Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Frederick J DeWitt

Ronald Otto Radko

Christopher J Guzak

Thomas Dee McGuire

Stuart T Laney

Kurt J Eckhardt

Peter Blackburn Stewart

A method and system for automatically running a program stored on a medium upon detection of insertion of the medium into a drive are provided. The operating system periodically polls the drive regarding the status of the drive. After receiving a response from the drive regarding the drive's status, the operating system determines whether the drive's status has changed. If the drive's status has changed, the operating system broadcasts a message indicating the change in the drive's status. When the shell receives a message from the operating system indicating a change in the drive's status, the shell determines whether the change in the drive's status indicates that a medium has been inserted into the drive. If the change in the drive's status indicates that a medium has been inserted into the drive, the shell searches for a predefined file on the medium. The shell then runs a program stored on the medium that is specified in the predefined file. Thus, the running of the program on the medium is performed without any action being required on the part of a user.

Method and system for automatically running a program

An encoder and method, such as for use in CD-ROM pre-mastering software, optimizes storage on a computer readable recording medium by eliminating redundant storage of identical data streams for duplicate files. The encoder and method detect whether two files have equivalent data streams, and encodes such duplicate files as a single data stream referenced by the respective directory entries of the files. In the illustrated embodiment, the encoder and method detect duplicate files based on file size and a cyclic redundancy check calculated on the file's data stream or portion thereof.

Storage optimizing encoder and method

A method and system for caching data that improve the efficiency of a cache are provided. Generally, three types of data are stored in a cache constructed according to the principles of the present invention. These types of data include: (1) path tables, (2) directories, and (3) files. Path tables include data regarding all of the directories on a storage medium, directories include data regarding all of the subdirectories and files in each directory, and files include the actual file data. The preferred embodiment of the cache logically includes eight regions. These regions include (in order of preferred descending priority): (1) path table, (2) directory, (3) two-access, (4) zero-access or prefetch, (5) sequential-locked, (6) one-access, (7) discarded, and (8) invalid. The path table region includes sectors containing path table data, the directory region includes sectors containing directory data, the two-access region includes sectors containing file data that have been accessed twice, the prefetch region includes sectors containing file data that have been prefetched, the sequential-locked region includes sectors containing file data that were prefetched and have now been locked for access, the one-access region includes sectors containing file data that have been accessed once, the discarded region includes empty sectors that are available for reuse, and the invalid region includes a single dummy sector that is used as a placeholder. During operation, a cache manager manages the cache. The cache manager is responsible for manipulating the cache, such as by adding and removing sectors to and from the cache.

Method and system for caching data

A method and system for dynamically converting audio data into a standard format. The method and system also provides for using a directory hierarchy to specify a fidelity level and dynamically generating the audio data at the specified fidelity level. When a drive is loaded with, for example, a CD ROM containing raw audio data, the system generates a directory hierarchy for the drive. The directory hierarchy contains sub-directories corresponding to various fidelity characteristics. For example, the system may generate a sub-directory corresponding to audio data stored in stereo format and another sub-directory corresponding to audio data stored in mono format. The system also generates a file entry in sub-directories for each track of the CD ROM. For example, the stereo sub-directory may contain a file entry for track 1 of the CD ROM and the mono sub-directory also may contain a file entry for track 1. The file in the stereo sub-directory represents the audio data in storage and the file in the mono sub-directory represents the audio data in mono. When accessing a file at a specified fidelity level (as indicated by the directory pathname), the system reads raw audio data from the CD ROM and converts the raw audio data to the fidelity level specified by the pathname.

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Kirkland, WA, United States of America

Frederick J DeWitt