Abstract: An electronic blackboard displays information and optically detects input information on a display/writing surface by determining the corresponding coordinates. To determine the input coordinates, a predetermined number of pairs of light emitting elements and light detecting elements are placed in parallel for each axis near the edges. The light emitting elements and the light detecting elements are also linearly and equidistantly placed. A control unit is connected to the light emitting elements for sequentially activating these light emitting elements and for controlling the light detecting elements to detect the light in an overlapping manner. Based upon the above positional information from the light detecting elements, an input coordinate determination unit determines the input coordinates of an input on the display/writing surface.

Abstract: An electronic blackboard displays information and optically detects input information on a display/writing surface by determining the corresponding coordinates. To determine the input coordinates, a predetermined number of pairs of light emitting elements and light detecting elements are placed in parallel for each axis near the edges. The light emitting elements and the light detecting elements are also linearly and equidistantly placed. A control unit is connected to the light emitting elements for sequentially activating these light emitting elements and for controlling the light detecting elements to detect the light in an overlapping manner. Based upon the above positional information from the light detecting elements, an input coordinate determination unit determines the input coordinates of an input on the display/writing surface.

Abstract: A method, computer readable medium and apparatus for inputting information which includes coordinate data. The method includes extracting a predetermined object from an image which includes a predetermined object above a plane; detecting a motion of the predetermined object while the predetermined object is within a predetermined distance from the plane; and then determining whether to input predetermined information.

Abstract: Slave terminals and a master terminal are wirelessly connected according to the Bluetooth protocol. When a number of the slave terminals exceeds a predetermined number of the slave terminals for the wireless connection, the wireless connections are controlled by a predetermined set of rules. Active slave terminals are switched into inactive slave terminals according to the predetermined rules so as to efficiently use the resources in the system. The system is used for a data conferencing or class room instructions.

Abstract: An optimal pen color is automatically selected for a given background color based upon a predetermined relative distance in the Munsell color-order system. The predetermined distance is defined in terms of saturation, hue and or lightness. In general, sufficient visual distinction is observed when the color representations of the pen and the background are separated by the predetermined relative distance in the Munsell color-order system.

Abstract: An electronic blackboard displays information and optically detects input information on a display/writing surface by determining the corresponding coordinates. To determine the input coordinates, a predetermined number of pairs of light emitting elements and light detecting elements are placed in parallel for each axis near the edges. The light emitting elements and the light detecting elements are also linearly and equidistantly placed. A control unit is connected to the light emitting elements for sequentially activating these light emitting elements and for controlling the light detecting elements to detect the light in an overlapping manner. Based upon the above positional information from the light detecting elements, an input coordinate determination unit determines the input coordinates of an input on the display/writing surface.

Abstract: A wireless communication system in which an angle range of an operational device such as a keyboard or a drawing input device or other peripheral devices are usable, is expanded, and the operability of the device is improved. The system includes at least one data sending unit and a data processing unit remote from the data sending unit. The data processing unit includes a plurality of wireless data communication units each of which includes a wireless data receiving element capable of receiving data transmitted from the data sending unit by wireless communication. The wireless data communication units are directed to different directions. The data processing unit performs a wireless communication with the data sending unit by selecting one of the wireless data communication units.

Abstract: An information-inputting device is provided which device includes a plurality of photographing units photographing an area on a plane; an object-recognizing unit extracting an object located on the plane from a photographed image, and recognizing whether the object is a specific object; a location-calculating unit calculating a contact position of the specific object on the plane from the photographed image if the object has been recognized as the specific object; and a data-storing unit storing information about a track of the contact position while the specific object is contacting the plane. The information-inputting device determines a shape of the object on the plane by use of the object-recognizing unit, and calculates the contact positions of the specific object by use of the location-calculating unit if the object has been determined as the specific object by the object-recognizing unit.

Abstract: In a communication conference method which uses display units in order to display handwritten inputs, handwritten input signals are transmitted between first and second terminals to perform a communication conference session. Information concerning numbers of pixels of the display units are exchanged between the first and second terminals. The next step is to set a common display area used in the communication conference session. The common display area has the smaller of the number of pixels of the first terminal and the number of pixels of the second terminal.

Abstract: History information indicating a history of how respective items of help information have been displayed in a data processing apparatus is formed and stored. A function of outputting a list of the history information is provided. A center data processing apparatus collects, via a communications network, such history information from one or many user data processing apparatuses which the center apparatus manages. This collection is achieved either in response to the center apparatus sending a request or by a function of each user apparatus such that each user apparatus automatically sends the history information to the center apparatus periodically. The thus-collected history information is integrated and thus numbers of times of display of help information are summed for every item of history information or for every item of operation guidance information. Instead, the thus-collected history information may be individually stored.

Abstract: A communication system includes: a source multimedia station; a destination multimedia station; a first unit for generating a first random number in response to a connection start request, for transmitting the first random number to the destination multimedia station, and for receiving a second random number from the destination multimedia station; a second unit for generating a second random number in response to a connection start request, for transmitting the second random number to the source multimedia station, and for receiving the first random number from the source multimedia station; a control unit for establishing a telewriting connection between the two stations over a network by performing a telewriting connection protocol in response to a telewriting connection request issued from one of the two stations; and a unit for allowing the one of the two stations to issue a telewriting connection request to the other station, based on the result of comparison between the first random number and the seco