Method and apparatus for instantaneous in-band document exchange during a video conference

• US 5,764,279 A
• Filed: 08/01/1997
• Issued: 06/09/1998
• Est. Priority Date: 09/01/1993
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Unify Inc. (Atos SE)
• Original Assignee: Siemens Business Communication Systems Inc. (Siemens AG)
• Inventors: Ford, Gordon Douglas, Saegert, Pamela, Duncan, Michael Glen
• Primary Examiner(s): Kuntz, Curtis
• Assistant Examiner(s): PALAN, STEPHEN C
• Application Number:
  US08/905,283
• Time in Patent Office: 312 Days
• Field of Search: 348/14-17, 370/259-265, 358/400, 358/468, 379/90.01, 379/93.01, 379/93.05, 379/93.08, 379/93.14, 379/93.15, 379/93.21, 379/93.26, 379/100.01, 379/100.13, 379/100.17
• US Class Current: 348/14.08
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00098 via a television channel, e.g. for a series of still pictures with or without sound
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32 Circuits or arrangements for control or supervision between transmitter and receiver or between image input and image output device, e.g. between a still-image camera and its memory or between a still-image camera and a printer device H04N1/38, H04N1/387 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3261 of multimedia information, e.g. a sound signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/147 Communication arrangements, e.g. identifying the communication as a video-communication, intermediate storage of the signals selecting H04Q
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/15 Conference systems

Abstract

A method and apparatus for "piggy backing" a FAX transmission on a video call. A document, in the form of modulated facsimile data, is received from a machine located in proximity of a sending station. The document is demodulated, packetized and a header, indicating that the packet contains facsimile data, is added. The packets are then injected into a digital video stream carrying video conference data bound for the receiving station.

Claims

1. A method of exchanging facsimile data between a local station and a remote station, with each of said local and remote stations having facsimile capability and video capability, comprising the steps of:

generating modulated facsimile data in response to operation of a first facsimile machine that is located in physical proximity to the local station;

receiving the modulated facsimile data at an interface module coupled to a video conferencing system of the local station, the modulated facsimile data being generated by the first facsimile machine from a document to be imaged;

demodulating the facsimile data so as to form digital facsimile data;

formatting the digital facsimile data into packets, including selecting between formatting the digital facsimile data into facsimile-directed packets for imaging the document via a second facsimile machine at the remote station and formatting the digital facsimile data into video-directed packets for imaging the document via a video conference screen in physical proximity to the second facsimile machine at the remote station;

automatically injecting the packets of digital facsimile data into a digital video stream carrying video conference data bound for the remote station;

receiving a data stream at the local station from the remote station, including receiving video data from the remote station; and

selectively converting a portion of the video data received from the remote station into facsimile data and forming a facsimile image of the converted portion of video data at the first facsimile machine.

2. The method of claim 1 comprising the further step of displaying the document on the video conference screen at the remote station in response to video-directed packets that were formatted as video-directed packets at the local station.

3. The method of claim 1 comprising the further step of adding a header to the facsimile-directed packets, indicative that the facsimile-directed packets contain the formatted facsimile data, thereby distinguishing the facsimile-directed packets from the video-directed packets.

4. The method of claim 3 comprising the further steps of receiving the packets at the remote station;

remodulating, as analog facsimile data, only the data in the facsimile-directed packets containing the header, stripping the header, and, sending the remodulated data to the second facsimile machine located in proximity to the remote station.

9. The method of claim 4, wherein said second facsimile machine is automatically dialed prior to the step of sending said remodulated data.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the step that includes converting the portion of video data into facsimile data and forming the facsimile image includes substeps of:

storing the contents of a video image from said remote station in a video frame buffer of said local station;

receiving the contents of said video frame buffer at said interface module of said local station; and

transmitting modulated facsimile data that is representative of said video image to said first facsimile machine to thereby produce a snapshot of said video image at said first facsimile machine.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein said interface module automatically establishes communications with said first facsimile machine upon receipt of the contents of said video frame buffer.

5. An apparatus for handling facsimile capabilities during a video conference involving a local system and a remote system, comprising:

VCS interface means for interfacing with data and control lines of a local video conferencing system having a local video frame buffer;

communication means, connected to said VCS interface means, for transmitting facsimile data to a remote FAX machine and to a remote video frame buffer;

said communication means forming a facsimile copy in response to incoming facsimile data received at the VCS interface means from the remote FAX machine and in response to selected video information received as video data at the local video frame buffer from said remote system;

header injection means, connected to receive outgoing facsimile data from the communication means and to send an outgoing digital video data stream to the VCS interface means, for adding a header to first outgoing facsimile data that is to be transmitted to the remote FAX machine, the header identifying the first outgoing facsimile data as FAX-directed facsimile data, the header thereby distinguishing the first outgoing facsimile data that is transmitted to the remote FAX machine from second outgoing facsimile data that is to be transmitted to the remote video frame buffer of said remote system; and

,

FAX data detector means, connected to receive an incoming video data stream from the VCS interface means and to send the incoming facsimile data embedded in the incoming video data stream to the communication means, for detecting data having an identifying header in the incoming video data stream, for stripping the identifying header from the data, and for forwarding the data to the communications means;

wherein the FAX directed facsimile data having the header is automatically transmitted over a common data link with a video conference being transacted by way of the video conferencing system.

6. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the communication means includes an asynchronous transmitter coupled to the remote FAX machine.

7. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the communication means includes a FAX modem.

8. The apparatus of claim 7 further comprising link interface means, coupled to the FAX modem, for interfacing with a telephony communication line.

12. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein said VCS interface means includes means for accepting the contents of the local video frame buffer of said local video conferencing system to thereby create a snapshot of a video image that is sent to the communication means as facsimile data.

13. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein said FAX modem includes an autodialer for automatically establishing communications with said remote FAX machine upon detection of data to be transmitted.

14. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein said communications means further includes a plurality of I/O ports adapted to be coupled to a document scanner and printer.