An automated system and method for predicting a future resource utilization tendency by analyzing a change in resource usage on the basis of a real operation condition in a computer system. A CPU utilization estimating unit acquires a resource log and a transaction log, and estimates utilization for each transaction, and information on the number of executions for each transaction, a processing amount predicting unit performs a statistical time-series analysis on the basis of time-series data of the number of executions for each transaction included in the transaction log and predicts an amount of processing for each type of a transaction, and a resource utilization predicting unit predicts the computer resource utilization or demand on from the estimated resource utilization for each transaction and the future predicted amount of processing for each transaction.

In a computer system, a computer resource (hereinafter referred to just as a resource) such as processing capability of a CPU and storage capacity of a storage device preferably has a capacity appropriate for a system transaction. Accordingly, in a computer that can offer various services via a network, it is necessary to prepare an appropriate capacity according to the access amount or the change in access frequency.
Conventionally, as a method of adjusting the capacity of a computer system resource, for example, there was provided the method wherein, monitoring a real operating condition of the system, a person predicts when and which resources lack the capacity and adds required resources.
In addition, the configuration and setting of software and hardware in the server (sizing) required for satisfying the needs of the application was tested in a test environment before operation of the system by measuring the system load for each type of transaction according to an application and estimating the necessary capacity (capacity planning) (for example, See: "Tool for Capacity Planning", [online], 6 Jun. 2003, Microsoft [searched in 28 Apr. 2004], <URL: http://www.microsoft.com/japan/msdn/net/bda/bdadotnetarch081.asp>). In this method, as a parameter in the test, a person estimated and inputted the number of processing transactions expected duringreal operation of the system.
Furthermore, in recent years, research has been performed on autonomic computing that endows a computer with features of "configuring", "restoring", "optimizing", and "protecting" itself to make it autonomously work (for example, See: "Blueprint Relating to Autonomic Computing Architecture", [online], April 2003, IBM Japan, [searched in 22 Aug. 2003], <URL: http://www-6.ibm.com/jp/autonomic/pdf/acwp-j.pdf>).
The capacity of the system can be adjusted using this technique. That is to say, having an additional resource ready in advance, this technique makes a computer itself to supplement the resource lacking in the real operation, using this additional resource.

System, method and program product for forecasting the demand on computer resources


A structured generative model of a speech coarticulation and reduction is described with a novel two-stage implementation. At the first stage, the dynamics of formants or vocal tract resonance (VTR) are generated using prior information of resonance targets in the phone sequence. Bi-directional temporal filtering with finite impulse response (FIR) is applied to the segmental target sequence as the FIR filter's input. At the second stage the dynamics of speech cepstra are predicted analytically based on the FIR filtered VTR targets. The combined system of these two stages thus generates correlated and causally related VTR and cepstral dynamics where phonetic reduction is represented explicitly in the hidden resonance space and implicitly in the observed cepstral space. The combined system also gives the acoustic observation probability given a phone sequence. Using this probability, different phone sequences can be compared and ranked in terms of their respective probability values. This then permits the use of the model for phonetic recognition.

The present invention relates to models of speech. In particular, the present invention relates to vocal tract resonance (VTR) models of structured speech and integrating the VTR models into cepstra prediction.
Human speech contains spectral prominences or VTRs. These VTRs carry a significant amount of the information contained in human speech.
In the past, attempts have been made to model the VTRs associated with particular phonetic units, such as phonemes, using discrete state models such as a Hidden Markov Model. Such models have been less than ideal, however, because they do not perform well when the speaking rate increases or the articulation effort of the speaker decreases.
Research into the behavior of VTRs during speech indicates that one possible reason for the difficulty of conventional Hidden Markov Model based systems in handling fluent speech is that during fluent speech the static VTR values and hence the static acoustic information for different classes of phonetic units become very similar as the speaking rate increases or the articulation effort decreases.
Although this phenomenon, known as reduction, has been observed in human speech, an adequate and quantitative model for predicting such behavior in VTR tracts has not been developed. As such, a model is needed that predicts the observed dynamic patterns of the VTRs based on the interaction between phonetic context, speaking rate, and speaking style.

Two-stage implementation for phonetic recognition using a bi-directional target-filtering model of speech coarticulation and reduction


Examples are disclosed for context aware synchronization. A mutual exclusion (mutex) lock object or monitor may be created to enable threads to acquire a lock to access a shared data structure when executing a critical section of code. The mutex lock object may have at least a first input associated with a context via which the one or more threads execute the given critical block of code. The mutex lock object may then be stored in a shared memory and an indication as the where the mutex lock object was stored in the shared memory may be provided to a thread. The thread may use the mutex lock object to acquire the lock to access the shared data structure. Other mutex lock objects may be created in a similar manner to allow additional threads to acquire locks to access the shared data structure. Other examples are described and claimed.

Concurrent programs may include multiple threads or processes separately executing sections or blocks of code as part of the program that allows multiple tasks to be executed in parallel. This may result in race conditions in which different threads or processes make modifications to a common memory location represented by a shared data structure. The modifications to the shared data structure are done by executing software routines which access the shared data structure. These software routines may be referred to as a critical section or block of code. Modifications to the shared data structure may leave the shared data structure in an inconsistent state and may not produce the expected result during the execution of the program.
Synchronization may be a technique to prevent a race condition in which multiple threads or processes cooperate with each other for executing the critical section of code and only one thread or process executes the critical section at a time. Synchronization between threads may be achieved by a variety of techniques of which locking may be one of them. Mutually exclusive (mutex) is a type of lock in which a thread may be required to first acquire a lock on a mutex lock object before getting exclusive access to execute a critical section of code. The other threads may then need to acquire the lock on the mutex object before getting exclusive access to execute the critical section. For these examples, if the lock has already been acquired, a given thread may be configured to wait until the lock has been released on the mutex lock object before acquiring the lock. The given thread may then lock the mutex lock object to execute the given critical section of code while locking out other threads. In some examples, after executing the critical section, the given thread or process holding the lock may release it. Other threads waiting to acquire the lock on the mutex lock object may then try to acquire the lock to execute the critical section.
Acquiring a lock on a mutex lock object and then releasing the lock is an example methodology to ensure synchronization between threads that may modify the shared data structure during execution of the critical section of code. However, lock contention between different threads may slow down or stall a multi-threaded program. As the number of threads for a given multi-threaded program increases so does the likelihood of lock contention.
Additionally there can be multiple types of modification of the shared data structure which can be related or unrelated depending on a nature of the application, components of the application, use cases involved or the shared data structure in question. Mutual exclusion of threads by locking mechanism for any type of modification of a given shared data structure that is achieved by executing the same or multiple critical sections of code or routines may sometimes cause unnecessary delay in program execution. The unnecessary delay may result in performance degradation of the application. In particular, performance degradation may occur for modification operations that may not be related to each other, do not cause shared data structure inconsistency or induce an acceptable amount of shared data structure inconsistency.
Also, similar or different types of modifications to the shared data structure may occur within different execution conditions or environment settings. These modifications of the shared data structure under different environment setting or contexts may or may not be related to each other. In other words, concurrent modification of the shared data structure may or may not leave it in inconsistent situation under different contexts. Hence, concurrent modifications of the shared data structure may purely depend on a nature of an application or components of the application, use cases involved, the shared data structure in question as to what level of synchronization between different threads may be needed in different execution contexts.

Context aware synchronization using context and input parameter objects associated with a mutual exclusion lock


A method and apparatus to prevent invalid data from propagating into devices connected to a PCI tristate bus is provided. The method and apparatus utilize the PCI bus control signals to monitor the bus transaction's mode (e.g., as a bus target or as a bus master), type (e.g., read, write), and status (e.g., ongoing bus transaction). Using these information, control the opening and closing of a window gate hardware to allow valid data to propagate into a device connected to the PCI tristate bus and to prevent invalid data from propagating into the device.

