A video game device comprises a storing unit for storing one or a plurality of character information (special capabilities, etc.) in the game, an injury event control unit for controlling injury events occuring during the game, a game interrupting control unit for interrupting the game in the event that an injury event occurs, and a game resuming control unit for resuming the game at the point that the injury event ends, so the game player can cause the play character on the screen to preform a simulation experience closer to actual playing. Thus, a video game device wherein the game player can cause a play character on the screen to perform a simulation experience in a manner closer to actually playing the sport can be provided.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a video game device wherein a play character on the video screen is caused to perform a simulation experience (playing) instead of the player, a play control method for the video game, and a readable recording medium storing the play control method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, regarding playing games wherein the player performs a simulation experience as a play character on the video screen, there are known such which include scenes wherein a play character becomes the object of a negative event consisting of being injured during play. In this case, the arrangement is such that it is found out after the play ends that the player was the object of the injury event, and the play character cannot come up for the next play.
However, in such a case with actual play, the sport player either returns to play or is replaced with another sport player depending on the degree of injury treatment, so conventional games have a poor sense of reality, and lacked in interest in that point.
The present invention has been made in light of the above, and it is an object thereof to provide a video game device whereby a player can cause a play character on the screen to perform a simulation experience closer to actual playing, the play control method for the video game device, and a readable recording medium whereupon is recorded the method thereof.
The video game device according to a first aspect of the invention comprises: a storing means for storing one or a plurality of character information in a game; an injury event control means for controlling injury events in a game; a game interrupting control means for interrupting the game in the event that the injury event occurs; and a game resuming control means for resuming the game in the event that the injury event has ended.
According to this configuration, one or a plurality of character information in a game are stored in a storing means, injury events in a game are controlled by injury event control means, the game is interrupted by game interrupting control means in the event that the injury event occurs, and the game is resumed by the game resuming control means in the event that the injury event has ended. Thus, the player can cause a play character on the screen to perform a simulation experience closer to actual playing, so the game is full of sensations of reality, and is absorbingly interesting.

Video game device, play control method for video game, and readable recording medium recording the method

Kabushiki Kaisha Konami Computer Entertainment


An optically active amino acid derivative is produced by N-protecting an optically active 3-haloalanine derivative followed by cyclization, or cyclizing this derivative followed by N-protection to thereby give an optically active N-protected-aziridine-2-carboxylic acid derivative which is protected by a benzenesulfonyl group substituted by nitro at the 2- and/or 4-positions and then treating this product with an organic metal reagent, or by N-protecting an optically active 3-haloalanine derivative to thereby give N-protected-aziridine-2-carboxylic acid which is protected by a benzenesulfonyl group substituted by nitro at the 2- and/or 4-positions and then treating this product with an organic metal reagent. According to this process, natural and unnatural optically active amino acids can be produced from inexpensive materials by using simple procedures.

There have been known a great number of optically active natural or unnatural amino acid derivatives which are useful as intermediates of drugs and pesticides, physiologically active substances, etc. It is still an important problem to develop an efficient process for producing these derivatives. As noteworthy processes, there have been reported several processes of activating the OH-group at the β-position of optically active serine and then reacting with a nucleophile or an electrophile.
Examples of these processes are as follows:
(1) a process wherein an optically active N-tosyl-aziridine-2-carboxylic acid derivative is reacted with lithium acetylide of trimethylsilyl acetylene (Tetrahedron Lett. vol. 36, 151 (1995));
(2) a process wherein an optically active N-protected-3-iodo-alanyl ester is substituted at the 3-position by reacting with a nucleophile (Tetrahedron, vol. 41, 1833 (1985));
(3) a process wherein an optically active N-protected-3-iodo-alanyl ester is converted into an organic zinc compound and then reacted with an electrophile (J.O.C., vol. 57, 3397 (1992));
(4) a process wherein a β-lactam derivative or a sulfamidate derivative is produced from a serine derivative and then reacted with a nucleophile (J. Am. Chem. Soc., vol. 107, 7105 (1985)); and
(5) a process wherein an optically active N-protected-aziridine-2-carboxylic acid ester is synthesized from a serine derivative and then reacted with an organic copper reagent (JP-A-7-252202; the term "JP-A" as used herein means an "unexamined published Japanese patent application"), etc.
In addition, there has been known a process for producing aziridine-2-carboxylic acid by treating a 3-haloalanine or its ester or a mineral acid salt thereof with an alkali metal or alkaline earth metal hydroxide or aqueous ammonia in water or an aqueous organic solvent (JP-B-60-39357; the term "JP-B" as used herein means an "examined Japanese patent publication").
Among the processes of activating the OH-group at the β-position of optically active serine and then reacting with a nucleophile or an electrophile, the above-described process (1) is not industrially advantageous. This is because the metal acetylide reagent should be used in large excess and only a poor yield can be achieved thereby. Moreover, it is needed in this process to synthesize the substrate in plural steps, which makes the performance troublesome.
Similarly, it is also needed to synthesize the substrate in plural steps in the processes (2) to (5), which makes the performance troublesome. To maintain the optical purity of a product at a high level, it is further needed to carry out the reaction at a low temperature with the use of a less basic organic copper reagent as the nucleophile and the occurrence of partial racemization is yet unavoidable. In these processes, furthermore, only an insufficient selectivity of functional groups is achieved and thus by-products having reacted with ester group are also formed.
As discussed above, these known processes each suffers from problems to be solved as an industrial process for producing optically active natural or unnatural amino acid derivatives. Therefore, it has been required to develop an industrially applicable process for producing optically active natural or unnatural amino acid derivatives without resort to any expensive reagents or troublesome procedures.
Concerning the process for producing aziridine-2-carboxylic acid as described above, the procedures and analytical methods are described in the document as cited above. When the inventors carried out a detailed follow-up experiment after establishing an appropriate analytical method, the yield reported in the document could be hardly achieved. It has been thus revealed that there is a serious problem in efficiently producing aziridine-2-carboxylic acid by this process on an industrial scale.

Process for producing optically active amino acid derivatives


Provided are an ultrasonic fingerprint identification circuit, a driving method thereof, and a display device. The ultrasonic fingerprint identification circuit comprises fingerprint identification units each including an ultrasonic fingerprint identification sensor connected to a first node; a control module connected to a composite signal line, a first control signal line and the first node and configured to provide a reset potential to the first node and to provide a pull-up potential to the first node in response to a first level provided by the composite signal line; a reading module connected to a second control signal line, the first node and a reading signal line, and configured to read a detection signal of the first node. The first control signal line connected to one fingerprint identification unit is reused as the second control signal line connected to another fingerprint identification unit.

In recent years, with the rapid development of technology, display devices with biometric functions have gradually emerged in our lives and work, and the fingerprint identification technology is widely used in the areas such as unlocking and secure payment by virtue of unique identities of fingerprints. In addition, for an ultrasonic fingerprint identification technology, due to strong penetration of ultrasonic waves, the fingerprints can still be identified even when there are water stains or dirty stains on a surface of the finger, and the technology attracts a lot of attention.
However, regarding the existing designs of the ultrasonic fingerprint identification circuit, a large number of wirings are arranged in the circuit, and the reading of signal will be interfered by coupling capacitance generated between the wirings during a transmission process, thereby resulting in poor identification precision.

