An image forming device is adapted for placement on a surface on which pictures or characters are drawn or displayed. The image forming device includes a lens member including a plurality of distributed-index rod-like lens elements disposed in juxtaposed relationship with each other in a matrix-like arrangement and operable to map the pictures or characters as a visual real image on substantially one image plane in the air spaced from the surface. A touch-less display switch for use with a display device includes a sensor in addition to the lens member as in the image forming device. The sensor has a detection area corresponding to at least a part of the formed image on the image plane and operable to detect an object entering the detection area in a non-contact manner.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming device for forming in the air an image of pictures or characters drawn or displayed on a surface, and also relates to a touch-less display switch which utilizes such an image forming device.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventionally, static or animated pictures or characters displayed on a picture plane of a display device are adapted to be observed by an observer while he visually recognizes the picture plane itself through a surface structure of the display device.
However, such pictures or characters are those merely displayed on the picture plane, and they lack amusingness.
In addition, various kinds of display switches called xe2x80x9ctouch-panel switchesxe2x80x9d have been proposed. In general, such switches are disposed on an upper surface of a display device and have a common basic construction which includes a contactor or a specific member having a variable impedance covered by a transparent sheet. The contactor is normally made of a transparent electrode.
Here, the term xe2x80x9ctouch-panel switchxe2x80x9d means a multi-function switch (operable as an input/output terminal as well as a switch) which is operable to open and close its contact when an operator touches or pushes a transparent sheet (or a contact) of the switch with his finger(s), or when the finger(s) of the operator is moved away from the transparent sheet after contacting the same.
Since, with the conventional touch-panel switch, the operator has to touch the transparent sheet of the switch after he visually recognizes keys which are displayed on a picture surface of the display device and which are positioned at the back of the transparent sheet, there has been a serious drawback that the transparent sheet tends to be stained in addition to the drawbacks of lack in amusingness of the display device itself.
Further, for the reason of stains, the conventional touch-panel switch is not suitable for use as an input/output terminal for an instrument or an apparatus in which particular consideration should be given to sanitary aspect.
For example, as for an operation switch for a medical instrument, it is often desirable that the switch is turned on and off while the operator does not touch the switch. As is well known, in recent years, nosocomial infection by virus has been a serious problem. Thus, the conventional touch-panel switch is not appropriate to be used where it is not suitable for uses where the operator directly touches a switch (or its keys).
It is, accordingly, an object of the present invention to provide an image forming device which serves to form an image of pictures or characters in a visually specific manner.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a touch-less display switch which permits an operator to operate the switch without touching the switch while the operator visually recognizes an image of keys of the switch which has been formed in a special form.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a touch-less display switch which does not cause stains on the switch or keys as well as fingers of an operator when the switch is operated.
It is a still further object of the present invention to provide a touch-less display switch which is advantageously used as an input/output terminal of an instrument where particular consideration should be given to sanitary aspect.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image forming device for placement on a surface on which pictures or characters are drawn or displayed, comprising a lens member including a plurality of distributed-index rod-like lens elements disposed in juxtaposed relationship with each other in a matrix-like arrangement and operable to map the pictures or characters as a visual real image on substantially one image plane in the air spaced from said surface.
With the first aspect, for example, static or animated pictures or characters displayed on a picture surface of a display device are mapped by the lens member as a visual real image in the air space from the picture surface. Thus, an observer or an operator can observe the image in the air risen from the actual picture surface, so that the image thus obtained is very unique and provides excellent view.
According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a touch-less display switch for use in combination with a display device, comprising:
a lens member including a plurality of distributed-index rod-like lens elements disposed in juxtaposed relationship with each other in a matrix-like arrangement. and operable to map pictures or characters displayed on a picture surface of the display device as a visual image on substantially one image plane in the air in spaced relationship with the picture surface; and
a sensor having a detection area corresponding to at least a part of the mapped image on said image plane and operable to detect an object entering said detection area in a non-contact manner.
The lens elements may have a predetermined length and having flat upper and lower ends, so that the lens member has flat upper and lower surfaces.
The lens member is positioned above the display device such that the pictures or characters displayed by the display device are mapped on the image plane as a visual real image in the air above the lens member.
When an object such as a finger(s) of an operator enters the detection area of the sensor positioned on or adjacent the image plane of the mapped image, the sensor detects the position of the object or a particular area part (one of area parts of the detection area) to which the position of the object belongs.
The pictures or characters displayed by the display device may include a plural kind of keys, so that the keys are mapped on the image plane in the air by means of the lens member. Thus, the operator can visually recognize the image of the keys floating in the air and can move his finger to touch or select either one of the keys as the visual image. When the finger of the operator enters the particular area part of the detection area of the sensor corresponding to the selected key, the sensor outputs a corresponding output signal.
The output signal from the sensor may be used for converting the pictures or characters currently displayed by the display device into another ones and may be also used for controlling a suitable device or instrument associated with the switch.
The invention will become more apparent from the appended claims and the description as it proceeds in connection with the drawings.

Image forming device and touchless display switch


A wire cutting mechanism for smoothly cutting a broken cutting wire of a wire electrode cutting device that positively guides the scrape position of the wire electrode to a disposal passage. The cutting mechanism has a feed mechanism positioned above a wire cutter to control the feed of the wire electrode during the cutting operation. Both the cutter and the feed mechanism are mounted on a plate that is displaceable in order to align the wire electrode feed with the disposal passage when the wire electrode has been broken and must be cut to ensure accurate feeds the cutting zone. The cutting mechanism, when positioned for cutting, feeds the broken end of the electrode wire for a predetermined time so that the wire electrode enters the disposal passage prior to cutting.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a wire-cut electrical discharge machine having a wire electrode cutting device capable of cutting off a predetermined length of a wire electrode, which is broken by an accident, in order to dispose of the unusable length before rethreading the wire electrode.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the wire-cut electrical discharge machine, electrical discharge pulses are supplied in a machining zone between a wire electrode and a workpiece in order to cut a complex shape from the workpiece. In such a wirecut electrical discharge machine, there is a need to forcibly cut off the wire electrode in two cases when the wire electrode is not broken. For example, in the first case after one workpiece is safely cut and a new workpiece is set, the wire electrode is forcibly cut off. Then, it is easier to position the wire electrode in a starting position for cutting the new workpiece. The second case when the wire electrode needs to be forcibly cut off is when there is one pattern comprising some parts disposed independently each other. To cut out the pattern from the workpiece, first, one part is cut out from the workpiece and then, to cut out a next part from the workpiece, the wire electrode is forcibly cut off. As a result, it is easier to position the wire electrode in a starting position for the next part.
As mentioned above, the electrical discharge pulses are supplied in the machining zone between the wire electrode and the workpiece, so that the pattern is cut out from the workpiece. However, if the electrical discharge repeatedly occurs in the same position of the wire electrode, there is the possibility that the wire electrode will break. Upon the accidental breakage of the wire electrode, a predetermined length of the wire electrode must be cut off before the wire electrode is rethreaded Especially, when the wire electrode breaks by accident, the breaking point of the wire electrode (the pointed head of the wire electrode) or the periphery thereof is usually deformed by the electrical discharges occurring in the machining zone between the wire electrode and the workpiece. As a result, it is difficult to put the pointed head of the wire electrode, resulting from the deformation, into the small wire guide of the wire-cut electrical discharge machine, or into the starting position on the workpiece, that is, it is difficult to rethread the wire electrode in the wire-cut electrical discharge machine.
Therefore, in the wire-cut electrical discharge machine, a predetermined length of the deformed wire electrode is cut off and scrapped. Then, since the wire electrode is smoothly cut at the pointed head, it is easy to introduce the wire electrode into the wire guide so that the wire electrode is rethreaded in the wire-cut electrical discharge machine. Especially, in the case where the wire-cut electrical discharge machine is continuously operated for a long time without an operator, it is preferable that the operation of cutting off and disposing of the unusable length of the broken wire electrode and the operation of rethreading the wire electrode are automatically executed. Various types of wire electrode cutting device capable of automatically executing the above-mentioned operations are disclosed in the art.
One type of wire electrode cutting device is the wire electrode cutting device disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 63-11232. According to the wire electrode cutting device so disclosed, the pointed head of the broken-down wire electrode is held by a clamp (holding means) and the wire electrode is cut off at the wire electrode supply side with respect to the pointed head. After cutting, a driving device lifts and rotates the clamp holding the scrap wire electrode such that the clamp is positioned above a disposal box. When the clamp opens, to release the wire electrode, the scrap wire electrode falls into a disposal box. However, when the clamp opens, the wire electrode does not always release from the clamp. In other words, the operation of disposing of the wire electrode is not always executed with certainty.
Moreover, according to the wire electrode cutting device disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,698,478, the wire electrode to be cut is drawn between a brake device and a clamp device. The brake device is used to give a back tension to the wire electrode, upstream of the feeding direction of the wire electrode, while machining. The rolling-type clamp device is disposed above the workpiece. The drawn wire electrode is cut off by a cutting device disposed above the clamp device and the scrap wire around the clamp is pushed off such as to fall in a disposal chute.
According to the above-described structure, the pointed head of the broken-down wire electrode is wound around the clamp device so as to be drawn tight. Therearound fore, after the wire electrode is cut off, the scrap wire electrode is tightly wound around the clamp device. As a result, it is very difficult to push the bundle of scrap wire from the clump device. Further, a scrap wire push-off disposal device becomes very complex.
In addition, in the above-mentioned wire electrode cutting device, after the unusable length of the wire electrode is cut off, the scrap wire electrode is carried above the disposal box. Therefore, it takes a lot of time to cut off and dispose of the wire electrode. As a result, the wire electrode is not speedily rethreaded and working efficiency is reduced.

