A rotor assembly includes a plurality of rotor disks that each have a rim portion. The plurality of rotor disks includes a first rotor disk and at least one first bleed air passage that extends through a forward rim portion of the first rotor disk. At least one second bleed air passage that extends through an aft rim portion of the first rotor disk.

A gas turbine engine typically includes a fan section, a compressor section, a combustor section, and a turbine section. Air entering the compressor section is compressed and delivered into the combustion section where it is mixed with fuel and ignited to generate a high-speed exhaust gas flow. The high-speed exhaust gas flow expands through the turbine section to drive the compressor and the fan section.
To increase efficiency of the gas turbine engine, operating temperatures generally increase in the compressor and turbine sections. This increase in temperature results in a need to manage the heat the structure of the gas turbine engine can withstand to achieve a desired operating life span.

Rotor bore conditioning for a gas turbine engine


A call is forwarded by connecting the call between an originating location and a forwarding location without connecting the call through a terminating location. The originating location is associated with a calling party. The terminating location is associated with a dialed number. The terminating location and the forwarding location is associated with the called party. A bill for the call is apportioned between the calling party and the called party. The bill portion for the calling party is a function of the originating location and the terminating location. The bill portion for the called party is a function of the terminating location and the forwarding location.

The present invention generally relates to a call forwarding service. More specifically, the present invention relates to call forwarding to the forwarding location without hairpinning the call through the destination location while still allowing split billing.
Known call forwarding services allow a call initiated at an originating location to be forwarded from the destination location (usually specified by the called number) to the forwarding location (usually specified by the called party). Typically, the type of call forwarding allows the call to be routed so that the call is connected between the originating location to the forwarding location without being routed through the destination location, i.e., without the call being "hair pinned" through the destination location.
Such known call forwarding services without hairpinning, however, cannot allow the billing for the forwarded call to be split between the calling party and the called party. Ideally, the calling party should be billed for the portion of system resources involved in routing the call between the originating location and the destination location, while the called party should be billed for the portion of the system resources involved in forwarding the calling from the destination location to the forwarding location. In other words, the calling party should not be billed for the entire call when the called party is responsible for the forwarding of the call to a forwarding location different from the destination location.
Known call forwarding service without hairpinning, however, cannot provide such split billing between the calling party and the called party. This shortcoming is due to the fact that once the call has been rerouted without being routed through the destination location, no effective mechanism exists to determine the apportionment for the used network resources, and the corresponding apportionment of the billing between the calling party and the called party.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Method for call forwarding without hairpinning and with split billing


Provided is an electroconductive paste for forming via-holes through ceramic substrates, and a method for producing ceramic substrates using the paste. The via-holes formed with the paste crack little during baking, and have high electric reliability and good solderability and platability. The paste comprises from about 80 to 93% by weight of a spherical or granular electroconductive metal powder having a grain size range of between about 0.1 and 50 .mu.m, from about 2 to 10% by weight of an insoluble resin powder having a grain size range of between about 0.1 and 50 .mu.m, and from about 5 to 18% by weight of an organic vehicle. The via-holes 2 formed through a ceramic green sheet 1 are filled with the paste 1, and a plurality of those ceramic green sheets 1 are laminated under heat and baked under a predetermined condition to produce a multi-layered ceramic substrate 6.

Ceramic substrates with good mechanical and electric characteristics are used in a variety of recent electronic parts. For those, multi-layered ceramic substrates, which comprise a plurality of ceramic sheets with electrodes and circuit patterns mounted thereon and in which the inner electrodes and circuit patterns are connected with each other via holes formed through the ceramic sheets, are widely used in order to increase packaging density.
One conventional method for producing such multi-layered ceramic substrates having inner electrodes and circuit patterns connected with each other by via holes comprises the following steps (1) to (4):
(1) First, holes for "via-holes" are formed through ceramic green sheets, using a drill or punch.
(2) Next, the thus-formed holes are filled with an electroconductive paste or metal powder.
(3) Next, an electroconductive paste is applied over the surface of each ceramic green sheet through screen printing or the like, to thereby form an electrode and/or a circuit pattern thereon.
(4) Last, a plurality of those ceramic green sheets are laminated under pressure, cut into predetermined sizes, and baked, whereby the ceramic green sheets are sintered while the electroconductive paste or metal powder existing in the via-holes is also sintered, and hence the inner circuit patterns are electrically connected with each other.
In that conventional method, copper is popularly used as the electroconductive material for forming the via-holes, since it has a small specific resistivity, it hardly migrates through the laminated sheets and it is inexpensive. For example, generally used therein is an electroconductive paste prepared by mixing and dispersing copper powder in an organic vehicle comprising a resinous component such as ethyl cellulose. As in the above, the ceramic green sheets and the metal existing in the via-holes are simultaneously baked in the baking step in the conventional method. In this method, therefore, any short or excessive filling of the electroconductive paste into the via-holes and any difference in the degree of contraction between the electroconductive paste and the ceramic green sheets being baked simultaneously will produce cracks of the electroconductive metal (formed as a result of sintering of the electroconductive metal powder in the paste) in the via-holes and/or cracks of the baked ceramic sheets themselves. Those cracks of the electroconductive metal in the via-holes and the ceramic sheets cause the via-holes to fail to have good electroconductivity and make the resulting ceramic laminate substrate have structural defects, resulting in that the reliability of the ceramic laminate sheet is lowered.

Electroconductive paste, and method for producing ceramic substrate using it


A control system/method for controlling engine brake (50) assisted upshifts in a vehicular, at least partially automated transmission system (10). A value representing expected engine brake turn-off reaction time (T.sub.REACTION) is adjusted as a function of sensed engine deceleration (dES/dt) at the time just prior to completing the assisted upshift.

1. Related Applications
This application is related to copending U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 08/461,715 filed Jun. 5, 1995, and 08/784,985 filed Jan. 17, 1997.
2. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a control system/method for controlling the shifting of vehicular fully or partially automated mechanical transmission systems of the type including an engine equipped with an engine retarding device or devices, such as a compression brake, and in particular, relates to a control system/method of the above-described type which is effective to adaptively determine the optimal time to deactivate the retarding device or devices to achieve rapid and smooth upshifting.
3. Description of the Prior Art
Vehicular fully and partially automated mechanical transmission systems are known in the prior art as may be seen by reference to U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,361,060; 4,595,986; 4,648,290; 4722,248; 5,050,427; 5,136,897; 5,335,566 and 5,582,558, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference.
Such fully or partially automated mechanical transmission systems typically include a microprocessor-based controller for issuing command output signals to various controllers to implement or assist selected transmission shifts, including manipulation of the engine fueling and/or of engine or input shaft brakes to cause the transmission input shaft to rotate at a substantially synchronous speed for a given output shaft speed and target gear ratio.
Engine brakes, usually called "engine compression brakes" or "exhaust brakes" are well known in the prior art and such devices, such as the well known "Jake brake," are commonly provided on heavy duty vehicles. These devices are typically manually operated, may provide variable retardation by manual selection of one, two or three banks of cylinders operation, and are utilized to retard the vehicle and, in recent developments, to quickly retard engine/input shaft speed for more rapid synchronization during an upshift. Examples of vehicular automated mechanical transmission systems utilizing automatically actuated engine brakes may be seen by reference to U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,933,850; 5,042,327; 5,409,432 and 5,425,689, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference.
Generally, as is well known in the prior art, engine compression brakes are effective to alter, usually hydraulically, the engine valve timing/porting so that a relatively large compressive force and resistance is provided to rotation of the engine and the vehicle drive wheels acting through to drive axles, drive shaft, transmission and master clutch.
Other devices and techniques to selectively retard engine rotation are also known. By way of example, by increasing the load on engine-driven accessories, such as air-conditioning, the deceleration of the engine may be increased. As used herein, the term "engine braking" or like terms is intended to include such devices and/or techniques, as well as techniques involving more common engine brakes.
The prior art automated mechanical transmission systems of the type having manually and/or automatically operated engine brakes were not totally satisfactory as engine brake assisted upshifts tended to be somewhat harsh and abrupt and/or were not as rapid as desired.
In accordance with aforementioned U.S. Pat. No. 5,409,432, some of the drawbacks of the prior art were overcome by the provision of control system/method for an engine brake-equipped automated mechanical transmission system which was effective to provide relatively smooth, high-quality, rapid upshifts. By allowing automatic actuation of the engine brake, during certain upshifts, the engine brake was operated by the system controller during an upshift to exert a minimum retarding torque at initiation of the shift and to then exert a smoothly increasing retarding torque, until a maximum retarding torque value is achieved, and to exert a smoothly decreasing retarding torque upon sensing that engine rotational speed (ES) and input shaft rotational speed (IS) were within a predetermined value (about 80 to 100 RPM) of synchronous speed, which is equal to the product of output shaft speed times the numerical value of the target gear ratio (OS*GR.sub.T). The controller preferably initiated these events in advance in view of actuator response times, current values of engine speed and output shaft shaft, and/or the rates of change thereof.
A problem with the above-described and other systems utilizing automatically controlled engine braking to assist some or all upshifts was that a fixed offset or shut-off point was used to determine when to shut off the engine braking device. If the shut-off occurred too early in the shift, the upshift took too long because the transmission input shaft and associated gearing did not declerate as rapidly as desired. If the shut-off occurred too late in the shift, the input shaft and associated gearing may have decelerated too rapidly for a smooth engagement and/or may have decelerated to a speed making target ratio engagement difficult or impossible.
A problem associated with using engine retarding devices to assist upshifting is that these devices tend to have a relatively long response time (often 100-500 milliseconds) so that a command to shut off the devices must anticipate the actual optimal time to shut off the devices by several hundred milliseconds. Also, vehicle configuration (2 or 3 banks of cylinders available for compressor braking) and/or operating conditions will cause large fluctuations in vehicle retarding device performance.