In the area of digital systems, the task of accommodating increasing bus traffic continues to pose a challenge. The primary bottle-neck in most bus transactions appears to be the system bus. The system bus is a bottle-neck primarily because many devices share the same bus and must contend for its resources.
The PCI bus is a high performance, 32-bit or 64-bit bus with multiplexed address and data lines which can accommodate multiple high performance peripherals. The PCI Bus supports burst modes in which a bus transaction may involve an address phase followed by one or more data phases in tandem with a command phase followed by one or more byte enable phases. As such, an external device may require the use of the bus for multiple clock cycles during a bus transaction which can exacerbate bottle-neck problems associated with a system bus. Reference is now made to FIG. 1 which illustrates an overview of a computer system that utilizes the PCI bus. In FIG. 1, computer system 100 comprises host CPU 101, host memory 102, peripheral hardware controller 103, and bridge device 105. Peripheral hardware controller 103 is coupled to host CPU 101 and host memory 102 through PCI bus 104. More particularly, peripheral hardware controller 103 provides an interface between PCI bus 104 and external devices such as disk drivers, display monitors, parallel data port, local area network, wide area network, or the like.
In general, host CPU 101 and external devices may take turns controlling PCI bus 104 in carrying out transactions such as read and write transactions. While a device which takes control of PCI bus 104 to initiate the transaction is known as a "bus master" device, a device at the other end of the transaction is known as a "bus target" (or "slave") device. Information that are involved in bus transactions between devices include data, address, commands, byte enables, and identification of bus master and bus target device.
While a bus may be synchronous or asynchronous, PCI bus is a synchronous bus. In other words, information flowing from the bus master device to the target device and vice versa are synchronized to a system clock such that a bus transaction must take place in an integral number of synchronized clock cycles. In carrying out bus transactions, bus protocols must be followed. These protocols consists mainly of bus mastership, requests for read or write transactions, and acknowledgment of such requests. PCI bus protocols can be found in "The PCI Local Bus Specification Rev 2.1", published by the PCI Special Interest Group, P.O. Box 14070, Portland, Ore. 97214 and incorporated herein by reference.
The PCI bus can be tristated which means that the bus is floated to indicate that it is available for use. When a bus is floated, it generally indicates to devices connected to it that it is available for usage. However, depending on the threshold voltage of a device connected to the bus, the logic value associated with a tristated PCI bus may inadvertently trigger an undesired state in the device connected to the bus. In the Prior Art, to prevent the propagation of invalid data values into a device, flip-flops or latches are implemented inside the device to hold known and unknown data propagated from the bus until it can be determined whether the data is valid or not. Having additional flip-flops or latches for this purpose is not cost efficient.
Hence, there is a need for an apparatus, system, and method to prevent invalid data from propagating into a device connected to the bus without incurring unnecessary added costs.

Dynamic window mechanism for preventing invalid information propagation from the PCI bus


A hose clamp for preventing a leak during tightening of a hose includes a clamp body of a strip-shaped leaf spring material with an annular shape, and a pair of operation pieces. The clamp body maintained in a diameter expansion state by a locking claw of the operation piece engaged with an engagement concavity of the other operation piece. The engagement released by bringing the operation piece close to the other operation piece and moving the operation piece in the opposing direction in an axial direction of the clamp body, whereby reducing the clamp body diameter. An expansion restricting piece restricts divergence of both the operation pieces in opposite directions in the axial direction of the clamp body. Further, a tilt prevention section which prevents the clamp body from being obliquely assembled to a hose during tightening of the hose is provided.

A hose clamp according to an example of the related art (refer to JP-A-2001-280566, for example) will be described. FIG. 16 is a perspective view showing the hose clamp.
As shown in FIG. 16, a hose clamp 100 includes a clamp body 101 formed by bending a metal strip into an annular shape, tapered portions 106 extending toward a central portion from both end portions of the clamp body 101 in a state of crossing each other in a width direction (an axial direction of the clamp body 101), and a pair of operation pieces 102A and 102B standing up in a radial direction from tips of the tapered portions 106. When the clamp body 101 is reduced in diameter, tightening of a hose (not shown) is made possible. Further, when both the operation pieces 102A and 102B are brought close to each other, the clamp body 101 is expanded in diameter. Further, a locking claw 103 is raised from the clamp body 101 near the operation piece 102A on one side. Further, on a side of the operation piece 102B on the other side, a receiving portion 104 with which the locking claw 103 is engaged so as to be capable of being disengaged is formed and also a cut-out portion 105 which allows axial overlap of the clamp body 101 with the operation piece 102A on one side to be avoided at the time of a diameter expansion is formed.
The clamp body 101 is maintained in a diameter expansion state by bringing both the operation pieces 102A and 102B of the hose clamp 100 close to each other in a circumferential direction by a pair of pliers and then making the locking claw 103 be engaged with the receiving portion 104. Further, if the hose is inserted into the clamp body 101 which is in the diameter expansion state and both the operation pieces 102A and 102B are brought close to each other in an axial direction (a width direction) of the clamp body 101 by a pair of pliers, both the operation pieces 102A and 102B are shifted in the width direction by an amount equivalent to the width of the cut-out portion 105, whereby the engagement of the locking claw 103 with the receiving portion 104 is released. Then, the clamp body 101 tightens the hose due to diameter reduction by an elastic restoring force.


A reversible hinge greeting card with an electronic component is provided. The greeting card has a card body with a plurality of panels. One of the panels is a front panel, one of the panels is a back panel, and one of the panels is an intermediary panel. The intermediary panel and a connecting band connect the front panel to the back panel, such that the greeting card can open from right to left or from left to right. An electronic component is integrated within the connecting band. The electronic component includes at least one switch operably connected to the front panel and at least one switch operably connected to the back panel.

The present invention relates generally to a greeting card. More particularly, embodiments of the present invention relate to a greeting card with electrical components that can be opened in more than one manner and can provide different activation responses accordingly.
Technology may be added to a greeting card to cause an event to occur when a consumer interacts with the greeting card. For example, an electronic component may be added to a card, or greeting card, in order to amplify the consumer experience of a papercraft only format. Such an enhanced greeting card experience may be pleasing to consumers. In this way a consumer may present a greeting card in a more attractive, exciting, or personal manner. A greeting card which integrates an electronic component will allow a giver of a gift card to do so in such an attractive manner. Incorporating multiple electronic components into a gift card, however, may be unappealing to the eye and cause a greeting card to become too bulky. Therefore, there is a need to integrate a multifunctional electronic component into a greeting card in a discrete fashion.

Reversible-hinge greeting card with dual-activated electronics


For a non-volatile memory system, compressing the erase threshold voltage distribution into the lowest threshold voltage state will decrease the valid data threshold voltage window. Decreasing the valid data threshold voltage window reduces the floating gate to floating gate coupling effect. The compression can be performed as part of the erase process or part of the programming operation.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to technology for non-volatile memory.
2. Description of the Related Art
Semiconductor memory devices have become more popular for use in various electronic devices. For example, non-volatile semiconductor memory is used in cellular telephones, digital cameras, personal digital assistants, mobile computing devices, non-mobile computing devices and other devices. Electrical Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM) and flash memory are among the most popular non-volatile semiconductor memories.
Both EEPROM and flash memory utilize a floating gate that is positioned above and insulated from a channel region in a semiconductor substrate. The floating gate is positioned between source and drain regions. A control gate is provided over and insulated from the floating gate. The threshold voltage of the transistor is controlled by the amount of charge that is retained on the floating gate. That is, the minimum amount of voltage that must be applied to the control gate before the transistor is turned on to permit conduction between its source and drain is controlled by the level of charge on the floating gate.
When programming an EEPROM or flash memory device, such as a NAND flash memory device, typically a program voltage is applied to the control gate and the bit line is grounded. Electrons from the channel are injected into the floating gate. When electrons accumulate in the floating gate, the floating gate becomes negatively charged and the threshold voltage of the memory cell is raised so that the memory cell is in a programmed state. More information about programming can be found in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/379,608, titled "Self Boosting Technique," filed on Mar. 5, 2003; U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/629,068, titled "Detecting Over Programmed Memory," filed on Jul. 29, 2003; U.S. Pat. No. 6,522,580; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,643,188; all four of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
Some EEPROM and flash memory devices have a floating gate that is used to store two ranges of charges and, therefore, the memory cell can be programmed/erased between two states (an erased state and a programmed state). Such a flash memory device is sometimes referred to as a binary flash memory device.
A multi-state flash memory device is implemented by identifying multiple distinct allowed/valid programmed threshold voltage ranges separated by forbidden ranges. Each distinct threshold voltage range corresponds to a predetermined value for the set of data bits encoded in the memory device.
Shifts in the apparent charge stored on a floating gate can occur because of the coupling of an electric field based on the charge stored in adjacent floating gates. This phenomena is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,867,429, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. The problem occurs most pronouncedly between sets of adjacent memory cells that have been programmed at different times. For example, a first memory cell is programmed to add a level of charge to its floating gate that corresponds to one set of data. Subsequently, one or more adjacent memory cells are programmed to add a level of charge to their floating gates that correspond to a second set of data. After the one or more of the adjacent memory cells are programmed, the charge level read from the first memory cell appears to be different than programmed because of the effect of the charge on the adjacent memory cells being coupled to the first memory cell. The coupling from adjacent memory cells can shift the apparent charge level being read a sufficient amount to lead to an erroneous reading of the data stored.
The effect of the floating gate to floating gate coupling is of greater concern for multi-state devices because multi-state devices typically have smaller threshold voltage margins between states than that of binary devices, in addition to storing greater amounts of charge. Additionally, the difference in charge stored between the lowest state and the highest state of a multi-state device is likely to be greater than the difference in charge stored between the erased and programmed states of a binary memory device. The magnitude of the voltage coupled between adjacent floating gates is based on the magnitude of charge stored on the adjacent floating gates.
As memory cells continue to shrink in size, the associated reduction in space between word lines as well as between bit lines will also increase the coupling between adjacent floating gates. Furthermore, the natural programming and erase distributions of threshold voltages are expected to increase due to short channel effects, greater oxide thickness/coupling ratio variations and more channel dopant fluctuations. This will dictate increased the separation between the lowest state and the highest state of multi-state memory devices. Also, as more bits of data are encoded in a multi-state memory device, more states are needed; therefore, there will be a greater separation between the lowest state and the highest state. Increasing the separation between the lowest state and the highest state of multi-state memory devices may increase the coupled voltage between adjacent floating gates.
Thus, there is a need to reduce the effect of coupling between floating gates.