Wire-cut electrical discharge machine having wire electrode cutting device


A process and apparatus for elongating an optical fibre preform includes heating the preform so as to soften one region thereof; elongating the preform by submitting the preform to a traction; determining, during the step of elongating, the preform diameter in at least one measuring point along the preform; and controlling the step of elongating on the basis of the determined diameter. During the step of elongating, at least a geometrical parameter of the preform is measured, and the position of said diameter measuring point is controlled according to the measured geometrical parameter. Measuring at least a geometrical parameter of the preform may be accomplished by determining the profile of at least a portion of the softened region, e.g., an image of the neck region profile.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to the manufacturing of optical fibers, and particularly to processes for forming glass preforms for the optical fibers. Specifically, the invention concerns a process and an apparatus for the elongation of an optical fiber preform.
2. Description of the Related Art
Several processes are known for making glass preforms for drawing optical fibers. Such processes include the modified chemical vapour deposition (MCVD) process, the outside vapour deposition (OVD) process and the vapour axial deposition (VAD) process.
Many of the known processes for making the preforms include a stage, called elongation, in which a vitrified preform rod, formed according to different techniques depending on the specific manufacturing process, is submitted to reduction in diameter to obtain a preform of prescribed final diameter. To this purpose, the vitrified preform rod is heated, in a furnace or by means of a burner, up to the softening temperature. The preform rod is then stretched so as to reduce the diameter thereof in the softened region, referred to as "neck". The vitrified preform rod may have a central hole that, during the elongation stage, may collapse.
Several solutions are known for stretching the preform. According to some solutions, both ends of the preform are moved, while the heated region of the preform is kept steady. In this case, the preform is generally elongated along a vertical axis ("vertical elongation process"), and it is attached at the upper end thereof to a feeder; the feeder sustains the preform and feeds it to a furnace. At the bottom end, downstream the furnace, the preform is attached to a puller, providing the traction force necessary to stretch the preform.
Within the furnace, the preform is heated up to the softening temperature. The puller imparts a translation speed higher than the feed rate of the feeder, thereby the softened region of the preform is stretched. The outer diameter of the preform in the softened region is thus reduced and, if present, the preform central hole may collapse. Optionally, the feeder and the puller may also impart to the preform a rotation about its axis.
According to other solutions, one end of the preform is kept steady and the other end is moved, while the heated region is moved in a direction same as or opposite to the moving end of the preform. In this solutions, the preform is generally elongated along a horizontal axis ("horizontal elongation process"). The preform is heated by means of a horizontally movable heater, e.g. a burner mounted on a carriage. The preform ends are attached to mandrels of a horizontal lathe: one mandrel is kept steady, while the other is moved horizontally. The translation speeds of the movable mandrel and the heater determine the final diameter of the preform. Also in this case, the preform may be rotated about its axis.
Irrespective of the specific solution adopted for stretching the preform, the main objective of the preform elongation stage is that of obtaining rods of a prescribed diameter, to be submitted to subsequent processing up to the drawing of optical fibers. It is therefore of paramount importance to monitor the preform diameter during the elongation stage.
Various techniques have been proposed for monitoring the preform diameter during the elongation stage. Generally speaking, all these techniques call for measuring the preform diameter in a limited number of discrete points (one, two or three points) along the preform axis, particularly along the neck, for example by means of laser-based instruments; the measured diameter or diameters are typically compared to predetermined diameter values, and the feed rate of the feeder and/or the speed of the puller, or the speed of the movable mandrel and/or the speed of the heater, depending on the solution adopted for stretching the preform, are controlled accordingly. For example, assuming that the measured diameter is higher than the target diameter, the speed of the movable mandrel is increased, and vice versa.
Techniques providing for measuring the preform diameter in one prescribed point along the preform axis are for example described in JP 57092534, JP 62108743, JP 61014149, U.S. Pat. No. 5,755,849 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,942,019. JP 5147971, U.S. Pat. No. 6,178,778 and JP 8091861 are examples of prior art documents describing the measurement of the preform diameter in two or three discrete points along the preform axis.
In particular, U.S. Pat. No. 5,942,019, in relation to the elongation of preforms by means of a furnace, underlines the importance of setting the position for measuring the outer diameter of the taper portion (i.e., the neck). Summarising, in that document it is observed that in the case where the outer diameter measuring position is disposed near the upper end of the taper portion, i.e., near the heater, even when the moving speeds of the chucks are controlled to keep the outer diameter of the upper end of the taper portion constant, the outer diameter may be varied at the taper portion, thereby the outer diameter of the elongated body may become uneven and fluctuate. On the other hand, in the case where the outer diameter measuring position is disposed near the lower end of the taper portion, since the glass preform has almost been cooled at this position and its viscosity has been quite large to be elongated, even if a fluctuation in the outer diameter is detected, it can hardly be corrected. Still according to U.S. Pat. No. 5,942,019, the optimal outer diameter measuring position, which varies depending on the outer diameter of the glass preform before elongating, the outer diameter of the elongated body, the heater temperature, the inner diameter of the furnace core tube and the like, is to be determined experimentally.
According to the Applicant, determining the optimal position of the diameter measurement point by means of experiments is not satisfactory from an industrial application viewpoint.
The Applicant has moreover noticed that prior art methods provides for measuring the diameter in one, two or three prefixed points, in particular in points that have no correlation with the actual geometry of the neck of the preform being elongated, and that because of the dependency of the neck length and shape on several process parameters, such as the initial and final diameter of the preform, the process operating speeds, the temperature profiles, the speed of rotation of the preform, if provided, the diameter of the preform central hole, if present, and the internal pressure, the neck geometry may vary from process to process and even in the course of a single elongation process. The Applicant has found that, for this reason, measuring the neck diameter in prefixed points, which are not correlated to the geometry of the neck, does not allow a precise control of the preform final diameter.

Process and apparatus for elongating of an optical fibre preform


A hypothesis of co-occurrence relation information is generated from sentences and results of processing these sentences. Sentences for verification are generated based on the hypothesis. The adequacy of the sentences generated for verification is judged, and if the sentences are adequate, dictionary information including co-occurrence relation information is generated from the sentences for verification and the hypothesis which is the basis for the verification sentences.