Transmission system control system/method including adaptive control for engine deceleration device


A mechanism fixed under a cushion for adjusting an interval of two armrests is disclosed. The invention includes a base, an armrest support and a handle set. The base is a hollow body with a channel and has an elastic block with a central through hole. The armrest support has a connecting section slidably penetrating the channel. The connecting section is formed with a longitudinal through hole corresponding to the central through hole in position. The handle set is fixed under the base and includes a handle with a fixing bar and an opening; a presser received in the opening and has a fixing hole corresponding to the central through hole in position and an engagement trench for engaging with the fixing bar; and a bolt passing through the fixing hole, longitudinal hole and central through hole, and screwed with a nut to fasten the handle to the base.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates to chairs, particularly to armrests of chairs.
2. Related Art
Office chairs with an elevation mechanism and/or flexible back have been very popular. However, armrests of few chairs provide an adjustment mechanism. Even if an adjustment mechanism is provided to armrests of a chair, it offers a single function of height adjustment. In fact, an armrest interval adjustment mechanism is needed by some users. However, there is no chair with an armrest interval adjustment mechanism in the market. Complexity, adjustability and reliability are very difficult to achieve a compromise.

Armrest interval adjustment structure for a chair

DONGGUAN KENTEC OFFICE SEATING CO., LTD.


In a member having a hydrogen-containing, amorphous carbon coating having a relatively smooth surface, similarly amorphous, fine carbon particles are dispersed in the hydrogen-containing, amorphous carbon coating to have improved cracking resistance while keeping smoothness on the surface and hardness in the entire coating. Specifically, fine particles discharged from a carbon cathode of an arc evaporation source by arc discharge are introduced into the coating, so that similarly amorphous, fine carbon particles are dispersed in the hydrogen-containing, amorphous carbon coating.

High power, long life and high fuel efficiency are recently required for internal engines such as automobile engines, needing the reduction of friction loss in sliding portions. Thus, hard, amorphous carbon coatings having low friction coefficients are proposed.
Among them, a plasma CVD method and a reactive sputtering method using plasma formed by exciting reactive hydrocarbon gases such as methane, acetylene, etc. introduced into a vacuum chamber, by high-frequency discharge, direct current discharge, etc., can form hydrogen-containing, hard, amorphous carbon coatings having relatively smooth surfaces.
Such hydrogen-containing, hard, amorphous carbon coatings formed on sliding members such as engine parts should indispensably have high wear resistance. Many proposals have been made therefor. For example, JP 2006-283134 A discloses the addition of Si to a hydrogen-containing, hard, amorphous carbon coating, JP 2001-316800 A discloses a method for forming a metal-containing, hard, amorphous carbon coating, and JP 2001-261318 A discloses a method for adding graphite clusters to a hard, amorphous carbon coating.
In hydrogen-containing hard carbon coatings, part of carbon bonds constituting the coatings are terminated by hydrogen regardless of the production method. Accordingly, the hydrogen-containing hard carbon coatings fail to have as strong carbon bonds as those in hard, amorphous carbon coatings containing no hydrogen, suffering faster wearing when formed on sliding members used under a high load. This appears to be due to the mechanism that weak carbon bonds in the hard, amorphous carbon coating are broken by a sliding load, resulting in worn powder detached from the coating.
In the hard, amorphous carbon coating containing graphite clusters, Van der Waals bonds of graphite contained are weaker than sp2 and sp3 bonds of carbon atoms constituting the matrix, reducing the wear resistance of the coating. Even coatings to which metal elements are added have lower hardness than that of hard, amorphous carbon coatings containing no metal elements, indicating that the metal elements do not have a high function of improving wear resistance.
Unlike other metal elements, Si forms a stronger covalent bond to carbon, resulting in improved hardness. However, because only sp3 bond is used, some Si atoms are not fully bonded, resulting in brittle coatings, which are easily cracked.

Member having hydrogen-containing, hard, amorphous carbon coating and its production method


Some examples include a computing device that receives optical signal information based on respective optical signals received through a plurality of optical fibers during a welding operation. For example, the plurality of optical fibers may be positioned to receive electromagnetic radiation from a weld area during the welding operation. The computing device may compare the optical signal information corresponding to a first one of the optical fibers with the optical signal information corresponding to a second one of the optical fibers. Based at least partially on the comparing, the computing device may determine whether at least one of a weld geometry or a welding arc is irregular. The computing device may perform at least one action based on determining that at least one of the weld geometry or the welding arc is irregular.

Tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding, also known as gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW), is at type of arc welding process that uses a non-consumable tungsten welding electrode for forming a weld. The weld area and the welding electrode are protected from oxidation or other atmospheric contamination by an inert shielding gas (e.g., argon, helium, carbon dioxide), and a filler metal may be used, although some types of welds, referred to as autogenous welds, do not employ filler material. A constant-current welding power supply may provide electrical energy that is conducted across an arc between the welding electrode and the workpiece through highly ionized gas and metal vapors.
TIG/GTAW is widely used in many industry sectors and is conducive to use with robotic welding systems. However, welding defects may affect the usefulness of this welding technology. Welding defects and other irregularities may be categorized into several different categories, such as geometric defects, internal defects, property defects, and so forth. For instance, internal defects may include lack of fusion, lack of penetration, internal porosity, internal cracks, and the like. Geometric defects may include incorrect weld bead geometry, such as weld bead size, weld bead shape, and/or weld bead location. Property defects may include incompatible materials, non-metallic inclusions, and the like. Defects such as those discussed above, may directly result in a defective final product and corresponding revenue loss. For instance, such a defective product might have a lower than expected weld strength, a shorter than expected service life, and/or irregular or off-set weld locations that are not aesthetically acceptable to a customer.


A system and method for efficiently performing an inverse telecine procedure includes an inverse telecine module that converts input frames of video information into corresponding output frames by applying an inverse telecine policy to the input frames. A motion statistics generator then calculates motion statistics results corresponding to the output frames. A synchronizer module then compares the motion statistics results to entries in a synchronization table for determining whether the inverse telecine procedure is correctly synchronized. The synchronizer module may then reposition a current start boundary of the inverse telecine procedure whenever the inverse telecine procedure is not correctly synchronized.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to techniques for processing video data, and relates more particularly to a system and method for efficiently performing an inverse telecine procedure.
2. Description of the Background Art
Implementing methods for efficiently processing video data is a significant consideration for designers and manufacturers of contemporary electronic entertainment systems. However, processing data may create substantial challenges for system designers. For example, enhanced demands for increased system functionality and performance may require more system processing power and require additional hardware resources. An increase in processing or hardware requirements may also result in a corresponding detrimental economic impact due to increased production costs and operational inefficiencies.
Furthermore, enhanced system capability to perform various advanced operations may provide additional benefits to a system user, but may also place increased demands on the control and management of various system components. For example, an enhanced electronic system that effectively processes video data may benefit from an efficient implementation because of the large amount and complexity of the digital data involved.
Due to growing demands on system resources and substantially increasing data magnitudes, it is apparent that developing new techniques for processing video data is a matter of concern for related electronic technologies. Therefore, for all the foregoing reasons, developing efficient systems for processing video data remains a significant consideration for designers, manufacturers, and users of contemporary electronic systems.

