Palo Alto Research Center Inc.

Constructive Labs

Michael Roberts

Shane Patrick Ahern

Nicolas B Ducheneaut

Doron Kletter

James M A Begole

Victoria M E Bellotti

Simon Tucker

Anselm Hook

Robert Roy Price

Ed H Chi

Oliver Brdiczka

Kurt Edward Partridge

Evgeniy Bart

David Gunning

Glenn S Meader, Iii

Marco Ferrari

A method of editing and creating content of a virtual space maintained within a virtual space hosting system is provided. The virtual space hosting system includes a plurality of user devices each of which is connected to one or more human interface devices for displaying the virtual world to a respective user and allowing user gestures by the user to be detected. The method comprises: generating a selection virtual object and, in response to detected user gestures, selecting a virtual object within the virtual space and consequently generating a tool palette virtual object, and, in response to detection of palette interaction gestures from the user, changing the tool palette representation and/or the selected object.

User interface for multi-user application with human interface devices

A server system () for processing a virtual space, the virtual space comprising a plurality of entities (A-E), the server system () comprising: one or more back-end servers (); and one or more front-end servers (); wherein each back-end server () stores a respective subset of the plurality of entities (A-E); each front-end server () is communicatively coupled to each back-end server (); each front-end server () is configured to be communicatively coupled to one or more client devices (); each front-end server () stores one or more entity references (RefA-RefE); and each entity reference (RefA-RefE) comprises a first identifier for identifying a respective entity (A-E) and a second identifier for identifying the back-end server () on which the entity (A-E) identified by the first identifier is stored.

Server system for processing a virtual space

A computer-implemented system and method for distributed activity detection is provided. Contextual data collected for a user performing an activity is processed on a mobile computing device. The mobile computing device extracts features from the contextual data and compares the features with a set of models. Each model represents an activity. A confidence score is assigned to each model based on the comparison with the features and the mobile computing device transmits the features to a server when the confidence scores for the models are low. The server trains a new model using the features and sends the new model to the mobile computing device.

Computer-implemented system and method for distributed activity detection

One embodiment provides a system that facilitates shared virtual reality space. During operation, the system receives a first message associated with a first virtual reality object, wherein the first message includes a first address for the first virtual reality object and indicates a first action to be performed on the first virtual reality object. The system performs the first action on the first virtual reality object. The system determines a second address for a second virtual reality object that is remotely maintained and corresponds to the first virtual reality object. The system constructs a second message, which includes the second address and indicates the first action, thereby allowing the first action to be performed on the second virtual reality object.

System and method for facilitating sharing of virtual three-dimensional space

A computer-implemented system and method for predicting activity outcome based on user attention is provided. Sensor data is collected for a user, and an activity performed by a user is identified based on the sensor data. Features of the user are collected while performing the activity and a subject of focus of the user is determined based on the collected features. An outcome of the activity performed by the user is predicted based on the features and the determined subject of focus.

Computer-implemented system and method for predicting activity outcome based on user attention

A method and system for editing a shader. The method comprises providing a graph () corresponding to the shader (e.g. a shader graph). The graph () comprises a plurality of entities (), for example shader nodes, which are connected together by one or more edges (). One or more of the entities each include a respective variable parameter. The method further comprises sending, from an editor entity (-), to an entity () within the graph (), a message, the message specifying a change in a value of the variable parameter of that entity (); responsive to the entity () receiving the message, changing the variable parameter of that entity (), thereby providing a changed graph; and modifying the shader based on the changed graph.

Shader editing

A computer-implemented system and method for providing contextually relevant task recommendations to qualified users is provided. Sensor data is collected for a user. The user's location is determined and subsequently, an activity of the user is determined based on the sensor data and the location. Two or more recommendable items are scored based on the activity and one or more of the recommendable items with the highest scores are selected. Finally, one or more recipients qualified to perform each of the recommendable items are identified.

Computer-implemented system and method for providing contextually relevant task recommendations to qualified users

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for providing context-based web services to a user. During operation, the system may receive a sentence as input from a user. The system may determine a sentence structure of the sentence, and determine whether there is an entry in a database corresponding to the sentence structure. Responsive to determining that there is no entry in the database corresponding to the sentence structure, the system may engage in a dialog with the user. The system may extract one or more parameters of the sentence based on information from the dialog. The system may obtain contextual and background information associated with the parameters. The system may then determine a set of arguments based on the parameters and the contextual and background information, and interact with web services to perform an action and provide a response to the user.