Reducing floating gate to floating gate coupling effect


The invention relates to a special control for current-controlled inductors which allows inductance to be varied at a considerably faster rate than is the case in the prior art. The control presented in the invention can be employed for coil arrangements which carry at least one control winding and at least two working windings on a ferro or ferromagnetic core material. The accelerated change in inductance is achieved by means of a demagnetizing inverse voltage impulse which is generated by a special part of the circuit.

The invention especially relates to a means for controlling a coil arrangement with variable inductance which allows the inductance to be varied at particularly rapid rates. This means can then be used whenever the inductance of the coil arrangement is varied by means of current-induced pre-magnetization and when at least two working windings are provided which are connected in parallel.
The invention can basically be employed in all applications in which current-controlled, variable inductors are needed to control an electric alternating current. More specifically, the invention can be applied to current-controlled, variable inductors having a control winding and two working windings connected in parallel as shown, for example, in FIG. 2.
Coil arrangements with variable inductance are used in power engineering and telecommunications applications. One invention-related application of coils with variable inductance is in the area of switching power supplies in order to adapt the energy taking place in the high-frequency range to changing load requirements.
Examples of such switching power supplies are described in "High Power Densities at High Power Levels" by A. Jansen et al. in CIPS 2002, 2nd International Conference on Integrated Power Systems, 11-12 Jun. 2002, Bremen, Germany and in German Patent Application 103 21 234.5, to which reference is made.
To realize such electrically controlled inductance, the effect in which the relative magnetic permeability of ferro and ferromagnetic materials decreases together with the magnetic flux density in the material can be exploited. Based on this principle, numerous coil arrangements have been proposed in the past which, by means of a current in a control coil, cause a magnetically highly permeable coil core to be pre-magnetized and in this way control the inductance of the inductor winding, also positioned on the coil core.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,317,021 proposes that two inductor windings be connected in parallel in such a way that the magnetic fluxes for the control winding generated by these windings cancel each other out.
German Patent Application 102 60 246.8 proposes a coil arrangement with variable inductance having two separate toroid coils which carry inductor windings, as well as a control winding which encompasses the two wound toroid coils in order to pre-magnetize the core material of the toroid coils.
The invention can particularly be applied to current-controlled, variable inductors which have inductor windings connected in parallel as outlined above in reference to U.S. Pat. No. 6,317,021. In the following description, the term inductance thus refers to the inductor or working windings, and particularly to the working windings connected in parallel, of such a coil.
In such coil arrangements, a direct current in the control winding brings about DC pre-magnetization of the entire core material and thus changes the inductance of the working windings. It is clear that the direction of the direct current for pre-magnetization is arbitrary.
The main disadvantage of these current-controlled, variable inductors is the relatively long demagnetization time of the core material resulting in a slow change in inductance from lower to higher inductance. If the variable inductor is used, for example, as an AC power valve in the secondary regulation loop of a switching power supply, this sluggishness results in considerable overshoot once load jumps that go from a high load to a low load appear. This voltage overshoot is countered in the prior art by clamping circuits. These clamping circuits, however, expose a large number of components to high stress due to short-circuit currents.
In the past, the problem thus arose that the current-controlled, variable inductors of the type described could only run through inductance variations very slowly, that is they could only vary their inductance from a minimum value to a maximum value within several milliseconds.
It is therefore the object of the invention to accelerate this process of inductance variation and accordingly to make damper circuits superfluous and to prevent the high component stress associated with them.

Means for controlling a coil arrangement with electrically variable inductance


A semiconductor integrated circuit which converts power-supply voltage applied from outside into optimum voltage for operating an internal circuit at the frequency of an internal clock in response to a multiplication control signal supplied to a PLL circuit from outside to generate the internal clock for operating the internal circuit by dividing a clock supplied from outside or by judging the cycle of an internal clock generated by dividing an external clock so as to supply the optimum voltage to the internal circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to reduction in electric power consumption of a semiconductor integrated circuit and a semiconductor integrated circuit device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electric power consumption P to be consumed by an LSI (Large Scale Integrated Circuit), such as a microprocessor and a DSP (Digital Signal Processor), of a type which is operated in response to an input clock is expressed by the following equation: EQU P=f.multidot.C.multidot.V.sup.2
where f is the frequency of an internal clock, C is an effective capacity of the LSI and V is power-supply voltage.
Since the electric power consumption is in proportion to the frequency of the clock as can be understood from the foregoing equation, there have been LSIs of a type having a mode for interrupting the internal clock so as to reduce electric power consumption by interrupting the internal clock in a case where the operation of the LSI is not required. However, since interruption of the internal clock is interruption of the operation of the LSI, the foregoing method cannot reduce the electric power consumption of the LSI which is being operated.
Since the electric power consumption is in proportion to the square of the power-supply voltage, there have been LSIs of a type arranged to lower the level of internal power-supply voltage when the LSI is operated in order to reduce the electric power consumption.
However, if the level of the power-supply voltage is lowered, gate delay time in the LSI is elongated and, therefore, there arises a difficulty when the foregoing structure is applied to LSIs of a type which is operated at high speed.
As described above, the LSI involves elongation of the internal gate delay time when the internal power-supply voltage is lowered, thus resulting in the frequency, at which the LSI can be operated, being lowered. Thus, there arises a problem in that the level of the power-supply voltage for the LSI cannot easily be lowered to reduce electric power consumption. FIG. 12 is a so-called Shmoo Plot graph showing the relationship between the frequencies of a clock and power-supply voltages at which the LSI can be operated. The longer the cycle of the clock is, the lower the power-supply voltage, at which the LSI can be operated, becomes. The shorter the cycle of the clock is, the higher the power-supply voltage, at which the LSI can be operated, becomes.
To solve the foregoing problem, an integrated circuit device has been suggested which comprises a frequency detection circuit for detecting the frequency of the clock, a constant-voltage power-supply circuit for generating a plurality of constant voltages, and a power-source selection circuit for selecting the output from the constant-voltage power-supply circuit in accordance with an output from the frequency detection circuit (refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 58-171842).
Moreover, an electric circuit has been suggested (refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 4-112312) which comprises operating clock selection and generation means for selecting and switching frequencies of a plurality of operation clocks, a variable voltage power source and control means for controlling the level of the output voltage from the variable voltage power source in accordance with the frequency of the operation clock. An integrated circuit device has been suggested (refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 60-111528) which comprises a ring oscillation circuit for detecting delay time taking place in transmitting the signal and a comparison means for subjecting the oscillation cycle of the ring oscillation circuit and a reference value to a comparison to control the delay time taking place in transmitting the signal in accordance with an output from the comparison means.

Semiconductor integrated circuit and semiconductor integrated circuit device


A method for treating hard water comprising the steps of flowing water containing suspended colloidal mineral particles through a confined treatment zone, applying an electrical potential across the flowing water to cause electrical current to flow through the water, increasing the zeta potential of the suspended colloidal particles. The increased zeta potential causes the particles to repel each other, preventing aggregation and precipitation onto surfaces in contact with the water to form scale or create hard pan conditions in soil on which the water falls.

Perceived hard water environments exist where water contains more than 5 grains of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) per gallon. Such a condition forms undesirable scale in pipes, cooling towers, tubs, showers and sinks when colloidal CaCO3 comes out of suspension in an electro statically un-stable hard water environment. Following evaporation of hard water used for irrigation, the walls and fences exposed to the spray of sprinklers are stained by the accumulation of the concentrated deposits of CaCO3. In addition, the deposited CaCO3 creates hardpan soil conditions that reduce the ability of the soil to absorb water and necessary minerals for plant utilization.
A common method of treating hard water to avoid these problems includes adding sodium chloride salt to the water. This method, commonly known as "softening", involves the replacement of the calcium ion in the compound a sodium ion, forming sodium carbonate that does not precipitate out of solution to form scale. While this softening method continues to see extensive use, it has several disadvantages. First, the process consumes salt and requires continuous maintenance and replenishment of this ingredient in the ongoing process. Secondly, the discharge from regeneration of the ingredient following such softening treatment has been known to have a negative effect upon subsequent water treatment operations. Third, such treatment of drinking water may be counter-productive and harmful to the health of the large number of people relegated to a low sodium diet.
Filtering of water has also been used as an adjunct to water softening but is usually a component of a more elaborate and expensive process, such as chlorination disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,751,598.
Electro magnetic processes, such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,288,323, have seen limited use in water softening applications. The disadvantage of such a method is that once the water leaves the influence of the applied magnetic field the purported beneficial effect of the treatment is short lived. The colloidal particles again become electrostatically unstable and tend to aggregate and form scale.
The method of the present invention overcomes the disadvantages of the prior art by providing an economical system of electrically treating hard water. In the process of the present invention the colloidal calcium carbonate particles are held in suspension, keeping them from aggregating to form scale in pipes, boilers, and plumbing fixtures or creating hard pan soil conditions.
Thus, it is the primary object of the present invention to provide a method for treating hard water that creates and maintains an electrostatically stable colloidal water environment that retards the formation of scale and hard pan soil conditions.


