The present application discloses systems, computer readable media, and methods for determining the operational status of network resources based on failed attempts by communications devices to access the network resources. In some embodiments, error messages are analyzed, and status data is associated with hostnames corresponding to network resources based on the analysis. The status data may include status identifiers that indicate the apparent operational states of network resources and geographic accessibility information associated with network resources. Some embodiments may include sending status messages to users and/or network managers based on the status data. Still other embodiments may include sharing the status data with a search engine configured to generate, display, format, and/or rank search results based on the status data.

At any point in time, many millions of people may be using many millions of communications devices to access network resources to obtain information and/or entertainment services from locations all around the world. Most of the time, communications devices are able to successfully access desired network resources to obtain desired information and/or entertainment services without incident.
Sometimes, however, a communications device may be unable to access a desired network resource. There may be many different reasons why a communications device may not be able to access a desired network resource. For example, sometimes network problems may prevent a communications device from connecting to the desired network resource. Some network problems may be local to a particular user, while other network problems may affect many different users. Sometimes a problem associated with the actual desired network resource may prevent a communications device from connecting to the network resource. For example, the network resource may be "down" or otherwise non-operational (or at least less than fully operational) because of hardware, software, and/or local network problems affecting the network resource.
In situations where a particular communications device may be unable to access a desired network resource, the user of the communications device may change configuration settings on the communications device, restart the network connections, restart the communications device, or perform other steps in an attempt to make the communications device connect to the desired network resource. But in some situations, the reason or reasons why the user's communications device may be unable to access the desired network resource may be entirely beyond the user's control.
If a user knew when the reasons for a failed connection attempt were beyond the user's control, then the user might not waste time and effort trying to connect to the desired network resource after the first failed attempt. However, it may be very difficult if not impossible for the user to determine whether the problem or problems that may be preventing access to the desired network resource are beyond the user's control, in part because of the decentralized nature of the management and operations of network resources in the public Internet.

Systems and methods for determining operational states of network resources based on network user activities


A satellite dish antenna mounting construction including a vertical support post having upper and lower ends, a pivotal polar mount member mounted on the upper end of the vertical support post, a satellite antenna dish frame pivotally mounted on the polar mount, a satellite antenna dish mounted on the dish frame, a power operated dish actuator having a motor and gear box housing with a motor and gear train mounted therein, an outer telescoping member extending downwardly from the gear box housing having an open outer and movable within and extending downwardly from the outer telescoping member, a clamp positioned on the vertical post at a position intermediate the upper and lower ends of the support post, a first universal pivot mount pivotally mounted to the clamp, and a second universal pivot mount pivotally mounted to the satellite dish frame at a position above the level of the location of the clamp.

The use of dish antennas to receive television signals from satellites for personal use has become quite common. There are numerous satellites which relay television signals from ground located antennas to "dish" antennas located at an individual's home or other location for the private use of the television-receiving public. There are in excess of 30 satellites which orbit the earth approximately 23,000 miles in a stationary orbit about the equator. To receive the signals from the satellite, the homeowner's dish antenna must be aligned with the precise location along the equator of the particular satellite from which the television viewer desires to receive a signal . Each of the satellites will transmit or relay a number of different signals, and each satellite will normally include up to 24 transponders to relay up to 24 signals. Approximately 18 of the satellites using from 5 to 20 of the transponders provide the bulk of television transmission normally viewed by home viewers.
Since more than one satellite transmits signals which are of interest, the home viewer's television dish antenna must be moved from one position to another to align the dish with the particular satellite from which the viewer wishes to receive a signal. This reception is accomplished, therefore, by mounting the satellite dish on a mounting system which includes a polar mount; that is the satellite dish is mounted on a frame which rotates about an axis which is oriented parallel to the axis of rotation of the earth. Depending on the latitude of the location of the dish, the dish is oriented so that when rotated about the polar axis, the dish will scan along the equator upon which the various satellites are located. The satellite dish can, therefore, move from alignment with one satellite to another, each of the satellites being positioned at some point upon the equator approximately 23,000 miles out in space.
In the early days of satellite dish reception, the dish was moved manually from one satellite position location to another and this, of course, was at best a haphazard operation. More recently, powered automatic systems rotate the satellite dish about the polar mounting axis and various internal control devices automatically position the satellite dish to the optimum location.
These powered automatic systems all employ what is known in the art as an actuator. The actuator is basically a jack-type device which is connected or mounted on the frame at one point and at another upon the stationary portion of the mount. These jacks normally include a telescoping-type construction which includes a motor that operates a screw which in turn engages a nut that is attached to the inner tube of the telescoping actuator. The motor and screw assembly are located at one end of the outer tube of the telescoping assembly and thus operate the jack device.
Operation of the motor in one direction or the other will activate the screw device to move the telescoping inner tube either toward or away from the motor. Thus, the inner tube slides inwardly and outwardly within the outer tube of the jack or actuator construction and, being attached to the dish frame, will rotate the dish about the polar axis upon which the dish is mounted. In the trade, this polar axis is also called the "dish axis".
In all constructions of which I am aware in the prior art, the inner tube of the actuator is connected by a pivotal mount of a universal type to the dish frame and the outer tube of the actuator is attached to the stationary mount of the satellite dish mounting system. This stationary mount normally includes a vertical post and the outer tube is attached to this by a plurality of bracket members, which are attached to the stationary frame which is a part of the vertical post.
Because of the manner in which the actuator is attached both to the stationary mounting assembly and the dish frame which is movable about the polar axis, and the dish being positioned at an angle to scan the equator, the actuator is angled upwardly the proper number of degrees depending upon the latitude of the location of the receiver.
As the satellite dish is moved from one position to another so that the signals from different satellites may be received, the inner tube of the actuator mechanism slides inwardly and outwardly within the outer tube of the actuator mechanism. After a period of time wear, caused by this constant inward and outer motion of the inner tube, permits various weather elements such as rain, sleet and snow to enter the jack mechanism. In an attempt to prevent problems from occurring, actuators include drainage holes in the motor and gear box housing so that this moisture can be drained from the mechanism. The provision of drainage holes normally will prevent problems from occurring; however, in actual practice, after a period of time, because of the wear, caused by the continual inward and outward movement of the inner tube member of the telescoping construction, as well as the accumulation of dirt and other foreign matter, a situation will exist in which moisture will accumulate within the gear box and telescoping tube members of the actuator.
When this happens, at locations where freezing temperatures are encountered, the accumulated moisture will freeze and prevent movement of the actuator or cause damage to either the gears which operate the screw or the screw device itself.
Under such conditions, the actuator must either be repaired or thawed to allow proper actuator operation. Efforts to alleviate the problems have included the provision of a weather resistant rubber boot which is placed around the outer exposed end of the outer tube at the position where the inner tube slides inwardly and outwardly in the outer tube. These boots, while being an improvement over no protection, are less than satisfactory and the actuators are still subject to the same problems of moisture accumulation primarily because of the wear to the boot caused by the continual inward and outward movement of the inner tube as the actuator moves or rotates the satellite dish from one position to another.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,918,363 discloses a typical example of the prior art devices which are subject to the aforementioned problems. The device disclosed in this reference includes an electrically powered motor which drives a series of gears that turns a worm gear assembly to move an inner telescoping member within an outer telescoping member to either elongate or shorten the actuator length, thereby rotating the satellite dish about a polar axis so that the dish may be aligned to a desired satellite position. The actuator or jack disclosed in this reference shows the motor and gear assembly mounted within housing members and located at the lower end of the jack. As seen in FIG. 1 of this reference, as the motor turns the worm gear assembly, the inner tubular member is moved inwardly or outwardly and the dish is thereby rotated. As can be seen in FIG. 8 of this reference, the juncture between the inner and outer tube appears to be protected by the aforementioned rubber boot. However, because of the jack's positioning, as shown in FIG. 1, moisture will eventually enter the interior of the telescoping tube construction and likewise enter the gear box area with the resulting problems associated with the moisture freezing.
Accordingly, there is an unsatisfied need for a satellite actuator or jack mounting construction which will eliminate the problems caused by the accumulation of moisture within the interior of the telescoping jack. It is, therefore, a primary object of the present invention to provide a jack mounting construction which is not susceptible to problems caused by the accumulation of moisture within the interior of the actuator construction.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a satellite antenna actuator mounting construction in which the motor or drive system of the jack is mounted directly to the satellite dish frame, and in which the inner tubular telescoping member of the construction is attached to the upright support member whereby the open end of the outer actuator tubular member, through which the inner tubular member passes, faces downwardly to prevent the accumulation of moisture within the interior of the jack construction.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a mounting bracket for attaching the housing end of the actuator construction directly to the frame of a satellite dish.
These and other objects and advantages will be apparent from the construction of the mounting mechanism of the present invention, the general nature of which may be stated as a power driven telescoping actuator construction having a housing enclosing a motor and gear mechanism, an outer tubular member extending from said housing, a gear member connected to an inner tubular member which is extendible and retractable, said housing end of said outer tubular member being attached to the frame of a satellite dish which is pivotally mounted on a polar axis and the outer end of the inner tubular member being attached to an upright dish support member whereby extension or retraction of the inner tubular member within the outer tubular member will rotate the satellite dish about the polar axis.