Ultrasonic fingerprint identification circuit, driving method thereof, and display device

Shanghai Tianma Micro-Electronics Co., Ltd.


The objective of the present invention is to realize, in an antenna and an electronic equipment using the same, miniaturization of that antenna. To achieve said objective, an antenna electrode (19) is provided on the surface of the main body (18), a grounding electrode (20) is provided on the back face, and a signal electrode (21) is provided on the circumferential face, the antenna electrode (19) being different in length at the X axis from the Y axis. This enables to construct a broad-band antenna with a single piece of antenna, contributing to miniaturization of the antenna.

Among the conventional types of electronic equipment, such as personal computers, etc. for example, there are some which enable to provide various kinds of communication services with the personal computer, by inserting a communication module in a slot portion of that personal computer. As communication module, one which is realized by comprising an antenna inside, to enable such communication, is introduced on the Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. H9-98015, for example.
A problem with conventional electronic equipment is a large antenna size. Namely, in the communication system which became popular in recent years, the working frequency range is widened and, and the antenna must cover a broad band area to fully meet the service requirements of such communication system. The volume of antenna must inevitably be increased, for realizing such a broad-band antenna.

Antenna and electronic equipment using the same

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


Natural gas is stored in a closed vessel under a pressure of about 1400 to 4500 kPa using a carbon molecular sieve adsorbent. The deliverable volume of natural gas from a vessel packed with carbon molecular sieve particles is increased by impregnating a polymer precursor of the carbon molecular sieve with additional monomers and polymerizing the monomers before carbonizing the precursor.

This invention relates to a method of storing natural gas. More particularly, the invention relates to storage of natural gas at near ambient temperatures using a solid adsorbent, in particular, a carbon molecular sieve.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,820,681 one of the present inventors has disclosed an improved carbon molecular sieve which has a high capacity for carbon dioxide and may be characterized as hydrophobic, requires no binders, and may be carbonized in a single step.
Natural gas, being substantially methane, has a low molecular weight and it occupies a large volume per unit weight compared to liquid fuels. Thus, reducing the volume of natural gas is necessary for most practical applications of natural gas as a fuel. Methods for doing this could include (1) storage at high pressure, (2) liquefaction and storage at low temperatures, and (3) adsorption on solids. Of these methods the last is of particular interest since compact storage of natural gas at moderate pressures may be achieved, while avoiding the cryogenic temperatures needed for liquid natural gas or the high pressures needed for storage as a gas in reasonable volumes.
Conventional activated carbons have been found to have reasonable capacity for natural gas but higher capacity is believed necessary for commercial success. Inorganic zeolites have also been tried, but found to have relatively low capacity for natural gas. Carbon molecular sieves also have been suggested for adsorption of natural gas. Improvements in the storage of natural gas have been disclosed in copending application U.S. Ser. No. 07/906,995.
In this continuation-in-part the inventors will disclose a method for increasing the packing density of carbon molecular sieves and thereby increasing the volumetric efficiency of the adsorption of natural gas.

Preparing carbon molecular sieves of increased density


A rappelling or abseiling device with a rope guide pulley which is rotationally mounted in a housing and is connected by a toothed wheel to two toothed shafts of centrifugal power shoes provided with brake pads, the brake shoes of at least one of the brakes being provided with an additional pair of brake pads and the brake shoes being maintained in their idle position by an electromagnet and a cooperating counter element.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a rappelling device provided with a rope guide pulley rotatably mounted in a housing and which by way of a toothed wheel is operatively connected to two toothed shafts of a centrifugal braking device provided with pairs of brake shoes having brake pads mounted thereon acting upon, or reacting with, the housing of the device.
2. The Prior Art
Such devices which can be attached to a stationary structure such as a building, for instance, by means of a karabiner (snap hook) are known in various structures, for instance from German patent specification DE 198 18 688 C1. In these rappelling devices which serve for lowering loads, in particular persons, and which are used as rescue equipment in particular, the rappelling velocity varies as a function of the weight of the load or person to be lowered. The greater the weight, the higher is the rappelling velocity.


A protective wind energy conversion chamber provides a protected multiple turbine mechanism axially aligned to convert kinetic energy of a moving fluid (e.g., wind) into rotational mechanical power by the reaction of the moving fluid with the turbine. The conversion chamber may either be configured as a vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT) or horizontal axis wind turbine (HAWT). The conversion chamber repositions an intake windward to collect and concentrate the wind prior to converting the wind into energy via the axially aligned multi-turbine mechanism. The remaining wind is released via a leeward-facing exhaust. Completely enclosed by the protective wind energy conversion chamber, the axially aligned multi-turbine mechanism avoids interference by birds and other outside objects.

Energy needs of our society continue to grow at an increasing rate. Unfortunately, much of this energy is supplied by nonrenewable resources whose relative availability continues to decrease. Members of the power generation industry are gradually developing more efficient methods of power generation, with the ambition of one day generating their electricity from clean, sustainable renewable resources.
One such potential area for expansion is wind energy. Wind turbines of various sizes and designs can mitigate our dependence on foreign energy supplies while providing distinct benefits to our domestic economy. Wind turbine designs may be optimized for particular locations and conditions. Moreover, wind turbines use the wind, a clean, nonpolluting energy source.
The United States has tremendous wind energy resources. In California, wind farms currently replace almost 4 million barrels of oil per year. At least sixteen states have even greater wind potential than California based on measured average wind rates.
The installed wind energy generating capacity in the U.S. is currently estimated to be around 6,400 MW, and is expected to generate about 16.7 billion kWh of electricity in 2004, which is less than about 1% of the total U.S. electricity generation. By contrast, the total amount of electricity that could potentially be generated from wind in the United States has been estimated at about 11,000 billion kWh annually, over three times the electricity generated in the U.S. today.
Existing wind farms help demonstrate how wind energy can help meet growing needs for affordable, reliable power. Moreover, with continued government encouragement through, among other things, heightened technology transfer from national laboratories to the wind energy industry, wind energy is slated to become more economical than traditional fossil-fueled energy. Some estimate that wind related energy sources could provide at least six percent of the nation's electricity by 2020. More importantly, the wind generator could help revitalize farms and rural communities without consuming any natural resource or emitting any pollution or greenhouse gases.
Wind turbines have traditionally been built using a turbine attached to a horizontal axis suspended high above the ground. Wind turbines have been used for centuries to capture the power of the wind to mill grain into flour or pump water. More recently, as previously indicated, wind generators; such as a wind turbine configured to produce electricity, have also been used to supplement the electrical energy supply.
Unfortunately, while the electricity generated by wind turbines use a clean, nonpolluting energy source, traditional wind turbine systems have a somewhat unexpected negative effect on the wildlife in the immediate environment, particularly on the local avian population.
Specifically, some wind turbine systems are configured to maintain such a fast rotation that the blades become almost invisible. The wind turbines must have sharp blades that efficiently cut through the wind. Moreover, the same sharp blades are often positioned high in the air at the top of a wind tower. As the wind towers are typically the tallest structures in the area, they become a natural perch for raptors and other birds. A deadly combination when coupled with the virtual invisibility of the sharp rotating blades, which are also very good at slicing through eagles and other birds. For example, the Center for Biological Diversity reports that the approximately 5,400 turbines located around Altamont Pass in California kill more than an estimated 800 birds a year, including several species protected by federal and state laws.
Even the officially documented avian collision and electrocution incidents reported from 1985 to 1988 at various California wind energy facilities tend to support the contention that the wind generators are more dangerous to the larger birds. For example, of the 147 reported incidents during the period from 1985 to 1988, 101 were raptors, of which 34 were eagles and 58 were hawks. Some estimate that in the Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area, an average of 11 eagle and 17 hawk incidents occurred annually. Unfortunately, ninety-one percent of all documented avian incidents eventually resulted in mortality for the bird. This high mortality rate and incident information helps identify the need to better understand and resolve the biological effects of wind projects on the surrounding environment.
As such, there is clearly a need for a more environmentally friendly and efficient wind based power device. Unfortunately, none of the currently available systems can provide environmental protection for the surrounding avian population.

