Abstract: A method for designating a class of data content for determining how the content will be handled by a content delivery network (CDN) into one of: a transport designation by which content is transported from an entrance node to one or more edge nodes; a caching designation by which the content is stored at one or more edge nodes; and a hybrid designation by which content is stored at a node in the CDN for subsequent transport to one or more edge nodes in the CDN, the method comprising: determining a set of one or more transport designation options; determining a set of one or more caching designation options; determining a set of one or more hybrid designation options; determining a normalised measure resource requirement for each of the transport, caching and hybrid designation options; and selecting one designation option for the class of content from all of the transport, caching and hybrid designation options by an optimisation function for selecting the designation option based on the determined normalise

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for monitoring mobile service quality in a mobile network and also for determining parts of a mobile network which need expansion or upgrade. Embodiments of the invention monitor the market impact and/or service quality, and determine an expansion ranking. The market impact, service quality and/or expansion ranking may view the network from a plurality of perspectives, including a location perspective, an historical time perspective, a future time perspective and/or a network element type perspective. The results of the monitoring and determining can be acted on by predetermined rules and/or actions to derive a list of prioritized expansion tasks for the network.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for localization. It is particularly concerned with localization techniques based on time difference of arrival for wireless devices. Embodiments of the invention relate to techniques in which a transmitter transmits periodic distinguishable signals which are relayed upon receipt by the client whose location is sought in a form distinguishable from that of the transmitter. Signals from both the transmitter and the client are received by at least three signal receivers which generate a time difference of arrival based on the difference taken for a signal to reach the receiver directly and via the client. Further embodiments of the invention provide a phase detector in the receivers to determine the time difference of arrival between the signals.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for estimating offset and skew using linear programming. Embodiments of the invention relate to methods and systems which apply linear programming principles to links with asymmetric transmission rates which are estimated from an exchange of timing messages (for example under IEEE 1588 PTP). Further embodiments provide for the estimation of clock offsets using linear programming techniques when the skew is known or estimated.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and devices for bias estimation and correction, particularly for time-of-arrival (TOA) based wireless geolocation systems. Multipath and non-line-of-sight (NLOS) biases can cause distance estimation errors in the range of tens-hundreds of meters and is particularly problematic in urban and indoor environments. The behavior of the biases dynamically changes depending on the clutter and/or obstructions between the base station and the mobile device. Aspects of the present invention provide practical real-time bias estimation and correction techniques for TOA-based systems and are based on inferring and estimating the biases from dynamic time differential measurements. The techniques can operate in real-time and involve simple calculations.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for workload distribution, particularly in data centers, more particularly data centers which use fresh air cooling. Embodiments of the invention provide methods and systems which calculate a load value for each server which takes account of both the temperature of the server and its current job queue, and determine the server to which an incoming job should be allocated on the basis of the load values of the available servers.

Abstract: This invention relates to the use of frequency synchronization accuracy as an additional quality metric for mobile call handover between base stations. Call handover is of major importance within any mobile network; without checking frequency synchronization before handover dropped calls and interrupted communication can result.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for limiting consumption, particularly power consumption, more particularly by appliances in a building, and is generally suitable for integration with building management systems. Embodiments of the invention provide arrangements in which the aggregated power load of a plurality of appliances is capped to a selected value (which may be arbitrary, or may be dictated by conditions) while seeking to minimize the deviation from target environmental conditions within the building through a combination of distributed decision making by the appliances themselves and centralized orchestration, which may be informed by real-time sensor readings and/or known properties of the building. The distributed decision-making by individual devices may be based on projected deviation from the target conditions after a period of activity or inactivity but with a central controller which determines which devices should be switched on.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and devices for clock synchronization. The invention has particular application in the alignment of slave clocks to a master clock and in dealing with transmission delay asymmetries where the forward and reverse communication paths between the master and slave clocks have asymmetric transmission rates. Such methods and devices have particular application in small cell backhaul solutions for 4G/LTE deployments. In embodiments of the invention, the slave clock uses link rate information to estimate the transmission delay asymmetry and thus estimate the offset and skew of the slave clock. Embodiments provide a simple linear approximation technique and a Kalman filter-based technique for estimating offset and skew of the slave clock.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods for storing and searching data. Embodiments of the invention make use of suffix trees to support binary pattern matching. Embodiments of the invention can be shown to have comparable search speeds to searches of known suffix trees, but are advantageous in that they have lower memory usage requirements which is important in large data environments.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for estimating and checking synchronization accuracy, in particular frequency synchronization accuracy. It is particularly applicable to synchronization methods and systems which involve a digital phase-locked loop (DPLL) and embodiments provide methods and systems for estimating and tracking how well the DPLL is frequency synchronized to a source frequency. In one embodiment, frequency synchronization accuracy is used as an additional quality metric for mobile call handover between base stations. Call handover is of major importance within any mobile network; without checking frequency synchronization before handover dropped calls and interrupted communication can result.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and devices for time transfer. The invention has particular application in the alignment of slave clocks to a master clock and dealing with packet delay variations. In embodiments of the invention, the slave clock uses the residence times measured by end-to-end transparent clocks to compensate for clock synchronization errors that arise due to variability in message transfer delays. Embodiments provide a simple linear approximation technique and a Kalman filter-based technique for estimating offset and skew of the slave clock.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and devices for time synchronization. The invention has particular application in the alignment of slave clocks to a master clock and in dealing with packet delay variation and dynamic asymmetries in the network links between them. In embodiments of the invention, the slave clock uses the peer link delay and residence times measured by peer-to-peer transparent clocks to compensate for clock synchronization errors that arise due to variability in message transfer delays. Embodiments provide a simple linear approximation technique and a Kalman filter-based technique for estimating offset and skew of the slave clock.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for controlling consumption, particularly power consumption, more particularly by appliances in a building, and is generally suitable for integration with building management systems. Embodiments of the invention provide methods and systems which probabilistically limit the aggregated power load of a plurality of climate control appliances in a building to a selected value, while seeking to minimize the deviation from target environmental conditions within the building. The embodiments of the invention propose distributed decision-making by individual devices based on projected deviation from the target conditions after a period of activity or inactivity.

