Abstract: In an embodiment, a method is provided for creating a personal animated entity for delivering a multi-media message from a sender to a recipient. An image file from the sender may be received by a server. The image file may include an image of an entity. The sender may be requested to provide input with respect to facial features of the image of the entity in preparation for animating the image of the entity. After the sender provides the input with respect to the facial features of the image of the entity, the image of the entity may be presented as a personal animated entity to the sender to preview. Upon approval of the preview from the sender, the image of the entity may be presented as a sender-selectable personal animated entity for delivering the multi-media message to the recipient.

Abstract: A system and method for providing a natural language interface to a database or the Internet. The method provides a response from a database to a natural language query. The method comprises receiving a user query, extracting key data from the user query, submitting the extracted key data to a data base search engine to retrieve a top n pages from the data base, processing of the top n pages through a natural language dialog engine and providing a response based on processing the top n pages.

Abstract: A system and a computer-readable medium are provided for controlling a computing device to define a set of computer animation parameters for an object to be animated electronically. An electronic reference model of the object to be animated is obtained. The reference model is altered to form a modified model corresponding to a first animation parameter. Physical differences between the electronic reference model and the modified model are determined and a representation of the physical differences are stored as the first animation parameter. Altering of the reference model and determining of the physical differences are repeated. The stored parameters are provided to a rendering device for generation of the animation in accordance with the stored parameters. Determining physical differences between the electronic reference model and the modified model and storing a representation of the physical differences as the first animation parameter include comparing vertex positions of the reference model.

Abstract: A system, method and computer-readable medium for practicing a method of emotion detection during a natural language dialog between a human and a computing device are disclosed. The method includes receiving an utterance from a user in a natural language dialog, receiving contextual information regarding the natural language dialog which is related to changes of emotion over time in the dialog, and detecting an emotion of the user based on the received contextual information. Examples of contextual information include, for example, differential statistics, joint statistics and distance statistics.

Abstract: A system and method are disclosed for retrieving audio segments from a spoken document. The spoken document preferably is one having moderate word error rates such as telephone calls or teleconferences. The method comprises converting speech associated with a spoken document into a lattice representation and indexing the lattice representation of speech. These steps are performed typically off-line. Upon receiving a query from a user, the method further comprises searching the indexed lattice representation of speech and returning retrieved audio segments from the spoken document that match the user query.

Abstract: A method, device and non-transitory computer-readable storage medium transferring information using a network. The information transferred by connecting a destination device operatively to a storage device using the network. The storage device storing information to be transmitted to the destination device. The network providing a point-to-multipoint connection between an origin device and a plurality of destination devices. The plurality of destination devices including the destination device. Also, the information being transferred by receiving the information stored in the storage device by the destination device in response to the destination device being operatively connected to the storage device. The information received by the destination device having been transmitted from the origin device to the network prior to the destination device being operatively connected to the storage device.

Abstract: A system, method and computer-readable media are introduced that relate to data coding and decoding. A computing device encodes received data such as video data into a base layer of compressed video and an enhancement layer of compressed video. The computing device controls drift introduced into the base layer of the compressed video. The computing device, such as a scalable video coder, allows drift by predicting the base layer from the enhancement layer information. The amount of drift is managed to improve overall compression efficiency.

Abstract: A particular device includes a transmitter. The transmitter is adapted to estimate a packet erasure rate for packets of a data window to be transmitted to a receiver. The transmitter is adapted to determine a number of proactive forward error control (FEC) packets for the data window based on the estimated packet erasure rate. The transmitter is adapted to determine a packet size for the packets in the data window based on a window size of the data window and the determined number of proactive FEC packets. The transmitter is also adapted to transmit the data window to the receiver. The packets in the transmitted data window have a size corresponding to the determined packet size and include the determined number of proactive FEC packets.

Abstract: A method includes steps of indexing a media collection, searching an indexed library and browsing a set of candidate program segments. The step of indexing a media collection creates the indexed library based on a content of the media collection. The step of searching the indexed library identifies the set of candidate program segments based on a search criteria. The step of browsing the set of candidate program segments selects a segment for viewing.

Abstract: A method of determining a mean square differential group delay associated with a length of optical fiber. The method including measuring a polarization mode dispersion vector as a function of frequency, using a frequency-domain polarization mode dispersion measurement apparatus. The method also including calculating a second-order polarization mode dispersion vector as a function of frequency by calculating a derivative of the polarization mode dispersion vector with respect to frequency. Also, calculating the mean of the magnitude of the second-order polarization mode dispersion vector to obtain a first result. Further, multiplying a proportionality coefficient by the first result to calculate the mean square differential group delay.

Abstract: In accordance with a method of encoding meta-data associated with tree-structured data, a first set of elements of a plurality of elements in the tree-structured is associated explicitly with explicit meta-data levels, and a second set of elements of the plurality of elements is associated by inheritance with explicit meta-data levels of closest ancestor elements of the first set of elements. The plurality of elements is packed into a plurality of leaf nodes of an index structure. The plurality of leaf nodes is merged into a plurality of non-leaf nodes until a root non-leaf node is generated. The plurality of non-leaf nodes of the index structure is associated with indicators representing ranges of the explicit meta-data levels in the packed first set of elements, such that explicit meta-data level ranges of descendant non-leaf nodes are subsets of explicit meta-data level ranges of ancestor non-leaf nodes.