Protective wind energy conversion chamber


A valve that includes a control spline positioned to move from a first position to a second position and the control spline being axially rotatable in both the first position and second position. The valve also includes a portion of a first fluid mixing cartridge rotatably coupled to at least one portion of the control spline when the control spline is in the second position. The valve includes a portion of a second fluid mixing cartridge rotatably coupled to the at least one portion of the control spline when the control spline is in the second position and the first fluid mixing cartridge is configured to rotate in a different direction than the second fluid mixing cartridge when the control spline is in the second position.

The present disclosure relates to providing fluids to a user and providing the user with a mechanism to control fluid flow. The present disclosure generally relates to a fluid mixing mechanism that allows a user to control the proportions of at least two fluids having different temperatures, compositions, or so on. The present disclosure also relates to allowing the user to control of delivering at least two different fluid proportions. In other words, the systems and methods deliver a mixed fluid proportion flow and two distinct flows at a deviation from the mixed fluid proportion.
Fluids and gases are often delivered through the control of a valve. Fluids of different properties, for example water of different temperatures, are often mixed within a valve for sanitary purposes such as bathing and cleaning, and are delivered for use to basins, bathtubs, and shower enclosures through a spigot or showerhead.
The mechanical valves may include one or more valves, such as gate valves, ball valves, butterfly valves, etc., that control an aperture that regulates the amount of fluid flow. At least two of the valves may be used to control the composition and proportions of two different fluids. The fluids may then be combined in a subsequent chamber for delivery. The aperture control for each fluid may be coordinated through a common handle, as is used in single-handle faucets.
Mechanical valves may also include pressure-balancing or thermostatic valves. Such valves allow for coordinated control of two fluids through one control handle, additionally regulating the flow of each fluid through changes in pressure or temperature of the supply fluid, respectively. Such valves provide autonomous control of the delivery of fluid to help eliminate fluctuations in delivery temperature caused by changes within the supply lines. Each water supply is delivered into a common chamber to mix the water to the desired proportions.
Electronic valves are similar to gate valves. Common electronic solenoid valves use an electromagnet to turn the flow of water on or off. Control of the proportions of the water supply is limited; however, pulse width modulation may be employed with the solenoid valves to achieve a partially open position of the valves. Other electronic valves use a stepper motor attached to a gate valve, pressure balancing valve, or thermostatic valve, which allow control of the proportions of the water supply. The water is delivered to a common chamber to mix the water to the desired proportions.
All gas and fluid valves may include a control element. Mechanical valves include one or two handles allowing the user to select the proportion of each fluid and the water temperature he or she desires. Electronic valves are controlled through an electronic user interface with buttons or switches. The user is able to control the proportion of each water supply individually, with two-handled faucets, or in synchronization, with one-handle and electronic faucets.
All of the described valves can be used individually or in a pairing to control the flow of two water supplies of unequal temperature, which are often mixed within a subsequent and common chamber to be delivered through a spigot or shower head. The two different water supplies are quickly homogenized within the valve and delivered at a mixed water temperature.

Multiple proportion delivery systems and methods


A layered material for use in transparent, flame resistant components couples a thin, fire resistant outer polymeric film to a thicker, transparent inner polymeric material. The resultant transparent layered material meets FAA flammability requirements for OSU heat release, has excellent solvent resistance and cleanability, is scratch resistant, and is transparent enough for use in interior applications in the aerospace industry. The layered material is formed via a co-extrusion or co-lamination process.

The interiors of commercial aircraft are typically formed with a large number of components in many shapes and forms that have both practical and aesthetic functions. Currently, the aerospace and plastics industry does not have available any clear transparent materials that will pass current Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requirements in terms of flammability resistance properties (FAR 25.853 and Appendix F), including heat release, vertical burn, smoke emissions tests, and toxic fume emissions tests. For example, the standard test method for heat release is the Ohio State University heat release test as found in FAR 25.853-Part IV.
Transparent windows used today on commercial aircraft are typically formed of a transparent polycarbonate material having a scratch-resistant polysiloxane coating. Because these polycarbonate windows do not meet the FAA requirements for OSU heat release, exemptions have been provided by the FAA to allow their use. For airplane windows, however, the FAA exemption has limited the size of the windows so as not to impose more than the historic vertical burn flammability requirement.
It is highly desirable to increase the size of these interior windows for aesthetic purposes. In order to increase the size of the windows further, while maintaining the transparency and scratch resistance properties desired, however, it is necessary to comply with the FAA requirements for OSU heat release.