Satellite dish actuator mounting construction


Provided is a tempered glass sheet, including: a compressive stress layer having a compressive stress of 20 MPa or more continuously from a main surface in a depth direction thereof; a tensile stress layer that is arranged on an inner side with respect to the compressive stress layer in a sheet thickness direction and has a tensile stress of 20 MPa or more continuously in a depth direction thereof; and a stress-neutral layer arranged between the compressive stress layer and the tensile stress layer, wherein the stress-neutral layer has a compressive stress of less than 20 MPa and/or a tensile stress of less than 20 MPa continuously in the sheet thickness direction, and has a thickness of 5.3% or more of a sheet thickness.

Devices such as a cellular phone (in particular a smartphone), a digital camera, a PDA, a touch panel display, a large-screen television, and contact-less power transfer show a tendency of further prevalence. In those applications, a tempered glass obtained through ion exchange treatment has been used. In addition, in recent years, the use of the tempered glass in exterior components of a digital signage, a mouse, a smartphone, and the like is increasing.
A chemically tempered glass includes, on its surface, a compressive stress layer formed by ion exchange treatment. Accordingly, the formation and extension of a crack in the surface are suppressed, and hence high strength is obtained. The strength of the tempered glass is considered to be capable of being improved by adjusting the formation mode of such compressive stress layer (e.g., Patent Literature 1).

Chemically strengthened glass and method for manufacturing chemically strengthened glass


An aqueous adhesive composition for bonding nitrile rubber. The adhesive composition contains a chlorosulfonated polyethylene latex, a polyhydroxy phenolic resin copolymer, and a high molecular weight aidehyde polymer. The adhesive composition exhibits an unusual affinity for nitrile rubber and exhibits excellent adhesive performance as a single-coat formulation. The adhesive composition withstands high temperature bonding conditions and minimizes the utilization of volatile organic solvents.

Acrylonitrile-butadiene copolymer rubber, commonly referred to as nitrile or NBR rubber, is well recognized for its outstanding oil resistance and hence its excellent performance in seal applications where it is necessary to prevent the passage of oil or other fluid from one compartment to another in a given device. For example, ball bearings or other components surrounding a shaft or axle are typically enclosed within a housing that contains oil, grease, or other lubricant fluid. The lubricant fluid is typically sealed within the housing with a metal ring or cylinder which is lined with an elastomeric material such as nitrile rubber. The seal prevents leakage of the lubricant fluid and prevents contaminants from entering the housing.
In order for nitrile rubber to be utilized in seal applications, the nitrile rubber is typically adhesively bonded to a metal ting, cylinder, or the like. The nitrile rubber is typically bonded to the metal ting or cylinder by applying an adhesive to the ring or cylinder and compression molding, transfer molding, injection molding, or autoclave molding the nitrile rubber to the ring or cylinder at temperatures ranging from 175.degree. C. to 200.degree. C. The resulting rubber-lined ting or cylinder is then used in combination with a shaft or axle to form the fluid-tight seal.
Previous adhesive compositions utilized for bonding nitrile rubber are based on organic solvents and hence are becoming more and more undesirable in light of the increasingly circumscribing environmental regulations relating to volatile organic solvents. Many of the previous adhesive compositions have also been found to be adversely affected by the high-bonding temperature (175.degree. C. to 200.degree. C.) which can cause premature degradation of the adhesive, resulting in susceptibility to corrosion at the adhesive-metal interface.
A need therefore exists for an environmentally acceptable aqueous adhesive composition for bonding nitfile rubber that can withstand high temperature bonding conditions. Such an adhesive composition should be capable of being applied as a one-coat formulation and should also be capable of forming an adhesive bond that can withstand adverse environments such as corrosive materials and high temperature fluids.

Adhesive composition for bonding nitrile rubber to metal


The hand held grass cutter preferably includes an elongated handle provided with a user interface adapted to be held by a user, a motor located at the handle wherein the motor is communicatively coupled to the user interface, a cutting mechanism located at a distal end of the handle and communicatively coupled to the motor; and a disc section adjustably attached to the handle and spaced subjacent to the cutting mechanism.

1. Technical Field
This invention relates to grass cutters and, more particularly, to a grass cutter for providing a user with an easy and convenient means to take the weight off the operation of the grass cutter.
2. Prior Art
No matter what the size of your home is, plants, shrubs or trees, as well as healthy green grass on your lawn definitely add beauty and value to your dwelling. A well-maintained lawn can be an ideal setting to relax by yourself or entertain friends and family. A thick layer of healthy, green grass which is neat and trimmed is one of the main components that make up a well-maintained lawn. The most common type of grass used for lawns is Bermuda grass, which thrives in warm climates. Among the other types of grass which can be used is the centipede grass, which is ideal for areas with acidic soil, while Zoysia is suitable for areas with cold weather.
However, no matter what type of grass is planted, they have to be cut and trimmed to its ideal height so that pest problems may be controlled. A plant with an ideal length will also make the grass absorb sunlight better while retaining more moisture. Lawn care and maintenance is therefore one of the chores that most homeowners must do, and further there is such a sense of fulfillment and joy brought about by a thriving lawn or garden that homeowners treat these kind of activities as a hobby.
The basic tools for maintaining a lawn includes hand and powered tools that are considered essential for keeping that green carpet in shape. A powered lawnmower is the most basic. But keeping the lawn neat is almost always a matter that can't be completely carried out just by mowing. A cutter or edger is also needed for example to run the blade alongside patio bricks, steps and other edges to keep the lawn trim and looking good. Usually a powered cutter comes with a long handle with cutting means such as a rotating blade or a plastic string attached to its lower end. A user has to hold the long handle and position the blades a few inches above the ground to ensure that the ideal height of the grass to be cut is maintain before proceeding to switch on his cutter. Holding such an appliance for long periods of time can contribute to back pain and other bodily strains. An unfit person may find it extremely difficult to undertake such a task on a routine basis before resorting to paid help which may be quite costly.
Accordingly, a need remains for a grass cutter in order to overcome the above-noted shortcomings. The present invention satisfies such a need by providing a grass cutter that is convenient and easy to use, lightweight yet durable in design, versatile in its applications, and designed for providing a user with an easy and convenient means to take the weight off the operation of a grass cutter.


A lever-type connector 10 disclosed by this specification includes a housing (20), a lever (40), a cover (50) and a lever lock portion (23) provided to extend backward from a rear end (22) of the housing (20) and hold the lever (40) at a rear position by locking an operating portion (42). The cover (50) is composed of an upper cover (52) and a lower cover (51) to be assembled below the upper cover (52). The upper cover (52) includes an upper locking portion (56) configured to cover an upper lock receiving portion (24) provided on the rear end (22) of the housing (20) from above and lock the upper lock receiving portion (24) from front and the lever lock portion (23) is arranged along an upper surface of the upper cover (52).

1. Field of the Invention
This specification relates to a lever-type connector.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2013-45509 discloses a lever-type connector with a rotary lever. The lever-type connector includes a female housing, a U-shaped lever rotatably mounted on the female housing and a housing lock that extends back from an upper part of a rear wall of the female housing to hold the lever at a connection position. The lever includes left and right arms arranged respectively along left and right side walls of the female housing and an operating portion that couples ends of the arms to each other. The operating portion has a lever lock to lock the housing lock at the connection position.
A wire cover is mounted on the connector, and the wire cover has a U-shaped cut for drawing wires to outside. The housing lock is arranged inside the cut when the wire cover is mounted on the connector to prevent the housing lock from interfering with the wire cover when mounting the wire cover. However, clearances must be set between left and right side edges of the cut and the housing lock due to mounting tolerances. Thus, high-pressure washing water, flying stones and the like can enter into connector cavities.


