Patents by Inventor Alexander G. MacInnis
Alexander G. MacInnis has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
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Patent number: 9176782Abstract: Dynamically splitting a job in wireless system between a processor other remote devices may involve evaluating a job that a wireless mobile communication (WMC) device may be requested to perform. The job may be made of one or more tasks. The WMC device may evaluate by determining the availability of at least one local hardware resource of the wireless mobile communication device in processing the requested job. The WMC device may apportion one or more tasks making up the requested job between the wireless mobile communication device and a remote device. The apportioning may be based on the availability of the at least one local hardware resource.Type: GrantFiled: December 17, 2012Date of Patent: November 3, 2015Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Thomas Quigley, Alexander G. MacInnis, Arya Behzad, Jeyhan Karaoguz, John Walley, Mark Buer
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Patent number: 9154749Abstract: Methods for removing redundancies in a video stream based on efficient pre-transmission detection of static portions of the video stream. In one embodiment supporting wireless transmission of a video stream having a series of video frames, a mathematical operation (such as a hash function, summing operation or CRC) is performed on (1) a (reconstructed) data block(s) of a video frame in order to generate a first check value and (2) a co-located data block(s) of a second, sequential video frame in order to generate a second check value. The first and second check values are compared to detect static video content in the video stream. When static video content in a video stream is detected, the static nature of the content is indicated in the compressed bit stream and the amount of wirelessly transmitted data corresponding to the static portions of the video stream may be reduced.Type: GrantFiled: August 20, 2012Date of Patent: October 6, 2015Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Murat Mese, Brima B. Ibrahim
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Patent number: 9131242Abstract: Presented herein are system(s), method(s), and apparatus for scalable memory access. One example, among others, is a system for requesting services. The system includes one or more requesting node(s) for performing a function with real-time requirements, such as making requests. The one or more requesting node(s) indicates whether each of said requests is required or optional.Type: GrantFiled: February 6, 2009Date of Patent: September 8, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
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Publication number: 20150237354Abstract: Methods are disclosed for performing improved deblocking filtering across edges between macroblocks, with particular application to cases where one macroblock is field coded and its neighbors are frame coded. A method for filtering across horizontal edges comprises determining which macroblocks are considered to be vertically adjacent to each other. The method also determines which macroblocks are considered to be sampled at a same time. Finally, filtering is performed between vertically adjacent macroblocks that are considered to be sampled at a same time. Another method for filtering across vertical edges comprises determining which macroblocks are considered to be horizontally adjacent to each other. The method effectively re-arranges a vertical ordering of horizontal lines of at least a subset of the horizontally adjacent macroblocks. Finally, filtering is performed between the horizontally adjacent macroblocks after the re-arranging.Type: ApplicationFiled: May 6, 2015Publication date: August 20, 2015Applicant: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Sheng Zhong
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Publication number: 20150237608Abstract: A wireless mobile communication (WMC) device may discover available networks, and available local and/or remote resources. The WMC device may configure routes utilizing one or more of discovered resources and one or more available networks. The routes may be utilized to performed operations requested via the WMC device. A standardized language and/or protocol may be utilized in discovering and/or communicating with available resources and/or networks. The standardized language and/or protocol may enable commonality among the discovered networks and/or resources, and encryption of data communicated through the established routes. The standardized language and/or protocol may be updated and/or modified to incorporate new resources either by direct interactions between the new resources and the WMC device, or via existing available resources and/or networks. The discovery of resources and/or establishment of routes may be user-triggered, or it may be based on user preference information.Type: ApplicationFiled: May 7, 2015Publication date: August 20, 2015Applicant: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Mark BUER, Thomas QUIGLEY, Alexander G. MACINNIS, Arya BEHZAD, Jeyhan KARAOGUZ, John WALLEY
