Method and system for device recruitment interoperability and assembling unified interoperating device constellation

• US 20060026305A1
• Filed: 06/08/2005
• Published: 02/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 06/08/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: David E. Kahn
• Original Assignee: Covia Labs, Inc.
• Inventors: Bernstein, Bruce, Mirabella, Richard, Pieb, Wolfgang, Illowsky, Daniel, Wenocur, Michael, Tiberi, Richard, Sidney, Raymond
• Granted Patent: US 7,788,663 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 710/8
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3203 Power management, i.e. event-based initiation of a power-saving mode
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2082 Data synchronisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2365 Ensuring data consistency and integrity
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/445 by mutual authentication, e.g. between devices or programs
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6218 to a system of files or objects, e.g. local or distributed file system or database
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/5015 Service provider selection
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2113 Multi-level security, e.g. mandatory access control
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2149 Restricted operating environment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/10 Requirements analysis; Specification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/20 Software design
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/24 Object-oriented
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/30 Creation or generation of source code
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/41 Compilation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/61 Installation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/63 Image based installation; Cloning; Build to order
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/658 Incremental updates; Differential updates
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/71 Version control security arrangements therefor G06F21/57; Configuration management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/449 Object-oriented method invocation or resolution
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4843 by program, e.g. task dispatcher, supervisor, operating system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5011 the resources being hardware resources other than CPUs, Servers and Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5027 : the resource being a machine, e.g. CPUs, Servers, Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5044 : considering hardware capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5072 : Grid computing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/54 : Interprogram communication
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/541 : via adapters, e.g. between incompatible applications
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/542 : Event management; Broadcasting; Multicasting; Notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1083 : In-session procedures
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1094 : Inter-user-equipment sessions transfer or sharing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/80 : Responding to QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 : in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 : Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1068 : Discovery involving direct consultation or announcement among potential requesting and potential source peers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1072 : Discovery involving ranked list compilation of candidate peers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 : Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 : Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 : Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/08 : Protocols for interworking; Protocol conversion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/24 : Negotiation of communication capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/328 : in the presentation layer [OSI layer 6]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/41265 : having a remote control device for bidirectional communication between the remote control device and client device unidirectional remote control device H04N21/42204
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 : Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/00 : Reducing energy consumption in communication networks

Abstract

System, device, method, and computer program and computer program products for providing communicating between devices having similar or dissimilar characteristics and facilitating seamless interoperability between them. Computer program software and methods of and systems and devices for sharing of content, applications, resources and control across similar and dissimilar permanently or intermittently connected electronic devices. Devices, systems, appliances, and the like communicating and/or interoperating within the framework provided. A recruitment interoperability method and model provide an alternative to the conventional client-server and peer-to-peer device interoperability models. Recruitment is used by a software application package to forms teams of devices based on their capabilities and content and then intelligently spread portions of itself to the teams of devices which then work together to carry out the intended purpose of the application package.

Claims

1. A method for a software application running on a source device to recruit a team of devices, the method comprising:

sending an inspection procedure operative to find a device having a needed resource or capability to at least one reachable device different from the initiating source device over at least one communication link, the inspection procedure including inspection procedure instructions coded in an executable form common to both the initiating source device and to the device the inspection procedure is intended to reach;

receiving on the initiating device the return response from each of the reachable devices directly or indirectly over a communication link;

analyzing, by a procedure executing on the initiating device, the received returns from all responding reachable devices to determine a utilization plan identifying the combination of capabilities and resources of the initiating source device and the responding reachable devices to best carry out the intent of the software application; and

distributing, by an application program executing on the initiating device, at least one of executable code, data, content, and/or Dart to at least one of each of the reachable devices identified as having a needed resource or capability according to the identified utilization plan.

84. A method as in claim 1, wherein the software application running on more than one device is at least partially performing the interoperability operations on two or more devices with code and or data and or content that were originally part of a single software package on the initiating device so as to enjoy a reliably of interoperability greater than that where independently developed and or independently distributed applications are used to perform the interoperability operations.

