METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING SYNCHRONIZED VIEWS OF MULTIPLE APPLICATIONS FOR DISPLAY ON A REMOTE COMPUTING DEVICE

• US 20130346482A1
• Filed: 06/20/2013
• Published: 12/26/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/21/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Calgary Scientific Inc.
• Original Assignee: Calgary Scientific Inc.
• Inventors: Holmes, Colin J.
• Granted Patent: US 9,729,673 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1454 involving copying of the display data of a local workstation or window to a remote workstation or window so that an actual copy of the data is displayed simultaneously on two or more displays, e.g. teledisplay
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/452 Remote windowing, e.g. X-Window System, desktop virtualisation protocols for virtual reality H04L67/131
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/14 Display of multiple viewports
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• 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 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/131 Protocols for games, networked simulations or virtual reality

Abstract

A method and system of providing remote access at a client computer that executes a client remote access program that simultaneously communicates with first and second server remote access programs. The first and second server remote access programs determine first and second presentation data indicative of an application state of first and second application programs. The client remote access program receives the first and the second presentation data and determines display data in dependence thereupon for substantially simultaneously displaying the first and the second presentation data. The first and second application programs are provided with an out-of-band communication path to synchronize data between themselves, without the synchronization occurring through the client remote access program.

Claims

1. A method of providing remote access to a plurality of application programs executing on plural server computers, comprising:

providing at least one server remote access program on each the plural server computers, each of the plural server remote access programs being in communication with a respective one of plural application programs;

providing at least one remote connection to a client remote access program executing on a client computer, and the client remote access program communicating with the at least one server remote access program over the at least one remote connection to enable access to the plural application programs;

providing a communication connection between the plural server computers to synchronize the state among the plural server computers;

communicating presentation data representing a change in a state of at least one of the plural application programs to the client remote access program; and

displaying the presentation data at the client computer.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication connection comprises at least one of a shared memory space, a socket, a direct path between the plural server computers, a local path that traverses a local area network between the plural server computers, and a wide area network path that between the plural server computers.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication connection between the plural server computers excludes the client computer.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein communication connection utilizes interprocess communication (IPC) facilities.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the communication connection is provided between the plural server remote access programs.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising substantially simultaneously displaying, in accordance with the presentation data, a user interface associated with each of the plural application programs.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

defining interaction zones on a display of the client computer; and

associating interactive functionalities of each of the plural application programs with a respective interaction zone.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein a same interactive functionality of the plural application programs are associated with a same interaction zone.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

providing the at least one remote connection to plural client remote access programs executing on plural client computers;

communicating presentation data representing a change in a state of at least one of the plural application programs to the plural client remote access programs; and

displaying the presentation data at the plural client computer.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

associating the interaction zones with off-screen display buffers having characteristics that are independent of hardware capabilities of either of the plural server computers and the plural client computers; and

sizing, by at least one of the plural server computers, the interaction zones to match each client computer in a round robin fashion as each client computer connected to the plural server computers is updated.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

defining the interaction zones having one size for all of the plural client computers; and

sending interaction zone scaling instructions to each client computer for display.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing the at least one remote connection to plural client remote access programs executing on plural client computers;

communicating presentation data representing a change in a state of at least one of the plural application programs to the plural client remote access programs; and

displaying the presentation data at the plural client computer.

13. An apparatus for providing remote access to a plurality of application programs executing on plural server computers, comprising:

a first server having a first memory and a first processor, the first server executing a first server remote access program on the first processor that is in communication with a first application program; and

a second server having a second memory and a second processor, the second server executing a second server remote access program on the second processor that is in communication with a second application program,

wherein a communication connection is provided between the first server and the second server to synchronize a state between the first server and the second server, wherein presentation data representing a change in the state of at least one of the first application program and the second application program is communicated to a client remote access program associated with a client computer in remote communication with the first server remote access program and the second sever remote access program, and wherein the client computer displays the presentation data on a display associated with at the client computer.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the communication connection comprises at least one of a shared memory space, a socket, a direct path between the plural server computers, a local path that traverses a local area network between the plural server computers, and a wide area network path that between the plural server computers.

15. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein communication connection utilizes interprocess communication (IPC) facilities.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein a user interface associated with the first application program and the second application program is substantially simultaneously displayed in accordance with the presentation data.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein interaction zones are defined on a display of the client computer, and wherein interactive functionalities of the first application program and the second application program are associated with a respective interaction zone.

18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein plural client remote access programs execute on respective plural client computers, wherein presentation data representing a change in a state of at least one of the first application program and the second application program is provided to the plural client remote access programs, and wherein the presentation data is displayed at the plural client computers.

19. A method of providing remote access to a plurality of application programs executing on plural server computers, comprising:

providing a server remote access program on each of the plural server computers, each server remote access program being in communication with a respective one of plural application programs;

synchronizing, among the plural server computers, presentation data associated with each the plurality of application programs;

communicating the presentation data associated with the plurality of application programs to a client remote access program executing on a client computing device;

determining display data to be displayed at the computing device in accordance with the presentation data; and

simultaneously displaying the presentation data to display a view of the plural application programs.

20. The method of claim 19, further comprising synchronizing the presentation data using an out-of-band communication link between the plural server computers.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the out-of-band communication link utilizes interprocess communication (IPC) facilities.

22. The method of claim 19, further comprising:

defining interaction zones within the view displayed on a display of the client computer; and

associating interactive functionalities of each of the plural application programs with a respective interaction zone.