System and method for efficiently performing an inverse telecine procedure


An insulation piercing terminal is so designed that, by press working a piece of metal plate, an electrical contact section which is engaged with a mating terminal, and a wire clamping section are formed respectively at the front end portion and at the rear end portion, and an insulation piercing conductive section is formed between those sections, the insulation piercing conductive section being U-shaped in section, having right and left side walls, and a bottom wall, and the right and left side walls of the insulation piercing conductive section are partially cut and bent inwardly to form a pair of right and left insulation piercing blades which defines an insulation piercing slot. In the insulation piercing terminal, the bottom wall of the insulation piercing conductive section is a curved bottom wall which is curved downwardly in such a manner that the bottom wall is smoothly continuous to the right and left side walls, and the curved bottom wall has stability supports so that the curved bottom wall is stably set on a flat surface.

This invention relates to an insulation piercing terminal which is so designed that, when a covered wire is pushed in an insulation piercing slot, the conductor (core) of the wire is brought into contact with the insulation piercing terminal without removal of the insulating cover of the wire.
FIGS. 3(a) to 3(c) show a conventional insulation piercing terminal disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 4,385,794. More specifically, FIG. 3(a) is a perspective view of the insulation piercing terminal, FIG. 3(b) is a sectional view taken along line IIIb--IIIb, and FIG. 3(c) is a perspective view showing part of a covered wire connected to the insulation piercing terminal.
In the figures, an insulation piercing terminal 1 is formed by blanking and press working a piece of thin metal sheet. Its front end portion is an electrical contact section 2 which is engaged with a mating terminal, and its rear end portion is a wire clamping section 3, and the middle portion between those front and rear end portions is an insulation piercing conductive portion 4. The electrical contact portion 2 is engaged with the mating terminal so that the former is electrically connected with the latter; the wire clamping section 3 has right and left retaining pieces (parts of the walls) 3a, which are bent inwardly to fixedly hold the wire W from above the insulating cover Wb; and the insulation piercing conductive section 4 is electrically connected to the conductor Wa of the wire W. The wire clamping section 3 is coupled through a first neck 6 to the insulation piercing conductive section 4, and the insulation piercing conductive section 4 is coupled through a second neck 7 to the electrical contact section 2.
The insulation piercing conductive section 4 has a front insulation piercing piece 10A and a rear insulation piercing piece 10B respectively at the front end and at the rear end. Each of the front and rear insulation piercing pieces 10A and 10B has a pair of right and left insulation piercing blades which are confronted with each other, forming an insulation piercing slot 12 in which the conductor of the wire is pushed. The wire clamping section 3, the insulation piercing conductive section 4, and the electrical contact section 2 have a bottom wall 7 formed of a belt-shaped common flat plate.
The insulation piercing conductive section 4 is U-shaped in section, having a part of the bottom wall 7, and a pair of right and left side walls 9 which are formed by bending the right and left edge portions of the bottom wall 7 upwardly. In this case, the right and left edge portions of the bottom wall are bent 90.degree. upwardly so that the resultant right and left side walls are confronted with each other, and suitable recesses 18 are formed on the bending lines by pressing, thereby to increase the rigidity of the portions corresponding to the bending lines. The insulation piercing blades 11 of the insulation piercing pieces 10A and 10B are formed by inwardly bending the front and rear edge portion of the side walls 9.
The wire W is connected to the insulation piercing terminal 1 as follows; One end portion of the wire W is laid on the rear end portion of the insulation piercing terminal 1 in such a manner that the one end portion of the wire W is in parallel with the rear end portion of the insulation piercing terminal 1. Under this condition, the one end portion of the wire W is pushed in the insulation piercing slots 12 of the insulation piercing conductive section 4 from above. In this case, the right and left insulation piercing blades 11 cut the insulating cover Wb of the wire W and contact the conductor Wa of the wire W. When the one end portion of the wire W is further pushed in, the conductor Wa is caused to go in between the right and left insulation piercing blades 11, thus being positively held by the insulation piercing blades 11. In this operation, force is applied to open the right and left insulation piercing blades 11 outwardly.
In general, an insulation piercing terminal is mass-produced, and a number of insulation piercing terminals are built in a connector housing in such a manner that they are adjacent to one another. Hence, there has been a strong demand for the provision of an insulation piercing terminal which is small in size, and light in weight. In order to decrease the weight of the insulation piercing terminal, it is essential to reduce the thickness of a metal plate which is formed into the insulation piercing terminal. And in order to miniaturize the insulation piercing terminal, it is necessary to decrease the width and the length of the insulation piercing terminal. For instance, in order to decrease the width of the insulation piercing terminal, it is essential to decrease the width of the insulation piercing blades forming the insulation piercing slot.
However, if the thickness of the metal plate, which is used to form the insulation piercing terminal, is decreased, or if the width of the insulation piercing blades is decreased, then the mechanical strength of the insulation piercing blades is decreased, as a result of which, when the wire is pushed in the insulation piercing slot, the right and left insulation piercing blades are opened outwardly.
In view of the foregoing, in the conventional insulation piercing terminal 1 shown in FIGS. 3 (a) to 3(c), the insulation piercing blades 11 are formed by bending inwardly the front and rear edge portions of the side walls 9 of the insulation piercing conductive section 4. However, the force which acts on the insulation piercing blades 11 when the wire is pushed in the insulation piercing slots, acts collectively on the junctions (the bent portions) of the side walls 9 and the bottom wall 7 (the junctions being decreased in thickness in the above-described bending operation; i.e., reduced in mechanical strength). As a result, the side walls 9 are apt to be bent outwardly, and accordingly, the insulation piercing blades 11 may be bent outwardly (opened). In order to overcome this difficulty, the recesses 18 are formed on the junctions of the side walls 9 and the bottom wall 7; however, the recesses 18 are not so effective in preventing the upper end portions of the side walls 9 from falling aside; that is, they are not so effective in preventing the insulation piercing blades 11 from being opened.


A system and method of relating a public key to a compact identification string in a digital certificate to enable an entity to construct a certificate chain from a root certificate authority to an end-entity efficiently and further allow a certificate holder to store only its identifier, thus providing privacy protection, and present this in place of a digital certificate for authentication rather than storing and presenting its certificate or a chain of certificates representing the certificate path up to the root certificate authority. In a preferred embodiment, the certificate authority generates unique identifier for each certificate consisting its pseudonym concatenated with the pseudonyms of other sub-certificate authorities in the certificate chain between it and the certificate holder, concatenated with certificate holder's pseudonym. The pseudonyms are generated by the entity known by the pseudonym or the entity certifying a binding between the pseudonym and the entity's public key.

This invention relates to the field of secure communications, and in particular to a method of establishing communication in a digital communications network comprising a hierarchical arrangement of digital certificate servers.
In asymmetric encryption technology, each user generates a pair of keys known as a public key and a private key. The public key is widely disseminated and used by others to encrypt communications intended for the owner of the pubic key. Once the message has been encrypted with the public key, it can only be decrypted with the corresponding private key. This is the basis of public key encryption.
The problem with this technology is that the sender needs to have a way of guaranteeing that the public key used for encryption does indeed belong to the recipient. Otherwise, the sender could unintentionally encrypt a message that could only be decrypted by some mischievous third party. A way was therefore needed for users to be able to have a high degree of assurance that the owner of a public key was indeed the intended recipient.
Digital certificates were invented to solve this problem. A recognized certificate authority issues a certificate binding the public key of a subscriber to his real world identity. The certificate is digitally signed by the recognized issuing authority. A message is digitally signed in effect by encrypting it with a private key. The message can then only be decrypted with the corresponding public key, and provided the user has a high degree of trust in the certifying authority, he will then have assurance that the public key contained in the certificate does indeed belong to the user to whom it is bound.
Digital certificates generally follow the X.509 standard, developed by the International Standards Organization (ISO) and the Comité Consultatif Internatinale Telegraphique et Telephonique (CCITT). These certificates create a binding between an entity's public key and its real world identity. Real world identities are values that have meaning to general applications that use certificates and include identifiers such as email addresses, first and last names, social insurance numbers, telephone numbers, URL's, or IP addresses. In X.509 certificates, only the identity of the issuer of the certificate and the holder of the certificate are included in the certificate body.
In order to allow a distributed arrangement of certifying authorities, they are arranged in a hierarchical fashion. Referring to FIG. 1, a root authority 1 certifies subordinate authorities 2, 3, 4 and so on in a chain down to an end user 5. However, the identities of the issuer's certificate issuer 3 and other higher level entities 1, 2 are not mentioned and must be gathered independently to reconstruct the certificate chain.
Also, certificates containing real world identities for both the certificate holder and the certificate issuer and are published in public directories. While application servers may want their real world identities known to many, application users may want some degree of anonymity or pseudonymity that a real world identity cannot provide.