The present invention relates to a maintenance support method and an apparatus for a natural language processing system. Particularly, the present invention relates to a maintenance support method and an apparatus for a natural language processing system for processing a sentence written in a natural language which is suitable for supporting maintenance of grammar rules and dictionaries that are used for the processing.
Generally, a natural language processing system is structured by a dictionary and grammar rules for a source language and a processing system which processes an input by applying the grammar rules.
Question answering systems using a natural language and machine translation systems have been studied and developed as a natural language processing system. For example, the following processing is performed in a machine translation system. A sentence of a source language is analyzed by using dictionary information relating to the words of the source language and grammar rules for analysis. Grammar rules for generation are applied to the result of analysis. A sentence (a translation) is generated by using dictionary information of the words of a target language. A translation processing of this type is discussed in the JOHO SHORI of the Information Processing Society of Japan, Vol. 26, No. 10 (1985), pp. 1174-1190.
Some machine translation systems perform processings which take account of semantic information in addition to the processing based on syntactic information, in order to improve the quality of translation. For example, there is a method in which information about co-occurrence relation is stored as dictionary information that shows possibilities of a certain word appearing in a same text with some relation to any other words, and this stored information is utilized to reduce any syntactic or semantic ambiguity that may occur in the course of processing of a natural language sentence.
However, when a sophisticated processing is realized by this method, the amount of information which is necessary for this processing becomes very huge and the information becomes very detailed. As a result, a person who prepares this information is required to have linguistic knowledge and take a heavy work load for this purpose. Accordingly, it has been necessary to employ a method to improve the quality of grammar rules and dictionary information with a small work load.
In order to meet the above purpose or the like, there are methods of surveying linguistic phenomena that appear in actual sentences. As one of those methods, there is one method for surveying with a list called a KWIC (Key Word In Context) list in which sentences including a specific word are listed after sorting sentences that include this specific word. Based on the surveyed result, maintenance of grammar rules and dictionary information are performed manually. A method of this type for analyzing sentences is discussed in the SIGNAL Notes 54-3 of the Information Processing Society of Japan, Mar. 28, 1986.
There are also attempts for reducing human work by (semi) automatically obtaining dictionary information including co-occurrence relation, etc., from actual texts. Transactions of the Information Processing Society of Japan, Vol. 26, No. 4, pp. 706-714 (1985), etc., is relevant to the extraction of this type of dictionary information.
There are also many publications of grammar books and dictionaries for men, and utilization of these publications is also considered. However, such information cannot be used for machine processing without encoding. Depending on the purposes of processing, it is necessary to interpret and encode or structure the information. Such information is based on the assumption that human beings who have world knowledge and experience other than linguistic knowledge, and linguistic phenomena are explained in fractional sentences only. Accordingly, it is necessary to supplement knowledge of missing parts and ambiguous parts in order to prepare a dictionary for machine processing. In actual documents, a variety of linguistic phenomena exist depending on the kinds of documents, and there is no other way than to survey the actual source documents to obtain these detailed phenomena.
The inventors of the present invention have already filed an application (JP-A-1-70871) in relation to the present invention. There is also JP-A-62-99865 as relevant art. These are not relevant to the substance of the present invention.

Maintenance support method and apparatus for natural language processing system


A water-based ink set for ink-jet recording has a plurality of color inks. Each of at least one of the plurality of color inks contains a first ink and a second ink. The first ink has a first hue angle and the second ink has a second hue angle, wherein the first hue angle is not equal to the second hue angle and a differential range therebetween is a hue angle color range of a normal color of the at least one of the plurality of color inks; and a coloring agent of one of the first ink and the second ink is a pigment and a coloring agent of the other thereof is a dye.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a water-based ink set for ink-jet recording composed of inks of a plurality of colors.
2. Description of the Related Art
When a color image is developed by use of an ink-jet recording method, a three-color ink set has been generally used which is composed of a yellow ink (Y), a magenta ink (M) and a cyan ink (C). Moreover, a four-color ink set has also been used in which a black ink (K) is further added to the three-color ink set.
In order to develop natural colors over a wide range in a color image formed by use of the above color ink sets, hue is controlled by changing the formation ratio of dots of each of the yellow, magenta and cyan inks discharged from an ink-jet head. In addition, lightness is controlled by changing the formation density of dots of each of the inks.
Recently, in order to obtain excellent image reproducibility, a combination of inks of a plurality of colors has been employed to widen a color reproducible range. Specifically, additional inks are added to the abovementioned four-color inks (Y, M, C and K) to form an ink set composed of five to seven inks. These additional inks include a yellow ink having a low color density (a light yellow ink), a magenta ink having a low color density (a light magenta ink), and a cyan ink having a low color density (a light cyan ink). Further, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-248217 proposed a method in which at least one of a blue ink (B), a violet ink (V), a red ink (R), an orange ink (O) and a green ink (G) is employed in addition to the above four-color inks (Y, M, C and K).
However, the desired chromaticity and chroma saturation are not always obtained in an ink-jet recording color image even when the light yellow, light magenta and light cyan inks are added to the conventional four-color inks (Y, M, C and K). This is also the case when the additional inks including the blue ink (B), the violet ink (V), the red ink (R), the orange ink (O) and the green ink (G) are added.
Further, in the ink set employing such additional inks, the ink ejection amount on a recording material increases relative to the number of the additional inks. Thus, if a dye is employed as the coloring agent of each ink in this ink set (hereinafter, such an ink will be referred to as a dye ink), blurring or cockling becomes noticeable on a recording material, such as ordinary paper, in which blurring is prone to occur. Also, when an ink set is composed of dye inks, environmental resistance to water, light, and gas such as ozone is unsatisfactory, and thus the storage stability of an image is insufficient.
On the other hand, in the ink set employing the additional inks in addition to the conventional four-color inks (Y, M, C and K), a pigment may be employed as the coloring agent of each ink (hereinafter, such an ink will be referred to as a pigment ink). In this case, generally, blurring is suppressed on a recording material, and also environmental resistance to water, light, and gas such as ozone is excellent. However, in many cases, the chromaticity and chroma saturation developed by use of a pigment ink are not as satisfactory as those developed by use of a dye ink. Further, when an ink set is composed of pigment inks, various problems are present such as insufficient fixability on photo glossy paper.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Water-based ink set for ink-jet recording


A system and method for calibrating a printer includes the steps or functions of: printing a predetermined color test pattern with the printer by transforming data, representing said predetermined color test pattern, from a device-independent color space to a device-dependent color space associated with the printer by use of a color transform, said predetermined color test pattern including a set of color patches with one of said color patches representing a preferred mid-gray hue; providing a predetermined reference gray surface; comparing said reference gray surface to said set of colored patches of the printed test pattern to find a closest matching one of said patches, if the closest matching one of said patches is the patch representing the preferred mid-gray hue, then ending the method; otherwise determining, for each color channel of the printer, a solution set of correction values as a function of believed gray versus actual gray, said solution set derived from and including a white point, a black point and a point mapped at {G.sub.b, G.sub.a } where G.sub.b is the believed gray value of the closest matching one of said patches and G.sub.a is the actual gray value of the closest matching one of said patches; and adding to the color transform the corresponding solution set for each color channel of the printer.

