA) frame from the destination station, said computer program comprising: a routine for attempting to disconnect the connection by transmitting a DISC frame; and a routine, responsive to disconnection of the connection, for returning to a station search state to transmit an XID command.
Typically, it takes at least several minutes in time to access a Web server on the Internet to transfer one or more Web pages, and to store the acquired file (e.g., an HTML file) into its own memory. No matter how a line speed on a network is improved in the near future, there would be no hope to shorten the time required for acquisition of a Web page less than 1 second, due to negative factors such as control of a protocol, a disk access of a Web server, and accessing time at a gateway. Thus, if a PDA is of the type that is connected to a network on its own initiative to directly acquire a Web page, it will be inevitably subject to consumption of its own internal battery during such data acquisition. Further, in order to perform works such as control of the TCP/IP protocol, any device requires to have its own intelligence (i.e., a specification of hardware/software). Where a PDA itself supports works such as control of the TCP/IP protocol, it is difficult to maintain small size/light weight/immediateness, which leads to increase of costs of the device.
it continues:
The present application is directed to systems and methods for reordering unconstrained handwriting data using both spatial and temporal interrelationships prior to recognition, and for spatially organizing and formatting machine recognized transcription results. The present invention allows a machine recognizer to generate and present a full and accurate transcription of unconstrained handwriting in its correct spatial context (i.e., the transcription output can appear to "mirror" the corresponding handwriting).
In one aspect, a handwriting recognition system comprises:
means for storing handwriting data, the handwriting data comprising a set of strokes, each stroke comprising a set of x-y coordinates;
a recognition engine; and
a system for spatially sorting handwriting data for recognition, the spatial sorting system comprising:
means for determining bounding region information for each stroke based on the x-y coordinates of the stroke;
means for clustering the strokes into groups of spatially-related strokes based on the bounding region information; and
means for ordering the clustered groups; and
means for submitting the ordered clustered groups to the recognition engine.
In another aspect, the handwriting recognition system further comprises a system for spatially formatting recognition results from the recognition engine, the spatial formatting system comprising means for positioning the recognized text on a display page in a proximate spatial location as the corresponding handwriting data is located on an ink page using the bounding region information for the corresponding handwriting data.
In yet another aspect, the handwriting recognition system further comprises:
means for tracking a recognition state comprising previous recognition results for each stored page of handwriting data; and
means for merging current recognition results from the recognition engine with a corresponding recognition state to produce the recognition results that are processed by the spatial formatting system.
These and other aspects, features and advantages of the present invention will be described and become apparent from the following detailed description of preferred embodiments, which is to be read in connection with the accompanying drawings.
MSKR
(don't ask)
[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Masker ]</p>
Comments
What's the context of this paper? What's the invention?
With the handwriting recognition, it could be a removable tablet, for example (LCD + base), but this infrared thing bugs me. It's line-of-sight. It's also too slow for a removable tablet, depending on its implementation. Darn.
I don't have much experience with diffused infrared (other pointing my tv remote willy-nilly), but that could make it more useful.
<strong>An Apple white paper dated 12-20-01
Start white paper intro:
PDA Controlling Device for desktop computers
...
MSKR
(don't ask)
[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Masker ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
I agree with Garden - why infrared? The only thing I can think of is a remote control - somewhat smaller in scope than a PDA.
On the other hand, PDA merely means Personal Digital Assistant. Modern usage associates PDA's with mobile PIM's, but strictly speaking this is a misnomer. What if this PDA paper rejects that association? What if it's only describing a "personal assistant to your digital lifestyle". A remote control may very well fit this description.
In one of the iPod discussions, someone suggested that the iPod could be used as a wireless monitoring device for processes happening on your "home" machine. For example, you can watch TV on the couch and your iPod monitors the progress of the rendering operation on your desktop. Doesn't that make the iPod a PDA?
Still, in this scenario, infrared would certainly NOT be the way to go. Ideas?
-mithral
[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Mithral ]</p>