A method for fetching sparsely indexed MIB tables for a managed network device using an approximation operation, such as a GetNext SNMP operation, comprises sending a plurality of operations in a first data packet at least one of the plurality of approximation operations specifying a speculative approximation. By using speculative approximations of index values of data to be fetched, it is possible to retrieve MIB table data more quickly and efficiently.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to communication systems and more particularly to networks having managed devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
The following description is concerned with a data communications system such as a local area network (LAN), that is an Ethernet network. However, the skilled person will appreciate that the present invention will have more general applicability to other types of managed communications systems including wireless networks.
A local area network (LAN) typically comprises a plurality of computers, computer systems, workstations and other electronic devices connected together by a common media such as twisted pair or coaxial cable or fibre optic cable. Data can be communicated between devices on the network by means of data packets (or frames) in accordance with a predefined protocol.
Computers and other devices connected to a network can be managed or unmanaged devices. A managed device has processing capability which enables it to monitor data traffic sent from, received at, and passing through the ports of the device. Monitored data associated with the ports oft he network device is stored in memory on the network device.
Network devices typically represent data in the form of a MIB (Management Information Base), as is well known in the art. A typical managed device may implement a number of MIBs (defined in RFCs), of which one (or more) represents data used in network management, as described below.
An example of a MIB containing network management data is MIB-II (formerly MIB-I) as specified by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force). MIB-II is common to core managed network devices of most vendors. Another MIB containing more complex management data is RMON (Remote Monitoring). As is well known in the art, each class or type of management information represented in a MIB is called an xe2x80x9cobjectxe2x80x9d. A specific instance from a data object is called an xe2x80x9cobject instancexe2x80x9d. An object may be defined to have one instance (a scalar object), or multiple instances (a columnar object). Columnar objects are typically organised into xe2x80x9cconceptual tablesxe2x80x9d (hereinafter referred to as xe2x80x9ctablesxe2x80x9d) and all the objects in a table use the same indexing scheme for identifying instances of that object. Thus, tables can be thought of as an array of rows and columns, each column comprising all instances of a particular object and each row comprising the instances of all objects at a common index (the index for the row).
It is becoming increasingly common and necessary for an individual to be appointed to manage a network. The appointed network manager (or administrator) utilises a network management station which includes network management hardware and software. In particular, the network management station is able to access management data from managed network devices using an appropriate management protocol (e.g. the SNMP protocol) and display this data for use by the network manager.
The SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) defines the procedure and data packet format for the network management station to access network data from MIBs in managed network devices for TCP/IP-based networks. In SNMP the data packet or PDU (Protocol Data Unit) is defined to have a size of 1500 bytes. The SNMP protocol utilises five main commands: GET, SET, GETNEXT, GETRESPONSE and TRAP.
The GET request is sent by the network management station to a network device to fetch a value of an object or objects from a MIB. The GET request specifies an object using a unique xe2x80x9cobject identifierxe2x80x9d which is defined in the MIB, which includes an index to identify the required instance of the object.
The SET request is sent by the network management station to write a value to a MIB. Like the GET request, the SET request specifies an object identifier of the object whose value should be modified and additionally specifies the new value to be written to the object.
The GETNEXT request, an example of an approximation operation as explained below, is used by the network management station to inter alia fetch object data in MIB tables. The network management station can use the GETNEXT command to fetch the data in a complete MIB table or a part thereof without knowing, in advance, the index values of data stored in the MOB table or part thereof. For example, the network management station will initially send a GETNEXT request specifying the xe2x80x9ctable rootxe2x80x9d. The table root can be thought of as the xe2x80x9ccolumn titlesxe2x80x9d since it is a placeholder after which the first row in the table, that is the row having the lowest index value, is guaranteed to appear. Thus, a GETNEXT request specifying the table root retrieves the first row in the table. The network management station will then use the response to this request in the subsequent GETNEXT command to fetch the next row in the table. The network management station will continue to iterate using the GETNEXT command until the data for all the rows in the relevant MIB table have been fetched.
Thus, because the GETNEXT command is an approximation operation, it does not need to specify the exact index of the object instance to be fetched at each command, as is necessary for the GET and SET commands, but merely an approximation of the index.
If a MIB table is indexed systematically with all indices within a bounded range present, for example 1 to 10, the network management station can issue a direct SNMP GET request for the values in the indexed rows and can pack the maximum number of requests into a single SNMP data packet (1500 bytes for an SNMP PDU) for transmission to the network device. However, if the table index values are sparse, then in the prior art the management station has no choice but to fetch the rows using the GETNEXT command. Because each GETNEXT request uses the response from the previous request, the management station can only fetch one row at a time, since it must wait for the information (i.e. the index value) contained in the response of the previous request before it can formulate the next request (i.e. using the index value as the approximation).
By way of example, a simple MIB table is represented in Table 1 below.
This MIB table, called xe2x80x9ctestTablexe2x80x9d, has two columns, with object identifiers xe2x80x9ctestAxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9ctestBxe2x80x9d of which xe2x80x9ctestAxe2x80x9d is identified in the MIB as being an index for testTable. Values for testA and testB values are integer values. Thus, the value stored in the xe2x80x9ctestAxe2x80x9d column is the value used to identify (i.e. index) the row in the table. Accordingly, the index which identifies the first row in the table is xe2x80x9c2xe2x80x9d, the index which identifies the second row in the table is xe2x80x9c3xe2x80x9d and the index which identifies the third row in the table is xe2x80x9c7xe2x80x9d. Thus, the rows of testTable are sparsely indexed as 2, 3 and 7 (instead of the systematically indexed 1, 2 and 3).
To fetch the whole of testTable, the network management station will typically send a GETNEXT request for the table root which will retrieve data at the lowest index value, and will then iterate using the previous response as the request each time until all the rows have been fetched. This looks like:
The main problem with the above described known method is that fetching of sparsely indexed MIB tables by the network management station is very slow, which causes delays and generates a lot of data traffic on the network. Furthermore, the utilisation oft he available byte space in data packets is poor.
In network management, it is very common for MIBs to include sparsely indexed MIB tables due to deletions, additions and changes to rows of data which arise during the dynamic operation of a network. Thus, as demands on the network resources increase, the above problems become increasingly significant.
It would be desirable to provide a method and apparatus for fetching sparsely indexed MIB tables in a more efficient manner.
According to a first aspect, the present invention provides a method for fetching sparsely indexed data for at least one data object in a data communications system using a communications protocol which defines a data packet format and an approximation operation, whereby the approximation operation retrieves the data object which has the closest available index value to, and which is greater than or less than, an approximation of the index value specified in the approximation operation, the method comprising sending a plurality of approximation operations in a first data packet, at least one of the plurality of approximation operations specifying a speculative approximation.
By employing speculative approximations of index values of data objects to be fetched, a network management station operating in accordance with the method of the present invention can include a plurality of approximation operations in a data packet, thus improving the speed of retrieving a table of data and utilising more of the byte-space available in a data packet in comparison with the known method.

Method and apparatus for fetching sparsely indexed MIB tables in managed network systems


An LDO regulator system has first and second current mirror circuits connected to its output terminal. A load attached to the output terminal is supplied with a constant voltage. Variations in the load that cause variations in the magnitude of the output voltage trigger one of the first or second current mirror circuits to generate a current that varies the magnitude of a gate voltage of a pass-transistor. The variation in the gate voltage in turns varies the drain current of the pass-transistor, which varies the output voltage to counter the change in the magnitude of the output voltage. Using the first and second current mirror circuits avoids the need for a large load capacitor and very high bandwidth of a conventional LDO regulator.

The present invention relates to a Linear Dropout (LDO) regulator, and more specifically, to an LDO regulator with an improved transient response.
Recent years have seen tremendous advancements in the field of electronic circuits. One such advancement is in the area of providing a supply voltage used to operate electronic circuits. The supply voltage may vary due to various factors such as changes in the load of the circuit to which the voltage is being supplied, temperature variations, aging, and so forth. Variation of the supply voltage can affect the operation of the electronic circuit. Thus, a voltage regulator is used to maintain the output of the supply voltage at a predetermined value. Over the years, a few different types of regulators have been developed, such as a standard regulator, a low drop-out (LDO) regulator, and a quasi-LDO regulator, with LDO regulators being the most widely used.
FIG. 1 is schematic circuit diagram of a conventional LDO regulator 100. The LDO regulator 100 includes an error amplifier 102, a pass-transistor 104, a capacitor C1, and resistance network R1, R2.
The error amplifier 102 is connected to the gate of the pass-transistor 104. The source of the pass-transistor 104 is connected to a voltage supply (VDD) and the drain of the pass-transistor 104 comprises the output terminal of the LDO regulator 100. The capacitor C1, which may be either an internal capacitor or external to the regulator circuit, is connected to the output of LDO regulator 100. The resistance network R1 and R2 also is connected to the output of the LDO regulator 100 and in parallel with the capacitor C1. A node between the resistors R1 and R2 is connected to an input terminal of the error amplifier 102 and provides a scaled-down version of the output voltage to the error amplifier 102. The error amplifier 102 also receives a reference voltage signal that is generated by an external voltage reference circuit. The error amplifier 102 compares the reference voltage signal and the scaled down version of the output voltage signal to generate an error amplified signal, which is provided to the gate terminal of the pass-transistor 104. The error amplified signal is used to maintain the output of the LDO regulator 100 at a predetermined voltage.
The LDO regulator 100 generates a constant output voltage to the load (not shown) by providing the required load current. If the magnitude of the load current increases due to variations in the load, there is a corresponding drop in the magnitude of the output voltage. The drop in the output voltage leads to an increase in the magnitude of the error amplified signal generated by the error amplifier 102. The increase in the error amplified signal in turn increases the magnitude of the source-gate voltage of the pass-transistor 104, causing a corresponding increase in the magnitude of the drain current of the pass-transistor 104, and the increase in the drain current pulls up the output voltage. Thus, the magnitude of the output voltage signal is maintained at the predetermined voltage. The capacitor connected to the output terminal improves the transient response of the LDO regulator 100.
During steady-state operation, the magnitude of the output voltage signal is maintained at the predetermined value and the output capacitor C1 is charged to the magnitude of the output voltage signal. If the current of the load circuit changes abruptly and the main regulation loop, formed by the error amplifier 102, pass-transistor 104 and resistor network R1 and R2, may not respond quickly because it has a bandwidth limitation, the capacitor C1 provides the extra charge required by the load. As a result, the magnitude of the output voltage decreases or increases from the predetermined voltage value.
The magnitude of output voltage drop or rise can be improved by either increasing the bandwidth/speed of the main regulation loop or by increasing the value of the capacitor C1. However, such changes have associated constraints such as power consumption, silicon area, and overall cost of the system. To increase the bandwidth or speed of the main regulation loop, the DC current should be increased, which results in higher power consumption of the system and also increased die area. The capacitor C1 can be realized as either an internal or external capacitor. An external capacitor increases cost, while an internal capacitor cannot be made very large because that would require significant additional die area. Thus, there is a need for a circuit that improves the transient response of the LDO regulator yet avoids the above-mentioned constraints.