This invention relates generally to a method and apparatus for calibration of printers. More particularly, the invention relates to a printer calibration method and apparatus whereby an unsophisticated user can calibrate a color printer by visually matching a reference gray card with a corresponding patch on a printed test pattern, without the use of a color measurement instrument such as a calorimeter or spectrophotometer.
A common problem when dealing with digital color imaging devices is getting the colors to match. For example, a color scanner is an input device in an image processing system that operates in some given device dependent color space such as red, green and blue (RGB) color space where colors are described in terms of RGB values or digits. The RGB values associated with specific colors are particular for the given device so that a digital imaging device which uses RGB digits (such as a monitor, digital camera or scanner) transforms a digital image into device-dependent RGB color space having RGB values which are dependent not only on the colors in the image, but on the particular device being used.
Digital output devices, e.g. printers, also operate in a given device-dependent color space which typically differs from those used by input devices. For example, many printers operate in cyan magenta, yellow and black (CMYK) device-dependent color space where output device color digits are CMYK values. Moreover, since the CMYK values are device-dependent, colors printed on any given printer will probably not match colors printed on a different printer for the same CMYK values. Further complicating color matching between devices is the fact that different devices have different color capabilities. Every rendering device, such as a printer or monitor, has a limited range of colors, i.e. gamut, that it can reproduce. Those skilled in the art will recognize that color display monitors tend to be able to produce a wider range of lighter colors whereas color printers tend to be able to produce a wider range of darker colors. Consequently, the gamut for a color display monitor is different from the gamut for a color printer. As a result, some colors displayed on monitors cannot be reproduced on color printers and vice versa. In other words, the combination of color device digits needed to acquire, process or render a particular color for one device is usually not the same as the combination of color device digits needed to acquire, process or render the same color on another device.
Many solutions exist for transforming color information from an input device to an output device in such a way that the perceived colors in the image are preserved. Often, the solution requires multiple transformations to account for more than one pair of input and output devices. FIG. 1 illustrates a block view of a typical imaging system 8 that incorporates such transforms.
A physical image 10 is acquired in digital form by an image acquisition, e.g. input, device such as a scanner 12. The scanner 12 translates the physical image 10 into a digital image 14 having device digits which are dependent upon the scanner 12 The digital image 14 is then sent for processing in the computer 6 where it is passed though two separate transforms. The color transform 16 converts the digital image 14 into a first printer image 20 appropriate for sending to a printer 24 of a particular model ("Model A"). The color transform 18 converts the digital image 14 into a second printer image 22 appropriate for sending to printers 26 or 28 of a different model ("Model B"). The first printer image 20 is then sent to the Model A printer 24, which produces a hardcopy 30. The second printer image 22 is sent to two distinct Model B printers 26 and 28 which produce hardcopies 32 and 34, respectively.
There are many ways in which the transforms 16 and 18 can be implemented. A common method is to use profiles for each input and output device. A device profile is standardized and defined as "a digital representation of the relation between device coordinates and a device-independent specification of color" in the International Color Consortium (ICC) Profile Format Specification, Version 3.3, Nov. 11, 1996, page 101 incorporated herein in its entirety for supplemental background information which is non-essential but helpful in appreciating the applications of the present invention.
The characterization of a device's image pixel data in device-independent color space is commonly codified in a tagged file structure, referred to as the device profile, that accompanies the digital imaging device.
A standard ICC profile includes header information, a tag table and tagged element data. The profile header provides the necessary information to allow a receiving system to properly search and sort ICC profiles. The header includes, but is not limited to, the following parameters: size; color management module (CMM) type; version number, device class; color space; connection space; creation date and time; file signature; primary platform target; flags; device manufacturer, device model; device attributes; rendering intent; XYZ values; and the name of the creator.
The profile size is given in bytes. The CMM, profile version number and device class each identified. The three basic device profile classes are input, output and display. Profiles are also classified as device link, color space conversion, abstract or named color profiles. Device link profiles provide a mechanism in which to save and store a series of device profiles and non-device profiles in a concatenated format as long as the series begins and ends with a device profile. Color space conversion profiles are used as a convenient method for CMMs to convert between different non-device color spaces. Abstract color profiles provide a generic method for users to make subjective color changes to images or graphic objects by transforming the color data within a profile connection space (PCS) to be described later. Named color profiles are related to device profiles so that, for a given device there would be one or more device profiles to handle process color conversions and one or more named color profiles to handle named colors. The color space of the data stored in the profile could be any color space such as XYZ, L*a*b*, Luv, RGB, CMY, CMYK, etc. Further, the profile connection space can be any device-independent color space such as XYZ or L*a*b*. The primary platform signature indicates the primary platform or operating system for which the profile was created. The profile flags indicate various hints for the CMM such as distributed processing and caching options. The device attributes are noted which are unique to the particular device setup such as the media type. The rendering intent is either perceptual, relative colorimetric, saturation or absolute colorimetric.
The tag table acts as a table of contents for the profile tags and the tag element data therein. Each profile classification requires a different set of tags. Of course, the intent of using tags with profiles is to provide a common base level of functionality. One example of a tag is the calibrationDateTimeTag which provides profile calibration date and time. Initially, this tag matches the contents of the creationDateTime header flag. This allows applications and utilities to verify if this profile matches a vendor' profile and how recently calibration has been performed. Another example of a tag is the mediaWhitePointTag which specifies the media white point and is used for generating absolute colorimetry. It is referenced to the profile connection space so that the media white point as represented in the profile connection space is equivalent to this tag value. Many other profile tags are available as described in the ICC specification
The ICC specification further defines a Profile Connection Space (PCS) as a device-independent color space which can be used as a standard intermediary color space for transforming color information from one device-dependent color space to another (e.g. RGB to CMYK). For example, the transformation of a color image from a digital camera to a printer can be described as a transformation into the PCS via the digital camera's profile followed by a transformation out of the PCS via the printer's profile. The PCS, however, is a virtual space so that the image may never actually be represented in the PCS on disk or in a computer memory. Thus, the PCS is regarded as a virtual stage of the image processing in contrast to an interchange or exchange color space, which is an encoding for the storage and transmission of images.
Although the use of profiles is common as standardized by the ICC, any known procedure for transforming color data between device-independent space and device-dependent space can be utilized with the present invention.
FIG. 2 illustrates the use of profiles to implement the transforms of FIG. 1. The digital image 14 is transformed into a device-independent image 42 in device-independent color space in accordance with information supplied by the scanner profile 40. Thereafter the device-independent image 42 is transformed into the device-dependent color space of the printers 24, 26 and 28 (see FIG. 1) in accordance with information supplied by the printer profiles 44 and 46, respectively. If the profiles 44 and 46 each contain the proper information for transforming the color image data from the device-independent image 42, the resulting hardcopies or physical images 30, 32 and 34 generated by the printers 24, 26 and 28, respectively, should look identical. In practice, this is rarely the case due to variations within the printers. These variations are caused by numerous factors such as: tolerances in original parts used to manufacture the printers; variations in amount and type of usage; changes in the device's consumables (e.g. new paper, new ink, new ribbons); changes in the environment (e.g. temperature and humidity); maintenance; replacement of parts; and aging of the device over time. Moreover, a transform is designed to be used not only for a particular printer or model of printer, but for a particular set of viewing conditions for the resultant physical image. One aspect of these viewing conditions is the spectral power distribution of light in which the physical image is viewed. Small variations in the actual lighting used can lead to variations in the observed image. In fact, gross variations in lighting usually negate the desired effect of the transform, resulting in poor color reproduction of the physical image when produced by the printer.
In order to compensate for the above shortcomings in consistent hardcopy reproduction of an image, calibration is used to discover and correct for variations in individual printer behavior.
There are many methods of printer calibration currently in existence. Typically, calibration is performed by printing out a set of color patches, measuring those patches with a color-measuring instrument such as a spectrophotometer or colorimeter, comparing those measurements with a set of expected measurements, and correcting for the difference between the two sets. A spectrophotometer measures the spectrum of energy reflected across the range of visible wavelengths, whereas a colorimeter measures the specific device-independent values of a color patch.
Disadvantages to conventional calibration methods include the requirement of expensive measurement equipment (such as the spectrophotometer or calorimeter), intricate knowledge of the equipment's operation and interpretation of the resulting measurements. Since calibration is often performed in the field by the end user of the system, rather than by the system designers, this puts a burden on the end user. Furthermore, measuring instruments are subject to error. For instance, most instruments contain their own light source to illuminate the object being measured. Many of these instruments assume that the same type of light will be used to view the measured object, but this is rarely the case in real-world situations. Even devices such as spectrophotometers, which try to eliminate the effect of their built-in illuminant, are subject to error because the spectral power distribution of the built-in light may vary from the spectral power distribution of the actual illuminant used, and any fluorescence effects will cause calculated measurements to be incorrect. A further disadvantage of conventional calibration methods is that there is no accounting for any small difference between the actual lighting and the assumed lighting.
It is thus a primary object of the present invention to overcome the above and other disadvantages of conventional printer calibration by providing an easy to use printer calibration method and system.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a printer calibration method and system which does not require the use of external measuring devices such as a spectrophotometer or colorimeter.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a printer calibration method and system which accounts for possible small variations between the actual lighting and the lighting which is expected by the transform.
It is further an object of the present invention to provide a printer calibration method and system which overcomes variations between individual printers of a same make and model.
It is still further an object of the present invention to provide a printer calibration method and system which generates a solution set of correction values for each color channel of a printer in response to a mid-gray point derived as a function of actual versus believed color values for that point.
These and other objects of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the appended claims.


A memory system that includes a plurality of memory devices includes: a controller for outputting a first clock signal, a second signal and a plurality of command/address input signals corresponding to the plurality of memory devices, respectively; and a register and delay circuit unit for outputting command/address output signals after receiving the command/address input signals front the controller and then correcting transmission delay due to transmission lines; wherein the plurality of memory devices receive the command/address output signals from the register and delay circuit unit via the transmission lines, respectively, and sample the command/address output signals using the first clock signal directly inputted from the controller. As a result, the memory system can simplify the layout of semiconductor device design and prevent the collision of clocks.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to memory systems comprising a plurality of memory devices, and more particularly, to a memory system for removing a command/address clock which samples command/address signals is removed.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A clock control device of conventional memory devices comprises a register chip for buffering command/address input signals and a phase locked loop chip for generating timing signals, in case of dual in line memory module 'DIMM'. When a plurality of PLL output clocks are generated in the PLL, a compensation capacitor (hereinafter, referred to as 'Ccomp') is used to control their edge timing.
FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example of a conventional memory system using distributed command/address signals. A PLL circuit 20 edge controls address clocks 'CACLK' inputted from a controller 10 by using the Ccomp, which compensates signal delay generated from transmission lines, and adjusts the edge-controlled CACLKS to have the same phase with the CACLKs inputted from the controller 10, and then applies the adjusted CLK0, CLK1, CLK2 and CLK3, to a plurality of memory devices 61, 62, 63 and 64, respectively. Here, a register 30 buffers a plurality of command/address input signals 'CAin' outputted from the controller 10, and outputs a plurality of command/address output signals 'CAout' to the plurality of memory devices 61, 62, 63 and 64, respectively, via transmission lines.
However, the conventional memory system has the following problems. First, since the conventional memory system should include the transmission lines to transmit clocks CLK0–CLK3 to the plurality of memory devices, the lay-out of semiconductor device design becomes complicated. Second, since the memory devices receive clocks CLK0–CLK3 and write data capture clocks 'WCLK', clock domain collision can be generated between clocks and write data capture clocks. Third, since each memory device should comprise an individual PLL or DLL circuit, jitter and cost of the whole system are increase. Fourth, since a register and a PLL circuit should be embodied using separate chips, the packaging process of semiconductor devices is complicated, thereby the packaging cost is increased. Finally, timing margins are degraded due to differences of a plurality of compensation capacitors.