Method of establishing secure communications in a digital network using pseudonymic digital identifiers


In a communication system for establishing the communication between a radio intelligent terminal and a server via gateways, it is necessary to notify a non-communicating and a disconnecting radio intelligent terminal of an address of an exchange-destination gateway at the time of changing from a gateway to be used at all time to an exchange-destination gateway for some reason. To achieve the above object, a communication system comprises address notifying means for notifying the radio intelligent terminal of the address of the exchange-destination gateway according to a gateway exchange instruction inputted by an operation. The address notice is sent to the non-communicating terminal at the time of inputting the gateway exchange instruction, and is sent to the disconnecting terminal when it can start the communication.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a radio communication system, more specially, gateway exchange methods for said system, and gateways, radio intelligent terminals and radio communication system utilized for said methods.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, the Internet Services such as WWW (World Wide Web) and etc. become so popular rapidly that the expansion of the computer network scales and the diversity of said connecting modes could be making advances.
In order to meet said progress, the gateways which connect intelligent terminals and servers via network are required to improve the processing ability and to increase the functions.
An example of the diversity of the connecting mode is a mobile computing. The mobile computing is a radio communication network which is able to be used by using a mobile terminal network such as portable phone network and by adding a radio communication function to an intelligent terminal even at the time of moving or even at a place impossible to connect directly with the computer network FIGS. 1 and 2 are conceptual view showing the communication mode adopting the above radio communication network.
FIG. 1 shows a constitution of the radio communication network with public network or in-house network for example, Local Area Network (LAN).
When a user executes an application in a terminal 1, the terminal 1 is connected with a server 6 via a radio base station 2, a network 3, and a gateway 4 or 5, and then the communication is established between the terminal 1 and the server 6. And the application is to be executed.
FIG. 2 shows an example of a radio communication network without passing through a network wherein gateways themselves have a server function, and which is operated in smaller area like an office than a place as shown in FIG. 1. Namely, the communication is established between the terminal 1 and the gateway 4 or 5 via radio base stations 2 or 10 and the application is to be executed.
In the radio communication network as described above, it is necessary to stop the operation of gateways temporarily for increasing functions of gateways to meet the change of networks and for operating the regular maintenance and so on. In order to continue the network operation on the stopped status of the gateway, it is necessary that the network is provided with the gateway exchange function, that is, a plural gateways are to be prepared as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, and in case of deactivating the function of the gateway, the communication is to be established between the terminal and the server through the other gateway 5.
The outline of the communication protocol between the terminal and the gateway will be explained according to FIG. 7.
An application 71 in the terminal is a program such as WWW browser that a user operates directly. And an application 75 in the gateway (as shown in FIG. 2, the case of the gateway including server function is taken as an example) is a program for exchanging information with an application in the terminal, for example, a WWW server software.
A session layer protocol handler 72 (represented by a "S. L. protocol handler" hereinafter) is protocol means for offering a transfer controlling function which is common to various applications 71 and 75, for example, means such as a transfer processing of dividing into a transferable data and of transferring data per divided unit. A management entity means 73 (represented by a "M. entity means" hereinafter) is a program for managing system resources (such as a memory) which is used by a plural session processes generating at the data communication between a terminal and a server, and for managing processings over the whole system (for example, notice of a gateway exchange timing). A lower layer protocol handler 74 is a program and device for performing a communication control.
FIG. 31 shows a sequence of the communication mode in FIG. 2.
A S. L. protocol handler 3102 in a terminal 1 is in communication 3103 with a S. L. protocol handler 3104 in the gateway 4 in order to execute the application 3101. At this time, an gateway exchange instruction 3108 is inputted by an operator to a M. entity means 3105 in the gateway 4, and the M. entity means 3105 sends a disconnection notice 3109 to the S. L. protocol handler 3102 in the terminal 1 via the S. L. protocol handler 3104. Accordingly the S. L. protocol handler 3102 in the terminal 1 performs the disconnect display 3110 to the application 3101 or not, and then the execution of the application 3101 is suspended.
After the gateway 4 sends out the disconnection notice 3109, the gateway 4 gets into shutdown according to the operator's instruction or the function of the gateway 4. After that, the terminal 1, in order to re-execute the application 3101 thus suspended, requests the S. L. protocol handler 3102 to re-connect 3111 with the gateway 5 according to the address information in the terminal itself.
After the session 3112 is established between the S. L. protocol handler 3102 in the terminal 1 and the S. L. protocol handler 3106 in the gateway 5, the terminal 1 changes to be in communication 3113 with the gateway 5 and then it is possible to re-execute the application 3101 which has been suspended.
In the conventional technique as described above, however, there are some problems as follows.
In order to perform the gateway exchanging because of the shutdown of a gateway, the terminal has to store beforehand in the memory the address information about a plural gateways to be changeable objects. But the meaning that the information necessary only for exchanging the connection of gateway are always stored in the terminal is equivalent to the wasteful use of resources, and is not preferable for the terminal which has to be compact and provided with many functions.
And another problem is that, whenever that the network constitution changes according to the addition, the delete and etc. of severs or gateways, the gateway address information stored in the terminal have to be updated.
The method to solve the above problems, which is disclosed in the Japanese patent application No. 11-198675 filed in the name of this applicant, is to notify the exchange-destination gateway address to each terminal which is in communication with the exchange-original gateway at the time of shutdown. But this method is not available for the non-communicating terminals or the disconnecting terminals explained hereinafter.
The "non-communicating" terminal means the status that a terminal can always receive incoming signals from the other terminals even when the session(logical connection) is not established although the switch is turned on, that is to say, it is in the state of "standing by". Meanwhile, the "disconnecting" terminal means the status that the terminal is switched off, or the status that the terminal cannot get into communication with a gateway because of standing outside the communication zone even though the switch is turned on.
In other words, there has not been any method for notifying the non-communicating or the disconnecting terminals of the address of the exchange-destination gateway. In the method disclosed in the Japanese patent application No. 11-198675, in case gateways changes when terminals are in the state of non-communicating or disconnecting, said terminals cannot receive the address of the exchange-destination gateway. Therefore the terminals cannot execute applications until the exchange-original gateway start up its operation again.
The present invention is proposed in order to solve the above problems, and provided with a radio communication system for notifying the address of the exchange-destination gateway and etc. to non-communicating or disconnecting terminals when the terminals starts the communication, in case the gateway exchange instruction was inputted by an operator. Therefore it is possible to avoid the wasteful use of the memory, to meet various changes of the network constitution easily, and to execute applications via the network at any time.

Radio-based intelligent terminal and program for notice of gateway exchange

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


A delivery device for deploying an expandable prosthesis and method of use thereof are described. The delivery device comprises an outer catheter that is capable of retracting in a proximal direction and resheathing over the prosthesis in a distal direction. The device comprises a drive pulley that can engage a particular gear set to retract the outer catheter and expose the prosthesis. The drive pulley can also engage another gear set to resheath the outer catheter and recapture the prosthesis between the inner and the outer catheter. A directional switch enables the device to operate between the two modes.

A self-expanding prosthesis is typically introduced into the body using a delivery device that comprises a push-pull mechanism. The delivery device comprises an outer catheter coaxially disposed and slidable over an inner catheter. The prosthesis is disposed at the distal end of the device in between the inner catheter and the outer catheter. The inner and the outer catheter move coaxially with respect to each other. The prosthesis may be deployed by proximally pulling back the outer catheter relative to the inner catheter until the prosthesis is exposed.
There are numerous drawbacks to the above push-pull delivery device. For example, utilizing a conventional push-pull delivery device may cause the physician to inadvertently use excessive force and pull back the outer catheter too far, thereby prematurely deploying the prosthesis in an incorrect position within a body lumen. At this step in the procedure, repositioning of the prosthesis becomes difficult, if not impossible, because the prosthesis has already radially self-expanded into the body lumen. Additionally, retraction of the outer sheath is not achieved with controlled movement because the physician is manually retracting the outer catheter. Manual retraction of the outer catheter may lead to inadvertent jerking back of the outer catheter. Furthermore, two hands are typically needed to deploy the prosthesis with a push-pull mechanism. One hand may be required to hold the inner catheter while the other hand pulls the outer catheter and slides it back over the inner catheter. The use of two hands prevents the physician from performing another task during the procedure.
Accordingly, in view of the drawbacks of current technology, there is a desire for a delivery system that can increase the control, accuracy and ease of placement during deployment of a prosthesis. Although the inventions described below may be useful for increasing the control, accuracy and ease of placement during deployment of the prosthesis, the claimed inventions may also solve other problems.