LDO linear regulator with improved transient response


What is described herein is a process for making copolymers of maleic anhydride and C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ethers of predetermined specific viscosities extending over a wide viscosity range. The invention is characterized by (a) precharging a reactor with a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether as solvent and a polymerization initiator at a reaction temperature, (b) feeding a mixture of maleic anhydride and a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether in substantially stoichiometric amounts, preferably with a slight excess of alkyl ether, and at a selected rate, into said precharged reactor, (c) polymerizing said reactants to form a slurry of said copolymer in said escess alkyl vinyl ether solvent, and (d) introducing toluene into said reactor during the polymerization to control the specific viscosity of the copolymer product being produced.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to copolymers of maleic anhydride and a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether, and, more particularly, to a general process for making such copolymers of predetermined specific viscosity.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Commercial processes are available for making copolymers of maleic anhydride and a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether. However, it has been found necessary to provide a different process for a copolymer of low specific viscosity, or molecular weight, than for a copolymer of medium range viscosity, and still another process for a copolymer of relatively high specific viscosity.
In these several processes, the molecular weight of the copolymer can be controlled either by adjusting the temperature of the polymerization, the concentration of the polymerization initiator and/or the kind of solvent utilized for the polymerization. Usually, higher polymerization temperatures will produce lower molecular weight copolymers, while higher concentrations of the polymerization initiator will produce lower molecular weight copolymers. The effect of the solvent used is to combine with the free radicals produced by the initiator to terminate the reaction at a point at which the weight copolymers. The effect of the solvent used is to combine with the free radicals produced by the initiator to terminate the reaction at a point at which the polymerization had progressed on a particular chain. This degree of interference with the polymerization on the part of the solvent can be determined from its chain transfer constant. Solvents having a low chain transfer constant, such as benzene, exhibit only a relatively slight tendency to interfere with chain-reaction type polymerizations; while solvents with a relatively high chain transfer constant, such as xylene, exert a rather high degree of interference with such polymerizations. Accordingly, for processes defined by a given polymerization temperature and initiator level, a low chain transfer constant solvent generally will produce higher viscosity (higher molecular weight) copolymers while higher constant solvents will provide lower viscosity (lower molecular weight) copolymers.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a general process applicable for making copolymers of maleic anhydride and a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether having a predetermined specific viscosity extending a wide viscosity range.
A particular object of this invention is to provide a general process using a solvent having a high chain transfer constant, whose addition at different times during the polymerization can predetermine the specific viscosity of the copolymers produced.
These and other objects and features of the invention will be made apparent from the following description of the invention.

Process for making copolymers of maleic anhydride and a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl vinyl ether having a predetermined specific viscosity


Provided is a generation and implementation system for the survey program, in which multi-faceted questions are easily generated as a survey program and distributed to portable terminals, a survey can be performed in a non-communicating state, and survey results of the survey program can be amassed at a management server without fail. A question preparation server receives an input of a question, configures an answer format for the question, generates a survey program configured to send the answers to a management server when a predetermined number of answers are inputted, and distributes the survey program to a portable terminal of a surveyor. At the time of survey, the question is displayed on the display unit of the portable terminal, an answer to the question is received via an input of the portable terminal and stored in a memory unit of the portable terminal, and a group of questions stored in the memory of unit is sent to the management server via a communication unit of the portable terminal. The management server has received the answer date analyzes the answer data, performs statistic processing, and generates visible survey report information.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a survey program for use on a portable terminal in exit polling and the like, and a method of generation the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
Up to now, the general survey method performed on the street, for example an exit poll or a traffic volume survey and the like, was that a surveyor carried survey forms and a portable counter, filled in a survey form for each surveyed person, and added up numerical values of the counter.
Then, the survey information collected, as noted above, was amassed at the survey center via a facsimile and a telephone, and inputted by an operator at the survey center with a keyboard or other such input device into a computer for tallying. After the statistical processing, the findings of the survey were reported to the news media or to a client who had requested the survey.
However, the above-mentioned survey collection method seems to be premodern, and it is quite obvious that the collection and the analyzing of the survey information at the survey center are extremely inefficient. Therefore, it has been desired to develop a technique that enables input of information electronically at the point of conducting the survey on the street, and collect and analyze the survey information automatically.
Considering these facts, applicants have proposed, in Japanese Patent Application 2001-29670, a technique that makes it possible to detect how many times each key is pushed in real time on the server side, and perform statistical processing immediately, using a portable telephone which enables it to connect to a network which connects to a server.
After the implementation of this technique, the applicants realized that it is necessary to improve this prior invention further.
Namely, since above the prior invention needed to connect the portable telephone and the server constantly, the information collection was sometimes disrupted due to communication disturbances in areas of poor electric wave condition, like the inside of a building.
Further, although the above prior invention was effective in a traffic volume survey and the like, in which a numerical value merely increased incrementally (+1), it was not suitable for a questionnaire survey which asks the age, gender, address, etc., of the surveyed person. Thus there was a desire to develop a survey system that was capable of coping with various surveys in a flexible way.


A high strength, high toughness stainless steel consisting, by weight, of C more than 0.16% but less than 0.25%, Si not more than 2.0%, Mn not more than 1.0%, Ni not more than 2.0%, Cr from 11 to 15%, Mo not less than 0.5% but less than 3.0%, Co from 12 to 21%, at least one kind selected from the group consisting of V from 0.1 to 0.5% and Nb less than 0.1% which at least one kind is added as occasion demands, and the balance Fe and incidental impurities. This steel is produced by a method comprising the steps of: preparing a stainless steel having the composition of any one of the claims 1 to 4; subjecting the stainless steel to a solution heat treatment at a temperature of 950 to 1150.degree. C.; quenching the steel; subjecting the steel to a sub zero treatment at a temperature of -50.degree. to -100.degree. C.; and subjecting the steel to a tempering at a temperature of 120.degree. to 450.degree. C.