2. A method for recruiting a team of devices, the method comprising:

receiving on a candidate device and executing an inspection procedure operative to determine if a receiving reachable candidate device has a resource or capability needed by another recruiting device over a communication link, the inspection procedure including inspection procedure instructions coded in an executable form known to both the receiving device and the recruiting device; and

identifying the source device for the received inspection procedure and sending a return to the source device status and information about whether the receiving reachable device has access to a resource or capability or set of resources and capabilities identified as being needed by the initiating source device; and

receiving in the case where the reachable device is determined by the source device to have resources or capabilities needed to form a team to carry out the intent of a software application at least one of executable code, data, content, and/or Dart from the source, device, recruiting device, or another candidate device.

3. A method for recruiting a team of devices, the method comprising:

(a) sending, from an initiating source device, an inspection procedure operative to find a device having a needed resource or capability to at least one reachable device different from the initiating source device over at least one communication link, the inspection procedure including inspection procedure instructions coded in an executable form common to both the initiating source device and to device the inspection procedure is intended to reach;

(b) receiving and executing the received inspection procedure on each of the reachable devices to identify if there is at least one resource or capability of the reachable device needed by the initiating source device;

(c) sending a return to the initiating source device at least when the reachable device has access to a resource or capability identified as being needed by the initiating source device;

(d) receiving the return from each of the reachable devices directly or indirectly over the communication link;

(e) analyzing, by an application executing on the initiating device, the received returns from all responding reachable devices to determine a utilization plan identifying the combination of capabilities and resources of the initiating source device and the responding reachable devices to best carry out the intent of the application; and

(f) distributing, by an application program executing on the initiating device, at least one of executable code, data, content, and/or Dart to at least one of each of the reachable devices identified as having a needed resource or capability according to the identified utilization plan.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising receiving, by the at least one reachable device, the distributed at least one of executable code, data, content, and/or Dart.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the method further comprises:

interoperating with the at least one reachable device to which the at least one of executable code, data, content, and Dart was distributed to carry out at least a portion of the initiating device'"'"'s application'"'"'s intent.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the method further comprises:

with each reachable device acting as secondary initiating source devices, spreading executable code, data, content, and/or Dart, across the initiating and reachable devices optionally together with the application code, data, content, and or Darts resident on the reachable devices farther recursively to other devices reachable by previously reached and teamed devices as necessary to extend the application as needed or as desired to other reachable devices until all or a predetermined criteria of desired devices and resources or capabilities needed or desired to carry out the intent of the original initiating device application have been reached, effectively forming a larger complete team of devices; and

distributing executable code, data, content, and/or Dart from and among the team of initiating and reachable devices according to the needs and desires of the initiating device application to perform the required or desired operations and resource access to carry out the intent of the initiating device'"'"'s application by executing code and exchanging whatever executable code, data, and content and or Darts are necessary to carry out and/or coordinate the operations that are to performed across the team of devices to carry out the intent of the initiating application.

7. The method of claim 3, wherein the initiating source device receives the return directly from an initially reached device that the initiating device sent the recruitment message to or indirectly from another reachable device via one or more intermediary reachable devices in a serial or recursive manner.

8. The method of claim 3, wherein the return to the initiating source device is also sent when the reachable device does not have access to a resource or capability identified as being needed by the initiating source device.

9. The method of claim 3, wherein the return to the initiating source device is a simple parameter that identifies that the reachable device has itself or access to (e.g., true or logical “

1”

) or does not have itself or access to (e.g., false or logical “

0”

) the resource or capability identified as being needed by the initiating source device.

10. The method of claim 3, wherein the return to the initiating source device comprises one of a DartEvent, a part of a Dart, data, content, executable procedures, a Dart, a plurality of darts, and any combination of these.

11. The method of claim 3, wherein the return to the initiating source device comprises returned data or content identifying the resources and/or capabilities of the particular reachable device to the initiating device over the communication protocols.