Abstract: A secure, open-air communication system utilizes a plurality of “decoy” data signals to hide one or more true data signals. The true data signal(s) are channel hopped with the plurality of decoy data signals to form a multi-channel “scrambled” output signal that is thereafter transmitted in an open-air communication system. The greater the number of decoy signals, the greater the security provided to the open-air system. Further security may be provided by encrypting both the true and decoy signals prior to scrambling and/or by utilizing a spatially diverse set of transmitters and receivers. Without the knowledge of the channel assignment(s) for the true signal(s), an eavesdropper may be able to intercept (and, with time, perhaps descramble) the open-air transmitted signals, will not be able to distinguish the true data from the decoys without also knowing the channel assignment(s).

Abstract: A system and method of updating automatic speech recognition parameters on a mobile device are disclosed. The method comprises storing user account-specific adaptation data associated with ASR on a computing device associated with a wireless network, generating new ASR adaptation parameters based on transmitted information from the mobile device when a communication channel between the computing device and the mobile device becomes available and transmitting the new ASR adaptation data to the mobile device when a communication channel between the computing device and the mobile device becomes available. The new ASR adaptation data on the mobile device more accurately recognizes user utterances.

Abstract: In an embodiment, a method of providing an on demand translation service is provided. A subscriber may be charged a reduced fee or no fee for use of the on demand translation service in exchange for displaying commercial messages to the subscriber, the commercial messages being selected based on subscriber information. A multimedia signal including information in a source language may be received. The information may be obtained as text in the source language from the multimedia signal. The text may be translated from the source language to a target language. Translated information, based on the translated text, may be transmitted to a processing device for presentation to the subscriber. The received multimedia signal may be sent to a multimedia device for viewing.

Abstract: An access radio port is provided that includes means for spreading a payload data signal, extracted from an ATM packet, with a uniquely assigned orthogonal code, means for transmitting the spread payload data signal to one of a group of mobile subscriber terminals located within a microport cell of a wireless terrestrial network, and means for releasing the uniquely assigned orthogonal code. In another aspect, a mobile subscriber terminal, configured to be located within a microport cell of a terrestrial wireless network that interfaces with an access radio port, is provided. The mobile subscriber terminal includes means for receiving an assignment of a unique orthogonal code, means for spreading a payload data signal by the unique orthogonal code, means for modulating and forwarding the spread payload data signal to the access radio port, and means for releasing the assignment of the unique orthogonal code.

Abstract: Input signals of each frame are encoded by mapping the signals onto a coordinate system dictated by the symbols of the previous frame, and symbols from a constellation are selected based on the results of such mapping. Received signals are detected by preprocessing the signals detected at each antenna with signals detected by the antenna at the immediately previous frame, and then applied to a maximum likelihood detector circuit, followed by an inverse mapping circuit.

Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and computer readable media for performing speech recognition. The method embodiment comprises selecting a codebook from a plurality of codebooks with a minimal acoustic distance to a received speech sample, the plurality of codebooks generated by a process of (a) computing a vocal tract length for a each of a plurality of speakers, (b) for each of the plurality of speakers, clustering speech vectors, and (c) creating a codebook for each speaker, the codebook containing entries for the respective speaker's vocal tract length, speech vectors, and an optional vector weight for each speech vector, (2) applying the respective vocal tract length associated with the selected codebook to normalize the received speech sample for use in speech recognition, and (3) recognizing the received speech sample based on the respective vocal tract length associated with the selected codebook.

Abstract: A method of providing security for network access radio systems and associated access radio security systems used with the systems. The method includes connecting an access radio having a radio link to a network; communicating between the access radio and a computer over the network using a ping application having ping commands and unique encrypted codes; and enabling operation of the access radio when the access radio is receiving ping commands. Typically, the access radio and the computer are nodes on the network and the network is a local area network (LAN). The ping application sends packets of information from the computer to the access radio and receives a response from the access radio. The ping application must be functioning (i.e., sending and receiving commands between the computer and the access radio) to enable the access radio to communicate via the radio link with a remote network.

Abstract: The disclosure presents a method, system and computer-readable medium related to automatically analyzing structure for a web page. The method embodiment comprises building a training corpus comprising a broad stylistic coverage of web pages, segmenting a web page into information blocks, identifying semantic categories of the information blocks using the training corpus and applying the identical semantic categories in a web-based tool.

Abstract: A method for detecting potential phishing URLs includes extracting a URL from a document, analyzing the URL context, and comparing the URL to stored trusted URLs and stored known phishing URLs. The URL context includes anchor text and surrounding content associated with the URL. The method further includes generating a phishing alert based on the comparing and the analyzing.