Abstract: A method and apparatus for providing a service at an incident scene is provided herein. During operation, a device will enter a geographic area (e.g., an incident scene), join a local-area network (LAN), and determine what services are presently being offered by other devices on the LAN. From a list of services deployed on the device, a determination is then made as to what services the device will run, and those services are then offered to all devices on the LAN.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for downloading content within a video-on-demand system is provided herein. During operation a Video Home Office (VHO) will cache a subset of the Video Service Office (VSO) content. When a user requests content that is not stored on the VHO, the VHO will request that content from another VHO or the VSO. In order to reduce the additional network load imposed during item forwarding while attempting to balance the total load on all the links interconnecting the VSO and VHOs, recorded traffic history metrics are used to predict their future or current traffic. A VHO or VSO is chosen for fetching the content that will result in the lowest predicted traffic on the interconnecting links.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for task-based allocation of services at an incident scene include determining assignments for a plurality of users at the incident scene, each of the plurality of users comprising a mobile device; identifying a group of the plurality of users performing a similar function near one another or at a same area; determining if the group is likely to be separated from a wireless local area network at the incident scene; and, in response to determining that the group is likely to be separated from the local area network, allocating service instances on at least one mobile device associated with the group.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for downloading content within a video-on-demand system is provided herein. During operation a Video Home Office (VHO) will cache a subset of the Video Service Office (VSO) content. When a user requests content that is not stored on the VHO, the VHO will request that content from another VHO or the VSO. In order to reduce the additional network load imposed during item forwarding while attempting to balance the total load on all the links interconnecting the VSO and VHOs, recorded traffic history metrics are used to predict their future or current traffic. A VHO or VSO is chosen for fetching the content that will result in the lowest predicted traffic on the interconnecting links.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for downloading content within a video-on-demand system is provided herein. During operation a Video Home Office (VHO) will cache a subset of the Video Service Office (VSO) content. When a user requests content that is not stored on the VHO, the VHO will request that content from another VHO or the VSO. In order to reduce the additional network load imposed during item forwarding while attempting to balance the total load on all the links interconnecting the VSO and VHOs, recorded traffic history metrics are used to predict their future or current traffic. A VHO or VSO is chosen for fetching the content that will result in the lowest predicted traffic on the interconnecting links.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for providing a service at an incident scene is provided herein. During operation, a device will enter a geographic area (e.g., an incident scene), join a local-area network (LAN), and determine what services are presently being offered by other devices on the LAN. From a list of services deployed on the device, a determination is then made as to what services the device will run, and those services are then offered to all devices on the LAN.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for downloading content within a video-on-demand system is provided herein. During operation a Video Home Office (VHO) will cache a subset of the Video Service Office (VSO) content. When a user requests content that is not stored on the VHO, the VHO will request that content from another VHO or the VSO. In order to reduce the additional network load imposed during item forwarding while attempting to balance the total load on all the links interconnecting the VSO and VHOs, recorded traffic history metrics are used to predict their future or current traffic. A VHO or VSO is chosen for fetching the content that will result in the lowest predicted traffic on the interconnecting links.

Abstract: A method and apparatus that creates reviews of media content on a mobile communication device is disclosed. The method may include identifying media content being played for a user, receiving a review from the user based on the played media content, and sending the user's review to a remote media content server for processing.

Abstract: A mobile station (201) receives (301) a transmission from a remote source (such as, but not limited to, a reference server (206)) comprising information regarding downloadable content. This information can comprise, in a preferred approach, addresses that can be used to download corresponding selections of downloadable content. This information can further comprise, in a preferred approach, characterizing information regarding at least some of the downloadable content selections identified via such addresses. In a preferred approach, such a mobile station can then also access (302) locally developed information regarding downloading constraints of interest and then make determinations (303) regarding when to automatically download at least a portion of at least one of the selections of downloadable content as a function, at least in part, of both the characterizing information as was received via the aforementioned transmission and the locally developed information regarding relevant downloading constraints.

Abstract: Embodiments include methods and apparatus for synchronizing data and focus between visual and voice views associated with distributed multi-modal applications. An embodiment includes a client device adapted to render a visual display that includes at least one multi-modal display element for which input data is receivable though a visual modality and a voice modality. When the client detects a user utterance via the voice modality, the client sends uplink audio data representing the utterance to a speech recognizer. An application server receives a speech recognition result generated by the speech recognizer, and sends a voice event response to the client. The voice event response is sent as a response to an asynchronous HTTP voice event request previously sent to the application server by the client. The client may then send another voice event request to the application server in response to receiving the voice event response.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for downloading content within a video-on-demand system is provided herein. During operation a Video Home Office (VHO) will cache a subset of the Video Service Office (VSO) content. When a user requests content that is not stored on the VHO, the VHO will request that content from another VHO or the VSO. In order to reduce the additional network load imposed during item forwarding while attempting to balance the total load on all the links interconnecting the VSO and VHOs, recorded traffic history metrics are used to predict their future or current traffic. A VHO or VSO is chosen for fetching the content that will result in the lowest predicted traffic on the interconnecting links.