12. The method of claim 3, wherein the inspection procedure includes an instruction to inspect for at least one particular identified resource or capability needed by the initiating source device to carry out the intent of the application task being performed at least in part on the initiating source device.

13. The method of claim 3, wherein the method is implemented at least in part by a software application encoded as a computer program product recruiting and effectively running an application across a team of devices.

14. The method of claim 3, wherein the method is effective to couple and subsequently permit control of the operations of the recruiting and recruited devices as if they were one device with the combined resources of all the recruiting and recruited devices.

15. The method of claim 3, wherein the returns comprises any one of:

no return, a data or content return, any digitally encoded information, one or more procedures, an indication that the device will be useful, a returned event, a return event containing any amount of data or sets of data via its file payload, a return procedure, a Dart, a return event that includes text names and descriptions of the device so a human can select from a menu on the initiating device which device(s) to use, an identifier of a specific package of at least one instance of a set of executable code, data and content residing on or capable of being generated on the source device, rendition or set of renditions most suitable to run on the device or a combination of any of these.

16. The method of claim 3, wherein the at least one resource or capability is selected from the set consisting of:

(i) available resources or a particular needed resource;

(ii) available capabilities or a particular needed capability;

(iii) one or more interrelated sets of resources and capabilities of the reachable device, or those resources and/or capabilities available to the reachable device for carrying out the intent of the application; and

(iv) any combination of these.

17. The method of claim 3, wherein the resources or capabilities include at least one of an identified capability selected from the set of resources or capabilities consisting of:

an identified data manipulation software, an identified information processing software, an identified computational software, an identified picture processing software, an identified communications software, an identified communications hardware, an identified media, an identified data set(s), an identified content, an identified program or programs, an identified configuration information, an identified graphics acceleration hardware or software, an identified storage medium whether temporary or not temporary (permanent), an identified printing capability, an identified faxing capability, an identified scanning capability, an identified user interface device whether input or output or both input and output, an access to the resources of other devices with which the device can communicate and with which the other devices can communicate in an unending chain, and any combination of two or more of these.

18. A method as in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedures in a common executable form comprises at least one inspection procedure formed from a Dart compliant instruction set (DartInstructionSet) as embodied in a Dart instruction compatible engine (DartEngine) or any other Interoperability Instruction Set.

19. A method as in claim 3, wherein the at least one communications link comprises any number of communications links, channels, and/or protocols that comprise any number or set of homogeneous or heterogeneous communications protocols whether wired or wireless, and whether permanently available or intermittent.

20. A method as in claim 3, wherein the heterogeneous and homogeneous communications links, channels, and protocols are supported by an identified hardware abstraction layer implementations that are parts of players running on any two or more communicating devices.

21. A method as in claim 20, wherein the identified hardware abstraction layer implementations comprises a Dart Hardware Abstraction Layer implementation that are components of DartEngines.

22. The method in claim 3, wherein the at least one communications link and a communications protocol are used to send events of a run procedure type, and an event identifier of the event references a file identifying the procedure to run on the reachable device.

23. The method in claim 22, wherein the events comprise DartEvents, and the run procedure type event comprises a Dart RUN_PROCEDURE type event.

24. The method in claim 3, wherein the event identifier that references a file identifying the procedure to run on the reachable device comprises a file identifier of the event referring to a file containing an image of the procedure to run on the reachable device.

25. The method i n claim 24, wherein the file comprises a Dart compliant file (DartFile) conforming to the DartFormat, and the image of the procedure comprises a binary data image of a Dart Procedure (DartProcedure).

26. The method in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedures comprise either DartProcedures or complete Darts.

27. The method in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedures are sent as the file associated with an event, and the receipt of the inspection procedure by a reachable device as the file associated with the event causes the inspection procedure to start executing on the reachable devices.

28. The method in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedure comprises a DartProcedure.

29. The method in claim 3, wherein resources and capabilities including base resources and capabilities of the reachable device are determined through use of an instruction set profile instruction.