Intelligent contextually aware digital assistants

User privacy while browsing the Internet can be preserved by reversing the man-in-the-middle attack using a distributed network of proxy servers. The proxy servers receive user requests to load webpages of interest to a user and simulate the user's web-browsing activity by retrieving the target webpage from a target server. The proxy servers remove elements that could be used to track the user from the retrieved webpages by creating a representation of a version of the page without the tracking elements, which is provided to the user. By interacting with the target servers, the proxy servers protect the user from being tracked by the target servers. Further, by observing the user's browsing activity, the proxy servers can build a profile of the users that can be used to supplement content provided to user. The user can edit the profile and thus can control the information stored on the network.

System and method for proxy-based privacy protection

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for generating a message. During operation, the system receives user interaction event data. The user interaction event data describes explicit or implicit interactions of a user with a web application and/or mobile application. Next, the system modifies a graph describing the user's current context associated with the user based on an analysis of the user interaction event data, as interpreted by the system learning from previous processing of user interaction event data. The context graph includes information about the user's state, behavior, and interests, and some or all portions of the context graph may be shared between users. The system determines a set of rules associated with a group of users that includes the user, and then applies the determined set of rules to any context graph associated with the user to generate the message.

Rule-based messaging and dialog engine

A computer-implemented system and method for providing contextual media tagging for selective media exposure is provided. A media file is maintained in a database. Contextual information is generated for a user. The media file is associated with the user contextual information, and the media file is shared to individuals in a social network of the user based on the user contextual information.

Computer-implemented system and method for providing contextual media tagging for selective media exposure

One embodiment of the present invention provides a recommendation system. During operation, the system receives context information associated with the user, updates a plurality of user models based on the received context information, and identifies at least one spatial data structure that stores a plurality of items. A respective item is stored within the spatial data structure based on a vector value associated with the item. The system then queries the spatial data structure to obtain a first set of recommendable items that have vector values within a predetermined range, calculates a score for each item within the set of recommendable items based on the plurality of the user models and a characterization vector associated with each item, ranks the items within the set of recommendable items based on calculated scores, and recommends one or more top-ranked items to the user.

Generalized graph, rule, and spatial structure based recommendation engine

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for providing context-based web services for a user. During operation, the system receives a sentence as input from a user. The system performs natural language processing on the sentence to determine one or more parameters. The system retrieves data from a foreground knowledge graph containing contextual data for the user and from a background knowledge graph containing background information corresponding to the parameters. The system determines a set of arguments based on the parameters and/or data from the foreground knowledge graph and/or data from the background knowledge graph. The system then selects an action module based on results of the natural language processing and/or the set of arguments. The system passes the arguments to the action module. The action module then uses the arguments to respond to a question or interact with web services to perform an action for the user.

A system that facilitates interaction with a 3-dimensional (3-d) virtual environment is described. In this system, a controller device provides information associated with the 3-d virtual environment to a first display. Furthermore, the system includes at least one portable electronic device, which includes a second display and a 3-d motion sensor that detects motion of the portable electronic device, such as: linear motion, rotational motion and/or a gesture. This portable electronic device communicates the detected motion to the controller device. In response, the controller device provides a subset of the 3-d virtual environment and associated context-dependent information to the portable electronic device, which are displayed on the second display.

System for interacting with objects in a virtual environment

One embodiment of the present invention provides a system for sharing annotated videos. During operation, the system establishes a real-time video-sharing session between a remote field computer and a local computer. During the established real-time video-sharing session, the system receives a real-time video stream from a remote field computer, forwards the real-time video stream to a local computer to allow an expert to provide an annotation to the real-time video stream, receives the annotation from the local computer, and forwards the annotation to the remote field computer, which associates the annotation with a corresponding portion of the real-time video stream and displays the annotation on top of the corresponding portion of the real-time video stream.

Growing community of inventors

Los Gatos, CA, United States of America

Michael Roberts