Abstract: An apparatus measures the tread of a tire on a vehicle, in which a laser line generator (34) generates an elongate pattern of light. Mirrors (36) are arranged to reflect light from the laser line generator (34) onto the rolling surface of the tire. Mirrors (36, 38, 42) are arranged to reflect light from different regions of the rolling surface of the tire towards a camera (32). The camera images the regions of the rolling surface of the tire. The apparatus may be hand-held or arranged such that a tire to be aged is driven onto or over it.

Abstract: The described messaging arrangement for delivering communication messages to recipients in a communication system comprises a number of messaging servers (201-204), a common message store (205) and a dispatcher (206). The messaging servers (201-204) are able to receive a message destined to a recipient, to store the message in the common message store and to inform the dispatcher of the received message that has been stored in the common message store. The dispatcher is then arranged to decide which messaging server to invoke for delivery of the message to the recipient. This decision could be made based on delivery preferences of the recipient. Thereafter, the dispatcher invokes the messaging server that has been decided to deliver the message, and the decided messaging server retrieves and delivers the message to the recipient. If necessary, the decided messaging server adapts the message to a message type handled by the decided messaging server.

Abstract: Targeted messaging, for example advertisements, may be provided to a user terminal connectable to a service node in a communications network, said network comprising a library node connected to the service node and comprising messages, such as advertisements, in different formats for different access types, by the following steps: requesting the delivery of at least one message from the library node to the service node for distribution to the user terminal, while specifying in the request the access type used by the user terminal, and providing from the library node to the service node the appropriate version of the at least one message in dependence of the access type used by the user terminal. One or more parameters, such as demographic data, may be specified for how to select a message from the library node.