30. The method in claim 29, wherein the instruction set profile instruction comprises a Dart compliant profile instruction (Dart PROFILE_INSTRUCTION) of a Dart compliant instruction set (DartInstructionSet).

31. The method in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedure execution within each reachable device determines a best rendition of the initiating Dart embodied application according to a rendition determination rule to be sent to the or each particular reachable device and sends back an identifier of the determined best Rendition as part of the returned data.

32. The method in claim 31, wherein the Rendition determination rule is embodied in as at least one procedures which is adapted to perform any needed computations of any complexity and access any needed profile information through a profile instruction to determine the resources, capability, and/or state of the reachable device.

33. The method in claim 31, wherein the inspection procedure execution determines the best Rendition from a plurality of renditions by reference to rules that define an order of Rendition, and checking each reachable device to determine if all the requirements of each of the plurality of Renditions are met in a predefined order of Rendition preferences until the first Rendition in the ordered plurality of renditions is found that meets all of the Rendition'"'"'s requirements.

34. The method in claim 3, wherein the inspection procedure(s) return Darts, procedures, data, or content to the initiating device over the communication link using an understood communications protocol.

35. The method in claim 3, wherein the returns include at least one of returned procedures, data, or content and any one or combination of:

complete Darts, DartParts, DartProcedures, or DartEvents, and the one or any combination may be returned with or without an associated event file.

36. The method in claim 3, wherein the return includes at least one of returned procedures, data, content, and/or Dart and further optionally includes a return code indicating an error has occurred, the error code identify either that a specific error has occurred or that a non-specific error has occurred, and the error code optionally including information useful in correcting or communicating the particular error and/or the nature of the error.

37. The method of claim 3, wherein the application code is at least one of a Dart, a DartProcedure, or any program of any form that can be executed on the initiating device or on devices which the initiating device has access to for initiating transfer or execution of a program and making use of the results of the execution.

38. The method of claim 3, wherein the application code comprises a Dart, a DartProcedure, or another procedural format that can execute on or otherwise convey information to the reachable device(s) whether or not the procedural format makes use of the DartInstructionSet, to be executed on the reachable device.

39. The method of claim 3, wherein the recruited team of devices may dynamically extend the team to include other reachable devices or reduce the team of devices to exclude reachable devices as desired during the lifetime or defined period of time for execution of the application.

40. The method of claim 3, wherein the distributing is accomplished through the sending of at least one of Darts, DartProcedures, data, content, or other information, or any combination of these, that are encapsulated as part of dart events (DartEvents) whether or not the information referenced by a field in the event is sent along or as part of the event.

41. The method of claim 3, wherein the code, data, and content that have been distributed from and among the team of devices according to the needs of the initiating application, perform the required operations and resource access to carry out the intent of the originating application by executing code and optionally exchanging whatever additional or different code, data, and content that is necessary to carry out or coordinate the operations that are to be performed across the team of devices to further carry out the intent of the initiating application.

42. The method of claim 3 wherein the application is embodied in a single binary image which contains all the code that is distributed to all the devices as part of the recruitment process.

43. The method of claim 3, wherein the method further comprises synchronization, serialization, and coordination of activates on the team of devices, and the synchronization, serialization and coordination is accomplished wholly or in part by the passing or exchanging of events or DartEvents alone or optionally with a file associated with DartEvents or events.

44. The method of claim 43, wherein the events reference at least one file so that they effectively contain and incorporate by that reference a file or files having file images of any complexity by virtue of that reference, and these file images are communicated along with the event structure contents.

45. The method of claim 3, further comprises the passing or exchanging of DartEvents events between interoperating and communicating initiating and recruited devices alone or optionally with a file associated with DartEvents or events, and the events effectively contain files or other data or data structures of any complexity, by a file identifier (field) reference in the DartEvent structure, and that file images when referenced are always communicated along with the event structure contents.