Abstract: The invention relates to a method and system that provide a continuous querying mechanism that analyses real-time data streams to generate relevant results. It leverages data grid and event processing technology to provide a high performance and extremely scalable continuous querying solution. An embodiment of the invention provides a flexible querying language and data storage to allow users to register their interest in specific types of data, e.g. processes. The users are notified of matching results using an event-based mechanism. In order to efficiently analyze a large amount of data, the embodiment uses a grid infrastructure that allows storage of the data across many grid nodes and distributes the query execution workload, avoiding the bottleneck represented by constantly querying a database. Continuous queries are stored in a Continuous Query Registry and that Registry is invoked every time an insert or update event occurs on the triple store.

Abstract: The invention relates to a method and system that provide a high performance and extremely scalable triple store within the Resource Description Framework (or alternative data models), with optimized query execution. An embodiment of the invention provides a data storage and analysis system to support scalable monitoring and analysis of business processes along multiple configurable perspectives and levels of granularity. This embodiment analyses data from processes that have been already executed and from ongoing processes, as a continuous flow of information. This embodiment provides defining and monitoring processes based on no initial domain knowledge about the process and such that the process will be built only from the incoming flow of information. Another embodiment of the invention provides a grid infrastructure that allows storage of data across many grid nodes and distribution of the workload, avoiding the bottleneck represented by constantly querying a database.

Abstract: Methods and systems for detecting and/or tracking one or more objects utilize depth data. An example method of detecting one or more objects in image data includes receiving depth image data corresponding to a depth image view point relative to the one or more objects. A series of binary threshold depth images are formed from the depth image data. Each of the binary threshold depth images is based on a respective depth. One or more depth extremal regions in which image pixels have the same value are identified for each of the binary depth threshold images. One or more depth maximally stable extremal regions are selected from the identified depth extremal regions based on change in area of the one or more respective depth extremal regions for different depths.

Abstract: Architecture for real-time extraction of maximally stable extremal regions (MSERs) is disclosed. The architecture includes communication interface and processing circuitry that is adapted in hardware to receive a data streams of an intensity image and a depth image in real-time and provide intensity labels for image regions within the intensity image that match a given intensity threshold and provide depth labels for image regions within the depth image that match a given depth threshold. The processing circuitry is also adapted in hardware to find intensity extremal regions within the intensity image based upon the intensity labels and to find depth extremal regions within the depth image based upon the depth labels. The processing circuitry determines strong extremal regions based upon significant overlap between the intensity extremal regions and depth extremal regions. The processing circuitry then determines X-MSER ellipses parameters based upon the strong extremal regions and X-MSER criteria.

Abstract: There is provided a computer-implemented method of estimating transmitted signals in a communication system, the signals being transmitted by a transmitter to a receiver over a communication channel having a channel response, the method comprising estimating the transmitted signals based on generated trial sequences minimizing the channel response between adjacent received signals. There is also provided a receiver, a signal detector device and a communication system adapted to estimated transmitted signals in a communication system by generating trial sequences and determining the generated trial sequences minimizing the channel response between adjacent received signals. The present invention is particularly adapted for OFDM communication systems.

Abstract: This invention relates to methods and systems for estimating skew based on, for example, the IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP). These methods and systems can allow the clock skew between a master clock (server) and slave clock (client) exchanging PTP messages over a packet network to be estimated. In one embodiment, the slave employs a digital phase-locked loop (DPLL) driven by timestamps supplied from a master clock. The slave is able to process the timestamp information embedded in PTP Sync and Follow_Up messages in order to lock its frequency to that of the master clock. In certain embodiments a frequency locked DPLL and a local free-running counter are used to estimate the skew of the local slave oscillator.