Layered, transparent thermoplastic for flammability resistance


Methods of manufacturing a nitride trapping EEPROM flash memory are described where each memory cell uses Si-FIN to form a nitride trapping EEPROM flash cell in which the source region and drain region are undoped. Each adjacent poly-gate to a selected poly-gate in a row of nitride trapping memory cells is used to produce the inversion region that acts as a source region or a drain region for transferring of a required voltage, which conserves the density of a memory cell given that the source region and the drain region for each memory cell are not doped. The flash memory includes a plurality of polysilicon layers intersecting with a plurality of Si-FIN layers.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to nonvolatile memory devices, and more particularly, to charge-trapping flash memories.
2. Description of Related Art
Electrically programmable and erasable nonvolatile memory technologies based on charge storage structures known as Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory (EEPROM) and flash memory are used in a variety of modern applications. A flash memory is designed with an array of memory cells that can be independently programmed and read. Sense amplifiers in a flash memory are used to determine the data value or values stored in a nonvolatile memory. In a typical sensing scheme, an electrical current through the memory cell being sensed is compared to a reference current by a current sense amplifier.
A number of memory cell structures are used for EEPROM and flash memory. As the dimensions of integrated circuits shrink, greater interest is arising for memory cell structures based on charge trapping dielectric layers, because of the scalability and simplicity of the manufacturing processes. Memory cell structures based on charge trapping dielectric layers include structures known by the industry names Nitride Read-Only Memory, SONOS, and PHINES, for example. These memory cell structures store data by trapping charge in a charge trapping dielectric layer, such as silicon nitride. As negative charge is trapped, the threshold voltage of the memory cell increases. The threshold voltage of the memory cell is reduced by removing negative charge from the charge trapping layer.
Nitride read-only memory devices use a relatively thick bottom oxide, e.g. greater than 3 nanometers, and typically about 5 to 9 nanometers, to prevent charge loss. Instead of direct tunneling, band-to-band tunneling induced hot hole injection (BTBTHH) can be used to erase the cell. However, the hot hole injection causes oxide damage, leading to charge loss in the high threshold cell and charge gain in the low threshold cell. Moreover, the erase time must be increased gradually during program and erase cycling due to the hard-to-erase accumulation of charge in the charge trapping structure. This accumulation of charge occurs because the hole injection point and electron injection point do not coincide with each other, and some electrons remain after the erase pulse. In addition, during the sector erase of a nitride read-only memory flash memory device, the erase speed for each cell is different because of process variations (such as channel length variation). This difference in erase speed results in a large Vt distribution of the erase state, where some of the cells become hard to erase and some of them are over-erased. Thus the target threshold Vt window is closed after many program and erase cycles and poor endurance is observed. This phenomenon will become more serious as the technology continues scaling down.
A typical nitride read-only memory flash memory cell structure positions a oxide-nitride-oxide layer between a conducting polysilicon and a crystalline silicon semiconductor substrate. The substrate refers to a source region and a drain region separated by an underlying channel region. A flash memory cell read can be executed by a drain sensing or a source sensing. For source side sensing, one or more source lines are coupled to source regions of memory cells for reading current from a particular memory cell in a memory array.
A traditional floating gate device only stores 1 bit per cell, but the advent of nitride read-only memory cells in which each nitride read-only memory cell provides 2 bits per flash cell that store charge in an oxide-nitride-oxide (ONO) dielectric. In a typical structure of a nitride read-only memory cell, a nitride layer is used as a trapping material positioned between a top oxide layer and a bottom oxide layer. The ONO layer structure effectively replaces the gate dielectric in floating gate devices. The charge in the ONO dielectric with a nitride layer may be either trapped on the left side or the right side of a nitride read-only memory cell.
A frequently used technique to program nitride read-only memory cells in a nitride read-only memory array is the channel hot electron injection method. During an erase operation, a common technique used to erase memory cells is called band-to-band hot hole injection. The other side potential, from the side that is being erased, of a nitride read-only memory cell is likely to have a lateral electric field effect on the eraseability. Evaluating the endurance and retention of a nitride read-only memory array, the lack of uniformity in eraseability causes a margin loss due to cycling and baking. The other side of nitride read-only memory cells is floating (or connected to ground) which may be coupled to an uncertain voltage level (e.g. 1 volt or 4 volts), which causes a variation of the erase threshold of array cells. This in turn causes Vt distribution after an erase operation to be wider. The variation of uncertain voltage level may result in over-erasing. On the other hand, if the other side is connected to ground, a punch-through may cause the pump circuit to crash when the bit line bias is over the punch-through voltage. Consequently, during an erase operation of a block, the nitride read-only memory cells, where some of the nodes are left floating, may cause lack of uniformity in voltage level applied for erasing the nitride read-only memory cells in a nitride read-only memory array.
As technology advances in flash memory devices, it is desirable to design a charge trapping flash memory cell structure that provides higher package density as well as superior device scalability.

Trapping storage flash memory cell structure with inversion source and drain regions


An apparatus, computer-readable medium, and computer-implemented method for data subsetting, including receiving a request comprising a criterion indicating a criterion table in a plurality of tables of a database, as schema of the database corresponding to an entity graph, the entity graph comprising a plurality of entities corresponding to the plurality of tables and a plurality of directed edges connecting the plurality of entities, determining directed edges in the plurality of directed edges that must be traversed in both directions in order to traverse all entities in the entity graph starting from a criterion entity corresponding to the criterion table, generating, an ordered list of edges for the entity graph based on the directed edges that must be traversed in both directions and topological ordering, and generating a subset of data from the plurality of tables based on the ordered list of edges for the entity graph and the request.

Enterprises frequently store large volumes of data across multiple tables in production databases, as well as in data warehouses. In order to effectively perform processes such as data testing, data analysis, and data reporting, it is sometimes necessary to extract information datasets from multiple tables at once.
For example, FIG. 1 shows a customer database that includes two tables, 101 and 102. The first table 101 lists the customer names and zip codes and the second table 102 lists IDs, customer names, and states. The Name field in the second table 102 may be a foreign key which points to the primary key of the Name field in the first table 101. In this case, if a user wishes to extract a subset of data for certain IDs, customer names, and corresponding states from table 102, then it will also be necessary to extract the corresponding zip code data from table 101 to ensure referential integrity. So, for example, if a user wanted to extract a data subset corresponding to the state value for the customer ID corresponding to ID=1, the data subset would include the values Robert and New York, as well as the value 11357.
FIG. 1 illustrates a simple example, but when there are many data dependencies between multiple tables, determining the appropriate subset of data to compile from all of the appropriate tables can be a complex and resource-intensive task.
Subset extraction from production databases is required when creating sandboxes or populating test environments which need data that mirrors the production data. Relational databases and many services such as Salesforce store data in multiple objects/tables which have relationships with other objects/tables. These relationships give rise to complex schemas which can be modeled as a graph where objects are vertices and relationships are edges.
When extracting a subset from these databases, it is often desirable that the referential integrity within the subset is maintained so as to mirror relationships present in the production data. A subset is obtained by starting with a set of filtered records in one of the objects and selecting records by performing join operations with related objects as the graph is traversed. There are a number of ways to traverse the schema graph. Prior traversal schemes may lead to the problem of no selection in some objects (when an intersection operation is used); some others may end up selecting a bigger subset than required (when a union operation is used).
There are other schemes, such as the one described in U.S. Non-Provisional application Ser. No. 14/389,360 filed Dec. 13, 2012, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety (hereinafter "the '360 application"). The '360 application includes the concept of Major/Minor relationships wherein an additional condition is added to the subset problem: for each record that gets selected, all the records referring to that record should also be selected. While this method works well for simple schema, it ends up selecting a large subset in some cases in complex schemas where one object is related to another through multiple relationships, directly or indirectly, and is not scalable for large schemas as it requires a lot of joins.

Method, apparatus, and computer-readable medium to extract a referentially intact subset from a database


The electrical equipment battery includes: a circuit board mounted with a heat generating element; and an outer case having a heat radiation plate made of metal. A heat transfer space is defined between the circuit board and the heat radiation plate, and then an electrical-insulating and heat-conducting gel is filled in the heat transfer space. Heat energy of the heat generating element is radiated to the outside via the heat radiation plate of the outer case. The heat radiation plate is provided with a flow-out block partition on the outer side of the heat transfer space. The flow-out block partition suppresses the electrical-insulating and heat-conducting gel from flowing out from the heat transfer space.

