Remotely accessing a computing device in a low-power state

• US 7,778,675 B1
• Filed: 01/13/2006
• Issued: 08/17/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/14/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: American Megatrends International, LLC
• Original Assignee: American Megatrends Incorporated
• Inventors: Righi, Stefano
• Primary Examiner(s): Le; Lana N
• Assistant Examiner(s): Hsieh; Ping Y
• Application Number:
  US11/332,542
• Time in Patent Office: 1,677 Days
• Field of Search: 713/320, 713/324, 455/419, 455/418, 455/566, 455/557, 455/574, 455/41.2
• US Class Current: 455/574
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3209 Monitoring remote activity, e.g. over telephone lines or network connections
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/10 Connection setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

Aspects provide a computer-readable medium for accessing computer applications and application data on a computer operating in a low-power state utilizing a wireless device and providing the requested information in a usable format over a short-range communications link. According to one aspect, a computer-readable medium causes a computer to receive a request for data over a short-range wireless link. If the computer is in a standby state, a low-power state is initiated, a software component is executed to receive the request, retrieve the data, format the data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device. If the computer is in a hibernation mode, a pre-boot application is executed to retrieve, format, and send the stored data to the wireless device or to initiate a low-power or power-on state and forward the request to a software component for retrieving the requested data.

Claims

1. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

establish a short-range wireless communications link with a wireless device;

receive a request from the wireless device for application data located on the computing device;

determine whether the computing device is in a hibernation state or in a standby state;

if the computing device is in a hibernation state, execute a pre-boot application within a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) of the computing device without causing the computing device to exit the hibernation state, the pre-boot application configured to receive a data request from the wireless device while the computing device is in the hibernation state, retrieve the data from a location accessible to the pre-boot application while the computer is operating in the pre-boot environment, format the data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device;

if the computing device is in a standby state, initiate a low-power state, execute a software component operative to provide a first interface for communicating with an application and an application data storage device and a second interface for communicating with a wireless device, and

wherein the software component is operative to receive a request at the second interface for data stored by the application, translate the request to a format necessary to retrieve the requested data through the first interface, retrieve the data through the first interface, format the data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device through the second interface.

2. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein establishing the short-range communications link comprises:

receiving a low power, short-range radio signal comprising an identification of the wireless device;

authenticating the signal at the computing device as being from an allowed wireless device; and

transmitting a response signal identifying the computing device.

3. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the computing device comprises a laptop computer.

4. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the short-range communications link comprises a BLUETOOTH communications link.

5. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, further comprising computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

execute the software component;

wherein execute a pre-boot application operative to receive a data request from the wireless device comprises initiate an operating system boot sequence in response to receiving the request for data, and send the request to the software component.

6. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the application data comprises at least one of electronic mail, contact information, and calendar information.

7. The computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the request from the wireless device for application data located on the computing device is a request for a specified portion of a file and wherein the software component is further operative to extract the requested portion from the file, format the extracted portion for display on the wireless device, and send the extracted portion to the wireless device through the second interface.

8. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions which, when executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to:

receive a request from a wireless device over a short-range wireless communications link for application data located on the computing device;

determine whether the computing device is in a hibernation state or in a standby state;

if the computing device is in the hibernation state, execute a pre-boot application within a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) of the computing device without causing the computing device to exit the hibernation state, wherein the pre-boot application is operative to receive the request at a second interface for the requested application data and execute means for retrieving the requested data through a first interface, retrieve the requested application data via the first interface, format the application data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device via the second interface; and

if the computing device is in a standby state, initiate a low-power state, execute a software component operative to provide a first interface for communicating with an application and an application data storage device and a second interface for communicating with a wireless device, and wherein the software component is operative to receive a request at the second interface for data stored by the application, translate the request to a format necessary to retrieve the requested data through the first interface, retrieve the data through the first interface, format the data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device through the second interface.

9. The computer-readable medium of claim 8, further comprising computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

export application data to a repository that is accessible to the pre-boot application while the computer is in the hibernation state according to user-defined parameters such that the requested application data is retrieved from the repository.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the user-defined parameters comprise computer-executable instructions which, when executed by the computer, cause the computer to export a specified portion of a file to the repository according to a selected time interval.

11. The computer-readable medium of claim 10, wherein executing means for retrieving the requested data comprises extracting the requested portion of a file from the repository, formatting the portion for display on the wireless device, and sending the portion of the file to the wireless device.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein executing means for retrieving the requested data comprises sending the request to a software component, wherein the software component is operative to receive the request for data stored by the application at a second software component interface for communicating with the wireless device, translate the request to a format necessary to retrieve the requested data through a first software component interface, retrieve the data through the first software component interface for communicating with an application and application data storage device, format the data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device through the second software component interface.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 12, wherein the request from the wireless device for the application data located on the computing device comprises a request for a specified portion of a file, and wherein retrieving the data through the first software component interface for communicating with the application and application data storage device comprises extracting the requested portion from the file through the first software component interface.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein causing the computing device to format the application data for display on the wireless device comprises causing the computing device to extract only a requested portion of data from an application data file and configure the data for display according to display characteristics of the wireless device.

15. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions which, when executed by a computing device, cause the computing device to:

establish a communications link with the wireless device;

receive a request from the wireless device for application data located on the computing device, wherein the request from the wireless device for application data located on the computing device comprises a request for a specified portion of a file;

determine whether the computing device is in a standby state or a hibernation state;

if the computing device is in the standby state, initiate a low-power state and execute a software component operative to provide a first interface for communicating with an application and application data storage device and a second interface for communicating with the wireless device, wherein the software component is operative to receive the request for the specified portion of the application data file at the second interface, interface with an application associated with the application data file to search for the requested portion of the application data file, extract the requested portion of the application data file from the application data file through the first interface, format the extracted data for display on the wireless device, and send the data to the wireless device through the second interface; and

if the computing device is in the hibernation state, execute a pre-boot application within a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) of the computing device without causing the computing device to exit the hibernation state, the pre-boot application configured to receive a request from the wireless device for application data stored by the computing device, to retrieve the application data from a repository without causing the computing device to exit the hibernation state, and to respond to the request from the wireless device with the application data without causing the computing device to exit the hibernation state.

16. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, further comprising computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to export the specified portion of the application data file to the repository according to a selected time interval.

17. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein the data sent to the wireless device from the software component is formatted according to the available bandwidth of the communications link between the computing device and the wireless device.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein formatting the extracted data for display on the wireless device comprises formatting the data according to a form factor of a display of the wireless device.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein the portion of the file that is requested is selected by the user of the wireless device such that only user-specified data selections are pulled from the computing device to the wireless device.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein the communications link comprises the Internet.

21. The computer-readable medium of claim 15, wherein the wireless device is configured to format the extracted data for display.