46. The method of claim 43, wherein the DartEvents or events are automatically copied and/or synchronized across event queues of any number of teamed devices by the DartFramework, DartRuntime, and/or DartEngine, or alternatively by a non-DartPlatform specific event driven implementation, so that DartEvents or events which are identified for automatic synchronization and which are placed on an event queue by a Dart appear in the event queues of any number of teamed devices in an automatically serialized and synchronized manner.

47. The method of claim 46, wherein the automatic serialization and synchronization are accomplished by a procedure for automatic serialization and synchronization of event driven cooperative applications, functions or renditions running across a plurality of cooperating devices including an initiating device, the method comprising:

instantiating a connection manager object instance on the originating device by an application for each inter-device cooperative function desired;

communicating a list of event types to be synchronized over all cooperating devices procedurally by the application to the connection manager;

establishing a team of cooperating devices having one connection manager on each device and sharing the same list of synchronization event types; and

maintaining, by the connection manager, a sessions list identifying teamed devices and event types to be synchronized; and

examining, by the connection manager, all events to be put in the event queue, and if a particular event examined is an event type the connection manager knows from the sessions list should be synchronized, then marking the event as an event to be synchronized with the other sessions and placing the event in the event queues of the devices listed in the connection manager.

48. The method of claim 47, wherein all events to be placed on cooperating device event queues by the any one of the event driven cooperative applications functions or renditions are serialized by not allowing an event to be placed on the any one device'"'"'s event queue until it receives acknowledgement that all cooperating device event queues to which the event has been sent directly by the any one device has successfully been placed on the cooperating devices'"'"' event queues.

49. The method of claim 48, wherein all events to be placed on cooperating device event queues received by any one of the event driven cooperative applications functions or renditions are serialized by not allowing an event to be placed on the receiving any one device'"'"'s event queue until it receives acknowledgement that all cooperating device event queues to which the event has been sent by the any receiving one device has successfully been placed on the cooperating devices'"'"' event queues.

50. The method of claim 48, wherein any number of cooperating devices'"'"' event queues whether the devices are communicating directly or indirectly through a chain of directly communicating devices establishes a single serialized system of queued events across all cooperating devices.

51. The method of claim 49, wherein any number of cooperating devices'"'"' event queues whether the devices are communicating directly or indirectly through a chain of directly communicating devices establishes a single serialized system of queued events across all cooperating devices.

52. The method of claim 47, wherein events to be placed on the cooperating devices'"'"' queues from two or more cooperating devices are synchronized into a single serialization of events in the cooperative devices'"'"' queues by a system where only one master device is allowed to place the events of the types in the list of event types to be synchronized so that all such events will be serialized across all cooperating devices.

53. The method of claim 52, wherein the master device is informed of the events to issue on behalf of other cooperating devices by way of a master request event type event which contains all the information needed for the master device to place the intended event into the queues of all cooperating devices.

54. The method of claim 52, wherein each device which has been recruited into the team of cooperating devices by another into the set of cooperating devices considers its relative master device to be the device that recruited it.

55. The method of claim 53, wherein each device which has been recruited into the team of cooperating devices by another into the set of cooperating devices considers its relative master device to be the device that recruited it.

56. The method of claim 54, wherein the placing of a master request event type event into a relative master device'"'"'s queue will cause the event to be propagated from device to relative master device until an initiating master device which has no relative master then forms an event using the information needed for the master device and places the intended event into the queues of all cooperating devices.

57. The method of claim 52, wherein the designated master device can be changed by issuing to the synchronized and/or serialized queues of cooperating devices a change master type event which is itself on the list of serialized events which informs all devices in a synchronized serialized manner that a new master device is to replace the current master device.

58. The method of claim 54, where the master request event propagates thorough the queues of cooperating devices until the new master device processes the event.

59. The method of claim 55, where the master request event propagates thorough the queues of cooperating devices until the new master device processes the event.