Vehicles are equipped with a lead battery, as an equipment battery, that supplies electric power to electric devices. The lead battery supplies the electric power to all electric devices in a vehicle and also supplies the electric power to all components required for the vehicle to travel; examples of such components include a cell motor, an engine control circuit, an electric power steering motor, automatic control, and by-wiring components such as a brake and a steering. On the other hand, in order to improve their fuel consumption, some modern vehicles employ a system in which a lead battery is charged with regeneration electric power generated during idling stop or speed reduction.
The lead battery continuously supplies the electric power to some electric components even while the ignition switch is off. Also, the lead battery self-discharges. As a result, the remaining capacity of the lead battery decreases. Nevertheless, even when the voltage decreases with the discharging, the lead battery does not stop supplying the electric power to the electric devices. If the vehicle is not used for a long period, the lead battery is not charged for a long period, in which case the lead battery may be completely discharged. When completely discharged, the lead battery cannot drive the cell motor to start up the engine. This disadvantage can be addressed by connecting an electrical equipment battery in parallel to the lead battery; the electrical equipment battery being a secondary battery, such as a nickel hydride battery or a lithium ion battery, different from the lead battery.
Electrical equipment batteries, such as nickel hydride or lithium ion batteries, are superior in charge efficiency and self-discharge rate to lead batteries. Thus, even if an electrical equipment battery is not used for a long period, the remaining capacity is not decreased so rapidly. Furthermore, a power switch can be provided between a lead battery and an electrical equipment battery used by being connected in parallel to the lead battery. When the ignition switch is off, the power switch disconnects the electrical equipment battery from the lead battery. If the power switch in the electrical equipment battery is off, the secondary battery does not discharge even while the vehicle is not used for a long period. For this reason, if the lead battery fails to drive the cell motor, the power switch can be turned on to cause the electrical equipment battery to drive the cell motor to start up the engine. Moreover, while the vehicle is traveling, the power switch can be switched on to connect the electrical equipment battery in parallel to the lead battery so that the electric power is supplied stably to all apparatuses in the vehicle. Tb realize these operations, the power switch that is provided at the output of the electrical equipment battery connected in parallel to the lead battery connects the lead battery to a nickel hydride battery or a lithium ion battery as necessary.
The power switch may be either a relay or a semiconductor switching element that withstands a large current. The relay that performs a switching operation at a given node may fail to operate due to a contact failure of this node, and may disadvantageously emit noise in response to the switching operation. The semiconductor switching element provides excellent advantages, such as high reliability and a long lifetime but may act as a heat generating element that generates heat due to Joule heat of current, causing a temperature rise. It is thus necessary to radiate the heat efficiently. This is because the temperature rise may hinder a stable operation of the heat generating element itself and overheat surrounding components, including the secondary battery, thereby leading to various troubles. The degree to which temperature of the heat generating element, such as the semiconductor switching element, increases depends on the balance of the amounts of generated heat and radiated heat. How efficiently the heat is radiated can be an important factor in stable operations of the heat generating element itself and surrounding components.
To radiate heat from the semiconductor switching element as the heat generating element, the following structure is employed: a semiconductor element is fixed to and thermally coupled to an inner surface of a metal case, which is made of aluminum and used as an outer case, and an insulating material, such as mica or a plastic sheet, and a heat-conducting paste are interposed between the semiconductor element and the metal case. In this structure, however, when a circuit board on which the semiconductor switching element as the heat generating element is mounted is fixed to the metal case, the relative position between the circuit board and the semiconductor switching element is determined. It is therefore difficult to simultaneously fix the circuit board to the metal case and the semiconductor switching element to the circuit board. To avoid this inconvenience, the semiconductor switching element may be connected to the circuit board via a lead wire after being fixed to the metal case. This assembling process, however, may be complicated. This inconvenience can be overcome by employing the following structure: the semiconductor switching element is fixed to the circuit board without being fixed to the metal case, and a heat radiation fin is fixed to the semiconductor switching element so that heat is radiated from the semiconductor switching element. This heat radiation structure, however, may disadvantageously cause a temperature rise inside the outer case, because the heat radiation fin dissipates heat inside the outer case. The temperature rise can be addressed by employing a structure for ventilating the outer case. It may be, however, difficult to freely ventilate the outer case of the electrical equipment battery for vehicles. This is because a structure that blocks entry of external liquid under various usage conditions is demanded for the electrical equipment battery for vehicles.
Another structure for radiating heat from the heat generating element has been developed. In this structure, heat energy of the heat generating element is transmitted to a heat radiating part remotely positioned (See PTL 1).
More specifically, the heat generating element is thermally coupled to the heat radiating part via a heat pipe, which transfers the heat from the heat generating element to the heat radiating part. This heat radiating structure enables the heat generating element to be positioned at a distance from the heat radiating part. However, the heat radiating structure may involve high component cost, because the heat pipe is used to transfer the heat. In addition, it may be difficult to thermally couple both ends of the heat pipe under an ideal condition. More specifically, it may be difficult to hold both ends of the heat pipe in an ideal thermally coupling state under a long-time vibrating usage condition, such as a condition inside a vehicle. The heat pipe conducts heat efficiently, but if the heat pipe is not ideally thermally coupled to the heat radiating part due to thermal resistance, the heat cannot be radiated from the heat generating element efficiently.

Electrical equipment battery for vehicles


Provided is a system, method, and computer program product for filtering spoken content in a preferred format to a plurality of users within a communication session A processor may detect spoken content from a first user and a second user of a plurality of users within a communication session over a network. Speech features may be extracted from the detected spoken content. The first user and second user may be identified based on the extracted speech features. The spoken content of the first user and the second user may be filtered according to preferences determined from profiles of the plurality of users. The spoken content of the first user and the second user may be transmitted to the plurality of users in a preferred format based on preferences from the profiles.

The present disclosure relates generally to the field of communications, and more specifically, to dynamic communication session filtering for providing a preferred communication experience during a communication session between a plurality of users.
Filtering background noise while multiple parties are engaged in a communication session is a common practice. Filtering the background noise allows users engaged in the session to clearly hear the other users within the session without being disturbed by unnecessary sounds. Further, muting all or individual users during the communication session is commonly used to filter out unwanted noises not captured by the background filter.

