Abstract: Component failures are reported using a radio-frequency identification tag associated with an electronic component of a computer system installed on a common communications bus and power bus among at least one other electronic component wherein failure of a component may cause disruption of the power bus, the communications bus, or both busses; a system-level diagnostic function within the computer system but external to the first electronic component receiving a diagnostic failure indication from the first electronic component, and responsive to receipt of the diagnostic failure indication, sending a latching signal to the first electronic component; and a latch controllable by the latching signal, the latch having at least two stable modes including an unlatched mode which prevents the tag from transmitting signals upon query by a radio-frequency identification reader, and a latched mode which enables the tag to transmit signals upon query by a radio-frequency identification reader.

Abstract: An opportunity server tracks in vehicle information system wireless web transactions using session identifiers, aggregates transaction records into session data, and uses session data assign cost of network and system usage to a winning bidding party in an online offering system so as to offset costs to the user for usage of the system. Credits are posted to share revenue and offset costs of OEM equipment and network access metered fees, thereby reducing the cost of the transactions by a user and promoting unfettered use of in vehicle information systems for a variety of services, purposes, and transactions.

Abstract: A file access manager for scheduling of read/write operations and disk I/O operations for files that must be retrieved from disk storage. The file access manager schedules the operations such that a single file retrieval from disk is required for a plurality of processes to operate on the file. If any of the processes write to the file, a single disk write operation is then performed.

Abstract: First and second applications having disparate concrete configuration models are integrated into a unified abstract model wherein configuration elements and associated element values are used to control configurable functions of the first and second application programs, respectively, and wherein the second configuration element has a similar configuration function as the first configuration element; using a first equivalence definition reflecting a functional relationship between the first application configuration element and an abstract model configuration element having the similar configuration function, wherein the abstract model configuration is application-independent and platform-independent; using a second equivalence definition reflecting a functional relationship between the second application program configuration element and the abstract model configuration element; and producing and associating a second configuration element value with the second application configuration element wherein the se

Abstract: Deployment descriptor files are generated for automation of installation and integration of computing system solution components by associating configurable behavioral models with a system solution design, configuring instantiations of the models to contain behavioral parameters, and, responsive to a user defining a connection between two model instances, displaying an intelligence form according to an expertise level of the user, receiving user inputs establishing configuration and option parameters for the connected model instances, saving the configuration and option parameters in a sub-template that defines the interface between the model instances in the system solution design, generating deployment descriptors by extracting the behavioral and configuration parameters from each sub-template, and packaging the configured behavioral model instances and deployment descriptor files into an application package for automatic deployment.

Abstract: Modules which are running outside of a first application server virtual machine (VM) are enabled to introspect into modules running inside the first VM by notifying a manageable component factory by an application module being executed by a first application server VM of a need to allow a second VM to introspect into and to load class information regarding objects already running in the first VM, wherein the first and second virtual machines are separate virtual machines; registering the already-running object class information to a manageable component server using a descriptor; and loading the registered class information by the second VM from the manageable component server, wherein a tool object or administrative object running in the second VM introspects into and loads the objects already running in the first virtual machine without use of an application programming interface.

Abstract: Multiple speaker cadence is managed for translated conversations by separating a multi-speaker audio stream into single-speaker audio tracks containing one or more first language audio snippets organized according to a timing relationship as related in the multi-speaker audio stream, generating a pause relationship model by determining time relationships between the single-speaker snippets and assigning pause marker values denoting the each beginning and each ending of each mutual silence pause, collecting a translated language audio track corresponding to each single-speaker track, generating pause relationship controls according the pause relationship model, and producing a translated multi-speaker audio output including the translated tracks in which the translated snippets are related in time according to the pause relationship controls.

Abstract: Web pages transmitted from a server to a web browser have at least two scripts and an AJAX-technique web page update command monitoring and collecting script error conditions, and for data exchange between the browser and a server to dynamically update the web pages without interruption of interaction flow caused by a full page refresh action. An browser AJAX engine executes the update commands, intercepts script calls to the server, converts the calls to HTTP requests, receives XML data from the server, and delivers corresponding web page and cascading style sheets to the browser for display and interpretation, using a background channel asynchronous connection to send a non-cacheable error message to an error processing server.

Abstract: A single starting point configuration for a complex, configurable system, is determined by collecting machine-reported data from a configurable system; obtaining information regarding the configurable system from one or more document applications external to the configurable system; merging the machine-reported data and the external document application data to produce a proposed configuration starting point; creating a user-readable actual starting point configuration according to the merged data; receiving a system configuration change description; receiving a proposed final system configuration; and verifying that the system configuration changes applied to the actual starting point configuration yields the proposed final system configuration.

Abstract: A set of acoustic components having complementarily tessellated shapes such that they may be nested together to constitute a rectangular parellelepiped, suitable for efficient storage and shipping. Each component also has a flat side. The shape set is further defined such that many aesthetically attractive, sculpture-like configurations may be created through installation of the components on a flat surface of a building such as a wall or ceiling, while substantially modifying the acoustic properties of the building feature. Acoustically absorptive, reflective, and diffusive components can be used in combinations with each other in order to achieve desired acoustic treatment of the building feature. Several methods of fabrication of the acoustic components are disclosed.