60. The method of claim 53, where the optional file identified as part of the event specified to be sent by the master request event type event, if such a file reference is present, is maintained on each propagating device with an identifier that will allow it to be re-associated with the event to be sent by the master as if it had been sent as part of the event sent by the master, this in order to reduce the amount of information that would might otherwise have to be send as part of each event sent as the result of a master request event type processed by the master.

61. An initiating apparatus comprising:

a processor coupled with a memory and adapted to execute a procedure that includes instructions for performance of an intended task;

means for executing at least partially in the processor and memory for recruiting at least one recruited device different from and external to the apparatus to participate in the performance of the intended task, the recruited device including at least the hardware resources necessary for a version of performance of the intended task; and

means stored entirely within the apparatus for supplementing the resources of the recruited device so that the hardware resources plus the enabling supplemented resources make the recruited device fully enabled to perform the intended task.

62. An initiating apparatus as in claim 61, wherein the apparatus and the recruited device each operate in a common procedural environment, and the means executing at least partially in the processor and memory for recruiting includes means for broadcasting a procedure implemented in the common procedural environment over at least one connection to other devices which also include or operate in the common procedural environment.

63. An initiating apparatus as in claim 62, wherein the means for recruiting further includes means for initiating the execution of the procedure on the other devices to programmatically inspect the resources and capabilities of each of the other devices in order to determine if each device has a needed resource or capability to participate in a performance of the particular task.

64. An initiating apparatus as in claim 63, wherein the inspection is performed in each particular other device at least in part by accessing a device specific hardware abstraction layer information stored in or computed about the particular device.

65. An initiating apparatus as in claim 64, wherein the means for supplementing further includes means for sending and installing enabling procedures, data, and/or content that are required to enable each device to carry out its part of the particular task.

66. An initiating apparatus as in claim 61, further including means for temporally or permanently synchronizing operations across the initiating and other devices, the means for synchronizing including a task event queue and means for maintaining the task event queue.

72. A recruited apparatus as in claim 61, further including means for temporally synchronizing operations across the initiating device and the recruited device, the means for synchronizing including a task event queue and means for maintaining the task event queue.

67. A recruited apparatus comprising:

a set of hardware resources including a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, and computer program code resources adapted to the performance of a set of tasks, the hardware resources being capable or performing at least a version of a performance of a particular task but the computer program code resources not initially capable of performance of a desired version or method for carrying out of the particular task or aspect of the particular task and means for receiving a communication including at least one of a computer program code communication and a data communication, the computer program code communication including supplemental computer program code resources that render the apparatus capable of performance of the desired version, method or aspect of the particular task.

68. A recruited apparatus as in claim 67, wherein the recruited apparatus and the initiating device each operate in a common procedural environment.

69. A recruited apparatus as in claim 68, further including means for execution of the procedure received from the initiating device to programmatically inspect the resources and capabilities of the recruited device in order to determine if the recruited device has a needed resource or capability to participate in a performance of the particular task.

70. A recruited apparatus as in claim 69, wherein the inspection is performed in the recruited device at least in part by accessing a device specific hardware abstraction layer information stored in or computed about the recruited device.

71. A recruited apparatus as in claim 70, further comprising means for installing enabling procedures, data, and/or content that are required to enable the recruited device to carry out its part of the particular task.

73. A method for forming an integrated ad-hoc on-the-fly distributed information processing system among a plurality of heterogeneous devices to participate in the performance of a particular task, the method comprising:

initiating formation of the distributed information processing system by an initiating device, the formation including broadcasting a message using at least one communication channel and protocol with the intention to identify and recruit other recruited devices that may possess a resource or capability to participate in the performance of the particular task; and

communicating at least one of procedures, data, and content as required to each of the recruited devices so that each of the recruited devices are made capable of carrying-out its part of the particular task.