Memory system using non-distributed command/address clock signals


A receiving device includes: a communication unit to receive a plurality of partial data divided from data to be transmitted through two or more connection networks; an information confirming unit to confirm (i) transmission order information and (ii) network transmission order information indicating related to a transmission order assigned to of the specific partial data among the plurality of partial data to be transmitted through a the specific connection network designated among the two or more connection networks; and the control unit to determine whether non-received partial data are lost based on at least one of the transmission order information and the network transmission order information.

The statements in this section merely provide background information related to the present disclosure and do not constitute prior art.
Recently, communication services based on a plurality of mobile communication networks, such as WCDMA, CDMA, WiBro, and LTE (Long Term Evolution), have been provided. In addition, communication services based on a WLAN (WiFi) network that is a near field communication network have been provided.
Even in a multi-network environment in which several networks coexist as described above, it is known to transmit data through one selected from the multiple networks.
According to this known method, however, in case where transmitting or receiving large-capacity data, the inventor(s) has noted that the load factor of the one selected network is abruptly increased to limit smooth providing of the data service. In an environment where various wireless devices, such as smart phones and tablet PCs, are increasing and various large-capacity data services with respect to such wireless devices are also increasing, the inventor(s) has experienced that the above-described known method is improper.
In order to provide a smooth data service in a multi-network environment, the inventor(s) has noted that a simultaneous data transmission service, in which a transmitting device divides one piece of data into several pieces of partial data and simultaneously transmits the divided partial data to a receiving device through two or more networks of multiple networks, has been proposed.
On the other hand, in order to efficiently operate such a simultaneous data transmission service, the inventor(s) has experienced a need for schemes for promptly determining whether to continuously wait for reception of non-received partial data, which indicate data that the receiving device fails to be received among the partial data transmitted from the transmitting device to the receiving device, or to determine that the non-received data are lost during transmission and then request retransmission of the non-received data.

Device and method for simultaneously transmitting data in multi-network


There is provided an image processing apparatus, comprising: a tomographic image acquiring unit for acquiring a tomographic image of a retina; an instruction unit for instructing for a change in the positions of display forms indicating a plurality of regions in one of the display forms indicating a plurality of layer boundaries of a retina; and a display control unit for causing the display unit to display respective display forms indicating the plurality of layer boundaries in positions corresponding to the plurality of layer boundaries in the tomographic image in an overlapped state, and in a case of instructing for the change in the position of at least one of display forms, for causing the display unit to display the display form instructed with the display form different from other display forms.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus and an image processing method for processing an image.
Description of the Related Art
A technology for an optical coherence tomography (OCT) apparatus is applied to the medical field. An ophthalmic tomographic image photographing apparatus enables three-dimensional observation of an internal state of a retina layer. This tomographic image photographing apparatus has become popular for its capability of more appropriately diagnosing diseases.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-073099 discloses a technology of obtaining a position of a layer boundary by sequentially referring to pixel values of a tomographic image along a depth direction of a fundus in a conventional technology for retinal layer analysis. An ophthalmological diagnosis, which necessitates grasping in units of layers that form a retina, involves displaying of a form and a thickness of each layer on the tomographic image of the retina or three-dimensional displaying in units of layers.
Here, an examiner sometimes wishes to correct a position of a layer boundary of a retina by an editing operation. Further, in recent years, the number of layers in demand has been increasing more than before owing to an increase in image quality of a tomographic image, an improvement in analysis accuracy, and the like. At this time, if the number of layer boundaries of the retina in the tomographic image increases, the editing operation for positions thereof becomes complicated.

Image processing apparatus and image processing method


A heat sealer including: a base bar equipped with a heater on a receiving section; and a pressure bonding lever facing the receiving section and capable of pressing and holding a sealing portion of a resin made sealing preform to accommodate contents therein from both sides, and the sealing portion of the resin made sealing preform placed on the receiving section and pressed by the pressure bonding lever to the receiving section side to hold the sealing portion between the receiving section and the pressure bonding lever, and current-heated and weld-sealed, wherein the base bar includes: a recording medium supplier supplying a recording medium from which specific information can be read to a predetermined position; and a recording medium transport machine transporting the recording media having been supplied to the predetermined position one at a time to the sealing portion, whereby the recording medium is sealable integrally with the sealing preform in a single piece.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a heat sealer, and more particularly, to a heat sealer including: a base bar equipped with a heater on a receiving section; and a pressure bonding lever facing the receiving section and capable of pressing and/or holding a sealing portion of a resin made sealing preform to accommodate contents therein from both sides, wherein the sealing portion is placed on the receiving section, the pressure bonding lever is pressed to the receiving section side to hold the sealing portion between the receiving section and the pressure bonding lever, and then the sealing portion is current-heated and weld-sealed.
2. Description of the Related Art
An impulse heat sealer (hereinafter referred to simply as a heat sealer) has been employed in many cases since the heat sealer has advantages such as simplicity and convenience, and certainty in sealing the opening section of a packing bag made of a resin film in which contents are accommodated.
On the other hand, a rule that various information concerning the contents contained in a packing bag are shown on the packing bag is laid down and a method, to meet the rule, has been implemented that a bar code is attached to the packing bag (JAPANESE UNEXAMINED PATENT PUBLICATION No. 10-311665).
In addition thereto, a proposal has been offered that an IC tag is attached to a commodity or a packing bag therefor so as to be obtained more detailed information concerning contained contents instead of a bar code since an information amount is limitedly provided by the bar code (JAPANESE UNEXAMINED PATENT PUBLICATION No. 2001-317862).
The above conventional techniques, however, adopt a method that a worker puts contents into a packing bag and then, seals the bag and thereafter, another worker attaches a bar code or an IC tag to the packing bag, or a method that the same worker conducts a series of manual operations. In any methods, therefore, a problem has arisen that a quality and productivity are determined by a handling ability of the worker or workers, which remains to be improved.


A method and apparatus for measuring multiple parameters of drilling fluid using electric field perturbation, permittivity curves, time domain analysis and frequency domain analysis to identify constituents of drilling fluid and ratios of the drilling fluid constituents on a real time basis and to measure volumes and densities of the constituents on a real time basis.