An image forming apparatus, including a main body, a cover, and an upper unit, is provided. The cover includes a stackable surface to stack an ejected sheet and an attachment section extending upward from the stackable surface. The upper unit includes a base surface and an attachable section. The base surface spreads over the stackable surface with a predetermined amount of a gap reserved there-between. The attachable section is arranged in a position to adjoin the base surface to face a top surface of the attachment section and is attached to the attachment section. The attachment section has a downward dent on the top surface thereof. The downward dent adjoins a boundary part, which is a part of a gap formed in a position between the top surface and a bottom surface of the attachable section. The downward dent is a groove elongated in parallel with the boundary part.

1. Technical Field
An aspect of the present invention relates to an image forming apparatus.
2. Related Art
A conventionally known image forming apparatus may include an image forming unit, a main body, a cover of the main body, and an upper unit. The image forming unit may form an image on a sheet, the main body may accommodate the image forming unit, the cover may be placed over an upper part of the main body, and the upper unit may be disposed in an upper position with respect to the cover.
The cover may include a stackable surface and attachment sections on an upper side thereof. After an image is formed on a sheet in the image forming unit, the sheet may be ejected out of the main body through an ejection opening, which is formed on a rear side of the main body, and may be placed on the stackable surface. The attachment sections may be formed to laterally adjoin the stackable surface and extend upward with respect to the stackable surface. Meanwhile, the upper unit may provide a ceiling plane and attachable sections at a lower side thereof. The ceiling plane may spread over the stackable surface with a predetermined amount of gap being reserved in there-between. The attachable sections may be arranged to face top surfaces of the attachment sections at positions to laterally adjoin the ceiling plane and may be attached to the attachment sections of the main body. Further, the image forming apparatus may be formed to have a pickup area, which spreads between the rear side and a front side of the main body. The pickup area may be formed by inner walls of the attachment sections, which adjoin the stackable surface and rise upward from the stackable surface, the stackable surface, and the ceiling plane of the upper unit. A user may pick up the sheet with the image from a sheet stack placed on the stackable surface through the pickup area.
The image forming apparatus may further include boundary parts. The boundary parts may be a part of gaps formed between the top surfaces of the attachment sections and lower surfaces of the attachable sections in the upper unit. The gaps may be exposed to be visually recognizable when viewed at a specific angle, wherein the view is not interfered with by the attachment sections that adjoin the stackable surface.
Image forming apparatuses, including the above-mentioned conventional image forming apparatus, may occasionally be exposed to liquid, such as water, which may be poured over the upper side of the upper unit. In this regard, the liquid pouring over the upper unit may enter the main body through the gaps formed between the top surfaces of the attachment sections and the lower surfaces of the attachable sections and may flow to the interior of the main body. If the liquid reaches the image forming unit, the image forming unit may be damaged.


Techniques for generating layout may include: receiving data corresponding to images modules; determining that a set of the image modules will fit a layout; assigning image modules from the set to the layout; determining a number of possible permutations of the image modules given one or more constraints associated with images in the set of image modules; selecting a number of candidate templates to accommodate the layout, where the number of candidate templates is based on the number of permutations; filling candidate templates with image modules from the set; receiving an input selecting one of the candidate templates containing image modules from the set; and outputting data for the selected candidate template, the data for generating a display of the selected candidate template.

This disclosure relates to generating a layout, e.g., for advertisements.
The Internet provides access to a wide variety of resources. For example, Web pages containing video, audio, news articles, and other content are accessible over the Internet. Content, such as advertising, may also be provided over the Internet, either alone or in combination with provided resources. An example of such content may be an electronic circular. An example electronic circular includes images displayed in one or more Web pages to satisfy some criteria. The images may be advertisements, as noted above, or other appropriate images, such as personal photographs, which may be organized so that they are visually appealing. An electronic circular may be displayed, e.g., on dedicated Web page(s) or in slots of a Web page containing other content. In some examples, Web pages may contain links to other Web page containing electronic circular(s).


A power connector assembly includes mateable power receptacle and power plug. The power receptacle includes an insulative housing and a number of receptacle power contacts received in the insulative housing. The insulative housing includes a mating surface, a mounting surface, a first slot recessed from the first mating surface, and a first through hole extending through the mounting surface to be exposed to an exterior. The first through hole is in communication with the first slot in order to form a heat dissipation path for eliminating heat generated by the receptacle power contacts.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a power receptacle and a power connector assembly thereof, and more particularly to a power receptacle and a power connector assembly thereof with enlarged heat dissipation path formed on a mating surface.
2. Description of Related Art
Mateable power receptacle and power plug are commonly used for power transmission. It is known that heat is generated by impedance of power contacts during power transmission. Nowadays, more and more electronic devices need heavy power to work, and power connector assemblies which can endure high current are accordingly needed. Heat dissipation becomes one of the most annoying problems in connector design. If the heat is limited in insulative housings of the power connector assembly, and cannot be eliminated timely, the insulative housings might be burnt. Besides, mateable contact portions of contacts of the power connector assembly might melt. The high temperature once monitored by the client-side will crash the electronic devices. Bad heat dissipation may result in security problems for the worse.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,994,598 B2 issued to Holmes et al. on Feb. 7, 2006 discloses a traditional power connector assembly. The power connector assembly includes a male connector and a female connector both provided with multiple power contacts retained in an insulative housing. However, such power contacts are closed in the insulative housings when the male connector and the female connector are mated with each other for power transmission. As a result, heat dissipation thereof is poor.
Hence, a power receptacle and a power connector assembly thereof with improved heat dissipation path are needed to solve the above problem.

Power receptacle with enlarged heat dissipation path formed on mating face and power connector assembly thereof


A semiconductor device advantageously has first and second oxidized silicon insulating layers formed on the surface of a substrate. A first oxidized silicon insulating layer is formed through a low temperature process and a second oxidized silicon insulating layer may be formed at a higher manufacturing process temperature. Advantageously, the first oxidized silicon insulating layer has a lower voltage resistance than the second oxidized silicon insulating layer.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor device employing an insulation film formed based on an insulation film-forming method and a manufacturing method of a semiconductor device employing this forming method.
2. Description of Related Art
Conventionally, gate insulation films comprising SiO.sub.2 used in the construction of MOS-type transistors are formed by thermally oxidizing a silicon semiconductor substrate. Insulation films comprising SiO.sub.2 formed by thermal oxidation techniques have extremely preferable surface boundary techniques i.e. low surface boundary level density and are a foundation of current semiconductor device manufacturing processes. Alternatively, an insulation film or inter-layer insulation film comprising SiO.sub.2 may be formed by a thermal chemical vapor deposition technique (thermal CVD technique).
While, on the one hand, gate insulation films, insulation films or inter-layer insulation films (hereinafter, these may also be given the name "insulation films, etc.") comprising SiO.sub.2 formed by thermal oxidation or thermal CVD techniques posses superior electrical characteristics, the film-forming temperature is extremely high. i.e. in thermal oxidation, heating a silicon semiconductor substrate temperature of 1000.degree. C. or more is necessary while with thermal CVD techniques, heating a silicon semiconductor substrate to a temperature of 600.degree. C. or more is necessary.
Therefore, when making semiconductor devices where low temperature processes depending on the materials used are applied in the manufacturing of thin-film transistors etc. made on glass substrates, these thermal oxidation techniques and thermal CVD techniques are not appropriate.
On the other hand, plasma CVD techniques may be used as a method of forming insulation films etc. comprising SiO.sub.2 at low temperatures. In these plasma CVD techniques, SiO.sub.2 generated by breaking down SiH.sub.4, N.sub.2 O or O.sub.2 gas using RF discharge is piled onto the surface of a board comprising, for example, a glass substrate. The piling of an insulation film or the like comprising SiO.sub.2 onto the surface of a board at temperatures of 300.degree. C. or less is possible with these plasma CVD techniques. However, high-energy plasma is generated during film-forming with these plasma CVD techniques. The material which the board is made up of, for example, silicon, therefore incurs damage due to the high energy plasma while a gate insulation film comprising SiO.sub.2 is being formed and the manufacturing of a transistor having desirable current/voltage characteristics is no longer possible.

Semiconductor device having first and second insulating layers


Low density mirrors for optical assemblies and methods of manufacture thereof. In one example, a reflective mirror is formed of a magnesium or magnesium alloy substrate that is single point diamond turned to provide a reflective surface. The magnesium or magnesium alloy substrate is compatible with thin-film finishing processes and/or magnetorheological finishing which may be applied to improve a surface finish of the mirror.