In general, high strength and low alloy steel represented by AISI4340,300M and the like are known well as a high strength material. These materials can provide high strength of about 180 Kgf/mm.sup.2 or more, when heat treatment conditions are selected. However, since these materials are low alloy steels and contain a small amount of Cr of 1% or less which greatly contributes to corrosion resistance, they have poor corrosion resistance. Thus, when these materials are used to an application requiring corrosion resistance, they have been conventionally subjected to a surface treatment such as Cr plating, Ni plating and the like. Nevertheless, the method of improving the corrosion resistance thereof by the surface treatment has problems in that the method needs many processes, when a surface treated layer is peeled, the peeled portion is partially corroded, and further the surface treatment is difficult to be carried out depending upon parts or locations.
On the other hand, generally stainless steel is often used to an application in which corrosion resistance is an important factor. Although stainless steel has excellent corrosion resistance, austenitic stainless steel represented by SUS304 and ferritic stainless steel represented by SUS430 and the like, which are known well, have low strength, and thus it is not suitable to an application simultaneously requiring corrosion resistance and strength. On the other hand, a precipitation hardening type stainless steel has high strength, which can be increased in such a manner that the stainless steel is age-hardened by an aging treatment. Well known commercially available precipitation hardening type stainless steel includes 17-4PH, 15-5PH, PH13-8Mo and the like. The strength of these precipitation hardening type stainless steels is about 120 Kgf/mm.sup.2 in the case of 17-4PH, about 135 Kgf/mm.sup.2 in the case of 15-5PH, and about 150 Kgf/mm.sup.2 in the case of PH13-8Mo, although it changes depending upon aging treatment conditions.
Although these precipitation hardening type stainless steels have high strength, the strength is lower than that of 4340,300M and the like as high strength low alloy steel. Therefore, these existing precipitation hardening type stainless steels cannot be used to an application in which both high strength similar to that of 4340 or 300M and corrosion resistance similar to that of stainless steel are required, from the view point of the strength, although the corrosion resistance thereof has no problem. Therefore, if there is stainless steel which has excellent corrosion resistance as well as strength similar to that of 4340 or 300M, it can be widely used to the application having strict requirements.
Further, since a high strength material has low toughness, there has been a desire to improve the toughness of the high strength material to a value as higher as possible in order to practically use the material and make use of the advantage of the high strength.
The high strength low alloy steel 4340 has the strength level of 180 Kgf/mm.sup.2 and the fracture toughness value (K.sub.IC value) of about 200 Kgf/mm.sup.2 .multidot..sqroot.mm, and further, existing precipitation hardening type stainless steels have the toughness level of about 200 Kgf/mm.sup.2 .multidot..sqroot.mm in the case of 17-4 PH and about 250 Kgf/mm.sup.2 .multidot..sqroot.mm in the case of 15-5PH and PH13-8Mo when represented by a fracture toughness value (K.sub.IC value). More specifically, the precipitation hardening type stainless steels have not always high toughness, although they have a strength level lower than that of high strength low alloy steel.
On the other hand, examples of stainless steel having high strength and relatively high toughness are disclosed in Reissue U.S. Pat. No. 26,225 as heat resistant high strength stainless steel having very high strength and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,756,808 as stainless steel, respectively. U.S. Pat. No. 3,756,808 shows in FIG. 2 that the heat resistant high strength stainless steel 77 (AFC77, C; 0.16%, Cr; 14.36%, V; 0.48%, Mo; 4.90%, Co; 13.60%, N; 0.05%, Al; 0.042%, and residue; Fe) disclosed in Re. U.S. Pat. No. 26,225 and the stainless steel AFC260 (C; 0.07%, Si; 0.25%, Mn; 0.25%, Ni; 1.85%, Cr; 15.5%, Mo; 4.5%, Co; 13.0%, Nb; 0.15%, N; 0.03%, residue; Fe) and Alloy B (C; 0.16%, Ni; 1.03%, Cr; 13.94%, V; 0.09%, Mo; 5.22%, Co; 13.67%, Nb; 0.22%, N; 0.032%, residue; Fe) disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,756,808 have strength and toughness higher than those of other precipitation hardening type high strength stainless steels represented by 17-4PH, 15-5PH, PH13-8Mo and the like. It is shown that Alloy B having the highest strength and toughness levels among them has a strength of 180 Kgf/mm.sup.2 (about 260 Ksi) and the toughness thereof at this strength level is about 400 Kgf/mm.sup.2 .multidot..sqroot.mm (about 115 Ksi .sqroot.in). U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,756,808 and 3,873,378 show that the strength and toughness of this alloy greatly depend on heat treatment conditions. According to U.S. Pat. No. 3,756,808, the heat treatment conditions for providing Alloy B with such high strength and high toughness are such that Alloy B is austenitized by being kept at 927.degree. C. for 1 hour and cooled to a room temperature, then again austenitized by being heated to 1150.degree. C. and kept at this temperature for 1 hour, cooled to 1038.degree. C. in this state and kept at this temperature for 1 hour and cooled to a room temperature, and further subjected to a sub zero treatment at -73.degree. C. for 1 hour, and finally tempered twice at 427.degree. C. for 2 hours.
In the above treatments, the first austenitizing treatment carried out at 927.degree. C. is to adjust the size and distribution of a Nb carbide to thereby prevent crystalline grains from coarsening in the next second austenitizing treatment carried out at a high temperature. Further, the second austenitizing treatment carried out at 1150.degree. C. and 1038.degree. C. is to stabilize austenite at the high temperature of 1150.degree. C. and to keep delta-ferrite as a brittle phase simultaneously made at this time at 1038.degree. C. to thereby make the same disappear. When Alloy B is cooled after the austenitizing treatments, much retained austenite remains, and thus the toughness and elongation thereof can be increased. To increase the toughness and elongation by the adjustment of an amount of the residual austenite, however, the amount and distribution of the residual austenite must be well controlled, and when the size of Alloy B is large, it is feared that the control of the amount and distribution of the residual austenite may be difficult. Further, the tempering carried out at 427.degree. C. is effective to increase strength.
As the result of a specific study of alloy having the composition of Alloy B carried out by the inventors using an experimental method, as shown in an embodiment, the high strength and high toughness disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,756,808 could not be obtained, even if the above heat treatment was carried out, and only a low value of proof stress was obtained. As described above, it is very difficult to simultaneously obtain both high strength and high toughness in stainless steel.

High strength and high toughness martensitic stainless steel and method of manufacturing the same

The Society of Japanese Aerospace Companies, Inc.


Instructions are provided to a vehicle braking mechanism for autonomous operation of the braking mechanism. At least one first parameter is retrieved for governing control of the braking mechanism. The first parameter is applied to operation of the braking mechanism. Data is collected relating to operation of the vehicle. At least one second parameter is determined for governing control of the braking mechanism.

A vehicle such as an automobile may be configured for autonomous driving operations. For example, the vehicle may include a central control unit or the like, i.e., the computing device having a processor and a memory, that receives data from various vehicle data collection devices such as sensors and generally also external data sources such as navigation information. The central control unit may then provide instructions to various vehicle components, e.g., actuators and the like that control steering, braking, acceleration, etc., to control vehicle operations without action, or with reduced action, by a human operator.
Autonomous and non-autonomous vehicles may be equipped with monitoring systems to detect faults in various vehicle sub-systems, such as a vehicle braking system. However, a vehicle braking system may be further affected by environmental conditions, which in turn can affect operation of the braking system as well as other vehicle systems, such as steering, powertrain, etc. For example, phenomena such as vehicle loading, a snow-packed road surface, precipitation, terrain, etc. can affect vehicle stopping time and distance. In a non-autonomous vehicle, a driver may compensate for phenomena affecting vehicle braking, and hence vehicle stopping time and distance, sometimes without even being aware that a correction or adjustment is being made to braking functions. Further, an adjustment may vary depending on a direction in which a vehicle is going, e.g., down a hill or up a hill, or the type of roadway surface, e.g., sand, gravel, wet, dry, ice etc. However, mechanisms are lacking for making appropriate compensations to vehicle braking in autonomous vehicles.


A system performs a first query to retrieve a commit lag timestamp, where the commit lag timestamp specifies an earliest time instance when a record of an entity is inserted or updated, but is yet to be committed, to a data source. The system determines an inline crawl interval based on the commit lag timestamp. The system performs a second query based on the inline crawl interval to retrieve a number of record identifiers and/or modification dates. The system performs a third query based on the inline crawl interval, where the third query corresponds to records that exist in a data store. The system determines at least one identifier that is missing from the third query due to commit lag based on a difference between data corresponding to the second and third queries. The system persists data corresponding to the second query and the at least one missing identifier.

Data analytics and data mining require analysis of large amounts of data. Data can be organized as fact and dimension tables in a time-series relational database. These tables allow analytical queries to retrieve data for a trend over period of time. For larger entities that have a lot of data, these tables can include tens of millions of records and queries, even with index optimizations, could take upwards of tens of minutes to execute.
In order to support real time data update/write backs, long-running transactions can cause data commit lags when data is mined from a database with data modification time different its completion (commit) time. For example, data mining with incremental crawl (queries), where data are queried at periodic intervals to gather the data from the data source can result in missing records if the records are modified during a particular interval but not yet committed to a data source.
As shown in FIG. 3 for an example interval, an incremental query when executed with an interval of Start Time (ST) to End Time (ET) ideally would retrieve data record that is inserted or modified within the interval. If a data record is modified at Modification Time (MT) but the changes are not reflected by the database until Commit Time (CT), which is beyond the incremental query interval of ST to ET, the change would not be captured by the incremental query for ST to ET. For a next interval, incremental query will execute a next interval with a start time from ET, and so forth. Since incremental crawl has already advanced in time, the data record with commit lag would be missed by the incremental query.
A solution is needed to address the issues of commit lag in collecting data with data consistency from a data source with incremental query.

Method and system for collecting data from data sources with commit lag to maintain data consistency in a data store


Methods and apparatus to control a flash crowd event in a voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) network are disclosed. An example method comprises receiving at a VoIP border element a VoIP registration response message having a field representing a priority assigned to a VoIP endpoint, receiving a message from the VoIP endpoint at the VoIP border element, detecting whether a network congestion condition exists, and placing the message received from the VoIP endpoint into one of a plurality of queues based on the priority when the congestion condition is detected.

A "flash crowd" event occurs in a voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) network when a large number of endpoints simultaneously attempt to initiate communication sessions from within a given geographic area. Such events may happen, for example, in response to a natural disaster, a man-made disaster, and/or a significant news event. In some instances, a flash crowd event can overwhelm the signaling and/or protocol processing capabilities of all or a portion of the VoIP network leading to, for example, an inability to establish communication sessions from and/or to emergency response locations, such as hospitals, police stations and/or fire stations.