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Patent number: 9111369Abstract: Disclosed herein are various embodiments of a graphics accelerator, which may include an integrated circuit. The integrated circuit may include a local memory; a direct memory access (DMA) engine; a processor; and one or more processing pipelines. The local memory stores graphics data that includes a plurality of pixels. The DMA engine transfers the graphics data between the local memory and an external memory. The processor performs at least one operation, in parallel, on components of at least a portion of the pixels. The one or more processing pipelines process the graphics data. The graphics accelerator works on operands and produces outputs for one set of pixels while the DMA engine is bringing in operands for a future set of pixel operations, and transfers data from the external memory to the one or more processing pipelines by directing data to the one or more pipelines.Type: GrantFiled: March 1, 2013Date of Patent: August 18, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Chengfuh Jeffrey Tang, Xiadong Xie, James T. Patterson, Greg A. Kranawetter
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Patent number: 9104424Abstract: A system and method for decoding a digital video data stream. In one aspect, a plurality of hardware acceleration modules are used together with a core processor. The accelerators operate in a decoding pipeline wherein, in any given stage, each accelerator operates on a particular macroblock of video data. In the subsequent pipeline stage, each accelerator works on the next macroblock in the data stream, which was worked on by another one of the accelerators in the previous stage. The core processor polls all of the accelerators during each stage. When all accelerators finish their tasks for a given stage, the core processor initiates the next stage. In another aspect, two variable-length decoders are employed to simultaneously decode two macroblock rows of a video frame. Each variable-length decoder works to decode an assigned row and the rows are variable-length decoded in parallel.Type: GrantFiled: August 9, 2011Date of Patent: August 11, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Jose R. Alvarez, Alexander G. MacInnis, Sheng Zhong, Xiaodong Xie, Vivian Hsiun
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Patent number: 9083986Abstract: For a portion of video data, a video processing device generates a plurality of compressed video bit streams comprising different bit rates, and selects one stream per portion of video data to transmit to a display device. The streams may be generated concurrently. Bit rates are determined based on operating conditions and link performance. The selections are determined dynamically in response to received information. The streams may be compressed utilizing different compression schemes, for example, DPCM and/or transform compression. The bit rates may be dynamically adjusted by adjusting compression scheme, compression parameters, frame size, frame rate, color space and/or chroma sampling. The portion of video data may comprise contiguous horizontal rows or portions of rows of pixels, a full frame and/or a scaled frame. Information is communicated to the display device for control of decompression operations. The display device receives, decompresses, reconstructs and displays the selected bit stream.Type: GrantFiled: April 28, 2010Date of Patent: July 14, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
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Patent number: 9077997Abstract: A graphics display system integrated circuit is used in a set-top box for controlling a television display. The graphics display system processes analog video input, digital video input, and graphics input. The system incorporates a unified memory architecture that is shared by the graphics system, a CPU, and other peripherals. The unified memory architecture uses real time scheduling to service tasks. Critical instant analysis is used to find a schedule for memory usage that does not affect memory requirements of real time tasks while at the same time servicing non-real-time tasks as needed.Type: GrantFiled: January 22, 2004Date of Patent: July 7, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Chengfuh Jeffrey Tang, Xiaodong Xie, James T. Patterson, Greg A. Kranawetter
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Patent number: 9042329Abstract: A wireless mobile communication (WMC) device may discover available networks, and available local and/or remote resources. The WMC device may configure routes utilizing one or more of discovered resources and one or more available networks. The routes may be utilized to performed operations requested via the WMC device. A standardized language and/or protocol may be utilized in discovering and/or communicating with available resources and/or networks. The standardized language and/or protocol may enable commonality among the discovered networks and/or resources, and encryption of data communicated through the established routes. The standardized language and/or protocol may be updated and/or modified to incorporate new resources either by direct interactions between said new resources and the WMC device, or via existing available resources and/or networks. The discovery of resources and/or establishment of routes may be user-triggered, or it may be based on user preference information.Type: GrantFiled: September 19, 2013Date of Patent: May 26, 2015Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Mark Buer, Thomas Quigley, Alexander G. MacInnis, Arya Behzad, Jeyhan Karaoguz, John Walley