High precision reflective mirrors are used in numerous optical devices and applications. One existing technique for making precision metal mirrors is to use a substrate of an aluminum alloy, such as that commonly known in the art as aluminum 6061-T6, and to carry out single point diamond turning (SPDT) of a surface on the substrate, which then serves as the reflective surface. Aluminum 6061-T6 is primarily aluminum, with alloy elements of zinc, chromium, iron, magnesium and silicon. The aluminum 6061-T6 alloy is lightweight, is easily machined by SPDT, and has good long-term stability. Accordingly, this alloy is commonly used to produce reflective mirrors for optical devices.

Magnesium mirrors and methods of manufacture thereof


An array antenna calibration method and device, which is used for calibrating an array antenna in real time in an open calibration environment. The method includes: determining, on the basis of a preset direction angle of each preset beam direction, an initial beam weight vector matrix of an array antenna to be calibrated, and emitting, by a test antenna in a standard beam direction, a first calibration signal to the array antenna to be calibrated; determining, on the basis of the first calibration signal received by each channel of the array antenna to be calibrated, a magnitude-phase error between the first calibration signal received by a center channel and the first calibration signal received by each channel; and using the magnitude-phase error to calibrate the initial beam weight vector matrix, so as to obtain a compensation beam weight vector matrix.

In the age of the 5th generation (hereinafter "5G") communication, massive active array antenna technology is a key enabling technology. An active array antenna is a system that receives or transmits electromagnetic waves by directly connecting an active circuit to each element of the array antenna. The active array antenna enables beamforming, and calibrates channels corresponding to each element to ensure the consistence of the amplitudes and phases of the elements, thereby ensuring the effectiveness of the beamforming function.
In the existing technology, over the air (hereinafter "OTA") testing in both the far-field and the near-field in an anechoic chamber is used to calibrate the massive active array antenna to measure the effectiveness of beamforming.
However, anechoic chambers are expensive to build and its testing efficiency is low in spite of high accurateness of testing results. Therefore, the testing method mentioned above is only suitable for laboratory studies instead of large-scale mass production.

Array antenna calibration method and device

DATANG MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS EQUIPMENT CO., LTD.


A GaN substrate 1, a group III nitride semiconductor substrate, is provided with an OF portion 2 for the periphery thereof. The bevel 7 on the periphery of the nitric polarity face 5 side of the GaN substrate 1 is provided throughout the entire periphery of the GaN substrate 1 including the OF portion 2, wherein the beveling angle θ2 of the bevel 7 is given a value in the range over 30° to 60° inclusive.

The present invention relates to a group III nitride semiconductor substrate suitable for epitaxial growth processing thereon in preparation of a semiconductor such as a laser diode for emissions ranging from ultraviolet to blue lights or a light emitting diode for short wavelength lights.
A gallium nitride (GaN) substrate in a practical use is known to have typically a shape illustrated in FIGS. 7A to 7D, (refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2002-356398). FIG. 7A is a plan view of such substrate viewed from the group III polarity face side; FIG. 7B is a plan view of the same substrate viewed from the nitric polarity face side; FIG. 7C is an enlarged sectional view of the same substrate viewed on the sectioning-line A-A′ in FIG. 7A where the substrate is given a C-beveling; and FIG. 7D is an enlarged sectional view of the same substrate viewed on the sectioning-line A-A′ in FIG. 7A where the substrate is given an R-beveling.
According to the description in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2002-356398 referred in the above, the shape of such substrate is as follows. A circular-shaped GaN substrate 20 is provided with an orientation flat (hereinafter referred to as OF) 22 to indicate the crystal orientation for a designated direction, and is given an index flat (hereinafter referred to as IF) 23 to permit easy discrimination of two sides of a transparent substrate such as the GaN substrate 20. The GaN substrate 20 has a bevel 21 throughout entire periphery thereof except for the OF portion 22 and the IF portion 23. The bevel 21 is formed in either a C-bevel having a beveling angle of θ=5° to 30° or an R-bevel having a rounding radius of 0.1 mm to 0.5 mm. These bevels prevent the GaN substrate 20 from the chipping and the bevel enhances the profile of the GaN substrate 20.
It has been reported that a silicon substrate is required to be beveled. According to a report, the vapor phase epitaxial growth implemented on such a silicon substrate as is given no beveling (a generic for C-bevel and R-bevel hereinafter referred to) will cause a build-up of epitaxial film, called an edge crown, at the periphery of the substrate. (Refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 07-226349 for example.)
Further, it is necessary to angle-align a substrate with the required crystal orientation in the building-up a device on a semiconductor substrate by observing the OF portion thereon under a microscope or by detecting the OF portion thereon using an optical sensor. In terms of this, it has been known that there is a semiconductor substrate, wherein its OF portion is exempted from beveling in order to accurately angle-align with an optical manner. (Refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2000-68171 for example.)

Group III nitride semiconductor substrate


An image data compressing method of the type in which a multi-valued image data signal read by an image input unit is compressed by an image data compressing circuit to be stored into a memory. In the image data compressing method, the image input unit performs a prescan, thereby to obtain prescan image data containing pixels smaller in number than those contained in image data of an original image Next, a definition of the original image is estimated on the basis of the prescan image data, thereby to obtain coding parameters for the image data compressing circuit. Then, the image input unit performs a regular scan, thereby to obtain regular scan image data containing all of pixels of the original image data. Finally, the regular scan image data is compressed using the coding parameters previously obtained.

The present invention relates to an image data compressing method in use with an image processor which can receive and output multi-valued image data.
In a digital copying machine, for example, an image input unit reads image data on an original document, and converts the data into a digital image signal. The digital image signal is temporarily stored in a memory. Various types of image processing are applied to the digital image data. Finally, an image output unit outputs the processed image data onto a sheet of record paper.
In the image data processing system of the type in which image data is processed after being converted to digital image data, the quantity of data to be handled is remarkably increased as a definition of the digital image becomes high and the images to be handled become color images. To store such a large quantity of data, a large memory capacity is required for the memory. The memory of the large memory capacity is expensive, and consequently increases the cost to manufacture.
To cope with the problem, an attempt to use the data compressing techniques has been made.
A discrete cosine transform coding method (referred to as a DCT method), as one of the data compressing techniques, will be incorporated into the international standards. Preparatory work for the international standards is currently progressing under the cooperation of ISO and CCITT. The DCT method has been known as a method capable of compressing the image data of a natural image at a high efficiency. As also known, the method has a shortcoming that the compression ratio is highly responsive to and readily varies with the high frequency components contained in the image data. The variation of the compression ratio must be made to converge to a predetermined value. The cost (computational quantity and time) to realize this is large.
Another coding method is proposed in the following literatures (1) and (2). In the coding method, an average energy of the whole image and a distribution of local energies of the image are measured before the image data is coded. The coding parameters are controlled so that the compressed result is below a predetermined code quantity.
LITERATURE (1): "Activity Detection Method for Solid-State Still Video Camera Using DCT Data Compression" by Takizawa et. al., IEICE (Institute of Electronics.Information and Communication Engineers) Spring Conference, D-97, 1989, 7-79.
LITERATURE (2) "A Rate-Adaptive DCT Coding for use in Solid-State Still Camera" by Watanabe et. al., IEICE Spring Conference, D-159, 1989, 7-14.
The coding systems described in the above literatures are applicable only for the image that is obtained by a solid-state electronic camera with a small image pickup area. The number of pixels of the image is relatively small, e.g., 720.times.480 pixels. Accordingly, it is possible to start the image data processing after the image data is completely stored in the memory.
In the case of a full-color digital copying machine, the size of the image per se is large, and image data of three
colors is required. Therefore, the number of pixels to be processed is considerably large. For example, in an image of which the size is A3 (297 mm.times.429 mm), and the resolution is 400 spi (spot per inch), the number of pixels to be processed is 6720.times.4752 pixels. To store such a great number of pixel data items, the memory capacity must be large, and much time is required to process the image data.
In the circumstances, other coding parameter estimation methods operable at high speed and not requiring a large memory capacity are required.
One of the estimation methods is disclosed in Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. Sho. 63-222591. In the method disclosed, the data compressing method is based on the vector quantizing process. In the full-color digital copying machine, however, the DCT coding system is employed, as a standard coding system, for the data compressing system which is used for memory saving purposes. The data which is coded by the vector quantizing method is incompatible with the data which is coded by the DCT coding system, because the data coding systems are different from each other. To secure the communication of it with other devices, the coded data must be changed so as to be compatible with the coding systems of the other devices.

Compressing a regular scan image using coding parameter from the prescan image


A DRAM or VRAM integrated circuit memory of the divided bit line design includes a first bit line pair divided into a first pair of bit line halves and a second pair of bit line halves, and second bit line pair divided into a third pair of bit line halves and a fourth pair of bit line halves. A row decoder addresses a row associated with the first pair of bit line halves during a first time period, addresses a row associated with the second pair of bit line halves in a second time period, addresses a row associated with the third pair of bit line halves in the first time period, and addresses a row associated with the fourth pair of bit line halves in the second time period. The access topology is thus asymmetric with respect to a column decoder connected to the second and third pairs of bit line halves.