Methods and apparatus to control a flash crowd event in a voice over internet protocol (VoIP) network


An electronic keyboard instrument has a plurality of key displacement sensors disposed in relation to respective keys of a keyboard. Each sensor detects a continuously variable key displacement induced by the key operation to provide an analog signal indicative of the displacement. An analog-to-digital converter digitizes the analog signal at a predetermined sampling rate to derive a stream of digital samples of key displacement. A control, which operates based on a predetermined tone control algorithm receives and analyzes the stream of digital samples. According to the analysis, tone parameters such as envelope and vibrato are produced for controlling the characteristics of a tone, so that a tone having a very dynamic key touch response is developed. In a preferred embodiment, there are provided a plurality of tone control algorithms adapted to process the stream of key displacement samples in manners different from one another. A manually operative selector selects the desired one of the algorithms to be used by the control during the play of the instrument. "

This invention generally relates to electronic musical instruments and particularly to an electronic keyboard instrument having a function of touch response for controlling a tone based on the detected touch of the key.
The prior art electronic keyboard instrument has used a key state sensor in the form of one or more contact switches disposed in relation to each key of the keyboard. These contact switches are arranged so as to change their states at two different positions of the key. When the key is depressed, the key will pass by a first predetermined displacement, changing the switch to another state, and then pass by a second predetermined displacement, causing further change of the switch state. An initial touch measuring apparatus connected to the contact switch measures the time for the key to move from the first displacement to the second. The measured time is, of course, in inverse proportion to the depressing velocity of the key. This information is utilized to control a tone, thus providing a touch response.
It is noted, however, that the time of moving between predetermined key displacements, as extracted by the prior art, is the sole variable factor that varies depending on the key operation. This indicates that the touch response provided by the prior art is insufficient and leaves room for improvement.

Electronic keyboard instrument with key displacement sensors


An image sensor pixel may include a photodiode, a floating diffusion, and a transfer gate. Column readout circuitry coupled to the image sensor pixel via a column line. Voltage settling circuitry may be coupled to the column line. Voltage settling circuitry may include a pre-charging circuit, a reset voltage slew boosting circuit, and an image signal voltage slew boosting circuit. The pre-charging circuit may pull down the column line voltage to a grounding voltage. The reset voltage slew boosting circuit may pull up the column line voltage to a reference voltage near a reset level voltage. The image signal voltage slew boosting circuit may pull down the column line voltage to an additional reference voltage near an image signal voltage. With the use of the voltage settling circuitry, a faster pre-charge and clamping of the column line can be achieved.

This relates generally to imaging devices, and more particularly, to signal line voltage settling in imaging devices.
Image sensors are commonly used in electronic devices such as cellular telephones, cameras, and computers to capture images. In a typical arrangement, an electronic device is provided with an array of image pixels arranged in pixel rows and pixel columns. The image pixels contain a photodiode for generating charge in response to light (e.g., by photoelectric conversion). Circuitry is commonly coupled to each pixel column for reading out image signals from the image pixels using a corresponding column line.
In general, the column line voltage needs to settle to either a signal voltage or a reset voltage before sampling of the column line should occur. However, there is usually a long delay to do so as the drive strength of a corresponding pixel source follower transistor is limited. Because sampling an unsettled voltage on the column line will result in image artifacts, to avoid the image artifacts, image sensor operations will be significantly delayed.
It would therefore be desirable to provide imaging systems with improved column line voltage settling.

Systems and methods for voltage settling

SEMICONDUCTOR COMPONENTS INDUSTRIES, LLC


A card edge connector assembly includes a card edge connector and support hardware. The card edge connector includes a housing extending between a top and a bottom having a card slot at the top receiving a pluggable module in a mating direction. Contacts electrically connect to the pluggable module and the host circuit board. The support hardware has a top and a bottom and has first and second mounting blocks mounted to the host circuit board. The support hardware has a side rail extending between the first and second mounting blocks. A cavity that receives the card edge connector is defined on a first side by the side rail and on first and second ends by the first and second mounting blocks. The top of the support hardware is flush with or below the top of the card edge connector.

The subject matter herein relates generally to card edge connector assemblies.
Card edge connectors are used in various system applications. For example, card edge connectors are typically mounted to a host circuit board. The card edge connectors include card slots for receiving a card edge, such as a circuit card of a pluggable module. However, know card edge connectors are not without disadvantages. For instance, the card edge connectors are typically designed for supporting the pluggable modules. The card edge connectors are subjected to stresses and strains during mating or when mated with the pluggable modules, which may damage or break the soldered connections between the contacts of the card edge connector and the host circuit board. Additionally, retention of the pluggable modules in the card edge connectors may present problems. For instance, latching systems are designed and occupy space around the card edge connectors for retaining the pluggable module in the card edge connector, limiting placement of other components on the host circuit board.
Some known card edge connectors include additional support hardware that is designed for interfacing with the particular pluggable module. However, it may be desirable to mate different types of pluggable modules with the card edge connector. The size, shape and placement of the support hardware are designed for one type of pluggable module and may restrict mating of a different type of pluggable module with the card edge connector. Additionally, some types of pluggable modules may require support hardware and other types of pluggable modules may be matable to the card edge connector without the need for support hardware. Adding support hardware in all instances may add unnecessary cost to the system, such as when a customer does not have the need for the support hardware. Moreover, the support hardware may require mounting hardware on the host circuit board for attachment of the support hardware to the host circuit board. Adding mounting hardware in all instances may add unnecessary cost to the system, such as when a customer does not have the need for the support hardware.
A need remains for a card edge connector assembly that may be mated with pluggable modules in a reliable manner.

Card edge connector assembly with support hardware


A circuit for detecting phase errors and generating control signals includes a digital phase detector and a digital filter. The digital phase detector receives an input signal and a reference signal and generates a set of phase error control signals, and the digital filter receives the phase error control signals to generate control data. The digital filter can include a lookup table, an adder, and a register. The lookup table receives the phase error control signals and outputs a lookup value. The adder receives the lookup value and a register value and generates the control data. The register receives and stores the control data and outputs the stored control data as the register value.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a circuit used in a phase-locked loop (hereinafter referred to PLL) or a delay-locked loop (hereinafter referred to DLL) for detecting phase errors and generating control signals, and more particularly, to a circuit for detecting phase errors and generating control signals through digital processing.
2. Description of the Related Art
A typical PLL may be a digital PLL or an analog PLL. FIG. 1 shows an analog phase detector used in a PLL, and FIG. 2 shows a digital phase detector used in a PLL.
The PLL 10 shown in FIG. 1 includes a phase detector (PD) 13, a charge pump 14, a loop filter 15, and a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) 16. The phase detector 13 detects the phase difference between an input signal Fref and a phase-locked clock Fvco and then outputs control pulses Up and Dn according to the phase difference to control the charge pump 14. For example, when the phase of the phase-locked clock Fvco leads the phase of the input signal Fref, the width of the pulse Up output by the phase detector 13 is smaller compared with the width of the pulse Dn to result in a negative control current Icp generated by the charge pump 14. Meanwhile, the loop filter 15 reduces a control voltage Vctl to decrease the frequency of the phase-locked clock Fvco output by the voltage-controlled oscillator 16. On the contrary, when the phase of the phase-locked clock Fvco lags behind the phase of the input signal Fref, the width of the pulse Up output by the phase detector 13 is larger compared with the width of the pulse Dn to result in a positive control current Icp generated from the charge pump 14. Meanwhile, the loop filter 15 raises the control voltage Vctl to increase the frequency of the phase-locked clock Fvco output by the voltage-controlled oscillator 16.
FIG. 2 shows a PLL 20 including a digital phase detector 23, a charge pump 24, a loop filter 15, and a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) 16, where the digital phase detector 23 has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,259,278. The digital phase detector 23 generates a set of phase error control signals Up1-UpN and Dn1-DnN through digital processing and transmits them to the charge pump 24. Then, the charge pump 24 generates a control current Icp that is to be transmitted to the loop filter 15 for generating a control voltage Vctl. The operating principle of the PLL 20 is the same as the PLL 10, except the signals generated by the digital phase detector 23 are digital signals. Such difference allows a better detection for the PLL 20 to eliminate the dead zone, reduce the clock jitter, and enhance the jitter tolerance of the data random jitter.
However, the output signals of the loop filter 15 of the PLL 20 are still analog signals, and a considerable occupied area is needed for the loop filter 15 since it is a low-pass filter.

Circuit for detecting phase errors and generating control signals and PLL using the same


A sensor device according to an embodiment of the present disclosure includes a plurality of detection electrode sections of a capacitive type, a reference electrode layer disposed at a position that faces each of the detection electrode sections, and a pressing transmission layer that causes locations, of the reference electrode layer, that face the respective detection electrode sections to be deformed locally in response to pressing performed from outside.