Drilling fluid is a complex oil-based or aqueous-based mixture of synthetic and organic compounds which is expensive and frequently proprietary in nature.
In the drilling of a petroleum well, drilling fluids are continually pumped, at high pressure, into the upper end of the drill-string whereupon the drilling fluid is forced downwardly through the drill-string and outwardly through a cutter head at the bottom of the wellbore. The continuous supply of drilling fluid at high pressure exiting the cutter head forces the drilling fluid, and cuttings and debris carried within the drilling fluid within the wellbore, and external to the drill string, to move upwardly between the circumferential wall of the wellbore and the outer circumferential surface of the drill string, and to be regurgitated from the bore hole at the surface. Drilling fluid is critical to the drilling operation and the drilling fluid performs several simultaneous functions. The drilling fluid lubricates the cutter head and dissipates heat. The drilling fluid also evacuates "cuttings" and rock chips from the wellbore. Further, the drilling fluid seals and stabilizes the circumferential walls of the wellbore to prevent leakage, collapse, "kicks" and "blow-outs".
Drilling operations expose the drilling fluid to ground water and thus the drilling fluid can become diluted by the water encountered in the drilling process. If a well passes into, or penetrates, a significant quantity of water, the ratio of the drilling fluid constituents, such as oil to water, will change significantly and the density of the drilling fluid will consequently be reduced. The density of the drilling fluid is an integral component of drilling operations and is an important parameter to maintain safety and preventing accidents and control of the drilling process.
The instant method and apparatus measures the density of the drilling fluid, corrected for temperature, as well as the ratio of oil and water in an oil-based drilling fluid as well as the water fraction in water-based drilling fluids. The method and apparatus herein has a central instrument package and two probes, one for measurement of the oil/water ratio and measures of temperature, and a second probe that measures temperature and density provided by a differential pressure between two pressure transducers spaced apart by a known distance, corrected for temperature. The disclosed method uses electric field perturbation (EFP) to perform the measurements.
Large tanks or pits are used to mix, store, filter and recirculate the drilling fluid during drilling operations. Typically, the last step of storage and mixing of the drilling fluid is a suction tank from which the drilling fluid is suctioned and then pumped to the top of the drill string by pumps, and injected downwardly into the well through the drill string. The injected drilling fluid displaces the drilling fluid within the wellbore that is carrying drilling cuttings and debris which is circulated upwardly back to the surface where the "regurgitated"drilling fluid is dispersed onto a shaker table which removes large cuttings and debris from the fluid. Following the shaker table, the fluid is moved to settling tanks where some percentage of the fluid is transferred to a centrifuge to remove the majority of smaller cuttings, sand and debris, and then the fluid is re-mixed with return fluid for pumping back into the wellbore to continue the drilling operation.
The primary safety assessment tools in a drilling operation include correlating the volume of drilling fluid returning "out of the wellbore" (called "return fluid") with the volume of "fresh" drilling fluid being injected back into the wellbore; the density of the return fluid; and the density of the "fresh" drilling fluid being pumped back down the wellbore. Determination of the oil/water fraction of the drilling fluid provides a measure of the dilution of the drilling fluid, and that determination/measure, when combined with a measurement of the density of the return fluid and the density of the fresh drilling fluid, forms the basis for the safety assessment of the operation of the well and the drilling operation. These measures allow an operator/driller to determine what materials/additives may need to be added to the drilling fluid, during the drilling operation to maintain a desired drilling fluid density that is capable of evacuating cuttings from the wellbore to prevent loss of the cutter head, and sealing the circumferential surfaces of the well bore to prevent "kicks" and "blow-outs" as well as the fluid chemistry so as to maintain safety of the drilling operation.
During circulation in the wellbore, the drilling fluid can become diluted with groundwater and other liquids, or altered chemically by naturally occurring substances. Continual monitoring of the drilling fluid is essential to the successful completion of a well drilling operation as it prevents "binding" of the drill bit, removes "cuttings" and prevents "kicks" or "blowouts" of the well. During the "kick" or "blowout", the possibility of explosion and fire is high which can be deadly to workers and cause extensive damage to drilling equipment.
The instant inventive method and apparatus is used to measure and characterize multiple "in situ", real-time parameters of drilling fluid including, but not limited to, density, temperature, volume fraction of water, volume fraction of oil and the oil/water ratio. The instant measuring method provides a near real-time measurement of these parameters which are directly related to drilling safety. The apparatus may be portable or may also be a fixed part of a drilling process and plumbed into the fluid system of the drilling rig.
Another important measurement problem in the oil and hydrocarbon production industry is the accurate measurement of water content. Water content directly affects the price paid for the product. Various devices are available to continuously measure water content, and most such devices are capacitance meters which measure the dielectric constant of the oil/water mixture to determine the water content. Unfortunately, such devices, which are known in the industry as "water cut meters" are not continuously accurate because the temperature, density and dielectric constant of the oil/water mixture all change as measurement conditions change, which results in measurement errors.
A further complicating factor in measuring volume fraction constituents of mixtures of produced oil and water is the salt content of the mixture because salt affects the dielectric constant of the fluid components. Similarly, lubricants within the drilling mud and proprietary lubricating drilling fluids may further affect the dielectric constants of the components which may make accurate identification and measurements difficult.
The instant Electric Field Perturbation (EFP) Drilling Fluid Measurement System provides rapid assessment of the density and composition of the fluid used in drilling oil wells. Currently there many types of drilling fluids used in a well drilling operations. The primary types of drilling fluids are water based fluids and oil based fluids due to cost and ease of handling. Injecting drilling fluid down into the bore hole exposes the drilling fluid to additional dilution with water and thus the oil based fluids which are made with a small fraction of water are then diluted by the water encountered in the drilling process. If a well intersects a significant quantity of water the ratio of oil to water will change significantly and the density will be reduced. A similar situation occurs with water based fluids that undergo dilution of the fluid by coming in contact with a significant quantity of water which again changes the density of the fluid mixture. The density of the fluid, as part of the oil well exploration and drilling operation, is a very important parameter in maintaining safety and preventing accidents and control of the drilling process. The measurement of the Oil/Water ratio in oil based fluids as well as the actual water content in the water based drilling fluid is an important safety parameter. The instant EFP system can measure the density, corrected for temperature, and the ratio of oil and water in the oil based drilling fluid. The instant method can also measure the water fraction in the water based fluids. The system described herein consists of a central instrument package and two probes, one probe for measurement of the oil/water ratio, and the second probe that measures temperature and fluid density provided by the differential pressure between two pressure transducers and temperature of the probe inserted into the fluid mixture. The method uses the Electric Field Perturbation (EFP) technique to measure the oil and water for oil based fluid or the water content for the water based drilling fluids.
Our method and apparatus for measuring multiple parameters of drilling fluid overcomes various of the drawbacks of known identifying and measuring methods and apparatus.

Method for measuring multiple parameters of drilling fluid


The present invention provides an integrated circuit chip having one or more circuit elements that perform a desired circuit function with the circuit elements being encompassed by a molding compound that forms a package for the chip. The molding compound has a capacitance associated with it. The integrated circuit chip includes a second integrated circuit element within the molding compound in which the second integrated circuit element monitors the molding compound to detect a change in capacitance in the molding compound resulting from a removal of a portion or all of the molding compound. In response to a detection of a change in capacitance, the second integrated circuit element alters the desired circuit function provided by the other integrated circuit elements.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to integrated circuits and in particular to a method and apparatus for protecting functions imbedded with an integrated circuit from reverse engineering.
2. Description of the Related Art
In designing and manufacturing integrated circuits, a large amount of time, effort, and money are expended in producing integrated circuits. It is desirable to protect integrated circuits from reverse engineering in view of the expenditures in designing and manufacturing integrated circuits. Reverse engineering an integrated circuit includes removing the package surrounding the integrated circuit and probing the integrated circuit to identify functions provided by the integrated circuit. One known method for protecting integrated circuits from reverse engineering includes incorporating misleading warning labels on the integrated circuit itself. This method, however, wastes valuable real estate area. Additionally, such a labeling method does not deter a detailed examination of the integrated circuit. Another known method of preventing reverse engineering includes using packaging materials that destroy the chip during a decapping operation in which the surrounding package is removed to examine the integrated circuit. Such a packaging technique is expensive. Yet another known method for preventing reverse engineering includes placing a metalization blanket layer over the core of the integrated circuit to prevent voltage contrast scanning electron microscopy (SEM) from determining the patterns generated within the integrated circuit. The use of a metalization blanket layer, however, wastes a layer of metal interconnect and requires additional processing. Therefore, it would be advantageous to have a method and apparatus for preventing reverse engineering that does not waste valuable real estate area on an integrated circuit, does not require expensive packaging techniques, and does not require additional processing.

Method and apparatus for protecting functions imbedded within an integrated circuit from reverse engineering


The invention relates to electronic circuits for measuring, by synchronous detection, weak signals whose reference level is not well known and is subject to large fluctuations. A first correlated double sampling is performed between a time T1 situated just before the start of the measurement pulse and a time T2 situated just before the end of the measurement pulse; subsequently, a second correlated double sampling is performed between time T2 and a time T3 situated after the end of the measurement pulse. Finally, the difference between signal levels coming from the two measurements is taken, this difference being a representation of the signal value Vm considered with respect to a reference level that is intermediate between the reference levels at times T1 and T3.

