Patents by Inventor Timothy J. Ray

Timothy J. Ray 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).

  • Patent number: 8094731
    Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, computer-implemented methods, and tangible computer-readable media for coordinating communications between a ground station, a control center, and a spacecraft. The method receives a call to a simple, unified application programmer interface implementing communications protocols related to outer space, when instruction relates to receiving a command at the control center for the ground station generate an abstract message by agreeing upon a format for each type of abstract message with the ground station and using a set of message definitions to configure the command in the agreed upon format, encode the abstract message to generate an encoded message, and transfer the encoded message to the ground station, and perform similar actions when the instruction relates to receiving a second command as a second encoded message at the ground station from the control center and when the determined instruction type relates to transmitting information to the control center.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 21, 2009
    Date of Patent: January 10, 2012
    Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
    Inventors: Timothy J. Ray, Vuong T. Ly
  • Publication number: 20100183082
    Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems, computer-implemented methods, and tangible computer-readable media for coordinating communications between a ground station, a control center, and a spacecraft. The method receives a call to a simple, unified application programmer interface implementing communications protocols related to outer space, when instruction relates to receiving a command at the control center for the ground station generate an abstract message by agreeing upon a format for each type of abstract message with the ground station and using a set of message definitions to configure the command in the agreed upon format, encode the abstract message to generate an encoded message, and transfer the encoded message to the ground station, and perform similar actions when the instruction relates to receiving a second command as a second encoded message at the ground station from the control center and when the determined instruction type relates to transmitting information to the control center.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 21, 2009
    Publication date: July 22, 2010
    Applicant: U.S of America as represented by the Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Admin.
    Inventors: Timothy J. Ray, Vuong T. Ly
  • Publication number: 20080250118
    Abstract: Systems, methods and apparatus are provided through which in some embodiments a CFDP protocol state machine and state table is implemented on each of a number of entities in a space communication system. Some embodiments of the state table specify at least one action to specific events for each of a plurality of possible states and each state table implements a core CFDP protocol. In some embodiments a method to transfer data into and out of space flight systems and/or ground systems includes receiving a user request into a memory of a CFDP-compliant library apparatus. The method also includes starting a state machine in the memory of the CFDP-compliant library apparatus that prompts a core protocol to transfer a specified file to and/or from a specified destination and initiating transfer of data blocks from the memory of the library apparatus.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 9, 2007
    Publication date: October 9, 2008
    Applicant: United States of America as represented by the Administrator of NASA
    Inventor: Timothy J. Ray