In recent years, an electronic apparatus capable of detecting pressing performed on a surface of a housing has been proposed. For example, as one of such an electronic apparatus, Patent Literature 1 proposes an electronic apparatus in which a film-like sensor device is provided on an inner side face of the housing.

Sensor device, input device, and electronic apparatus


A method and apparatus for conserving power in a mesh point in which in response to the mesh point participating in mesh activity while in an awake mode, the mesh point continues in the awake mode for a first awake time period. In response to the first awake time period expiring without the mesh point participating in the mesh activity, the mesh point is operated in a low power mode for a first sleep time period. In response to the first sleep time period expiring, the mesh point is operated in the awake mode for a second awake time period to detect additional mesh activity. And in response to the second awake time period expiring without detecting the additional mesh activity, the mesh point is operated point in the low power mode for a second sleep time period.

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11s is a draft amendment to an international wireless LAN (WLAN) standard that describes a mesh network. WLAN devices in a mesh network are referred to as mesh points (MP). The MPs form mesh links with one another, over which mesh paths can be established using a routing protocol. The MPs have relay functions for wirelessly communicating directly with each other, instead of going through centralized control equipment such as a base station.
In a mesh network, data transmitted from one device may arrive at a destination via a sequence of MPs resulting in a multi-hop wireless network configuration. The mesh network of interconnected wireless links between the MPs enables automatic topology learning and dynamic path configuration/reconfiguration around inoperable paths by hopping from MP to MP until the destination is reached.
Communication between different MPs is controlled primarily through a Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol that uses IEEE 802.11 MAC/PHY layers to determine routes through the mesh network. In the MAC routing protocol, each MP learns about neighboring MPs using a neighbor discovery protocol based on received beacons or response management frames. Neighbors and neighbor's neighbors information is provided within the beacon management frames. Therefore, each MP can rapidly discover mesh points up to two hops away.
The MPs may be implemented as devices either plug-in AC powered devices such as a laptop, a microwave, and the like; or as battery operated DC powered devices such as a picture frame, a camera, and a cellular phone, for instance. MPs that have a connection to a power source may stay continuously awake, but battery operated MPs may optionally support a power save mode to conserve their battery.
IEEE 802.11 supports two power modes: active mode and power saving mode, assuming clock synchronization of the MPs is available. Synchronization may be achieved by each MP updating time stamp and offset information with information received in beacons and probe responses from other MPs. Once synchronized, time in the mesh network is divided into equal-length beacon intervals, each of which starts with an Ad Hoc Traffic Indication Message (ATIM) window. MPs are required to stay awake during the ATIM window so that control communication can be transferred between the MPs. For example, the ATIM window may be used by the MPs to indicate pending traffic, a change in PS state or re-instating stopped traffic flows. Any MP not receiving an ATIM frame within the ATIM window may enter the power save mode after the ATIM window expires. In certain circumstances, an MP receiving ATIM frames may remain active for a time after the ATIM window finishes in order to send or receive more data frames. MPs not in the power save mode may communicate with MPs in power save mode by buffering the data to be sent and then sending the data during another ATIM window.
Although the conventional power saving approach attempts to conserve power by requiring each MP to go to sleep after data transmission or reception, and wake up when there is data to be transmitted or received, the approach requires global scheduling because the MPs must synchronize and wake up at the same time to send or receive data. In addition to the drawback of requiring synchronization between the MPs, another drawback is that while the MPs are in power save mode, there is no connectivity between active MPs and the MPs in power save mode.


According to the present invention, there is provided a depilatory device, comprising a manually grippable casing, having an electric motor; and an electric switch carried on said casing for energizing or de-energizing said motor. A hair plucking body is mounted onto said casing, having an exposed section plate, having a plurality of extended rotatable pins mounted into slide bearings on the circumference of said exposed plate. A belt is rotatable by said motor's to run around said extended rotatable pins continuously, so that when the depilatory device is placed in touch with body hair, said hair will be caught in gaps between said extended pins and said rotatable belt, clamping the hair towards the rotation of said pins and belt, thus pulling said hair out along the plate.

The present invention relates to depilatory devices which remove body hair, and are used for cosmetic purposes.
A number of depilatory devices have been proposed in the past. Some devices include discs arranged to provide gaps of wedge-like configurations for catching and plucking the hair; a device of this type is illustrated by U.S. Pat. No. 2,900,661. Other devices include helical springs which define hair-catching gaps between their windings; examples of the latter are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,232,617, 4,079,741 and 4,524,772, the first two being axial helical springs, and the latter being an arcuate spring, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,726,375 describing a rotable rubber or plastic slit cylinder catching the hair between the slits and pulling the hair off when rotating around its axis. It is an object of this invention to provide a depilatory device which uses neither discs nor helical springs but defines the hair-catching gaps in another manner producing several advantages over the prior art as shall be defined below.
According to the present invention, there is provided a depilatory device, comprising a manually grippable casing, having an electric motor; and an electric switch carried on said casing for energizing or de-energizing said motor. A motor base hair plucking body rotatably mounted onto said casing is also included and has an exposed section plate, having a plurality of extended rotatable pins mounted into slide bearings on the circumference of the said exposed plate. A belt, rotatable by said motor's central shaft runs around said extended rotatable pins continuously upon start-up of the motor, so that when the device is placed in touch with body hair, said hair will be caught in gaps between said extended pins and said rotatable belt, clamping the hair towards the rotation of said pins and belt, thus pulling the said hair out.
A substantial difference in construction of the depilatory device of the present invention, versus the devices described in the known prior art, is that the present exposed section in touch with a user's skin is not made of metal, but of a rubber or elastomeric belt running continuously around the pins.
Another important advantage of the device is that it plucks hair in all directions simultaneously, whereas the devices in the prior art are all operating unilaterally.
A further important advantage of the present device is that it pulls the hair parallel to the skin, and from tests carried out comparing the function of the present device to the prior art units, it was found that this feature greatly reduces pain during the depilatory process.
A further advantage of the device, is its compact form enabling use of a smaller casing than would be required for the devices described in the prior art.
In the preferred embodiment, the motor installed in the device is of 10-watt, direct current, with 5,000-10,000 RPM, energized by either disposable or rechargeable 9-volt batteries, or any other suitable power supply.
The preferred embodiment has a casing made of ABS or similar plastic. Said belt rotating around the pins is made of rubber, or any suitable elastomeric or plastic flexible material; the belt could be either flat or cylindrical 3-5mm wide. The structure of said belt can be either flat, circular, trapeze, or a combination of flat or circular. In order to achieve an improved friction factor between the belt and the hair to be plucked, one could roughen the outer surface of the belt, or introduce small teeth-like projections, so that when the belt comes into contact with the hair, it will be caught by the belt and pulled towards said pins to be plucked.
In the preferred embodiment, the exposed section to the user's body is a plate made of either steel or rigid plastic, or elastomer 3-10mm thick, having slide bearing bores on its circumference in a T form or any other suitable form. The number of pins in said exposed section could be any acceptable number between a minimum of 2 to 30 (or more).
The pins are 5-8mm high, 2-4mm in diameter and rotate freely in the slide bearing bores, on the exposed section. The pins could be made of any rigid tough material such as steel, rubber or plastic. The pins' extensions out of the exposed section would be in the range of 3-5mm in line with the width of the belt.
In the preferred embodiments, the combination of the pins and belt can be as follows:
either two pins and the belt running between them; PA0 or three pins and the belt running on the outer surface forming a triangle. This structure was found to be efficient for long hair; PA0 or a plurality of pins in a circle with the belt running on the outer circumference; PA0 or a plurality of pins placed on an inner circle, and another plurality of pins on an outer circle with the belt running alternatively between an outer pin and an inner pin; PA0 or a plurality of pins with a belt running around the pins and crossing its pathway, thus increasing the pulling effect on the hair; PA0 or a depilatory device wherein said device has a plurality of pairs of pins, having a belt run between said pins, and wherein each of said pairs is rotated by the driving pin connected to said rotatable central shaft; and having a third free moving rotatable pin attached to said driving pin, having said belt pass between them, so that any hair caught by the belt in the vicinity of said two attached pins will be pulled out by the rotational movement of the pins, and running belt; PA0 or a device having instead of a pair of pins, a triangular pin configuration with attached rotatable pins close to any required number of pins in the triangle; so that each triangular head having said two pins with said belt running between them can act as a depilating unit.
These last two devices are particularly useful for depilating short hair, or depilating hair having being previously treated with oil or cream.
In a further embodiment, said motor runs a central shaft having a gear wheel mounted on it; and said gear wheel rotates, by the aid of a plurality of gear wheels engaged to said first gear on the central shaft, a plurality of auxiliary shafts which rotate several of said pins around which rotate said belt. This mechanism gives a better distribution of power to said pins and belt rotation.
In another preferred embodiment, the plucking head including said pins and belt can be dismounted from the body of the main device; by having a cassette-like arrangement containing the pins and belt mounted in a plastic member, having a plurality of shaft connectors all to be mounted and hinged to a plurality of shafts rotated by said central shaft and motor. So that when said plucking head cassette is hinged to said shafts rotated by the motor and the motor is energized by said switch, the plucking process can be commenced when the user's hair is brought into contact with said pins and rotating belt. This device enables the user to dispose of the plucking head after several uses, or wash and clean the plucking head after use of an hair remaining on the surface of said pins or belt. The device can thus be designed to have several combinations of pins and belt as described below for different kinds of hair, or different lengths of hair.
In another preferred embodiment of the invention, there is provided a depilatory device for removing body hair comprising a manually grippable casing having an electric motor; and an electric switch carried on said casing for energizing or de-energizing said motor; and a motor base is mounted onto said casing, having an exposed section plate, having a plurality of pins mounted into slide bearings mounted onto the circumference of said exposed plate, and having the said pins secured to a plurality of gear wheels engaging one another, and said pins extend out of said gear wheels; and a belt wound around the pins, so that when the pins turn, the belt runs continuously around the pins; and said electric motor having a shaft secured to a driving gear wheel which is engaged to any of said gear wheels secured to said pins; so that when the motor rotates, the driving wheel engages one of said gear wheels which rotate all other gear wheels, thus rotating the pins and causing said belt to run continuously, so that when the device is placed in touch with the body hair said hair will be caught in the gaps between the extended pins and said rotatable belt, clamping other hair towards the rotation of said pins and belt, thus pulling the hair out.
Further features of the invention can be seen in the description below of the preferred embodiment illustrated in the drawings.


