Abstract: A stand for a portable electronic device includes: an annularly-formed stand body having a first end face and a second end face apart from each other in a direction vertical to a face forming an annular circle of the stand body, the stand body holding therein the portable electronic device to be inserted from a side of the first end face; and a leg portion having side surfaces projected radially outside the stand body so as to reduce the width dimension between the side surfaces. A grounding surface of the stand to be grounded when the stand is mounted is selected from the second end face of the stand body and one of the side surfaces of the leg portion.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for monitoring the operability status of nodes of a communication network determines first node status data at a first node by causing it to diagnose its own status and the status of at least one second node, and to send the first node status data to at least one second node. The first node receives second node status data from at least one second node, and determines node status evaluation data at the first node based on the determined first node status data and the received second node status data.

Abstract: An image pickup device that acquires images is controlled by an image pickup device controller that accepts image acquisition requests from multiple application programs, and an application scheduler selects application programs to be executed. Information indicative of the image data volumes and image data acquisition rates required for each of the multiple application programs is stored and used to select multiple concurrently executable application programs on the basis of the image data volumes and image data acquisition rates. An image acquisition scheduler determines the timing and intervals at which the multiple executable application programs repeat receiving image data from the image pickup device, without overlapping in terms of time. In addition, an operations section, which explicitly presents concurrently executable application programs to a user and commands the startup of these programs, is displayed on a navigation screen menu.

Abstract: A client device is registered with a network server by having the network server generate a key number and emit an optical representation of the key number for optical reception by the client device. The client device determines the key number from the received optical representation, and encrypts or decrypts a communication using the key number, or a value based on the key number. In one embodiment, the optical representation may be either an infrared signal or visible light signal.

Abstract: A method and apparatus is provided for controlling and monitoring the cutting function of a thread cutter driven by an electric motor in looms. The monitoring of the cutting function is effected by monitoring the rotation of the motor shaft of the cutter drive. To accomplish this, a magnetic pick-up and a permanent magnet are used which are supported at relatively movable parts of the cutter drive.