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Patent number: 9042445Abstract: Methods are disclosed for performing improved deblocking filtering across edges between macroblocks, with particular application to cases where one macroblock is field coded and its neighbors are frame coded. A method for filtering across horizontal edges comprises determining which macroblocks are considered to be vertically adjacent to each other. The method also determines which macroblocks are considered to be sampled at a same time. Finally, filtering is performed between vertically adjacent macroblocks that are considered to be sampled at a same time. Another method for filtering across vertical edges comprises determining which macroblocks are considered to be horizontally adjacent to each other. The method effectively re-arranges a vertical ordering of horizontal lines of at least a subset of the horizontally adjacent macroblocks. Finally, filtering is performed between the horizontally adjacent macroblocks after the re-arranging.Type: GrantFiled: May 19, 2003Date of Patent: May 26, 2015Assignee: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Sheng Zhong
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Publication number: 20150103929Abstract: Transcoding multiple media elements for independent wireless delivery. Respective media or multimedia elements are selectively and respectively encoded and/or transcoded. Such respective and selective processing of different media elements provides for their unbundled and independent communication to one or more other devices. In one instance, different respective overlays of a display (e.g., a computer, TV, PDA display, etc.) are respectively and selectively transcoded and/or encoded to generate different respective streams that may each be handled differently as a function of any number of parameters (e.g., media element type, content, communication channel characteristic, source proximity, priority, etc.). Different types of media elements include photo/image, video, graphics, text, audio, picture-in-picture, two-dimensional (2D), three-dimensional (3D), and/or other types of media elements as may be included within a given configuration of a display.Type: ApplicationFiled: November 24, 2014Publication date: April 16, 2015Applicant: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventors: James F. Dougherty, III, Yasantha N. Rajakarunanayake, Alexander G. MacInnis, James D. Bennett, Jeyhan Karaoguz
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Patent number: 8989263Abstract: The present invention provides an apparatus for performing inverse quantization for multiple decoding standards, where the functional operations that comprise the inverse quantizer are modularly implemented and can be selectably performed. Each operation can be represented via a table entry in an associated memory area, with the functional operation being performed via reference to that table entry. Functional operations can be bypassed as needed if inverse quantization does not need to be performed on a set of data. Certain other processing operations can be performed between steps as needed to accommodate different coding standards. Macroblock data can be read from and written back to a common storage area, or a direct path is provided for writing the data directly to a subsequent inverse transform device.Type: GrantFiled: April 5, 2011Date of Patent: March 24, 2015Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Vivian Hsiun, Alexander G. MacInnis, Xiaodong Xie
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Publication number: 20150074708Abstract: A system and method that provide reduced latency in a video signal processing system. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise receiving a current request from a user for first video information. Such a request may, for example, be received with a user interface module. A first video stream and a second video stream may be received simultaneously, where the first video stream comprises the first video information currently requested by the user, and the second video stream comprises second video information not currently requested by the user. A video receiver module may, for example, perform such receiving. The first video stream may be processed to present the first video information to the user at the current time. Further, the second video stream may be pre-processed in preparation for being presented to the user in the future. A video processing module may, for example, perform such video stream processing.Type: ApplicationFiled: September 22, 2014Publication date: March 12, 2015Inventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
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Patent number: 8913667Abstract: Video decoding system having a programmable variable-length decoding accelerator. The system includes a decoder processor and a variable-length decoding accelerator. The variable-length decoding accelerator is coupled to the decoder processor and performs variable-length decoding operations on variable-length code in the video data stream. The variable-length decoding accelerator is capable of decoding variable-length code according to any of a plurality of decoding methods. In one embodiment, the variable-length decoder includes a plurality of code tables stored in memory and a code table selection register that is programmable to dictate which of the plurality of code tables is to be utilized to decode variable-length code. In one embodiment, the decoding system includes two variable-length decoding accelerators.Type: GrantFiled: April 1, 2003Date of Patent: December 16, 2014Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Vivian Hsiun, Alexander G. MacInnis, Xiaodong Xie