Abstract: A mobile station (201) receives (301) a transmission from a remote source (such as, but not limited to, a reference server (206)) comprising information regarding downloadable content. This information can comprise, in a preferred approach, addresses that can be used to download corresponding selections of downloadable content. This information can further comprise, in a preferred approach, characterizing information regarding at least some of the downloadable content selections identified via such addresses. In a preferred approach, such a mobile station can then also access (302) locally developed information regarding downloading constraints of interest and then make determinations (303) regarding when to automatically download at least a portion of at least one of the selections of downloadable content as a function, at least in part, of both the characterizing information as was received via the aforementioned transmission and the locally developed information regarding relevant downloading constraints.

Abstract: During each node's awake period, each node multicasts the relative time or slot of their next awake period (beaconing interval) to all neighboring nodes. This enables each node to intelligently and independently schedule the time slot of its next transmission based on the beaconing intervals of the nodes it has heard from. During each active (awake) interval, a node builds statistics of the future transmission/receive times of its neighbors and uses them to determine its next transmission time. In one proposed implementation, at the end of an active interval, a node picks the time slot with the highest counter for its next transmission. In another proposed implementation, at the end of an active interval, a node picks one of the slots with a weighted probability; the weight of each slot is proportional with the value of the counter associated with the slot.

Abstract: During each node's awake period, each node multicasts the relative time or slot of their next awake period (beaconing interval) to all neighboring nodes. This enables each node to intelligently and independently schedule the time slot of its next transmission based on the beaconing intervals of the nodes it has heard from. During each active (awake) interval, a node builds statistics of the future transmission/receive times of its neighbors and uses them to determine its next transmission time. In one proposed implementation, at the end of an active interval, a node picks the time slot with the highest counter for its next transmission.

Abstract: A communication unit (105) includes a communication interface, for transmitting and receiving communications when operably connected to a first communication network; and a processor cooperatively operable with the communication interface. Responsive to receipt of an utterance, the communication unit (105) can perform a fetch (109) over the communication interface and can transmit a first message (107) having the utterance over the communication interface. The communication unit (105) can receive a second message (113) having a result (111) of a recognition of the utterance from the communication interface in response to the fetch (109).

Abstract: Disclosed is a “light weight” protocol used to coordinate shared copies of a data element. A central repository holds a master copy of the data element. Applications “subscribe” to the data element (or to an aspect of it) by sending a message to the central repository. Whenever the data element (or aspect) is changed, applications that have subscribed to the data element (or aspect) are notified of the change. When an application wishes to change the value of a subscribed aspect, it sends an update request to the central repository. The central repository changes the master copy of the data aspect to the requested value and then informs all subscribed applications of the new data value. If two applications both wish to change the value of the same data aspect, they send their update requests, and the central repository processes them in the order in which they are received.

Abstract: Embodiments include methods and apparatus for synchronizing data and focus between visual and voice views associated with distributed multi-modal applications. An embodiment includes a client device adapted to render a visual display that includes at least one multi-modal display element for which input data is receivable though a visual modality and a voice modality. When the client detects a user utterance via the voice modality, the client sends uplink audio data representing the utterance to a speech recognizer. An application server receives a speech recognition result generated by the speech recognizer, and sends a voice event response to the client. The voice event response is sent as a response to an asynchronous HTTP voice event request previously sent to the application server by the client. The client may then send another voice event request to the application server in response to receiving the voice event response.

Abstract: During operation, each client device will be provided with a list of addresses for all nodes within a network. The addresses for all nodes will be unique to a particular client device such that {address(node 1), address(node 2), . . . address(node n)} for a first client does not equal {address(node 1), address(node 2), . . . address(node n)} for a second client. Each client's address for a particular node will preferably only be known by the client and a naming server. When sending a message to a destination node, a client device will create a source route consisting of the unique addresses. Because each client's address for a particular node will only be known to itself and the naming server, anyone who intercepts the route will not know what nodes along the route are used for routing the message.

Abstract: Apparatus, a method, or an electronic device may be provided. Media and a data structure encoded on the media are each provided, to hold one or more digital media assets (DMAs). One or more share tools may be provided, which are configured to provide at least a target device of plural separate communication devices share access to a given DMA to which another source device of plural separate communication devices has access. The share access may be provided in response to a single share event at one of the source and target devices.

Abstract: A method and apparatus that creates reviews of media content on a mobile communication device is disclosed. The method may include identifying media content being played for a user, receiving a review from the user based on the played media content, and sending the user's review to a remote media content server for processing.