3com Corporation

Ismail Dalgic

Peter Si-Sheng Wang

Ikhlaq S Sidhu

Guido M Schuster

Jacek A Grabiec

Jerry J Mahler

Vipin Kumar Jain

Kenneth Araujo

Frederick D Dean

Carl Ketcham

William Paul Sherer

Wen-Tsung Tang

Jack Fijolek

A public telephone and Internet access system that comprises Personal Digital Assistants (PDA) that are connected to an Ethernet or other Local Area Network by a network cradle, and a number of Ethernet telephones connected to the same Local Area Network. The PDAs store encrypted information about their owners, including the owner's name, their phone forwarding preferences, access permissions to the network, and charging/billing information. When a PDA is attached to a network cradle, this information is automatically transferred to the gatekeeper, which is a server that performs management tasks for the Ethernet phone network. These tasks include deciding whether or not a user is allowed to sign up and use a public Ethernet phone, maintaining billing and charging information, and forwarding incoming calls for a given user to the Ethernet phone at the user's current location. This invention provides a secure method for the PDA and the gatekeeper to exchange authentication information.

Techniques for providing secure access to a communication system

A public telephone and Internet access system that comprises Personal Digital Assistants (PDA) that are connected to an ethernet or other Local Area Network by a network cradle, and a number of ethernet telephones connected to the same Local Area Network. The PDAs store encrypted information about their owners, including the owner's name, their phone forwarding preferences, access permissions to the network, and charging/billing information. When a PDA is attached to a network cradle, this information is automatically transferred to the gatekeeper, which is a server that performs management tasks for the ethernet phone network. These tasks include deciding whether or not a user is allowed to sign up and use a public ethernet phone, maintaining billing and charging information, and forwarding incoming calls for a given user to the ethernet phone at the user's current location. This invention provides a secure method for the PDA and the gatekeeper to exchange authentication information.

Method and system for providing secure user access to public or private telephone and internet systems

A method and apparatus for improving the scalability of H.323 systems is described. An H.323 gateway can be modified to store call state information associated with a call on at least one of the ports of the modified H.323 gateway. The modified H.323 gateway can send registration, admission, and status requests to a modified H.323 gatekeeper. This relieves the modified H.323 gatekeeper of the need to maintain call status information for that call. If the modified H.323 gatekeeper fails, there is no disruption of the call or the billing information associated with the call. The modified H.323 gateway and the modified H.323 gatekeeper can be embodied in interface cards suitable for IP telephony gateways. Additionally, the modified H.323 gateway can support a standard network address translation protocol and an H.323 proxy service. These features help prevent users of the modified H.323 gateway from bypassing the billing and user authentication systems while also conserving the IP address space.

Method and apparatus for providing a virtual distributed gatekeeper in an H.323 system

The invention provides an information appliance and a network appliance (or telephone) that function independently as well as with each other as companion appliances. The information appliance stores user information corresponding to a particular user. The telephone is linked to network. In some embodiments, the companion appliances are capable of simultaneously exchanging voice and data messages with devices connected to the network. The appliances are connected to each other physically through a communications port, and exchange data link layer formatted data corresponding to user personalized information, commands from the user, and responses including message status information corresponding to action of the network connected devices. The user information enables the telephone to perform network communications according to user specified settings, and enables the telephone to assume the user specific information appliance network identification. The information appliance is typically a portable computer and in some embodiments is a palm-sized computer. In some embodiments, the telephone is an Ethernet telephone. One aspect of the invention provides a method for transmitting data from a portable computer to a telephone. Other aspects of the invention include: a method for exchanging voice and data messages between a telephone and devices connected to a network, a portable computer adapted for connection to a telephone, a telephone adapted for connection to a portable computer, and a communications system including the telephone connected to the portable computer.

Method apparatus and communications system for companion information and network appliances

A system and method for providing call handling services on a data network telephony system. A portable information device, such as a PDA, associated with a user contains the user's address and/or appointment book information. The address and/or appointment book information includes priority information comprising one or more address/appointment entries having associated priority levels. The priority information is transmitted from the portable information device across a link to a data network telephone or other voice communication device, where it is stored in a call handling database. When an incoming call request is received at the data network telephone, the call is handled according to the priority information contained in the call handling database.

System and method for providing call-handling services on a data network telephone system

A system and method for providing user mobility services on a data network telephony system. User attributes may be transmitted from a portable information device, such as a personal digital assistant, to a voice communication device, such as an Ethernet-based telephone. The voice communication device receives the user attributes from the portable information device and may transmit a registration request to a registration server. The registration request may include the user attributes, and is used by the registration server to register the user to the voice communication device in a registration data base. When a call is placed to the user, the registration server may reference the registration data base to direct the call to the voice communication device.

System and method for providing user mobility services on a telephony network

Method, apparatus and communications system for companion information

An apparatus for converting frame-type transmissions to packet-type transmissions. In one embodiment, the apparatus comprises a medium access controller (MAC) coupled to a packet-based network and multiple packet assembler/disassemblers (PADs). The PADs include a data link layer (DLL) PAD coupled to the MAC, a high level data link control (HDLC) PAD coupled to the DLL PAD, a network layer (NL) PAD coupled to the DLL PAD, and a NL/frame alignment sequence-bit-rate allocation signal (NL/FAS-BAS) PAD coupled to the DLL PAD. Multiple detection units are coupled to respective PADs, wherein each of the plurality of detection units detects a frame-type transmission.

Integrated remote data access and audio/visual conference gateway

Method for improved configuration of a link between an end station and an intermediate device in a network. The intermediate device communicates through the link using a point-to-point protocol, and a lower layer protocol and is capable of translating between the lower layer protocol used by the link and a lower layer protocol used by a portion of the network. The intermediate device detects the lower layer protocol used by the end station and configures the link to use the point-to-point protocol, the lower layer protocol used by the end station, and an asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) protocol. A method including signaling the end station to use on the link a lower layer protocol having a particular relationship with the lower layer protocol used by the portion of the network. The particular relationship, according to an aspect of the invention, is that the protocol that the end station is signaled to use is the same as the protocol used by the portion of the network thereby creating efficiencies in transmission from the end station through the intermediate device onto the network.

Method and apparatus for detecting the protocol used by an end station

An improved computer network and network device uses characteristics of prior art shared network protocols to control the flow of data and access to the network among a group of transmitting nodes. The invention determines which nodes wish to send data when a collision occurs by detecting and recording which nodes participated in a collision. A scheduling routine is designed to give each connected node a chance to send. A transmission control mechanism is used to prevent a subset of transmitters from transmitting while allowing one ES to transmit without experiencing a collision. The invention has a number of applications including within an improved ethernet repeater in a multimedia ethernet.

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Mountain View, CA, United States of America

Ismail Dalgic