A microsource is provided, which includes a generator, a prime mover, and a controller. The prime mover includes a shaft connected to drive the generator to generate power at a frequency controlled by a rotation rate of the shaft. The controller calculates an operating frequency for the generator based on a comparison between a power set point and a measured power flow. A requested shaft speed for the prime mover is calculated by combining a maximum frequency change, a minimum frequency change, and the calculated operating frequency. A shaft speed adjustment is calculated for the prime mover based on a comparison between the requested shaft speed and a measured shaft speed of the prime mover. A fuel command for the prime mover is calculated based on the shaft speed adjustment. A rotation rate of the shaft of the prime mover is adjusted based on the calculated fuel command to control the frequency.

The demand for electrical power continues to grow world-wide. At the same time, aging transmission and distribution systems remain subject to occasional failures. Massive failures covering wide geographical areas and affecting millions of people have occurred, even in the United States, which has historically enjoyed a relatively reliable electrical power system. Problems with the capacity and reliability of the public power grid have driven the development of distributed energy resources (DER), small independent power generation systems which may be owned by, and located near, consumers of electrical power. DERs include a wide range of technologies, such as internal combustion engines, gas turbines, micro-turbines, photovoltaic cells, fuel cells, wind-power, storage systems, etc.
DERs can provide reliable power in critical applications as a backup to the primary electrical supply. For example, an interruption of power to a hospital can have life-threatening consequences. Similarly, when power to a factory is interrupted, productivity is lost, materials in process are wasted, and other costs are incurred in association with restarting the production line. Additionally, power from a DER can be provided to the main power grid to reduce energy price peaks by arbitraging energy price differentials. Geographically distributed sources of power, such as wind, solar, or hydroelectric power, may be too limited or intermittent to be used as the basis for a centralized power plant. However, these types of power sources can supplement or replace conventional power sources when the main power grid is available and can provide a backup when the main power grid is unavailable to increase energy efficiency and to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions through the use of combined heat and power DER systems. DERs also can be used to meet load growth requirements and to enhance the robustness of the transmission system with a minimal addition of new lines.
DERs may be designed to operate in one of two modes: (1) "isolation" or "island" mode, wherein the DER is isolated from the main grid, and (2) normal "grid" mode, wherein the DER is connected to the main grid to either import power from or export power to the main grid. Smooth and efficient transition between the two modes is necessary to effectively integrate DERs into the distribution system without harming the integrity of the remaining system. A centralized electrical power utility is in a position to monitor and coordinate the production and distribution of power from multiple generators. In contrast, DERs may include independent producers of power who have limited awareness or communication with each other. Even if the independent producers of power are able to communicate with each other, there may not be an effective way to ensure that they cooperate. As a result, to realize the potential of integrating DERs into the distribution system, the integration should not depend on complex, centralized command and control systems.
Generally speaking, DERs can include two broad categories of electrical power sources: Direct current (DC) sources, such as fuel cells, solar cells, and batteries; and high-frequency analog current (AC) sources, such as micro-turbines and wind turbines. Both types of sources are typically used to provide an intermediate DC voltage, that may be produced directly by DC sources, and produced indirectly from AC sources, for example by rectification. In both types of sources, the intermediate DC voltage is subsequently converted to AC voltage or current at the required frequency, amplitude, and phase angle for use. In most cases, the conversion from the intermediate DC voltage to the usable AC voltage is performed by a voltage inverter that can rapidly control the magnitude and phase of its output voltage.
A DER generator may be a permanent magnet or a wound field machine. The prime mover for the generator may be an engine, a turbine (gas, wind, steam, micro, etc.), a mechanical storage such as a flywheel, etc. In the case of a permanent magnet generator, the front end may consist of a rectifier feeding a DC bus which requires an inverter to interface with the AC system. The control of the inverter-based source is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 7,116,010 and/or in U.S. Patent Publication No. 2006/000208574, the contents of which are incorporated by reference. Where the disclosure of the present application is limited by or in conflict with the disclosures of U.S. Pat. No. 7,116,010 and U.S. Patent Publication No. 2006/000208574, the disclosure of the present application controls. In contrast, wound field generators generally use an exciter to control the AC voltage and relative phase produced by the machine. No inverter is needed because the machine provides the AC voltage at the desired frequency as long as the speed of the shaft is kept approximately equal to a fixed value. The reduced cost of this type of system due to the absence of the power electronic front end is a significant advantage over other types of systems. However, one of the primary drawbacks of this type of system is that, without the inverter front end, the dynamics of the prime mover cannot be decoupled from the output of the generator. What is needed, therefore, is a method and a system capable of effective utilization of a non-inverter based DER system.

Non-inverter based distributed energy resource for use in a dynamic distribution system


A method of treatment of postoperative and posttraumatic patients for improving the glutamine content in skeletal muscle by administrating alpha-ketoglutarate; also, a composition for carrying out the method.

The present invention relates to a method of treatment of postoperative and posttraumatic patients for improving the glutamine content in skeletal muscle by administrating alpha-ketoglutarate. The invention also relates to a composition for carrying out the method.
In states of illness, surgical operations and injuries, profound changes are induced in the energy and protein metabolism of the human body. This means, for example, loss of active cellular mass, leading to muscular fatigue, pronounced apathy and loss of appetite, and a period of convalescence involving general weariness which, for instance after a biliary tract operation, may last 5-6 weeks before the patient has regained his normal function. The cellular mass which is broken down very rapidly in different states of illness will need a time for reestablishment which is about four times as long as the time of breakdown for the same mass.
In severe states of illness and injuries, and in postoperative states, parenteral nutritional support is generally applied. In the past, preparations for intravenous nutritional support generally contained an aqueous solution of a high caloric content carbohydrate, such as glucose and the like, and electrolytes. In prolonged states of illness or in injuries and surgical operations, the nitrogen balance of the body must however be considered, i.e. the ratio of nitrogen loss to nitrogen intake. In the case of negative nitrogen balance, the parenteral nutritional support can be supplemented with an amino acid supply in an attempt to improve the nitrogen balance. Different amino acid compositions for parenteral supply are previously known, see e.g. SE Patent Application 8203965-2 and DE-A 25 30 246 concerning amino acid nutrient compositions in renal failure, WO 82/00411 concerning a nutrient composition containing branched-chain amino acids, and WO 83/03969 concerning an aqueous nutrient solution consisting of L-amino acids.
From a survey made of the free amino acid pattern in the muscles, it has been found that skeletal muscle, which is the major body tissue in respect of weight, has a free amino acid pool of which 62% consists of glutamine (see Bergstroem et al., "Intracellular free amino acid concentrations in human muscle tissue", J. of Appl. Physiol., Vol 36, No 6, 1974). In states of illness, injuries or surgical operations, this content decreases by at lest 50% and, in states of blood poisoning, even more (see Vinnars et al., "Influence of the postoperative state on the intracellular free amino acids in human muscle tissue", Annals of Surg., Vol 182, 6:665-671, 1975).
It has been found that this glutamine reduction cannot be affected by enteral or parenteral nutritional support according to the methods hitherto available (see Vinnars et al., "Metabolic effects of four intravenous nutritional regiments in patients undergoing elective surgery. 11. Muscle amino acids and energy rich phosphates", Clin. Nutr., 2:3-11, 1983). There is probably a correlation between the inability immediately postoperatively to make a negative nitrogen balance positive, the inability to normalize the exhausted intracellular glutamine pool, and the reduced muscular strength. This reduction probably depends on a reduced protein synthesis capacity postraumatically in skeletal muscle (see Wernerman et al., "Protein syntheses after trauma as studied by muscle ribosome profiles", Proceedings in the 7th ESPEN Congress. ED. Dietze et al, Karger, Basel).
The addition to the nutritional support of a dipeptide of the type ornithine-alpha-ketoglutarate to a commercial amino acid solution has been found to improve to some extent, but not to normalize, the intracellular glutamine pool (see Leander et al., "Nitrogen sparing effect of Ornicetil in the immediate postoperative state", Clin. Nutr. 4:43-51, 1985). However, this preparation is very expensive and it has not been possible so far to evaluate whether its use in parenteral nutrition confers a clinical advantage.
Postoperatively, the patient often exhibits loss of appetite, making it difficult to supply nutrition, although there are possibilities, by tube-feeding, of supplying different kinds of nutrient solutions. Since most patients do not tolerate this way of feeding, it becomes necessary to resort to intravenous feeding. The nutrition substrates available for energy metabolism are various sugar solutions and fatty emulsions, which today seem appropriate. However, the amino acid solutions available are inadequate, both because it is not possible to add tyrosine in sufficient amounts since this is a relatively insoluble amino acid, and because certain important amide derivatives of amino acids (e.g., glutamine and asparagine) cannot be included. This is due to difficulties in heat-sterilizing solutions of such amides, and also to the fact that the amides are unstable when stored. Another problem is that these compounds are relatively sparingly soluble and therefore require large amounts of water when being prepared.
After elective surgery, for instance biliary tract operations, it has been found that the negative nitrogen balance primarily depends on reduced protein synthesis which is assessed by determining the ribosome activity in skeletal muscle (see Wernerman et al., "Protein synthesis in skeletal muscle after abdominal surgery: The effect of total parenteral nutrition", JPEN, 1985). An increased protein breakdown occurs only in very severe traumas and primarily in septic states. This reduced protein synthesis capacity cannot be affected by conventional intravenous or enteral nutritional support.