There is disclosed an image pickup device provided with a focusing lens for regulating the focus state of a phototaking optical system; an encoder for detecting a region in which the focusing lens is positioned; and a control circuit for detecting, by means of the encoder, the region in which the focusing lens is positioned at the start of power supply and, if the focusing lens is not positioned in a predetermined region, releasing a drive control signal for driving the focusing lens to an initial position in the above-mentioned predetermined region.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lens control device adapted for use in an image pickup device such as a video camera or an electronic still camera.
2. Related Background Art
In the image pickup devices such as a video camera, there has conventionally been employed a focusing method of detecting the sharpness of the image frame from an image signal released from said image pickup means and controlling the position of a focusing lens so as to maximize said sharpness.
The sharpness is generally evaluated by the intensity of high frequency components extracted by a band-pass filter (BPF) from the image signal or the detected intensity of unfocused width of the object image, detected, for example, by a differentiating circuit from the image signal.
In case of taking an ordinary object, during an unfocused state with a low sharpness, the high frequency components are weak and the unfocused width of the object image is large. As the lens approaches to the focused state, the high frequency components assume a higher level and the unfocused width becomes smaller, and, in the completely in-focus state, the high frequency components assume a highest value while the detected unfocused width becomes smallest, whereby the sharpness becomes maximum.
Consequently, a focusing operation can be achieved by moving the focusing lens as fast as possible, while the sharpness is still low, in such a direction as to increase the sharpness and decelerating the focusing lens according to the increase of sharpness so as to stop the system on top of the peak of sharpness, whereby the focusing lens can be precisely stopped at the in-focus position. The automatic focusing method with such focusing lens control is generally called peak climbing automatic focusing (AF) method.
Also in association with the recent development of video cameras or the like with more complex functions, there is proposed so-called wide range automatic focusing system with a widened focusing range. In this system, the movable range of a conventional optical system is widened toward the shorter range side (macro region), thereby enabling focusing to an object at a shorter distance.
However, in the wide range automatic focusing system utilizing the above-mentioned peak climbing automatic focusing method, the focusing operation may not be conducted properly immediately after the start of power supply, if the focusing lens is positioned at the shortest object range side when the power supply is previously turned off. For example, there may be encountered drawbacks that the focusing lens is stopped at an out-of-focus position or that the focusing operation requires a long time. The object to be focused immediately after the start of power supply is empirically most often positioned in the ordinary distance range, while the focusing lens in the shorter object distance region requires a larger amount of movement, for a given change in the object distance, in comparison with the focusing operation in the ordinary object distance region. For these reasons, the system is often unable to follow the object in the ordinary object distance region while the focusing lens is in the shorter object distance region, thus eventually requiring a long time for escaping from such state or erroneously stopping the focusing lens before the focusing operation is completed.

Image pickup device with focusing control


An adjustable tray includes a first board, a second board and an adjustment component. The second board is pivoted on the first board, and the second board has at least one first position section and at least one second position section. The adjustment component includes a main part and at least one abutted part connected to each other. A first distance is between the first position section and the first board. A second distance is between the second position section and the first board. The first distance is different from the second distance. The main part is movably disposed on the first board for positioning the abutted part at the first position section or the second position section to pivot the second board with a first angle or a second angle between the first board and the second board, and the first angle is different from the second angle.

Information was recorded on the paper documents, such as images or handwriting, for the preservation in the past. With the development of digital technology, the information can be recorded in the computers or on the Internet to reduce the space needed for the preservation.
The information on the paper documents is able to be digitalized by a scanner. An automatic paper feeding mechanism of the scanner favorably increases the efficiency of scanning the paper documents. The paper documents are generally output from the scanner to a tray and arranged in a stack after the scanning process.


Embodiments of the present invention include architectures and methods for automated management of invoices. Embodiments of the present invention may include techniques for receiving and unifying invoice data, retrieving information about each invoice, verifying each invoice and resolving invoice exceptions. The present invention includes software components for efficiently processing invoices. In other embodiments, the present invention includes methods of processing an invoice.

The present invention relates to data processing and data management, and in particular, to a system and method for automated management and verification of invoices and data associated with invoices.
When two entities engage in a business transaction, an invoice is typically generated to capture and memorialize important information about the transaction. For example, an invoice commonly includes a list of goods delivered or services performed, with corresponding prices, quantities, descriptions and charges. As a company grows, keeping track of invoices from suppliers of goods or services (i.e., vendors) can quickly become a difficult task. Different departments within a company may use hundreds or even thousands of different vendors. Furthermore, vendors may send their invoices to different people across the company. Many companies typically have internal or external departments for receiving and processing invoices, but the employees in such departments may have very little information about the nature of the transaction leading to the invoice. Thus, tracking and promptly paying valid invoices, and detecting and correcting erroneous or fraudulent invoices, is a major problem facing today's business community.
To manage and track the flow of invoices, companies often require vendors to associate additional information with each invoice such as a purchase order number, information about which business unit in the company ordered the goods or services, and various tracking and/or reference numbers. Additionally, vendors typically include their name, address and various reference and tracking numbers of their own on their invoices. However, one problem that arises is that the information provided on different invoices can vary drastically from vendor to vendor. Moreover, even if the same information is provided across all vendors, the "format" of the information may be different. For example, the format of the invoice document itself may "look" different because different information is presented in different physical portions of each invoice. As another example, a vendor based in the United States may bill in U.S. Dollars while a vendor based in Germany may bill in Euros. Other problems commonly associated with invoice processing include processing multiple invoices sent by the same vendor for the same job or processing invoices with missing or invalid information, to name just a few. As the size of an organization grows, processing invoices with these and other problems can become economically burdensome because of the increased difficulty for accurate and efficient human processing of invoices.
FIG. 1 is an example of one common approach to automated invoice processing. Typical invoice processing is user-centric, often starting with a user entering data from a vendor's paper invoice 101 into a computer software invoice system 102. Data associated with or relating to an invoice that is stored or processed electronically is referred to herein as "invoice data" (e.g., structured or unstructured data or other electronic information). Once the user has entered invoice data into the system, the program may cross reference a purchase order number against an expected purchase order number. If the purchase order on the incoming invoice does not match exactly with an existing purchase order, the system may indicate that an erroneous invoice has been received. Erroneous invoices are referred to as "exceptions," and typically initiate a manual exception handling process 103. The manual exception handling process may require a company employee to call the vendor at 104 to determine which purchase order corresponds to the particular invoice. Alternatively, the manual exception handling process may require a user to acquire signature authorizations at 105 if, for example, no purchase order was ever assigned to the goods or services received from the vendor.
However, existing user-centric invoice management systems are expensive and highly susceptible to errors. As the number of invoices processed by a company grows, the necessary human interaction may require hundreds or even thousands of employees to manually enter paper invoices and handle exceptions and further processing. Additionally, because human invoice processors are often far removed from direct interaction with the vendor, such individuals are more likely to make a number of different mistakes including overlooking invalid or erroneous invoice data, paying out the same invoice two or more times (i.e., paying on duplicates) or paying out the wrong amount, to name just a few. These and other mistakes and inefficiencies in processing invoices can become very expensive as a company grows.
Thus, there is a need for a system that can process invoices in a way that will improve the efficiency, speed and accuracy of invoice processing over existing techniques. The present invention solves these and other problems by providing an invoice processing system and method for automated management and verification of invoices and the data associated with the invoices.

System and method for management and verification of invoices