74. A method as in claim 73, further comprising:

executing at least partially in a processor and memory of the initiating device a procedure for recruiting at least one recruited device different from and external to the initiating device to participate in the performance of the intended task, the recruited device including at least the hardware resources necessary for a version of performance of the intended task; and

storing entirely within the initiating apparatus a procedure and optional data for supplementing the resources of the recruited device so that the hardware resources plus the enabling supplemented resources make the recruited device fully enabled to perform the intended task.

75. A method as in claim 74, wherein the initiating device and the recruited device each operate in a common procedural environment, and the procedure executing at least partially in the processor and memory for recruiting includes broadcasting a procedure implemented in the common procedural environment over at least one connection to other devices which also include or operate in the common procedural environment.

76. A method as in claim 75, wherein the recruiting further includes initiating the execution of the procedure on the other devices to programmatically inspect the resources and capabilities of each of the other devices in order to determine if each device has a needed resource or capability to participate in a performance of the particular task.

77. A method as in claim 76, wherein the inspection is performed in each particular other recruited device at least in part by accessing a device specific hardware abstraction layer information stored in or computed about the particular device.

78. A method as in claim 77, wherein the supplementing further includes sending and installing enabling procedures, data, and/or content that are required to enable each device to carry out its part of the particular task.

79. A method as in claim 77, further including temporally synchronizing operations across the initiating and other recruited devices, the synchronizing including generating and maintaining a task event queue.

80. A method as in claim 73, wherein the communication is a communication and interaction that is neither in a client-server communication interaction nor in a peer-to-peer communication interaction.

81. A method as in claim 73, wherein the recruitment performs ad hoc device, service, and resource discovery to identify needed devices, then sends enabling procedures and information to the devices using events;

intelligently and effectively forms a team of devices, and then coordinates the team of devices using events, in order to accomplish the goal of the Dart or application or task originally running on the source initiating device.

82. A method as in claim 73, wherein the distributed information processing system includes access and coordinated use of some or all of the physical capabilities of the devices.

83. A method as in claim 82, wherein the physical capabilities of the device are selected from the set that optionally includes an ability to print, fax, display, render music, render video, control other devices, store data whether digital or analog on any media, manufacture goods, provide elimination, take pictures, or any other physical capabilities which can be accessed, monitored or controlled by the processing capabilities of the devices.

85. A computer program product for use in conjunction with a computer system or information appliance, the computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium and a computer program mechanism embedded therein, the computer program mechanism comprising:

a program module that directs the computer system or information appliance to function in a specified manner to recruit a team of recruited devices for interoperation, the program module including instructions for;

sending an inspection procedure operative to find a device having a needed resource or capability to at least one reachable device different from the initiating source device over at least one communication link, the inspection procedure including inspection procedure instructions coded in an executable form common to both the initiating source device and to the device the inspection procedure is intended to reach;

receiving, on the initiating device, the return response from each of the reachable devices directly or indirectly over a communication link;

analyzing, by a procedure executing on the initiating device, the received returns from all responding reachable devices to determine a utilization plan identifying the combination of capabilities and resources of the initiating source device and the responding reachable devices to best carry out the intent of the software application; and

distributing, by an application program executing on the initiating device, at least one of executable code, data, content, and/or Dart to at least one of each of the reachable devices identified as having a needed resource or capability according to the identified utilization plan.

86. A computer program product for use in conjunction with a computer system or information appliance, the computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium and a computer program mechanism embedded therein, the computer program mechanism comprising:

a program module that directs the computer system or information appliance to function in a specified manner to form an integrated ad-hoc on-the-fly distributed information processing system among a plurality of heterogeneous devices to act as a single virtual device and participate in the performance of a particular task, the program module including instructions for;

initiating formation of the distributed information processing system by an initiating device, the formation including broadcasting a message using at least one communication channel and protocol with the intention to identify and recruit other recruited devices that may possess a resource or capability to participate in the performance of the particular task; and

communicating at least one of procedures, data, and content as required to each of the recruited devices so that each of the recruited devices are made capable of carrying-out its part of the particular task.