Apparatus and system for managing multiple computers
First Claim
1. A computer management system comprising:
- a plurality of host computers, each one including a memory buffer and a host software program executing thereon;
a user console having associated user interface devices including a keyboard, a cursor control device, and a video display unit; and
a management device operatively connecting the user console to the plurality of host computers via a communications channel, wherein the management device manages keyboard control signals and cursor control signals transmitted from the user console to the plurality of host computers, buffers incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers, permits selection of a selected one of the plurality of host computers, and permits simultaneous display of the incoming video frames from the plurality of host computers on the video display unit, the management device including a management software program executing thereon and a video processing unit including a video frame buffer memory;
wherein the host software program and the management software program operate together to provide automatic generation of commands to transfer data from the selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least a second one of the plurality of host computers by monitoring a first memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, and upon detecting the data being added to the first memory buffer, copying the data to a second memory buffer of the second one of the plurality of host computers;
wherein the video processing unit is adapted to display on the video display unit windows controlled by each of the plurality of host computers while suppressing display of portions of video frames generated by respective ones of the plurality of host computers; and
wherein the video processing unit is adapted to reduce total video bandwidth processed by the video processing unit by performing at least one of selectively reducing resolution of the chrominance and selectively cropping video data corresponding to portions of incoming video frames from one of the plurality of host computers when the portions of incoming video frames would be displayed behind video from other ones of the plurality of host computers.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A system is presented for interconnecting a single user console having user interface devices, including a console keyboard, a console video display unit, a console mouse, and speakers, to a plurality of host computers each capable of using user interface devices, including a keyboard, a video display unit, and a mouse, and allowing the user to access one or more of the host computers from the single user console. The video output from each of the host computers is scaled and cropped as appropriate so that the video output of each host may be simultaneously displayed as host computer “windows” on the console video display unit or overlaid with the background suppressed to display application windows from multiple hosts on a single screen. The user may easily navigate between the host computers through a convenient and intuitive user interface that allows control of individual host computers, the transfer of files between computers using familiar a “drag and drop” interface, and copying and pasting of data between applications running on different computers. The audio output from each of the host computers may be mixed or switched for output to the speakers as desired.
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Citations
32 Claims
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1. A computer management system comprising:
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a plurality of host computers, each one including a memory buffer and a host software program executing thereon; a user console having associated user interface devices including a keyboard, a cursor control device, and a video display unit; and a management device operatively connecting the user console to the plurality of host computers via a communications channel, wherein the management device manages keyboard control signals and cursor control signals transmitted from the user console to the plurality of host computers, buffers incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers, permits selection of a selected one of the plurality of host computers, and permits simultaneous display of the incoming video frames from the plurality of host computers on the video display unit, the management device including a management software program executing thereon and a video processing unit including a video frame buffer memory; wherein the host software program and the management software program operate together to provide automatic generation of commands to transfer data from the selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least a second one of the plurality of host computers by monitoring a first memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, and upon detecting the data being added to the first memory buffer, copying the data to a second memory buffer of the second one of the plurality of host computers; wherein the video processing unit is adapted to display on the video display unit windows controlled by each of the plurality of host computers while suppressing display of portions of video frames generated by respective ones of the plurality of host computers; and wherein the video processing unit is adapted to reduce total video bandwidth processed by the video processing unit by performing at least one of selectively reducing resolution of the chrominance and selectively cropping video data corresponding to portions of incoming video frames from one of the plurality of host computers when the portions of incoming video frames would be displayed behind video from other ones of the plurality of host computers. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A computer management system comprising:
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a plurality of host computers, each one including a memory buffer; a user console having associated user interface devices including a keyboard, a cursor control device, and a video display unit; and a management device operatively connecting the user console to the plurality of host computers via a communications channel, wherein the management device manages keyboard control signals and cursor control signals transmitted from the user console to the plurality of host computers, and includes a video processing unit including a video frame buffer memory; wherein the management device permits the display of video from a selected one of the plurality of host computers on the video display unit and permits display of video representations of the host computers on the video display unit; wherein the management device permits selection of one of the plurality of host computers by selecting a corresponding one of the video representations using the cursor control device; wherein the management device is configured to permit copying of data from a selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least a second one of the plurality of host computers via the communications channel; wherein the management device is configured to permit copying and pasting of data from at least the selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least the second one of the plurality of host computers via the communications channel by monitoring the memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, and upon detection of the data being added to the memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, copying the data to the memory buffer of the second one of the plurality of host computers; and wherein the video processing unit is adapted to display on the video display unit windows controlled by each of the plurality of host computers while suppressing display of portions of video frames generated by respective ones of the plurality of host computers, and to perform at least one of (i) selectively cropping the incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers to prevent the portions of video from being stored in the video frame buffer memory in the video processing unit, and (ii) selectively cropping output video sent to the video display unit to prevent the display of the portions of video data on the video display unit. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17)
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18. In a computer management system comprising a plurality of host computers, and a user console having associated user interface devices including a keyboard, a cursor control device, and a video display unit, a management device operatively connects the user console to the plurality of host computers via a communications channel,
wherein the management device manages keyboard control signals and cursor control signals transmitted from the user console to the plurality of host computers, buffers incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers, permits selection of a selected one of the plurality of host computers, and permits simultaneous display of the incoming video frames from the plurality of host computers on the video display unit; -
wherein the management device is configured to permit copying of data from the selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least one other one of the plurality of host computers by monitoring a first memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, and upon detecting the data being added to the first memory buffer, copying the data to memory buffers of the remaining ones of the plurality of host computers; and wherein the management device includes a video processing unit including a video frame buffer memory, the video processing unit being configured to display on the video display unit windows controlled by each of the plurality of host computers while suppressing display of portions of video frames generated by respective ones of the plurality of host computers, and to perform at least one of (i) selectively cropping the incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers to prevent the portions of video from being stored in the video frame buffer memory in the video processing unit, and (ii) selectively cropping output video sent to the video display unit to prevent the display of the portions of video data on the video display unit. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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30. In a computer management system comprising a plurality of host computers, and a user console having associated user interface devices including a keyboard, a cursor control device, and a video display unit, a management device operatively connects the user console to the plurality of host computers via a communications channel, wherein the management device manages keyboard control signals and cursor control signals transmitted from the user console to the plurality of host computers, and permits the display of video from a selected one of the plurality of host computers on the video display unit and permits display of a video representation of the host computers on the video display unit;
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wherein the management device permits selection of one of the plurality of host computers by selecting a corresponding one of the video representations using the cursor control device; wherein the management device is configured to permit copying of files from any one of the plurality of host computers to any other one of the plurality of host computers via the communications channel; wherein the management device is configured to permit copying and pasting of data from at least the selected one of the plurality of host computers to at least one other one of the plurality of host computers via the communications channel by monitoring a first memory buffer of the selected one of the plurality of host computers, and upon detection the data being added to the first memory buffer, copying the data to at least one other memory buffer of at least one other one of the plurality of host computers; and wherein the management device includes a video processing unit including a video frame buffer memory, the video processing unit being configured to display on the video display unit windows controlled by each of the plurality of host computers while suppressing display of portions of video frames generated by respective ones of the plurality of host computers, and to perform at least one of (i) selectively cropping the incoming video frames received from the plurality of host computers to prevent the portions of video from being stored in the video frame buffer memory in the video processing unit, and (ii) selectively cropping output video sent to the video display unit to prevent the display of the portions of video data on the video display unit. - View Dependent Claims (31, 32)
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Specification