Method and apparatus to connect a general purpose computer to a special purpose system

• US 6,108,696 A
• Filed: 11/14/1997
• Issued: 08/22/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: R2 Solutions LLC (Acacia Research Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Online Anywhere (Apollo Global Management, Inc.)
• Inventors: Lee, Shinn-Der, Mendhekar, Anurag, Vishwanath, Mohan
• Primary Examiner(s): Asta, Frank J.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Jaroenchonwanit, Bunjob
• Application Number:
  US08/970,735
• Time in Patent Office: 1,012 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 709/219, 709/205, 709/206, 709/204, 709/227, 345/333, 345/340, 395/500
• US Class Current: 709/217
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/151 Transformation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/211 Syntactic parsing, e.g. based on context-free grammar [CFG] or unification grammars
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/221 Parsing markup language streams streaming G06F40/149
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2803 Home automation networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2816 Controlling appliance services of a home automation network by calling their functionalities arrangements in telecontrol or telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station; in which substation desired apparatus is selected for applying a control signal thereto or for obtaining measured values therefrom H04Q9/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/303 Terminal profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 Push-based network services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A transducer for transforming a set of syntactic and sampled data from a general purpose system to control a special purpose system. The transducer includes a first and a second transducer modules. The first transducer module is coupled to the general purpose system for receiving the syntactic and sampled data from the general purpose system, and to transform the received data into a different set of syntactic and sampled data. The second transducer module is coupled to the first transducer module for receiving the syntactic and sampled data generated by the first transducer module, and transforming the received data into another set of syntactic and sample data that are different from the other two sets of syntactic and sampled data to control the special purpose system.

Claims

1. A transducer for transforming a set of syntactic and sampled data from a general purpose system to control a special purpose system, the transducer comprising:

a first transducer module

operationally coupled to the general purpose system for receiving the syntactic and sampled data from the general purpose system, and

transforming the received data into a different set of syntactic and sampled data; and

a second transducer module

operationally coupled to the first transducer module for receiving the syntactic and sampled data generated by the first transducer module, and

transforming the received data into another set of syntactic and sample data that are different from the other two sets of syntactic and sampled data to control the special purpose system;

wherein at least one transducer module is separated into two parts, with one part being translated into a programming language, and with the two parts later merged after the translation.

2. A transducer as recited in claim 1 wherein:

the general purpose system is a computer, and

the special purpose system is a television.

3. A transducer as recited in claim 1 wherein:

the set of syntactic and sampled data from the general purpose system are in HTML format.

4. A transducer for transforming a set of syntactic and sampled data from a special purpose system to control a general purpose system, the transducer comprising:

a first transducer module

operationally coupled to the special purpose system for receiving the syntactic and sampled data from the special purpose system, and

transforming the received data into a different set of syntactic and sampled data; and

a second transducer module

operationally coupled to the first transducer module for receiving the syntactic and sampled data generated by the first transducer module, and

transforming the received data into another set of syntactic and sample data that are different from the other two sets of syntactic and sampled data to control the general purpose system;

wherein at least one transducer module is separated into two parts, with one part being translated into a programming language, and with the two parts later merged after the translation.