Method for improving the glutamine content in skeletal muscle and composition therefore


An LED lamp includes a bracket, a supporting plate mounted on the bracket, and a plurality of LED modules mounted on the supporting plate. The bracket includes a bottom plate, two sidewalls and two engaging portions. The two sidewalls respectively connect to two opposite sides of the bottom plate and extend upwardly from the bottom plate. Two protruded portions respectively obliquely extend from inner surfaces of the two sidewalls to define two grooves therebelow, respectively. The supporting plate has two opposite sides respectively slidably received in the grooves. A bottom surface of the supporting plate thermally contacts with a top surface the bottom plate. The LED modules are mounted on a top surface of the supporting plate.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates to LED lamps and, more particularly, to an LED lamp having a number of LED modules which can be easily assembled to or disassembled from the LED lamp to meet different luminous intensity requirements.
2. Description of Related Art
The technology of LEDs has rapidly developed in recent years from indicators to illumination applications. With the features of long-term reliability, environment friendliness and low power consumption, the LED is viewed as a promising alternative for future lighting products.
A conventional LED lamp comprises a bracket, a number of LED modules mounted on the bracket, and an envelope adhered to the bracket. Once the LED lamp is fixed under a determined circumstance, a luminous intensity of the LED lamp cannot be changed to meet different requirements. Generally, when it is necessary to change the luminous intensity, the LED lamp needs being totally dissembled and reassembled or redesigned, which is unduly time-consuming and raises production costs.
What is needed, therefore, is an LED lamp having a number of LED modules which can be easily assembled to or disassembled from the LED lamp to meet different luminous intensity requirements.

Fu Zhun Precision Industry (Shen Zhen) Co., Ltd.


A dynamically configurable list management system that supports list elements of multiple content types is presented. Each list element is associated with an element type via an element type identifier. The element type identifier uniquely identifies the element type to the list management system. Each property associated with each element type is included in the list. Each property is identified by a unique property identifier. When adding a list element of a new element type to an existing list that does not include any elements of the new element type, the list management system identifies every property associated with the new element type. For each property associated with the new element type, the list management system determines which properties are not already included in the list, and adds those properties that are not already including to the list.

Almost everyone that uses a computer, or some computing device, is familiar with a ubiquitous management tool called the list. Indeed, computer users maintain lists of e-mail contacts, URL bookmarks, music, digitized images, computer files, and the like, to name just a few. Using a list, a user can organize related items in useful ways. For example, a user can search or sort within a list of computer files for text, or the user can specify the order that certain songs will be played. With a list, a user can display, edit, and manipulate list items.
Unfortunately, as computer users are aware, lists are directed to homogenous items. In other words, while lists manage multiple list items, they manage multiple list items that are of a single type. For example, while a computer user may have lists of URL bookmarks, phone numbers, e-mail addresses, music, images, computer files, the computer user must manage each list separately, e.g., a list of phone numbers, a list of email addresses, a list of music, etc. Each list manages information of a single type.
As those skilled in the art will appreciate, each type of list item typically has various properties, many of which are unique to the type. In fact, in general, list items are included in a list because they share common properties, even though an individual list item's actual content is different. For example, FIGS. 1A, 1B, and 1C are pictorial diagrams illustrating typical displays of lists that may be found on any given computing system. In particular, FIG. 1A illustrates a music list 100 of music/songs available on a computing device. As is common with the display of list times, music list 100 is shown in a tabular format, with columns representing the various properties of each item type. For example, with reference to FIG. 1A, the list of music 100 includes at least six properties, including Title 102, Artist 104, Album 106, Genre 108, Length 110, and Sampling Rate 112. Each row in the list represents an item in the list. For example, the row included in box 114 represents a single song, and displays the title of the song, its artist, the album on which it is found, as well as the song's genre, length, and sampling rate.
FIG. 1B illustrates an image list 130 of images/pictures available on the computer. Images in the image list 130 all have common properties including Filename 132, File Size 134, Date Created 136, Color Depth 138, File Type 138, and the like. Similarly, bookmarks in the bookmark list 160 of FIG. 1C each have common properties, including Web Site Name 162, URL 164, Date Last Visited 166, and the like.
As mentioned above, lists are currently designed include only items of a single type. As can be seen by comparing FIGS. 1A, 1B, and 1C, this is due in large part to the fact that one list type does not share all, if any, properties with another type. However, in many instances, it would be useful to be able to include items of separate types into a single list. Indeed, what is needed is a list management system that is dynamically configurable, such that list items of different types may be included in a single list. The present invention addresses these and other limitations that exist in the prior art.

Dynamically configurable lists for including multiple content types


A gesture recognition method comprises capturing images, processing the images to identify at least two clusters of touch points associated with at least two pointers, recognizing a gesture based on motion of the clusters, and updating a display in accordance with the recognized gesture.

Interactive input systems that allow users to inject input (e.g. digital ink, mouse events etc.) into an application program using an active pointer (e.g. a pointer that emits light, sound or other signal), a passive pointer (e.g. a finger, cylinder or other object) or other suitable input device such as for example, a mouse or trackball, are well known. These interactive input systems include but are not limited to: touch systems comprising touch panels employing analog resistive or machine vision technology to register pointer input such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,448,263; 6,141,000; 6,337,681; 6,747,636; 6,803,906; 7,232,986; 7,236,162; and 7,274,356 and in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2004/0179001 assigned to SMART Technologies ULC of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, assignee of the subject application, the contents of which are incorporated by reference; touch systems comprising touch panels employing electromagnetic, capacitive, acoustic or other technologies to register pointer input; tablet personal computers (PCs); touch-enabled laptop PCs; personal digital assistants (PDAs); and other similar devices.
Gesture recognition methods employed by interactive input systems have been considered. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,411,575 to Hill et al. and assigned to SMART Technologies ULC, the contents of which are incorporated by reference, discloses a gesture recognition method employed by a machine vision interactive input system. During the method, multiple pointers in close proximity to a touch surface are detected to determine if the multiple pointers are being used to perform a known gesture. When the multiple pointers are being used to perform a known gesture, a command associated with the gesture is executed. Specifically, pointer data is examined to detect the existence of multiple pointers in captured images and then the nature of the multiple pointers is examined to determine if a known gesture has been performed, such as for example a right-click gesture, a scroll gesture, a rotate gesture etc. When a known gesture has been performed, a command event is generated that is associated with the determined gesture and the command event is conveyed to the active application program being executed by a computer.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,176,904 to Satoh discloses a touch panel with a display screen. An optical reflection film is provided on three sides of the display screen and reflects light towards two optical units aligned to look across the touch panel. A coordinate control section detects when a pointer has touched on the panel and generates a signal according to the detected point. The coordinate control section generates a coordinate signal that shows coordinates of a touched point, when one point touch on the panel has been detected. When simultaneous touches of two or more points on the panel have been detected, the coordinate control section generates a control signal that shows a control set in advance corresponding to the number of touched points.
U.S. Patent Application Publication Nos. 2008/0180404; 2008/0180405; and 2008/018406 to Han disclose methods and systems for interfacing with multi-point input devices that employ techniques for controlling displayed images including 2D and 3D image translation, scale/zoom, rotation control and globe axis tilt control. Various control techniques employ three or more simultaneous inputs, changes in characteristics of the inputs and pressure sensing.
In interactive input systems that employ rear projection devices to present images on the input surfaces of the interactive input systems (such as rear projection displays, liquid crystal display (LCD) devices, plasma televisions, etc.), multiple pointers from more than one user that are brought into contact with the input surfaces are difficult to locate and track, especially in interactive input systems employing only two imaging devices. For example, in interactive input systems employing two imaging devices, when multiple pointers are being tracked, the triangulation solutions for the pointers include actual pointer locations and imaginary pointer locations resulting in pointer ambiguity issues if the pointers do not carry markings that enable the pointers to be readily differentiated. The ambiguity issues become very complex when recognizing gestures made using multiple pointers.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a novel gesture recognition method and a novel interactive input system employing the method.