International Business Machines Corporation


The method comprises processing plural product information records from the product information sources into one or more groups based on which product information records are likely to correspond to the same product, correlating a unique product ID corresponding to the product associated with each of said groups to identify the product, comparing each identified product to categories of a taxonomy to determine a category for the identified products in the taxonomy, and determining attributes for each categorized product based on the product information records corresponding to each group, creating product specifications based on the determined attributes and storing the product specification in the corresponding determined categories of the taxonomy.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to systems for creating catalogs of goods and services over a communications network. More specifically, the invention is directed to a method and system for aggregating content for an on-line catalog system.
2. Description of the Related Art
The Internet is a worldwide network of computers linked together by various hardware communication links all running a standard suite of protocols known as TCP/IP (transmission control protocol/Internet protocol). The growth of the Internet over the last decade has been explosive, fueled in the most part by the widespread use of software viewers known as browsers and HTTP (hypertext transfer protocol) which allow a simple GUI (graphical user interface) to be used to communicate over the Internet. Browsers generally reside on the computer used to access content on the Internet, i.e. the client computer. HTTP is a component of TCP/IP and provides users access to files of various formats using a standard page description language known as HTML (hypertext markup language), and more recently XML (extensible markup language) and XHTML (extensible hypertext markup language), a reformulation of HTML into XML. The collection of servers on the Internet using HTTP has become known as the "World Wide Web" or simply the "Web."
As known and appreciated in the art, there are presently millions of Web pages with various content. Tools have been developed to allow the user to search these Web pages to obtain the various Web pages having the various content of interest. One way to locate the desired Web pages is to use a "search engine" which will search for Web pages having a particular keyword or key words. Search engines typically have three components: a crawler (such as a robot, bot or automated site searcher), an index, and a software program which presents the results of the search to the user. The crawler automatically "crawls" from Web server to Web server and the sites hosted therein to gather URLs and other information such as the text of the page that the search engine can use in the searches for keywords. When the information gathering by the crawler is completed, the information regarding the Web pages is stored in the search engine's databases and indexed. When a user seeking information from the Web types in a keyword(s) in a search field of the search engine, the search engine's software program then utilizes algorithmic functions and criteria to find keyword matches in the information stored in the databases. Some programs search all of the text of each page while other programs merely search the URLs and/or titles of the pages. The software program then sorts through the results of the search and provides a prioritized results to the user based on relevancy of the Web page. Various search engine software programs differ in their methods used for determining a Web page's relevancy. For example, the software may view the "meta tag" of the page, include a counter for counting the number of keyword occurrences on the text of the page, and/or consider the Web page's popularity as well as other factors such as whether the Webmaster of the Web page has made special arrangements to have the Web page displayed as a result of the search.
One of the primary applications of the Web has been shopping, i.e. the purchase of goods and services, i.e. products. Virtually every major commercial "bricks and mortar" merchant has established a Web site for the showcase and sale of their products. Further many manufacturers sell products directly over the Web. Finally, a plethora of on-line merchants, not previously existing in the bricks and mortar world, have come into existence. As a result, virtually every product is available for purchase over the Web from a plurality of merchants. This situation has increased the efficiency of markets by permitting shoppers to readily compare products and terms of sale from plural merchants without the need to travel physically to the merchant locations.
However, in order to compare products and terms of different merchants, one must "visit" the various merchant web sites individually. First, this requires knowledge of the URLs for each merchant Web site or the use of a search engine which can be cumbersome and inaccurate. It is possible to open the various sites in different browser windows for better comparison. However, the various formats of each merchant Web site render it tedious to compare products and terms directly. When a purchase decision is made, the purchase or purchases must be made through the individual merchant Web sites. Further, ordinarily the shopper is required to log in to each merchant Web site, by entering a username and password for example, prior to making a purchase and then proceed to the next site. For example, if the shopper decides to buy three items from three different merchants, three log in procedures and three buy procedures, i.e. procedures for effecting a purchase on the merchant Web sites, must be manually executed respectively through the three merchant Web sites and their proprietary interfaces.
It is well known to integrate a plurality of web sites into a single environment known as a "shopping portal." Shopping portals ordinarily include a Web server presenting an integrated interface displaying plural products from various merchants. Accordingly, conventional shopping portals facilitate comparison shopping and thus increase market efficiency. In order to provide an integrated shopping experience, it is known to prepare a catalog of product offerings from various merchants organized in a taxonomy of product categories. However, since various merchants and other parties having product information records all store information in various data formats and layouts, collection of information for a product catalog is a tedious and labor intensive task requiring a great deal of manual operations.

Method and system for determining allied products


This invention completes an authentication procedure early when it is ready to directly communicate with a printer, and serves as a user interface device of a direct print system. To this end, when a digital camera DSC is ready to directly communicate with a printer, and receives from the printer an inquiry about objects stored and held by the camera, it assigns an object which contains a word serving as authentication information of those stored and held in the DSC to a first handler (S52), assigns other objects (image data and the like) to subsequent handlers (S53), and sends that assignment result to the printer (S54).

Normally, upon printing an image sensed by a digital camera, the following processes are required. That is, an image stored in the digital camera is read by a personal computer (to be referred to as a PC hereinafter), and is printed by a connected printer using an application running on the PC.
That is, the flow of image data is DSC→PC→printer, and possession of the PC is indispensable. Also, the PC must be started to print an image stored in a DSC.
In consideration of such situation, some proposals in which a DSC and a printer are directly connected, and a print instruction is issued on a display normally equipped on the DSC (to be referred to as photo direct print hereinafter) have already been made.
Merits of use of the photo direct print system are easy print without starting a PC and low system building cost since a PC is not indispensable. Upon connecting a DSC to a printer, a display normally equipped on the DSC is used as means for giving various instructions and, especially, for confirming an image to be printed. Hence, a printer does not require any special display used to confirm an image, and the cost can be further reduced.
Most of recent DSCs comprise versatile communication means used to connect a PC. Typically, a DSC comprises a USB (Universal Serial Bus). Upon connection using this USB, a communication is established while defining the DSC as a slave and the PC as a host. When viewed from the PC side, the DSC can be handled like a simple external storage device.
Upon building a direct print system by directly connecting a DSC to a printer using such USB, it is desired to use the DSC not only as a simple storage device but also as a user interface device as the system unlike the DSC for the PC.
As described above, since most of DSCs have a USB interface, they can be physically connected to printers irrespective of whether or not they support the direct print function. Therefore, the printer apparatus side must determine (authenticate) whether or not the connected device is a digital camera which functions as a member of the direct print system. Images stored and held by a digital camera are normally managed as objects. Therefore, when a versatile communication means is used, if one of objects stores authentication information indicating that the camera is compatible to direct print, determination can be made on the printer side using even a normal protocol.
However, a memory (storage medium such as a CF card, smart media card, or the like) that can be attached to recent digital cameras can store and hold many images. Hence, the printer side must check object attributes one by one (if the contents of an object are transferred at that time, and that object is image data, the memory on the printer side overflows), and an authentication procedure takes much time.

Direct printing authorization in a digital camera


Compounds of formula (I), wherein X and R1-R6, are as defined in the claims, exhibit alpha2 agonistic activity and thus are useful as alpha2 agonists, especially as alpha2A agonists. Methods of use of said compounds are also provided.

The alpha2-adrenoreceptors (α2) are G protein-coupled cell membrane receptors widely distributed in humans and they are sub-classified into three subtypes in human; alpha2A, alpha2B and alpha2C (Bylund et al, Mol. Pharmacol., 1992, 42, 1-5). Alpha2 adrenoreceptors have a multiplicity of biological functions and compounds effecting to these receptors are attractive targets on various diseases (Goodman & Gilman's The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics, 12th edition, 2011, chapter 12; Brede et al Biol. Cell 2004, 96, 343-348). Indeed, many alpha2 active compounds have been prepared (Gentili et al, Curr. Top Med. Chem., 2007, 7, 163-186) and tested in clinical settings (Crassous et al, Curr. Top Med. Chem., 2007, 7, 187-194). For example, partial alpha2A agonist clonidine is used as a blood-pressure lowering agent and non-alpha2 subtype nonselective full agonist dexmedetomidine is used as a sedative in the intensive care units.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,438,995 discloses some isochroman and isothiochroman derivatives and suggests them to be useful as rubber accelerators, anti-oxidants, corrosion inhibitors, central nervous system (CNS) depressants and anti-inflammatories. WO 2007/085558 discloses a variety of imidazole derivatives useful as TAAR ligands for the treatment of variety of disorders, including various CNS disorders.


An image forming apparatus using a service of a server apparatus decrypts encrypted common authentication information of the image forming apparatus based on secret key information for decrypting the common authentication information, and then requests encrypted individual authentication information of the image forming apparatus from the server apparatus based on decrypted common authentication information and identification information for identifying the image forming apparatus. The image forming apparatus obtains the individual authentication information from the server apparatus, requests the server apparatus for use permission information of the service based on the decrypted individual authentication information and on service use information, and obtains the use permission information from the server apparatus.