Abstract: A system and method for managing battery energy usage by a mobile wireless network which detects threshold conditions for network signal found and lost; records historical events of signal found and lost with operational criteria associated with operational conditions of the events such as time, day, date, tower number, and geographic location; upon each detection of network signal loss, determines from the recorded event records a nap termination condition upon which network signal has been historically reliable; and enters a battery-saving nap mode until the nap termination condition is met.

Abstract: A networked computer arrangement and method for preparing entitled offerings to prospective brokers, buyers and bidders, by establishing an entitlement schema in an offering and bid collection computer system based on a contractual arrangement between the brokers, traders, and offeror; preparing an entitled offering through filtering the a master list according to the broker schema to include only information for items to which each broker is allowed to purchase: and, subsequently. but prior to receiving any bids, presenting via a user interface the entitled offerings to the prospective brokers such that each broker may review entitled offerings containing information regarding items being offered for sale on which the broker is entitled to bid, but are not allowed to view information regarding items to which each broker is not entitled to purchase.

Abstract: Access to state data by a client process such as state data in an Online Transaction Processing arrangement is controlled through generation of and exchanging of a dual-component token. The first component of the token is an Index value which indirectly points to a block of state data assigned to process or user. The second component of the token is a sequence value, such as a Random Unique Sequence value, which is also associated with the block of state data for a process. With each transaction request, a user process provides the token to the OLTP server, which then verifies the sequence numbers of the state data and the token match before allowing access to the data.

Abstract: A system and method for debugging system solutions under design which cooperates with a solution design platform in which relationships between two or more system-level computing components are defined, in which each system-level computing component is associated with a behavioral model, and in which each relationship between system-level computing components is defined as a message-based communications interface. During simulation of the solution, messages are created by analysis of each behavioral model, and are transported or exchanged between system components. The debugging facility monitors interfaces between the system-level components, captures messages at the monitored interfaces, and adds tracking information to the captured messages. Following simulation, the stored messages and tracking information can be reformatted and displayed for review by the user to assist in determination of the problems in system-level operation.

Abstract: Electronic documents related to a computer system solution having a plurality of computing components are aggregated and bundled by a solution building wizard having configurable behavioral models associated with a system solution design, a plurality of configured instantiations of the behavioral models previously configured to contain behavioral and interface parameters according to a set of user inputs to define connection logic pairs or groups of the model instances, a documentation retriever which determines that one or more electronic documents are available for each of the configured behavioral model instance and requesting and retrieving the available electronic documents, and a documentation bundler aggregating the retrieved documents into an electronically deliverable document bundle.

Abstract: A method for incorporating emotional information in a communication stream by receiving an emotional state indicator indicating an emotional state of a presenter in a communication session, retrieving a cultural profile for the presenter, retrieving a plurality of cultural profiles corresponding to each of several recipients in the communication session, for each recipient, translating the emotional state indicator into a corresponding emoticon according to a difference between the cultural profile of the presenter and the cultural profile of each recipient, merging the translated emoticon into a copy of the communication session, and presenting communication session and merged translated emoticon to each recipient.

Abstract: A system and method for preventing user-input text strings of illegal lengths from being submitted to a database where, for each character in the string, a character length is determined in quantities of digital units of storage according to an encoding schema, the character lengths are accumulated into a total string length, also measured in digital units of storage, and the total string length is compared to one or more database input field requirements such as non-null and maximum length specifications. If a limit is not met, the system and method are suitably disposed in a manner to block or prevent submission of the user-input string to the database. Overflow sub-strings are extracted and stored from input strings which exceed the input length limit, and are further processed to yield additional storage and resource allocation.

Abstract: An indication to a consumer that a product or item on a retail fixture matches a set of consumer preferences is provided by equipping a retail fixture with a consumer identification unit and with a display unit indicator associated with a sample product on the retail fixture. Responsive to a consumer moving from outside the proximity to inside the proximity of the consumer identification unit, the identity of the consumer is established, and the consumers set of preferences is retrieved. It is then determined, automatically, which sample products on the retail fixture matches the consumers preferences, and a display unit indicator is illuminated for the matching sample products such that the attention of the proximate consumer is directed to the physical location of the matching products.

Abstract: A location based service creates a bookmark to a physical point of interest by detecting a consumer presence at a physical location using a presence detector; determining a physical location and identity of the consumer from an identifier; prior to receiving a selection from the consumer, determining a set of points of interest in the physical vicinity; pushing to a consumer pervasive device the set of points of interest in the vicinity of the consumer; and receiving a selection by the consumer from the pushed set of points of interest; storing on a server the received selection to create a point of interest bookmark associated with the consumer.

Abstract: A device and process which eliminates potential moiré patterns in digitized images by employing a one-dimensional sensor array and a sampling method of the sensor signals which produces a data set of non-uniformly spaced sensor positions. This allows the spacing of the sensors to avoid having a strong “harmonic” which may interfere with details or harmonics present in the image source, which eliminates the occurrence of moiré patterns and the need for application of image processing to remove moiré patterns. Sensors are non-uniformly spaced along a first axis according to a predetermined, deterministic and predictable schema or function. Sensors are sampled during scanning according a non-uniform function in order to realize a non-uniform sampling scheme in a second dimension. Linear interpolation is applied to the non-uniformly spaced data set, synthesizing a uniformly-spaced data set for use in common imaging formats and processing.