Gesture recognition method and interactive input system employing same


Embodiments of the invention relate to a method for minimizing the influence of disturbing signals during calculation of shape elements from coordinate points. An aim of the embodiments of the invention is to exclude the coordinates which are not to be locally assigned to the desired shaped element from the calculation of the shaped element. This aim is achieved by combining compensation methods for calculating the desired type of shaped element with recognition methods for the same type of shaped element and using the recognition methods for filtering the coordinate points that are relevant for calculating the shaped element out of all input coordinate points.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to surveying instruments and methods of analyzing measuring data.
2. Brief Description of Related Art
A conventional surveying apparatus, such as a total-station, a tacheometer, and a theodolite, comprise an optical system, such as a telescope, having a predetermined optical axis carried on a mounting structure such as a tripod. A user, while looking through the telescope, adjusts an orientation of the telescope relative to the tripod such that a target of interest coincides with the optical axis of the telescope. The target of interest may comprise a reflector or pole or other features of an object such as an edge of a building or a landmark or others. By measuring the angle of the telescope relative to the mounting structure, it is possible to determine a position of the target. For this purpose, the surveying apparatus may comprise angle sensors, an optical distance measuring system and a light projection system transmitting a light beam through the telescope to a reflector located at the target.
Recently, research has been performed to develop a surveying apparatus comprising a camera for detecting an image of a scenario including the target, wherein an image processing is performed to automatically identify the target within the image and to determine the position of the target within the image.
It has been found that the conventional methods of image processing may not always achieve a satisfactory measuring result. The images detected by the camera are subject to disturbances due to varying lighting conditions. Moreover, the object to be identified in the image may have complex structures due to textured surfaces and image backgrounds, and portions of the objects to be identified may be hidden by other objects, such as trees. Therefore, a reliable and robust detection of object features is not always possible.

Surveying apparatus and method of analyzing measuring data


Provided is a method of determining a similarity between a target image and a reference image. The method includes (a) obtaining related approximation pixel-values of the reference image pt having overall relationship between coordinates (x, y) and original pixel-values ft of pixels of the reference image; (b) obtaining related approximation pixel-values of the target image ps having overall relationship between coordinates (x, y) and original pixel-values fs of pixels of the target image; and (c) determining the similarity using the target related approximation pixel-values ps and the reference related approximation pixel-values pt.

This application claims the priority of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2005-0092159, filed on Sep. 30, 2005, in the Korean Intellectual Property Office, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein in its entirety by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of determining a similarity between a target image and a reference image, and more particularly, to a method of determining a similarity between a target image and a reference image using a vision system included in a part mounter.
2. Description of the Related Art
A conventional part recognition method used by a part mounter is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 2002-222420 (title: Image Recognition Method). In this conventional part recognition method, picked-up parts are recognized using geometrical information such as lead shapes or edge shapes of the picked-up parts.
Another conventional part recognition method is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 2003-256809 (title: Image Processing Apparatus and Method). In this conventional part recognition method, picked-up parts are recognized using brightness information thereof.
According to such conventional part recognition methods, a part mounter can recognize parts with characteristic shapes but cannot recognize parts without characteristic shapes. FIG. 1 illustrates parts with characteristic shapes. FIG. 2 illustrates parts without characteristic shapes.
To recognize the parts without characteristic shapes as illustrated in FIG. 2, reference images, which are which are images of portions of reference parts of each type, are stored. Then, whether an image of a picked-up part includes a reference image is determined. In so doing, the type of the picked-up part can be determined.
In other words, it is required to determine a similarity between a target image, which is an image of part of a picked-up image, and a reference image. Therefore, a method of accurately determining a similarity between a target image and a reference image, even though the original pixel-values of pixels of the target image minutely vary according to photographing and image-processing conditions, is required.

Method of accurately determining similarity between target image and reference image


A configuration of acousto-optical tunable filters (AOTF) having stable output characteristics so that the output does not significantly vary with time. The configuration includes a plurality of AOTFs cascaded together. Each AOTF generates a surface acoustic wave in an optical waveguide in accordance with RF signals applied to the AOTF. A phase of a beat generated by the RF signals applied to one of the plurality of AOTFs is different from a phase of a beat generated by the RF signals applied to a different AOTF of the plurality of AOTFs.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to acousto-optical tunable filters cascaded together. More specifically, the present invention relates to acousto-optical tunable filters cascaded together and controlled by RF signals generating beats with different phases.
2. Description of the Related Art
Optical communication systems using fiber optical transmission lines are being used to transmit relatively large amounts of information. However, as users require larger amounts of information to be rapidly transmitted, and as more users are connected to the systems, a further increase in the transmission capacity of optical communication systems is required.
Therefore, there is a continual effort in increase transmission capacity of optical communication systems. For example, through improvements in the modulation rate, optical communication systems with modulation rates in the giga-order bits per second (Gb/s) rate are now in practical use. However, optical communication systems having a transmission capacity of tera-order bits per second (Tb/s) may be required for an optical communication system to handle future demands, such as those imposed by the transmission of images. Improvements in the modulation rate will not, by itself, be enough to handle these future demands.
Therefore, wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) is becoming an indispensable technique for increasing the transmission capacity of optical communication systems. With WDM, a plurality of wavelengths (or "channels"), each carrying information, are multiplexed together and transmitted through a single optical fiber as a WDM signal. This transmitted WDM signal is then received and demultiplexed back into individual wavelengths, so that the information can be obtained from the individual wavelengths. In this manner, a plurality of wavelengths are transmitted through a single optical fiber. This can be contrasted to conventional approaches where a single wavelength is transmitted through a single optical fiber.
Some WDM optical communication systems require wavelength multiplexing such that a few wavelengths to about one-hundred (100) wavelengths are multiplexed together over a wide band. Also, some WDM optical communication systems require wavelength intervals as wide as 1 nm to tens of nm.
Acousto-optical tunable filters (AOTF) are a type of optical wavelength filter that is becoming indispensable in WDM optical communications systems. With an AOTF, wavelength characteristics of the filter can be controlled by changing an RF signal applied to the AOTF, to thereby provide a selectively tunable wavelength filter. AOTFs will be very useful in optical components such as optical add/drop multiplexers (ADM), optical cross-connects, and optical switches.
For example, FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an optical ADM node. Referring now to FIG. 1, an optical ADM node 100 receives a light 102 which includes optical wavelength-multiplexed signals of wavelength 1 to wavelength 8. The wavelength-multiplexed light 102 is input to a separator 104 in optical ADM node 100.
Separator 104 separates wavelength 1 to wavelength 4 from wavelength-multiplexed light 102 and permits wavelength 5 to wavelength 8 to pass therethrough.
The lights passing through separator 104 are input to a coupler 106. Coupler 106 couples lights having wavelengths 1′ to 4′ with the lights of 5 to 8, and outputs a wavelength-multiplexed light 108 via an output node.
An acousto-optical tunable filter (AOTF) can be used as separator 104 or coupler 108 to arbitrarily change the wavelengths to be separated or coupled, and to arbitrarily change the number of wavelengths to be separated or coupled. As a result, it is easy to modify the system configuration by external control.
FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a polarization-independent type AOTF, which is one type of AOTF. With this type of AOTF, the main axis of the refractive index of a waveguide is rotated in response to light of the wavelength corresponding to the frequency of a surface acoustic wave (SAW). Hence, a rotation of the polarization of the propagating light makes it possible to extract or modulate a particular wavelength.
Referring now to FIG. 2, optical waveguides 11 and 12 are formed on a LiNbO3 X-cut substrate by diffusing Ti therein. A transducer 15 that generates a SAW corresponding to an RF signal (radio frequency signal that is an electromagnetic wave equal to or lower than 3000 GHz) is formed on optical waveguides 11 and 12.
In order to extract wavelengths 1 to 4, RF signals with four frequencies corresponding to the coupled wavelengths 1 to 4 are applied to transducer 15.
An input light 1 having the wavelengths 1 to 8 is applied to a waveguide type polarization beam splitter (waveguide type PBS) 16, which separates input light 1 into a TE-mode light and a TM-mode light. The TM-mode light enters optical waveguide 11, and the TE-mode light enters optical waveguide 12.
The polarization of the light of the wavelengths (wavelength 1 to wavelength 4 in the case shown in FIG. 1) corresponding to the SAWs is rotated from the TM-mode light to the TE-mode light in optical waveguide 11, and is rotated from the TE-mode lights to the TM-mode light in optical waveguide 12.
A waveguide type PBS 17 outputs the TM-mode light in optical waveguide 11 to a pass-through light side and outputs the TE-mode light to a branching light side. Further, waveguide type PBS 17 outputs the TE-mode light in optical waveguide 12 to the pass-through light side and outputs the TM-mode light to the branching light side. Hence, a particular wavelength (wavelength 1 to wavelength 4) can be extracted or modulated.
Absorbers 19 and 20 are SAW absorbers that prevent the SAWs from being reflected by an end surface of the substrate.
The AOTF shown in FIG. 2 can also be used as the coupler shown in FIG. 1. In this case, for example, wavelength 1′ to wavelength 4′ are input as input light 2, while wavelength 5 to wavelength 8 from the separator are input as input light 1.
Then, waveguide type PBS 16 causes the TM-mode light of the wavelength 5 to wavelength 8 to be incident to optical waveguide 11 and causes the TE-mode light thereof to be incident to optical waveguide 12.
When the RF signals corresponding to wavelength 1′ to wavelength 4′ are input to transducer 15, the polarization of the corresponding lights is changed from the TE-mode light to the TM-mode light in optical waveguide 11, and is changed from the TM-mode light to the TE-mode light in optical waveguide 12.
Waveguide type PBS 17 outputs the TM-mode light in optical waveguide 11 to the pass-through light side and outputs the TE-mode light to the branching light side. Further, waveguide type PBS 17 outputs the TE-mode light in optical waveguide 12 to the pass-through light side and outputs the TM-mode light to the branching light side.
Unfortunately, with the conventional use of an AOTF, the output can undesireably vary with time. For example, in a case where the AOTF is used to extract a plurality of wavelengths (such as wavelength 1 to wavelength 4), if a plurality of frequencies are applied to transducer 15 of the AOTF, the central frequencies of the band-pass/band-rejection characteristics deviate from the target frequencies with time. Hence, the output of the AOTF varies with time although the input light has a constant power.