1. Field of the Invention:
The invention in general relates to integrated circuit memory arrays and more particularly with the row access topology of such memory arrays.
2. Statement of the Problem:
Integrated Circuit memories generally contain a two dimensional array of storage cells arranged in rows and columns. A common architecture is to connect all cells in a row to a common row line, often referred to as the "word line" and all cells in a column to a common column line often called the "bit line" or "digit line". In this architecture, the row line provides a signal which enables cells to receive or output a data signal and the column line provides the input or output line on which the signal is transferred. An individual cell is addressed via a row decoder that selects a row to be addressed and a column decoder which selects a column to be addressed, thereby selecting one particular cell at the corresponding row and column location. The cell is accessed by placing an enable signal on the row line in the row associated with the cell and reading or writing a signal on the column line associated with the cell.
Integrated circuit memories are also generally binary logic circuits in which information is stored and transferred as voltages representing complementary logic values that are alternately referred to as "true and false", "logic 1 and logic 0", or "logic high and logic low". Typically a voltage of 5 volts may represent the logic 1 state while a voltage of zero volts represents the logic 0 state. Because of the constraints of resistance, capacitance etc. the individual voltages input to or output on the column lines by individual cells are usually at some intermediate voltage. Thus subcircuits are associated with the column lines of integrated circuit memories to pull the high voltage values up to, or as close as possible to, the full logic 1 voltage, for example 5 volts, and to pull the low voltages down to as close to the logic 0 voltage, for example 0 volts, as possible. These subcircuits are commonly referred to as sense amplifiers. A common architecture utilizes a separate pull down subcircuit, referred to as an N-sense amplifier, to pull the low signals down to the logic 0 voltage, and a separate pull up subcircuit, referred to as a P-sense amplifier, to pull the high voltages up to the logic 1 voltage.
The invention to be disclosed herein is particularly applicable to an architecture used in dynamic random access memories (DRAM) and video random access memories (VRAM). In this architecture the individual memory cell comprises a transistor and a capacitor connected in series. One side of the capacitor is connected to a reference voltage, and the other side is connected to the column line through the transistor. The gate of the transistor is connected to the row line. Information is stored in the form of charge on the capacitor, which charge is input and output via the column line and gated by the row line acting on the transistor gate. There are tens or even hundreds of such cells connected to each column line. The column lines are organized into pairs with one N-sense amplifier and one P-sense amplifier associated with each pair. The N-sense amplifiers and P-sense amplifiers are connected across the pairs, with one column line going low and the other going high when one of the pairs of lines is addressed. The attachment of the transistor gates to row lines is staggered with the cells associated with adjacent pairs of column lines belonging to different rows so that the transistor which gates one of each associated pair will be off when a cell on the other of the pair is being addressed. That is, when a particular cell is addressed, the column line it is attached to will go high or low, depending on the cells content; the other column line or the pair will go to the opposite logic value. When the read or write cycle is over, the pairs are shorted together, which quickly brings them to a mid-voltage level, resetting them for the next cycle. In this way the pairing of the lines results in faster cycling of the circuit as a whole. Since the connection of the cells to the row lines are staggered, the transistor gates associated with the one of the line pair that is not being addressed are always off and the information in the cells is not affected by the column line of the non-addressed cells going high or low. This architecture is referred to as "divided bit line sensing". A common arrangement of the various parts of the circuit in the divided bit line sensing approach is to locate the column decoder and DRAM input and output terminals at one end of the column lines, the P-sense amplifiers at the other end of the column lines, and the N-sense amplifiers at the center of the column lines thereby dividing each the column lines into two halves, one half of the line extending between the N-sense amplifier and the column decoder and the other half extending between the N-sense amplifier and the P-sense amplifier. In VRAM a sequential-access memory (SAM) port is connected to the column lines on the opposite side of the P-sense amplifier from the column decoder.
As is well-known, integrated circuit memories are generally mass produced by fabricating hundreds of identical circuit patterns on a single semiconducting wafer, which wafer is subsequently sawed into hundreds of identical dies or chips. The advantages of building integrated circuits with smaller individual circuit elements so that more and more circuitry may be packed on a single chip are well-known: electronic equipment becomes less bulky, reliability is improved by reducing the number of solder or plug connections, assembly and packaging costs are minimized, and improved circuit performance, in particular higher clock speeds. However, the smaller the size of the individual cell, the smaller the size of the individual electrical components in the cell, and the smaller the electrical signals associated with them As more and more individual storage cells are placed onto a single chip, the length of the column lines connecting the individual cells to the amplifiers becomes longer and longer as compared to the individual cell size, and the capacitance associated with the lines becomes larger. This means that the signal transferred to the column line from an individual cell will become even smaller as the capacitance of the line absorbs the charge, and further that the time for developing a useful signal level on the line may increase. As is well known, speed is an important factor in such memories, since the faster the cells can be read, the faster is the computer of which the memory is a part, and the more operations the computer can do. Thus a number of enhancements have been made to DRAM and VRAM architecture to increase the signal level and amplifier response time. One such enhancement is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,636,987. This patent describes an architecture in which a single column decoder is shared by four arrays, two arrays on either side of the column decoder. The row within the arrays are accessed symmetrically with respect to the column decoder: that is, a row in each of the arrays proximal to the column decoder are accessed in one access cycle, and a row in each of the arrays distal to the column decoder are accessed in a second access cycle. This access topology and related circuit design aspects provides a voltage doubling at the N-sense amplifiers and some convenience of design, but when further improvements described herein are added, it also results in uneven power use by the circuit. That is, as shall be seen in the detailed description below, when the circuit is accessing the arrays distal from the column decoder it generally draws more power than when it is accessing the arrays proximal to the column decoder. Such uneven power requirements means that the circuit power carrying capability must either be over-designed for the lower power cycles or under-designed for the higher power cycles, the first of which is wasteful and the second of which can result in decreased reliability and increased defects. Thus there is a need for a DRAM and VRAM architecture that allows the voltage doubling at the N-sense amplifiers and the improvements described below and at the same time has uniform power requirements in all access cycles.
For many applications of integrated circuit memories, such as for portable computers and other battery powered intelligent devices, the amount of power available is limited. Thus it is important that sense amplifiers not only are fast and small, but also consume a minimum of power. The largest component of the total power used in DRAM's is the charging and discharging of the column lines. Since all bits on the selected row line during an access must be refreshed, all the column lines must be charged or discharged. In the prior art, the entire column line had to be charged or discharged in every access. Therefore there is a need for an integrated circuit memory design in which this charging and discharging of digit lines is limited. In sum, it would be highly desirable to have an integrated circuit memory architecture that not only has uniform power requirements in all access cycles, but also decreases the maximum power consumed by the memory circuit. 3. Solution to the problem:
The present invention solves the above problems by providing a row access topology that is asymmetric with respect to the circuit input/output.
In DRAM, where the input/output port is associated with column decoder, one array distal from the column decoder is accessed in the same cycle as an array proximal from the column decoder. In VRAM, where the input/output port is associated with the SAM, one array distal from the SAM is accessed in the same cycle as an array proximal to the SAM.
The above-described asymmetrical access topology results in equal power requirements in all access cycles whether DRAM or VRAM is used.
Further, the timing signal which turns the isolation transistors on and off is altered from the prior art. The isolation transistors are controlled so that, in DRAM and VRAM, when the row being addressed is on the side of the N-sense amplifier nearer the input and outputs, the column line pair halves that are farther from the input and outputs are isolated from the N-sense amplifier during the both the N-sense and P-sense periods. That is, in DRAM, when the row being addressed is on the column decoder side of the N-sense amplifier, the isolation transistors on the SAM side of the N-sense amplifier remain off during both the N-sense and P-sense phases of the cycle, while in VRAM, when the row being addressed is on the SAM side of the N-sense amplifier, the isolation transistors on the column decoder side of the N-sense amplifier remain off during both the N-sense and P-sense periods. During the refresh cycle, the isolation transistors on the opposite side of the N-sense amplifier from the row being addressed remains off during both the N-sense and P-sense periods.
Further, the actuation of the individual P-sense amplifiers is controlled by a timing signal so that the P-sense amplifiers associated with the column line pair halves that are isolated from the inputs/outputs during the P-sense cycle do not fire, thus not charging the associated column line halves and saving power.

