Abstract: A sliding electrical switch (10) for use in a garment (32) has two spaced elongate flexible surfaces (16, 18), at least one electrical contact on each surface (22a, b, c, d, e, f), and a slider (20) slidable along the surfaces to cause electrical connection between the contacts. There may be a number of spaced contacts (22a, b, c, d, e, f), the slider (20) acting as a selector switch; or there may be two continuous spaced contacts (96, 98), movement of the slider (90) providing a variation in resistance. The slider can be a bead (20) running on cords (16, 18) attached to the edges of spaced pieces of fabric (14, 18); or a buckle (42) sliding on a strip (50); or a zip fastener traveller (66), adjacent teeth (64) of the zip being electrically connected (68); or a bead (90) running on lengths (82, 84) of flexible tubing with internally conductive strips (96, 98).

Abstract: The components of a portable personal audio system include first and second audio signal source devices, such as an MP3 player (14) and telephone (16). These are connected via respective leads (12) to a control and switching stage (22), and from there to left and right audio output devices (26). User input to effect operation of the control and switching stage (22) selectively directs audio signals from one or both of the signal source devices (14, 16) to a selected one or ones of the left and right audio output devices (26).

Abstract: The speech of a group of virtual characters is modelled using a directed graph or audio web, where each utterance is a node (A1-A7, B1-B5) in the web having links from it to each possible utterance that can be made in reply at any point in the course of the interaction. The choice of the next node (conversation segment) is dependent on attributes of the character and/or the virtual environment in which the conversation is taking place. These attributes may be fixed, modified by system function calls available at each node, or modified in response to user input.