Acousto-optical tunable filters cascaded together


A semiconductor device comprises a plurality of units, each including a sensor unit which accumulates charges upon photoelectric conversion and a storage unit which stores information, and a control unit which controls each of the plurality of units, wherein the control unit sequentially performs, for each of the plurality of units, first operation of comparing a reference voltage with an output signal from the sensor unit based on the amount of accumulated charges and second operation of storing information based on the comparison result in the storage unit corresponding to the sensor unit if an output signal from the sensor unit reaches the reference voltage in the first operation, and the control unit is configured to be able to start the first operation for a next unit upon skipping the second operation and skips the second operation in a predetermined period.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor device, a method of controlling the same, and a camera.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 11-150686 discloses a photoelectric conversion apparatus including photoelectric conversion means including photoelectric conversion elements and storage means, and a control means for controlling the photoelectric conversion means. The control means controls the charge accumulating operation of the photoelectric conversion elements based on control information stored in the storage means. The control means generates control information based on the monitoring result of the charge accumulation state of each photoelectric conversion element at a predetermined timing, and stores the information in the storage means. A photoelectric conversion means is provided for each distance detection point for the detection of the focus of a camera. The above control makes it possible to perform appropriate focus detection in accordance with the luminance of an object.
Repeating the operation of monitoring photoelectric conversion elements and the operation of storing control information in storage units based on the monitoring results will lead to delays in the timing of starting monitoring the photoelectric conversion elements of the respective photoelectric conversion means. This will lead to insufficient frequency of monitoring the respective photoelectric conversion elements, and hence can cause a deterioration in monitoring accuracy.

Semiconductor device, method of controlling the same, and camera based on reference comparison


A steering column has a housing. A steering spindle jacket is disposed within the housing. An outer steering spindle is disposed within the steering spindle jacket and has a spline hub. An inner spindle is disposed within the outer steering spindle and includes a spline shaft configured to permit axial movement and prevent rotation of the outer steering spindle when the spline hub and the spline shaft are engaged. In a non-stowed state the spline shaft and the spline hub are engaged and in a stowed state the spline shaft and the spline hub are free of engagement. A pin is disposed in the housing engages the spline hub portion in the stowed state and prevents rotation of the outer steering spindle and is free of engagement in the non-stowed state.

The steering column is primarily a supported shaft that connects a steering wheel to a gear unit that in turn causes steering wheels of the vehicle to turn responsive to user input. Typically, such steering columns use one or more of mechanical or hydraulic systems, an electromechanical steering system, or a steer-by-wire system, for example. Engineers and vehicle designers have improved the ergonomics of vehicles by providing adjustable steering columns with manual or motorized tilting and telescoping adjustability to increase fitting options for automotive vehicle users and to allow easy ingress and egress of the vehicle. It is increasingly desirable to provide more ways to address the comfort of users.
There is a need, therefore, to provide steering column features that increase vehicle user comfort, convenience, and safety. The present invention satisfies the need.


A computer-implemented method for detecting TCP packet losses and expediting packet retransmission is disclosed. The method includes assigning to each packet transmitted or retransmitted a sequential order number, determining from an ACK packet or SACK segment thereof the sequential order number of a received packet, recording the determined sequential order number as a highest received order number in case the determined sequential order number is greater than a current highest received order number, and retransmitting all unacknowledged packets having sequential order numbers less than the highest received order number.

The present invention relates generally to processing packets in computer networks, wireless data networks, and network components of computer operating systems, and more particularly to improvements to the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) on wired and wireless Wide Area Networks (WANs).
Internet Protocol (IP) is the most widely used protocol in today's computer and data networks. Running on top of IP, TCP has become the dominant transport protocol for applications requiring reliable packet transmission. Even for applications that do not require reliable packet transmission, such as video and voice applications, TCP has gained popularity on WANs because compared to UDP, TCP traffic is more likely to be able to pass the firewalls and other security devices widely deployed in today's networks. Detailed information about TCP and IP can be found in RFC793 and RFC791.
In addition to reliable packet transmission, TCP provides flow control that adapts to dynamic bandwidth changes in networks. Although, TCP has been scaled with the rapid expansion of the internet, it has become evident that TCP does not work well on long latency and high loss network links, especially wireless data networks. TCP is not able to use the available bandwidth efficiently in these types of networks because the assumption that packet loss is mainly due to network congestion is not always true. For transactional applications and real time applications, this inefficiency in TCP introduces unacceptable latency and throughput that does not meet the applications' needs.
To improve TCP performance in these types of networks, prior art solutions include scaling up the TCP window to deal with the so-called long fat pipe (long latency and high bandwidth network links) and redefining certain IP fields and/or TCP fields in order to better judge packet loss on the TCP sender side. Though these solutions provide improvements over standard TCP on certain networks, they all require deploying a modified TCP stack on the TCP sender and receiver sides. This requirement increases both the difficulty and cost of their deployment. In addition, the prior art solutions rely on RTO (retransmission timeout, refer to RFC793) to detect continuous packet losses and to trigger retransmissions. The resulting lagged retransmission and reduction of throughput does not meet the requirements of transactional or real time applications.

Method for detecting TCP packet losses and expediting packet retransmission


Relocatable personal and/or pet safety shelters for protecting occupants from dangerous conditions such as those from hurricanes and tornadoes. The shelters can include metal wall and ceiling panels of approximately 10 gage to approximately 12 gage thick and be able to withstand winds of up to approximately 250 miles per hour or greater, and be able to withstand a projectile such as 2 inch by 4 inch wood member shot at approximately 100 miles per hour from penetrating inside. The shelter can have a length of approximately 60 inches, a width of approximately 30 inches, a height of approximately 55 inches, with a total weight of up to approximately 940 pounds. The shelter can have fixed bench seats along opposite sides of the door from each other, and be attached in a fixed horizontal orientation above the floor by elongated L-shaped brackets that are attached to the walls be removable fasteners. The bench seats can also be attached by hinges so that the bench seats can have folded up positions adjacent to side walls and can fold down to horizontal positions to allow occupants to sit thereon. A fold down table can be included to fold down between the two bench seats when being used. A safety window such as plexiglass, can be formed in the door to allow the occupants to see outside environmental conditions. The shelter can be fastened to a concrete pad base, or driveway or concrete floor and the like, both inside and outside of a garage, a home, a trailer, and the like.