The typical application envisioned is the following: measurement of light transmission or reflection coefficient of a medium through which light passes, by means of a light-emitting cell and a photosensitive cell, or measurement of the variations of this transmission or reflection coefficient. In the presence of an ambient illumination of unknown and variable luminosity, or even an ambient illumination of much greater intensity than the illumination produced by the light-emitting cell, it will be understood that the measurement is not easy.
In order to overcome this drawback, a synchronous measurement is performed: the light-emitting cell emits periodic light pulses and the signal received by the photosensitive cell is observed during the emission times; in addition, a differential measurement is carried out at two different times, namely just before the start of the pulse and just before the end of the pulse. The difference in the measured signals will then represent an increase in illumination specifically due to the light produced by the light-emitting cell and having passed through the medium to be measured.
This differential measurement is called 'correlated double sampling' when the signals are measured by means of a sample-and-hold. A sample-and-hold is used notably when the signal coming from the measurement, obtained in analog form (this is the case for a photosensitive cell), has to be converted into a digital value by an analog-digital converter. In this case, the sample-and-hold is designed to directly perform a differential measurement, in other words it directly delivers an electrical voltage value representing, rather than each measurement of illumination, the difference between the measurements made just before the start of the pulse and just before the end of the pulse.
FIG. 1 shows an example of schematic circuit diagram of a sample-and-hold capable of making this direct differential measurement. The input E receives the measurement signal Ve (for example a signal produced by a photosensitive cell) which is equal to a reference level Vr, representing the ambient illumination, which is unknown, that exists in the absence of the light pulses. The input E is connected to a first terminal of an input capacitor Ce1 whose second terminal may be connected either to ground via a switch K1 or to the inverting input (−) of an operational amplifier AMP via a switch K′1. The operational amplifier, with high gain and high input impedance, has its noninverting input (+) connected to ground and its two inputs are considered as being virtually at ground potential. An integrating capacitor Cs1 is connected between the inverting input and the output S of the operational amplifier. A switch K″1 allows the integrating capacitor Cs1 to be short-circuited in order to periodically discharge it.
The switches K1 and K″1 are closed at the same time as the switch K′1 is open, during a reset phase H1 that ends just before the light pulse emitted by the light-emitting cell. The input capacitor Ce1 therefore charges up to the reference voltage Ve=Vr present at the input just before the light pulse; the integrating capacitor Cs1 is completely discharged. Then, the switches K1 and K″1 are opened and the switch K′1 is closed during a sampling phase H2 following the reset phase. During this phase H2, the light pulse is emitted. The sampling phase ends before the end of the light pulse, but only when the signal from the photoelectric cell is stabilized. The voltage Ve at the input E is then Vm, which is different from Vr due to the light pulse.
Owing to the conservation of the charges on the joined and isolated electrodes of the capacitors Ce1 and Cs1 (total charge Ce1Vr), the charges are divided up between the capacitor Ce1 and the capacitor Cs1 and, owing to the potential of the inverting input of the amplifier being virtually held at ground, the potential adopted by the output S is Vs=−Ce1(Vm−Vr)/Cs1.
This output potential Vs is therefore equal to the inverse of Vm−Vr if Ce1 and Cs1 are equal, or proportional to −(Vm−Vr) if this is not the case.
The output potential Vs is subsequently maintained during a hold phase (after the end of the sampling period H2, when all the switches K1, K′1, K″1 are open); this potential, held at its value until the next period H1, can be used for an analog-digital conversion since it is proportional to Vm−Vr; it directly represents the signal difference due to the light pulse, irrespective of the level of ambient light.
FIG. 2 shows the signal timing diagram corresponding to the operation of the circuit in FIG. 1:                the line a represents the periodic light pulse emission time intervals;        the line b represents the signal detected by the photosensitive cell; the signal level due to the ambient light just before the light pulse is Ve=Vr; the signal Vm measured at the end of the light pulse represents the addition of the ambient illumination and the illumination due to the light pulse;        the line c represents the control period of the switches K1 and K″1, corresponding to the reset phase H1; its duration is, for example, the same as that of the light pulse but beginning at a time T0 before the start of the light pulse and ending at a time T1 just before the end of the light pulse;        the line d represents the sampling signal H2 which controls the switch K′1; it begins just after the end of the reset signal H1 and ends at a time T2 just before the end of the light pulse; its duration is that of the light pulse;        finally, the line e represents the inverse −Vs of the output voltage Vs, which goes to zero during the period H1 (reset) and which takes the value Vm−Vr during the period H2 (sampling) then keeps this value until the following measurement (hold).
This method of correlated double sampling associated with a synchronous detection yields excellent results.
Other types of samplers, more or less complex, exist and are capable of performing the correlated double sampling operation. FIG. 3 shows a particularly simple sampler from the prior art; FIG. 4 shows a differential sample-and-hold, accomplishing the same correlated double sampling function, but on a differential useful signal Ve representing the difference between two voltages Vep and Ven referenced with respect to ground.
The invention is based on the observation that, in some applications, this measurement method by synchronous detection and correlated double sampling is not satisfactory. These applications are those in which the reference level of the measured signal (for example the level Vr representing the ambient illumination) is not sufficiently stable. In fact, the method assumes that the reference level has not changed between the beginning and the end of the signal H2.
However, the duration of the signal H2 cannot be reduced below a minimum time. It must be at least long enough so that the measurement signal has had the time to stabilize after the start of the light pulse. The stabilization time is linked to the response time of the photosensitive cell and of all the electronic circuits that allow the voltage Ve to be established at the input of the sample-and-hold.
Typically, the duration of H2 can be 30 microseconds. But if the reference level Vr has the time to vary significantly during this period, the differential measurement will be affected by an error since it takes the difference between the level Vm attained at time T2 during the pulse and the reference level V1 considered at time T1 before the start of the pulse, rather than taking the difference at the same moment.
In a particularly important application envisioned here, it has been noticed that the variations of the ambient illumination over the duration of the short pulse of the synchronous measurement could lead to a significant measurement error, rendering the application inoperative in certain cases. This application is the detection of rain on a vehicle windshield with a view to triggering the automatic sweeping by the windshield wipers. The detection is carried out by a photoelectric cell (visible or infrared light) which detects the changes in reflection coefficient of the windshield depending on the presence or absence of rain. The change in reflection induces small changes in measurement signal level, where these changes may be a thousand times weaker than the signal due to the ambient illumination. However, the ambient illumination is subject to variations that are all the more rapid the higher the vehicle speed (passage under bridges, trees, etc.). The variations in 30 microseconds are very significant, and induce measurement errors that can mask the variations in reflection coefficient that it is desired to measure. The presence of rain could be detected whereas this is simply the result of a measurement error.

Method and device for measuring with synchronous detection and correlated sampling


A system and method for querying a stream of XML data in a single pass using standard XQuery expressions. The system comprises: an expression parser that receives a query and generates a parse tree; a SAX events API that receives the stream of XML data and generates a stream of SAX events; an evaluator that receives the parse tree and stream of SAX events and buffers fragments from the stream of SAX events that meet an evaluation criteria; and a tuple constructor that joins fragments to form a set of tuple results that satisfies the query for the stream of XML data.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to processing mark-up language data, and more specifically relates to a single pass system and method for querying streams of XML data.
2. Related Art
As XML (extensible mark-up language) continues to gain popularity as a format for storing, sharing, and manipulating data, new tools and systems are being introduced to increase its flexibility. One important feature necessary to provide robust XML data processing applications involves the ability to query XML data. More specifically, with the growing popularity of streamed applications over networks such as the Internet, facilities for efficiently querying streams of XML data will become more and more critical.
Relational databases currently have efficient relational operators that can be re-applied for querying XML streams. Nevertheless, they lack support for XPath expressions, which are used to navigate through XML documents in most of the XML query mechanisms, such as XQuery and SQL/XML. While there are several implementations of XPath/XSLT that can be adapted for path processing in a relational engine, they are inadequate for the task of efficiently querying streamed XML data.
One obstacle in using the current XPath/XSLT technology in conjunction with a database engine is the mismatch between the tuple oriented model of the database engines and the node set model of the XPath processors. Retrieving multiple values from an XML document corresponds to retrieving multiple columns from a relational table and is very often needed. Achieving this goal for XML streams using the available XPath processors requires either materialization of the whole input stream, or significant changes to the query execution pipeline and optimizer to split one incoming stream into several streams of single valued results.
Another issue with the state-of-the-art XPath processors is that they are designed to operate over an in-memory Document Object Model (DOM) or similar representation of the input XML document. This approach does not work well when the documents are streamed, that is, when only certain fragments of the documents are available at query time. In this respect, current implementations assume that the XML documents are entirely available at query time. This processing model requires memory in the range of the input document size. In contrast, database engines are engineered to serve large numbers of concurrent users using limited main memory. A memory intensive XPath processor within a database engine can severely limit the number of users the system can support. Accordingly, a need exists for an efficient system and method of querying streams of XML data.

System and method for querying XML streams

International Business Machines Corporation


A novel and useful system and method of improved power performance and lowered memory requirements for an artificial neural network based on packing memory utilizing several structured sparsity mechanisms. The invention applies to neural network (NN) processing engines adapted to implement mechanisms to search for structured sparsity in weights and activations, resulting in a considerably reduced memory usage. The sparsity guided training mechanism synthesizes and generates structured sparsity weights. A compiler mechanism within a software development kit (SDK), manipulates structured weight domain sparsity to generate a sparse set of static weights for the NN. The structured sparsity static weights are loaded into the NN after compilation and utilized by both the structured weight domain sparsity mechanism and the structured activation domain sparsity mechanism. The application of structured sparsity lowers the span of search options and creates a relatively loose coupling between the data and control planes.