Integrated circuit memory with asymmetric row access topology


An apparatus for moving waste toner within a printer cartridge includes an auger having a radially inward facing surface, the radially inward facing surface defining an opening having an inner diameter. An elongated drive shaft has an outer surface defining an outer diameter, the outer diameter of the drive shaft being greater than the inner diameter of the auger. The radially inward facing surface of the auger engages the outer surface of the drive shaft with a first pressure when the drive shaft is rotated within the opening of the auger in a first direction with a first load applied on the auger.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to printer cartridges and particularly to a drive shaft-auger arrangement used within a cleaner assembly for moving waste toner within the printer cartridge.
2. Description of the Related Art
Inside each print cartridge, unusable "waste" toner is created as a byproduct of an electro photography (EP) process. All of the toner that is picked up by a photoconductive drum from a developer roll is ideally transferred onto a media sheet or a transfer belt in the case of a two-step toner transfer process. However, due to inefficiencies within the transfer process, all of the toner put on the photoconductive drum by the developer roll does not get transferred to the media sheet or transfer belt. The waste toner left on the photoconductive drum after it has contacted the media sheet or transfer belt must be removed so a clean photoconductive drum can be written to again by a laser. For this reason, a cleaner blade is placed in constant contact with the photoconductive drum to wipe the waste toner from its surface before it is re-charged and imaged again. This cleaner blade prevents the waste toner from a previous photoconductive drum revolution from contaminating the toner developed during the next photoconductive drum revolution. The waste toner removed by the cleaner blade falls into a sealed waste toner compartment disposed beside the photoconductive drum to prevent it from being distributed inside the printer.
The waste toner collected during transfer must be properly stored inside the waste toner compartment. As the photoconductive drum is in contact with the media sheet or transfer belt, there is very little storage space for waste toner around the cleaner blade. Generally, an auger is positioned in a cleaner housing disposed adjacent to the photoconductive drum. Rotational motion of the auger allows the waste toner to be delivered to the waste toner compartment from the photoconductive drum. Augers have proved to be an effective means of moving toner from one area to another for a wide variety of toner applications.
Augers used for transferring waste toner are usually made from either molded plastic or metal wire stock. However, each of these types of augers has its own drawbacks. For example, injection molded plastic augers have proved to be easier to manufacture compared to the metal wire variety. In addition, providing a drive for a plastic auger is more straightforward because the drive shaft for the auger can be molded in the same cavity as the helix, resulting in a simple one piece design. However, the problem with the plastic molded augers is that these are most often resistant to bending and can only transfer waste toner in straight channels. Comparatively, the metal wire augers have an advantage of being able to bend during waste toner transfer and as a result transfer the waste toner through a curved channel thereby effectively.
A barrier for practical implementation of metal wire augers is the need for a metal drive shaft used to connect the auger with its drive source. Having a metal drive shaft on which to fix the auger is advantageous in that the auger can be soldered or welded onto the drive shaft without an attachment part such as a screw, pin or other retainer. However, metal drive shafts add significant cost to the overall auger design, decreasing its likelihood for use in production laser cartridges.
Some manufacturers have used a plastic drive shaft instead of metal drive shaft to reduce some of the above problems faced by the metal drive shafts. For example, the cost of the drive component is reduced substantially by using plastic instead of a machined or cast metal part. Also, an additional processing station such as welding or soldering is not needed if the drive is made from plastic. Finally, a plastic drive shaft makes it easier to attach the gearing that is needed to turn the assembly.
However, securing or coupling the metal auger to the plastic drive shaft is a significant obstacle in designing a plastic drive shaft. The coupling mechanism must fit inside the auger channel without interference in order for the auger to turn freely. Further, the size of the coupling mechanism is also generally very small, making it difficult to transmit the torque needed without risk of breakage. An alternative employment of a coupling mechanism between the auger and the plastic drive shaft is to mold the auger into the plastic drive shaft to form a unitary device. Unfortunately, this method is very sensitive to manufacturing parameters and is a much more expensive alternative to hand assembly.
Thus, there is a need to provide a secure coupling between an auger and corresponding drive shaft that addresses at least some of the above problems and still provide a reliable waste toner removal operation from the photoconductive drum to the waste toner compartment in a printer cartridge.


A measuring device is used to measure the state of oils of fats. Said measuring device comprises a housing, a hollow connecting element which is secured therein and a carrier which is applied to the opposite end of the connecting element, said carrier being used to receive a sensor which can be used to measure an electric property of the product which is to be measured. The sensor is in contact with an evaluation unit by means of at least one electric line which is arranged on a non-conductive carrier, which is arranged in the region of the housing and/or the end of the connecting element which is oriented towards the housing. The measuring device comprises a plurality of carriers which are arranged in a row and which are thermally insulated from each other.

Hot oils or fats are often used not only once, but utilized in deep fryers over a longer period for successively preparing different foods. The oil or fat is decomposed by oxidation at the hot operating temperatures between approximately 120° and 180° C. and undesirable chemical products such as free fatty acids and polymers are formed, which do not only impair the taste, but may also have adverse health effects.
In order not to replace frying oils or fats too early or too late, measuring devices are used for measuring the state of oils or fats, including tests for their electrical properties. Measuring the dielectric constant, which is a reliable measure of the degree of decomposition of the fat or oil, is particularly suitable.
EP 1 046 908 A2, for example, describes a measuring device for measuring the state of an oil or fat, which has a housing which contains the electronic analyzing units and a data display, as well as a tubular connecting element with a sensor situated at its tip which may be directly immersed into the hot oil or fat and is suitable for determining the dielectric constant. The sensor and the electronic analyzer circuit are electrically connected via a cable laid freely within the connecting element.
DE 101 63 760 A1 describes a refinement of the above-mentioned measuring device. In the measuring device presented therein, the electrical conductors between sensor and electronic analyzer circuit are formed by metallic conductors printed on a ceramic substrate. The tubular connecting element is shaped in such a way that it surrounds most of the substrate and narrows downward so that only the area of the substrate on which the sensor is situated is accessible from the outside. An insulating sealing adhesive is introduced and cured between substrate and connecting element, so that there is no electrical connection between the connecting element and the electric conductors. In addition, a temperature-stable seal is thus achieved, which prevents the oil from penetrating inside the connecting element. A temperature sensor may also be provided, whose measurement results may also be processed by the electronic analyzer circuit.
The disadvantage of this device is, however, that heat is transferred from the oil or fat to be measured to the electronic analyzer circuit and thus the service life of the components is reduced and/or the accuracy of the measurement results is impaired.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a measuring device that would significantly reduce the temperature load on the electronic analyzer circuit and thus increase the service life of the electronic components.

Measuring device for measuring the state of oils or fats


Weight equipment for doing crunches, situps, and back extensions. A specially devised weight plate fits the upper chest and front shoulders, and has two handles placed at each hand's natural path (without necessitating the twisting of the wrists as they are moved to the upper part of chest. The equipment is intended to come in a collection of different weights in a weight rack that can be used at community gyms and fitness centers.

1. Technical field
The invention lies in the field of strength training (of a human body) by subjecting muscles, joints, and 1e skeleton to resistance due to gravity caused by weights. More specifically, the training concerns abdominal training with the exercise forms of situps or crunch, and back training with the exercise form of back extensions (also called hyper extensions). The invention is a compact equipment of the type free weight (in contrast to machine).
2. Definitions
The following definitions are provided for reference. Crunch is an exercise performed by using the abdominal muscles to curl up and pull the chest region towards the hips. Essentially only the abdominal muscles are being used, and the hips and thighs should not move during the exercise. The exercise is normally performed from a starting position lying with the back against the floor (or other horizontal support) with thighs in 90 degrees relative to the support and with the lower legs loosely resting (not locked) on a bench or similar. When doing situps not only are the abdominal muscles volitionally used, but also the hip flexors and the frontal thigh muscles.
Situps are done from a starting position lying on the back with the shoulders level with, or lower than, the hips. The legs are bent and usually with the lower legs or the feet locked under some restraint. The exercise is then performed by lifting as well as curling the upper body towards the knees. Both crunch and situps may be performed with twisted upper body, and then not only the straight muscle of the belly (rectus abdominis) but also to a great extent the waist muscles (obliques), are being used. Back extension is an exercise that is performed using a roman chair in which the person can lock his or her legs in a horizontal position, with the belly and the face facing the floor. The exercise is performed by bending the upper body at the hips, thereby lowering the head and the shoulders until the upper body hangs relaxed approximately vertically. And thereafter the upper body is raised, and the spine is extended with a curling movement, whereby the person returns to horizontal position. The lower back (erector spinae) predominantly used in the exercise, but also to some extent the muscles between the shoulder blades, the buttocks, and the back thighs.

Weight equipment for situps and back extensions