Dangerous storms such as hurricanes and tornadoes can occur with little warning. For dangerous fast approaching storms such as hurricanes and tornadoes, safe emergency shelters are needed to protect persons and property from the immediate harm and destruction. Tornadoes are normally seasonal with the months of March through June being the most active. Approximately twenty percent of all tornadoes occur during the months of July through October, and less than ten percent occur during November through January. Tornadoes have been recorded with wind speeds of over 300 mph and can stay on the ground for over one hour. Flying debris can cause much injury and destruction. In recent years, more than 1,000 twisters have killed in excess of one hundred twenty people and caused millions of dollars in property damage in the United States. The dollar figure for the damage caused by tornadoes which have struck Oklahoma City, Okla. in May, 1999 alone has exceeded more than 90 million dollars.
Hurricanes such as Hurricane Andrew, Wilma and Katrina have been known to cause catastrophic damages in the billions of dollars. Regardless of catastrophic damages that occur from tornadoes, hurricanes, and other hazards, relatively little protection against them is provided because of variously prohibitive problems with present protection alternatives. Thus, there exists a need for emergency shelters.
The National Tornado Forum has announced an effort to encourage more people to build "safe rooms" (emergency shelters). The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) have programs and financing in place the encourage people to put their families in "safe rooms" (shelters). The average family moves approximately every seven years. Thus, reusable and individualized shelters would be desirable.
A variety of emergency shelters previously have been pre-manufactured for field uses constructed of cement, steel, fiberglass and other materials. Others have been manufactured in an assembled condition for particular applications. None of these prior art shelters can be site-assembled from matching parts and possess the ability of being moveable or relocateable to another address, should the owner decide to relocate, as this invention.
As is well known between the times a tornado is spotted or warnings are given, there is usually very little time for individuals and families to seek shelter. Additionally, hurricanes have little warnings and are known to change direction with little advance notice.
Since community shelters are not close by to everyone needing the shelter and these types of shelters often do not allow for pets, there is a need for personal relocatable shelters and/or shelters for pets in close proximity to an individual's home.
Various patents have been proposed over the years as shelters but fail to provide safe, reliable, and easily relocatable shelters for individuals and/or pets.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,003,271 to Boyer et al. describes a pre-case security vault device that includes components that can be transported to a construction sites. However, this device includes the assembly of permanently affixing the components together such as by using permanent fasteners such as "welds", and the pouring of "concrete" for floors, and the like, and nonremovable fill such as "grout" at the site, column 1, lines 37-38, column 2, lines 66+, column 3, lines 1-10, 12-25, 60-65, column 4, lines 2-4, 37-43. No where does Boyer et al. describe, nor suggest being able to easily disassemble the vault to be able to be relocated at subsequent sites. Additionally, neither description, nor suggestion is given in the Boyer "vault" for ventilation purposes to allow humans to be sheltered therein. While Boyer mentions that it may be desirable in the background section of the patent to "protect property from damage or theft or to serve as a shelter . . . ", column 1, lines 4-7, the Boyer "vault" device requires that there construction forms a "vapor-tight enclosure . . . and . . . preventing water from seeping into the vault to damage the property in the vault", column 3, lines 14-18. Thus, Boyer is primarily used for protecting property and not as a "shelter" for people. Additionally, Boyer is too large to be used in limited spaces such as garages since it would take up to much space. Furthermore, Boyer has almost no other utility when not being used as a shelter.
Various other types of shelters have also been proposed but also fail to provide safe relocatable habitats for persons and/or pets. See for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,126,972 to Silen; U.S. Pat. No. 4,331,262 to Carren et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,438,606 to Chardon et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,953,866 to Poole; U.S. Pat. No. 5,979,128 to Parsons; U.S. Pat. No. 6,131,343 to Jackson; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,161,345 to Hope et al.
Many of these proposed devices has problems that would prohibit their wide use. For example, Carren '606 is primarily used for storing liquids, and not as a protective shelter for people. Chardon '606 is designed for "protecting large-size objects, such as open-air machines, cycles, motorcycles, windsurfers, etc.", abstract, and is also not designed for protecting people.
Poole '866, Parsons '128 and Hope et al. '345 are shelters that require some portion to be inserted into the ground making the shelter permanent and not easily disassembled. In addition the subsurface installation is not practical and in fact dangerous to be used in many low level water regions such as Florida, since storms can potentially flood these below ground shelters.
Further, these patents require users access the shelters through a roof door, which causes inherent problems if debris falls on the top of the shelter and restricting the door from being opened. While Jackson '343 and Silen '972 propose above ground shelters, these devices have another problem which is similar to the other patents referenced above in that none of them would be practical in limited spaces such as garages since the shelters would take up to much space and eliminate space of automobiles, and the like.
Still furthermore, the existing shelter industry does not target shelters to occupants of mobile home parks, and the like.
Thus, the need exists for solutions of the problems with the prior art listed above.

Relocatable personal and/or pet safety appliance


An amplitude detection circuit using a sinusoidal input signal inputs to produce a digital output (a one or zero) is described. The circuit uses an input field effect transistor (FET) with a gate load coupled to a gate of the input FET. A drain load may be coupled to a drain of the input FET. A source load may be coupled to a source of the input FET. A controllable variable current generator provides a current to the source of the input FET, biasing the source of the input FET to a reference voltage. An input signal conductor may be coupled to the gate of the input FET. Other embodiments are described.

Amplitude detection circuits are used to compare an input electrical signal against a reference signal, typically a voltage. The circuit generates an output, usually a high voltage (digital one), for an input signal amplitude greater than the reference signal and generates a different output, usually a low voltage (digital zero), for an input signal amplitude less than the reference signal.
The Figures illustrate specific aspects of the circuits. Together with the following description, the Figures demonstrate and explain the principles and operation of the circuits. In the drawings, the schematic circuit elements can represent their equivalent structures and connections. The same reference numerals in different drawings represent the same element, and thus their descriptions will not be repeated.

High-speed amplitude detector with a digital output


A plug-in connection system is disclosed which is economical to produce, is compact, is easy to handle and/or which connects to a module in an electrically reliable manner. A plug-in connection device includes locking hooks which are provided includes locking hooks which are provided with unlocking elements. As a result, the locking hooks can be maintained in an unlocked position such that the plug-in connection can be released in a simplified manner. The unlocking elements may project in an essentially non vertical manner over the housing of the connection device or in an extrinsically vertical manner over the housing of the connection device. The total space required for the plug-in connection system is reduced, thereby ensuring that the module is connected in an electrically reliable manner.

In plug-in connection systems, a large number of electrical connections generally have to be made between the modules. This is usually done by multicore connection cables whose ends are equipped with multipole connectors which are inserted into corresponding sockets on the modules.
In this case, it is necessary for it to be possible to make the plug-in connection in an equally quick and simple manner, and for a reliable electrical connection to be produced between the modules. It is also necessary to reliably lock the plug-in connections so that they withstand mechanical loads, for example vibrations and shocks, and in the process the electrical connection between the modules is maintained and remains fully functional.
Plug-in connection systems with locking apparatuses for connecting electrical modules are already known and include a connector and a socket which complements the connector, this connector and socket being connected to one another in the locked position by mechanical aids. In a known plug-in connection system of this type, the connector is connected to the socket using screws, with one or more screws being mounted on the connector such that they can rotate, and threads being provided on the socket. In the locked position, that is to say when the connector is plugged into the socket, the screws on the connector are screwed into the threads on the socket, and a firm connection is thus produced between the connector and the socket.
In order to break the connection between the connector and the socket, the screws have to be unscrewed from the threads again. This plug-in connection system therefore has the disadvantage that, in order to make and release the plug-in connection, a great deal of manipulation is needed and a large amount of space is also required both for the purpose of accommodating the screw connection and for operating the latter.
In a further plug-in connection system with a locking apparatus according to the prior art, rocker arms are arranged on the connector, engage on the socket in the locked position and thus produce a mechanical coupling between the connector and the socket. In this case, the rocker arms on the connector are resiliently mounted under prestress, so that, in the locked position, they snap into corresponding projections on, or recesses in, the socket.
In order to break the connection between the connector and the socket, it is necessary, in this plug-in connection system, to individually and manually move the rocker arms into an unlocked position in which they disengage from the projections on, or recesses in, the socket in order to allow the connector to be disconnected from the socket. This plug-in connection system therefore likewise has the disadvantage that is it relatively complicated to release the plug-in connection and a great deal of space is required to arrange the rocker arms on the connector and to operate them.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,328,288 discloses a known plug-in connection apparatus, which can be plugged onto a mating plug-in connection apparatus for electrical connection purposes in electrical modules. The plug-in connection apparatus described in that document includes a housing and a locking device which is connected to the housing and is designed to mechanically couple the plug-in connection apparatus to the mating plug-in connection apparatus. The locking device can be moved between a locked position and an unlocked position here. Furthermore, the locking device is integrally connected to the housing.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,312,268 also discloses a multi-electrode plug-in connection apparatus. This plug-in connection apparatus also includes a locking apparatus which is integrally connected to a housing, it being possible to move the locking apparatus for locking and unlocking purposes and for mechanically coupling the plug-in connection apparatus to the mating plug-in connection apparatus.
Corresponding plug-in connection apparatuses are also disclosed in EP 0 549 370 A2, EP 1 020 959 A2 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,102,727.

Plug-in connection system with an integrated lock