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Patent number: 8897377Abstract: Transcoding multiple media elements for independent wireless delivery. Respective media or multimedia elements are selectively and respectively encoded and/or transcoded. Such respective and selective processing of different media elements provides for their unbundled and independent communication to one or more other devices. In one instance, different respective overlays of a display (e.g., a computer, TV, PDA display, etc.) are respectively and selectively transcoded and/or encoded to generate different respective streams that may each be handled differently as a function of any number of parameters (e.g., media element type, content, communication channel characteristic, source proximity, priority, etc.). Different types of media elements include photo/image, video, graphics, text, audio, picture-in-picture, two-dimensional (2D), three-dimensional (3D), and/or other types of media elements as may be included within a given configuration of a display.Type: GrantFiled: August 29, 2011Date of Patent: November 25, 2014Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: James F. Dougherty, III, Yasantha N. Rajakarunanayake, Alexander G. MacInnis, James D. Bennett, Jeyhan Karaoguz
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Patent number: 8842175Abstract: A system and method that provide reduced latency in a video signal processing system. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise receiving a current request from a user for first video information. Such a request may, for example, be received with a user interface module. A first video stream and a second video stream may be received simultaneously, where the first video stream comprises the first video information currently requested by the user, and the second video stream comprises second video information not currently requested by the user. A video receiver module may, for example, perform such receiving. The first video stream may be processed to present the first video information to the user at the current time. Further, the second video stream may be pre-processed in preparation for being presented to the user in the future. A video processing module may, for example, perform such video stream processing.Type: GrantFiled: January 28, 2005Date of Patent: September 23, 2014Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
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Patent number: 8831091Abstract: Adaptive wireless channel allocation in a multi-user environment based on quality of received video streams. During the transmission of encoded media streams from a wireless access device to at least first and second video devices over a wireless channel, transmission windows are allocated in shared transmission frame intervals for transmission of media packets to the first and second video devices, respectively. Relative priorities are set/adjusted for the video devices based, at least in part, on one or more of the following: channel estimation information, reception characteristics, transmission acknowledgment information, video device characteristics and/or user feedback. The relative priorities are utilized to adaptively (re)allocate at least one portion of the transmission frame intervals. In addition to channel reallocation, the prioritization of devices may be utilized to adaptively alter the encoding bit rate of one or more media streams.Type: GrantFiled: September 13, 2011Date of Patent: September 9, 2014Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventors: Alexander G. MacInnis, Peyush Agarwal, Yasantha N. Rajakarunanayake
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Publication number: 20140149539Abstract: Disclosed are embodiments for streaming content over a network. First content segments are generated such that the time durations of at least a subset of the first content segments progressively increase with respect to time. Second content segments are generated that are configured to be played subsequent to the first content segments. The second content segments have time durations that are substantially the same with respect to each other. The first content segments and the second content segments are transmitted to a client device.Type: ApplicationFiled: December 21, 2012Publication date: May 29, 2014Applicant: BROADCOM CORPORATIONInventor: Alexander G. MacInnis
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Patent number: 8683535Abstract: A system and method that provide reduced latency in a video signal processing system. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise generating and receiving a request for a unit of video information. A video transmission system may, for example, receive the request for the unit of video information and communicate the unit of video information to a video receiver. For example, the video transmission system may transmit a first portion of the unit of video information at a rate that is faster than a typical steady-state transmission rate for the unit of video information, and the video transmission system may transmit a second portion of the unit of video information at the typical steady-state transmission rate for the unit of video information. A video receiver may then receive the first and second portions of the unit of video information at respective reception rates.Type: GrantFiled: August 25, 2004Date of Patent: March 25, 2014Assignee: Broadcom CorporationInventor: Alexander G. MacInnis