Artificial neural networks (ANNs) are computing systems inspired by the biological neural networks that constitute animal brains. Such systems learn, i.e. progressively improve performance, to do tasks by considering examples, generally without task-specific programming by extracting the critical features of those tasks and generalizing from large numbers of examples. For example, in image recognition, they might learn to identify images that contain cats by analyzing example images that have been manually labeled as "cat" or "not cat" and using the analytic results to identify cats in other images. They have found most use in applications difficult to express in a traditional computer algorithm using rule-based programming.
An ANN is based on a collection of connected units called artificial neurons, analogous to neurons in a biological brain. Each connection or synapse between neurons can transmit a signal to another neuron. The receiving or postsynaptic neuron is connected to another one or several neurons and can process the signals and then signal downstream neurons connected to it through a synapse also referred to as an axon. Neurons may have a state, generally represented by real numbers, typically between 0 and 1. Neurons and synapses may also have a weight that varies as learning proceeds, which can increase or decrease the strength of the signal that it sends downstream. Further, they may have a threshold such that only if the aggregate signal is below or above that level is the downstream signal sent.
Typically, neurons are organized in layers. Different layers may perform different kinds of transformations on their inputs. Signals travel from the first, i.e. input, to the last, i.e. output, layer, possibly after traversing the layers multiple times.
The original goal of the neural network approach was to solve problems in the same way that a human brain would. Over time, attention focused on matching specific mental abilities, leading to deviations from biology such as backpropagation, or passing information in the reverse direction and adjusting the network to reflect that information.
The components of an artificial neural network include (1) neurons having an activation threshold; (2) connections and weights for transferring the output of a neuron; (3) a propagation function to compute the input to a neuron from the output of predecessor neurons; and (4) a learning rule which is an algorithm that modifies the parameters of the neural network in order for a given input to produce a desired outcome which typically amounts to modifying the weights and thresholds.
Given a specific task to solve, and a class of functions F, learning entails using a set of observations to find the function that which solves the task in some optimal sense. A cost function C is defined such that, for the optimal solution no other solution has a cost less than the cost of the optimal solution.
The cost function C is a measure of how far away a particular solution is from an optimal solution to the problem to be solved. Learning algorithms search through the solution space to find a function that has the smallest possible cost.
A neural network can be trained using backpropagation which is a method to calculate the gradient of the loss function with respect to the weights in an ANN. The weight updates of backpropagation can be done via well-known stochastic gradient descent techniques. Note that the choice of the cost function depends on factors such as the learning type (e.g., supervised, unsupervised, reinforcement) and the activation function.
There are three major learning paradigms and each corresponds to a particular learning task: supervised learning, unsupervised learning, and reinforcement learning. Supervised learning uses a set of example pairs and the goal is to find a function in the allowed class of functions that matches the examples. A commonly used cost is the mean-squared error, which tries to minimize the average squared error between the network's output and the target value over all example pairs. Minimizing this cost using gradient descent for the class of neural networks called multilayer perceptrons (MLP), produces the backpropagation algorithm for training neural networks. Examples of supervised learning include pattern recognition, i.e. classification, and regression, i.e. function approximation.
In unsupervised learning, some data is given and the cost function to be minimized, that can be any function of the data and the network's output. The cost function is dependent on the task (i.e. the model domain) and any a priori assumptions (i.e. the implicit properties of the model, its parameters, and the observed variables). Tasks that fall within the paradigm of unsupervised learning are in general estimation problems; the applications include clustering, the estimation of statistical distributions, compression, and filtering.
In reinforcement learning, data is usually not provided, but generated by an agent's interactions with the environment. At each point in time, the agent performs an action and the environment generates an observation and an instantaneous cost according to some typically unknown dynamics. The aim is to discover a policy for selecting actions that minimizes some measure of a long-term cost, e.g., the expected cumulative cost. The environment's dynamics and the long-term cost for each policy are usually unknown but can be estimated.
Today, a common application for neural networks is in the analysis of video streams, i.e. machine vision. Examples include industrial factories where machine vision is used on the assembly line in the manufacture of goods, autonomous vehicles where machine vision is used to detect objects in the path of and surrounding the vehicle, etc.
An Artificial Neural Network (ANN) has an inherent structure that greatly relies on a set of parameters that are attributed to the so-called 'network model'. These parameters are often called 'weights' of the network due to their tendency to operate as a scaling factor for other intermediate values as they propagate along the network. The process for determining the values of the weights is called training as described supra. Once training is complete, the network settles into a steady state and can now be used with new (i.e. unknown) data to extract information. This stage is referred to as the 'inference' stage.
During inference, one can observe the resultant set of parameters, namely the weights, and manipulate them to yield better performance (i.e. representation). Methods for pruning and quantizing weights are known. These methods, however, are applied only on the trained model before moving to the inference stage. This approach does yield better execution performance. It does not, however, fully explore and exploit the potential of modifying the weights. In addition, existing solutions apply quantization of weights only after training once the weights of the ANN have converged to a satisfactory level.

Structured activation based sparsity in an artificial neural network


Process for the manufacture of a compound of formula (I) by reaction of at least one (meth)acrylate of formula (II) with a heterocyclic alcohol of formula (III) in the presence of sodium methoxide as catalyst, characterized in that the sodium methoxide is gradually introduced, as a solution, throughout the synthesis: ##STR1## R.sup.1 =hydrogen or methyl; A and B each independently represent a straight or branched hydrocarbon chain having from 2 to 5 carbon atoms; R.sup.2 =C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl group.

The present invention relates to a process for the manufacture of a compound of formula: ##STR2## in which: R.sup.1 represents hydrogen or methyl;
A and B each independently represent a straight or branched hydrocarbon chain having from 2 to 5 carbon atoms, by reaction of at least one (meth)acrylate of formula: ##STR3## in which: R.sup.1 has the abovementioned meaning; and PA1 R.sup.2 represents a C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 alkyl group, with a heterocyclic alcohol of formula: ##STR4## in which A and B have the abovementioned meanings.
These compounds of formula (I) are known for their role in the formation of polymers useful as coatings and adhesives, for the treatment of paper and textiles, in particular by U.S. Pat. No. 2,871,223, as well as for their uses as leather treatment agents, and in the production of emulsion paints. Ethylimidazolidone methacrylate (EIOM) is mainly used in paints as a wet-adhesion promoter.
The synthesis of EIOM by transesterification has already formed the subject of a great many patents, which differ from one another in the nature of the catalyst used. Solid or partly solid catalysts, which make it possible to operate at a temperature below 100.degree. C. while giving good results from the viewpoint of the EIOM yield and of the conversion of EIOH (1-(2-hydroxyethyl)imidazolidyl-2-one sic!), have been discovered. It appears, however, that it might be possible to make the synthesis even easier to operate on an industrial scale if a liquid catalyst offering the same advantages were to be provided for this reaction.

Process for the manufacture of alkylimidazolidone (meth)-acrylates


An object of the present invention is to reduce a rise time required for stabilizing the vibration state of a vibrator and the scale of a circuit needed for the activation of a driving vibration in exciting the driving vibration in the vibrator. A driving vibration is excited in a vibrator 1 for outputting a detection signal generated based on the driving vibration and a physical value, and the physical value is measured based on the detection signal. The driving vibration is excited using a circuit 9A for self-excited vibration having a CR oscillator 5A to generate an oscillation loop together with the vibrator 1. An activating signal of rectangular wave is applied on the vibrator 1 using the CR oscillator 5A to start the driving vibration in the vibrator 1.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention provides a method and system for exciting a driving vibration in a vibrator.
2. Related Art Statement
It has been studied to use a vibratory gyroscope as a turning angular rate sensor employed in a vehicle control system of an automobile body based on a vehicle turning rate feedback system. Such a system detects the direction of a steering wheel itself by a turning angle of the steering wheel. Simultaneously, the turning rate of the car vehicle is detected by the vibratory gyroscope. The system finds a difference by comparing the direction of the steering wheel with the actual body turning velocity, and attains a stable vehicle control by correcting a wheel torque and a steering angle on the basis of this difference.
Japanese patent publication 11-281372A mainly disclosed a vibratory gyroscope suitable for horizontal mounting using a planar vibrator. In these kinds of applications, the vibratory gyroscope is driven with a battery. It is thus necessary to reduce the consumed electric power and to lengthen the use life of the battery. It is thus desirable to inactivate the operation of the vibratory gyroscope when the vehicle stops, and to activate the gyroscope only when the vehicle starts. For this, it is indispensable to start normal operation in a short time after the vibratory gyroscope is activated and to start the detection of the position of the vehicle.

Method and system of exciting a driving vibration in a vibrator