Field
Aspects of the present invention generally relate to an image forming apparatus, a control method, and a storage medium.
Description of the Related Art
Multifunction apparatuses are currently evolving as multifunction peripherals that integrate functions of image forming apparatuses, such as printers, copying machines, and facsimiles. (Hereinafter multifunctional apparatuses are referred to as image forming apparatuses). Recent years, the cloud technologies have been utilized upon user's requests. The cloud technologies are computing services achieved by utilizing application programs stored on the Internet (Hereinafter, cloud technologies are referred to as cloud services).
Cloud services provide users, for example, with a printing function. By using a personal computer, a mobile terminal, etc., users can send a print request to any desired image forming apparatus via the Internet, without using driver software. The image forming apparatus receiving a print request as the cloud service can receive the print request and perform printing by preliminary installing an application program for using a printing function as the cloud service
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open 2009-193275 discusses a technique for preventing unauthorized use when an image forming apparatus performs printing in cooperation with a server.
However, with the diversification of data used in the cloud services, further security risk reduction is demanded. Therefore, it has become necessary to solve security problems which cannot be solved by conventional techniques.

Image forming apparatus, information processing method, and control method


An apparatus for use with a litter box is described which is in the form of a tray with a wall along each side and across the front edge to facilitate the containment of excess kitty litter. The walls taper to the floor at the back end of the tray. The back edge, which is blocked off by the litter box during use, is flat to facilitate in the ease of disposal of contained litter and the portion of the tray extending beyond the litter box. The length of the tray may be matched to the size of existing litter boxes available on the market to permit use with an owners current litter control system. The tray easily slides up or back permitting the possibility of an infinite number of tray lengths. The surface of the tray may be textured or ridged to facilitate the removal of the excess litter from the paws of the animals in a contained area as they exit the litter box.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of animal waste disposal and more specifically to a tray for use in connection with a cat litter box.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Owners of domesticated animals are often required to provide a box so the animal can eliminate waste within the home, e.g., a cat litter box. A problem that goes along with the box is that a sandy mess can occur in front of the cat litter box. The litter from the box is often tracked about the area where the box is stored when the animal covers its waste products or enters or leaves the box.
Commercially available litter boxes have sand guards and a hooded top to help minimize the litter from falling into the surrounding area. As the development of the cat litter box progressed, the sand guard and the hooded top both improved the neatness of the litter box area. However, while the sand guard and the hooded top both partially restrict sand from flying out of a cat box while a cat is using the box, there remains a need for products which stop the cat from tracking the sand which sticks to their paws out of the box after use. The bulk of the sand usually falls off within the first step or two a cat takes after leaving the box.
Prior attempts have been made to reduce the amount of litter which lands outside of the litter box area. Typically, this has been done by a non-adjustable physical barrier, ledge or panel. U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,092,277 and 5,042,430 display a tray-like area raised above ground level. Not only may some cats be unable to jump to a raised platform, they may also be reluctant to step on a tray attached to the upper portion of the sides of the litter box.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,361,725, 5,220,886, 5,165,366, 3,885,523, 3,246,630, Des. 346,677 and Des. 351,684 all display a tray apparatus which is non-adjustable.
U.S. Pat. No. 351,693 displays a non-adjustable tray with a ridge on the front edge of the tray only which may permit sand to easily fall off the open side edges.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,218,930 and 4,766,845 both display trays of narrow width which cats may be likely to step over completely.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,388,550 consists of a covered litter box with a screen covered debris compartment and a vanity panel extending in front of the access opening. While this prevents the animal from jumping over the screen, the apparatus requires some disassembling and reassembling for clean-up of the excess litter.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,195,464 shows an attached double tray which allows much of the sand to fly over the top of the litter box during use and the apparatus will not adjust to either room or cat size.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,476,083 discloses a pan member 12 which supports a shell for holding cat litter. The pan member 12 does not act to remove litter sand from the cat's paws, but provides aeration of the shell and allows the replenishment of deodorant materials.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,329,878 shows a litter container adapted for use by a pot belly pig with a ramp structure which allows the pig to enter and leave the container. The ramp is not adjustable.


Thermoplastic polyester, copolyester and polyblend molding compositions impact-modified by glycidyl methacrylate grafted EPDM exhibit high impact strength combined with good knit-line characteristics, when the grafted comonomer content exceeds 2 percent by weight in the impact modifier, it has a gel content in the range of from about 10 to about 80 weight percent.

High molecular weight linear polyesters and copolyesters of glycols and terephthalic or isophthalic acid have been available for a number of years. These are described inter alia in Whinfield et al., U.S. Pat. No. 2,465,319, and in Pengilly, U.S. Pat. No. 3,047,539. These patents disclose that the polyesters are particularly advantageous as film and fiber formers.
With the development of molecular weight control, the use of nucleating agents and two-step molding cycles, poly(ethylene terephthalate) or PET has become an important constituent of injection moldable compositions. Further, poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate) or PBT, because of its very rapid crystallization from the melt, is uniquely useful as a component in such compositions. Work pieces molded from such polyester resins, in comparison with other thermoplastics, offer a high degree of surface hardness and abrasion resistance, high gloss and lower surface friction.
Furthermore, in particular, poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate) is much simpler to use in injection molding techniques than poly(ethylene terephthalate). For example, it is possible to injection mold poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate) at low mold temperatures of from about 30.degree. to 60.degree. C. to produce highly crystalline, dimensionally stable moldings in short cycle times. Because of the high rate of crystallization, even at low temperatures, no difficulty is encountered in removing the moldings from the molds. Additionally, the dimensional stability of poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate) injection moldings is very good even at temperatures near or well above the glass temperature of poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate).
However, the impact resistance of unmodified polyesters is relatively low at room temperature and below. Thus for many applications, it is desirable to have polyesters which are impact resistant at relatively high and relatively low ambient temperatures. Yet, the other mechanical properties such as modulus of elasticity, tensile strength at yield and at break should be impaired either not at all or only to an acceptable degree.
It has been recommended in various places to improve the impact resistance of polyesters by adding other polymers including interpolymers and copolymers. Specifically, the impact strength of thermoplastic linear crystalline polyesters, including poly(1,4-butylene terephthalate), has been improved by the incorporation therein of an ethylene-propylene nonconjugated diene rubbery terpolymer (EPDM). Although EPDM is capable of impact-modifying BPT polyester compositions, e.g., Coran et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,141,863 and Tanaka et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,290,927, such compositions often suffer from "incompatibility" resulting in streaks or delamination of molded or extruded parts.
In Hepp, European Patent Application 0 149 192, abandoned published Jul. 24, 1985, there is disclosed a thermoplastic molding composition consisting of a thermoplastic resin, e.g., polyester, copolyester or block copolyester and an EPDM epoxidized with, e.g., m-chloroperozy-benzoic acid. The examples given by this reference in Tables 1, 2 and 3 do not, however, exhibit a combination of good impact strength and acceptable knit-line characteristics.
Siegel, U.S. Pat. No. 3,769,260 discloses that a functionalized rubber improves impact strength of polyesters, and suggests a range of 0.02 to 20 microns in diameter for the dispersed rubber phase particles.
Epstein, U.S. Pat. No. 4,172,859, discloses the use of random copolymers containing various polar monomers. He also alludes to the use of materials grafted with various polar monomers, e.g., glycidyl methacrylate (GMA), to impact modify thermoplastic polyesters including PBT and PET. However, this patent does not deal with and therefore fails to recognize several factors that are critical to the function of EPDM-G-GMA materials as impact modifiers for PBT systems. First, it does not recognize the benefits of reactive glycidyl (meth)acrylates as graft monomers over non-reactive polar monomers such as maleic anhydride or n-vinyl pyrrolidone. Second, in Col. 5, lines 35-36, Epstein discounts crosslinking (gel formation) as unnecessary to the function of such modifiers, and states that crosslinking may be harmful. Third, the Epstein patent does not teach the need for a specific range of grafted GMA content in the rubber. Finally, Epstein discloses modifier particle sizes between 0.01-3.0 micron, and expressly states a distinct criticality for particle size substantially entirely below 1 micron in size.
In Olivier, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 690,613, filed Jan. 11, 1985, abandoned there are disclosed glycidyl methacrylate grafted EPDM impact modifiers for polyester resins. In the specific examples, he describes materials having gel contents of less than 5 percent or more than 48.7, with nothing in between. With little or no gel contents, i.e., 5 percent or less, he states that thermoplastic polyester compositions with high impact strengths are obtained. With high gel contents, specifically above 48.7%, Olivier discloses that the material was a much poorer impact modifier than one which was free of gel. In any event, the specific examples have subsequently been found not to provide an acceptable combination of good impact strength and knit-line characteristics. Moreover, no mention is made of any effect of impact modifier particle size on these important characteristics.
It has now been unexpectedly discovered that thermoplastic polyester compositions comprising glycidyl methacrylate grafted EPDM (EPDM-g-GMA) impact modifiers can be prepared that possess high impact strength combined with good knit-line characteristics if careful attention is paid to graft monomer content, gel content, and rubber particle size in the impact modifier. The gel content preferably used is especially unexpected because it happens to fall in a range not actually investigated by Olivier. Compositions with these important properties have been developed as a result of numerous trials which have established that it is required to use EPDM-G-GMA materials with greater than 2.0 percent, preferably greater than 3 percent, and especially preferably greater than 4 percent, GMA contents, and gel contents in the 10-80 percent range. Impact properties are also vastly improved in thermoplastic blends with well-dispersed rubber particles in which more than 60 percent, preferably more than 70 percent by weight of the rubber particles are 1 micron or larger in diameter. Nothing in the prior art renders such parameters obvious, and they cannot be developed by mere routine optimization experiments.

Olefinic impact modifiers for, and blends with, thermoplastic polyester resins


Connector switch apparatus which can provide either a cable or satellite television signal or a ghost-free off-air television signal. The apparatus obtains the cable or satellite television signal from a cable or satellite tuner, which can be included in the apparatus; and includes a television tuning device for producing a ghost-free off-air television signal, and a switch which provides either of those signals. The television tuning device employs use of antenna directionality control and ghost cancellation to produce a ghost-free off-air television signal. In particular, the television tuning device obtains an off-air television signal from a antenna, which may or may not be included therein, whose directionality can be changed to change reception quality of a received off-air television signal; and includes a baseband ghost cancellation unit which can perform baseband ghost cancellation. In a first embodiment, the directionality of the antenna is changed so that an off-air television signal of sufficient reception quality is received from which a ghost-free off-air television signal can be produced therefrom by the ghost cancellation unit. In a second embodiment, the television tuning system further includes a tuner, and controls the directionality of the antenna and the tuning frequency of the tuner so that a tuned off-air television signal is produced which is properly tuned and of sufficient quality that a properly tuned ghost-free off-air television signal can be produced therefrom by the ghost cancellation unit.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a connector switch apparatus which can provide a signal from either of two sources. More particularly, the invention relates to a connector switch apparatus which can provide either a satellite or cable television signal or a ghost-free off-air television signal to a television or a television monitor (either hereinafter referred to as a "television").
2. Description of Related Art
With the development of cable and satellite television transmission, television viewers are shying away from receiving television signals, by means of a conventional antenna, from off-air television transmission. (Such a television signal is hereinafter referred to as an "off-air television signal".) Rather, television viewers are more and more often opting to receive television signals from cable or satellite television transmission. (Such a television signal is hereinafter referred to as a "satellite or cable television signal".) Two inter-related reasons for this are:
(a) television viewers do not want to have to manipulate a conventional television antenna which receives off-air television signals (e.g., a television viewer may need to physically adjust that antenna or its phase) so that better quality television images can be obtained therefrom, especially when no similar manipulation is required with respect to cable or satellite television signals to obtain good quality television images; and
(b) the television images which have been obtained from television signals received via a conventional television antenna from off-air television transmission have not had as good a quality, because of ghosting, as those which have been obtained from television signals received from cable or satellite television transmission.
A problem or potential problem of cable and satellite television transmission is that they currently do not (such as in the case of DSS Satellite Television Systems) or may not now or in the future (such as in the case of cable television) transmit, in some or all markets, certain local programming which is transmitted via off-air television transmission and can be received by a television viewer by means of a conventional television antenna. As a result, in such markets, the only way in which a television viewer can obtain such local programming is by hooking up his or her television to a conventional television antenna. Because conventional televisions typically have only one television signal (i.e., R/F) input, a television viewer in such a market who wishes to have the ability to receive both cable or satellite television and such local programming cannot do so without additional equipment, unless he or she continuously connects and disconnects the R/F input to (a) (i) a cable box or the cable directly or (ii) a satellite antenna and tuner and (b) a conventional television antenna.
An existing solution to this problem is a conventional A/B switch, i.e., connecting the R/F input of a television to the output of the switch, and the inputs of the switch to a cable or satellite television tuner and a conventional television antenna, respectively. However, that solution does not solve either of the following two problems, mentioned above:
(a) a television viewer will still have to manipulate a conventional television antenna to obtain better quality television images from off-air television signals; and
(b) the television images which a television viewer obtains from off-air television signals, by means of a conventional television antenna, will not be as good as those obtained from cable or satellite television signals, because of ghosting.
With respect to the latter, it is noted that the development of baseband ghost cancellation, described generally by W. Ciciora et al. in "A Tutorial On Ghost Cancelling in Television Systems", IEEE Trans. on Consumer Elec., Vol. CE-25, No. 1, pp 9-44 (February 1979), which is incorporated herein by reference, reduces the effects of ghosting on, thereby improving the quality of, the television images which are obtained from off-air television signals. (Methods and apparatus illustrating preferred methods of baseband ghost cancellation are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,047,859, 5,111,298, 5,121,211, and 5,172,232, which are all incorporated herein by reference.) Nevertheless, the ability of baseband ghost cancellation to perform ghost cancellation, and the quantity of such ghost cancellation when it can be performed, is limited by the reception quality of a television signal received by a television. Accordingly, if the television signal which is received by a television and supplied to a baseband ghost cancellation unit is of poor reception quality, the baseband ghost cancellation unit may either not be able to perform ghost cancellation on that signal, or if it can perform ghost cancellation, not be able to perform sufficient ghost cancellation to produce a television signal from which substantially ghost-free images can be obtained. (That type of television signal is hereinafter referred to as a "ghost-free television signal".)

Connector switch apparatus which can provide either a satellite or cable television signal or a ghost-free off-air television signal

Philips Electronics North America Corporation