Koninklijke Philips Corporation N.v.

Amazon Technologies, Inc.

Qualcomm Incorporated

Hewlett-packard Development Company, L.p.

Philips Electronics North America Corporation

Palm, Incorporated

Other

Pieter Sierd Van Der Meulen

Sanjoy Ghosh

Aditi Chandrashekhar Dixit

Gerrit Ary Slavenburg

Yen C Lee

Gregory Robert Roelofs

Jeff Finkelstein

Vijay K Mehra

Matt W Crowley

Fransiscus Wilhelmus Sijstermans

Yong H Cho

Ben Combee

Russell Brenner

Speech processing tasks may be allocated at least partly to a local device (e.g., user computing device that receives spoken words) and at least partly to a remote device to determine one or more user commands or tasks to be performed by the local device. The remote device may be used to process speech that the local device could not process or understand, or for other reasons, such as for error checking. The local device may then execute or begin to execute locally determined tasks to reduce user-perceived latency. Meanwhile, the entire media input, or a portion thereof, may be sent to the remote device to process speech, verify the tasks and/or identify other user commands in the media input (or portion thereof).

Allocation of local and remote resources for speech processing

Avatar animation may be enhanced to reflect emotion and other human traits when animated to read messages received from other users or other messages. A message may be analyzed to determine visual features associated with data in the message. The visual features may be depicted graphically by the avatar to create enhanced avatar animation. A text-based message may include indicators, such as punctuation, font, words, graphics, and/or other information, which may be extracted to create the visual features. This information may be used to select visual features as special animation, which may be implemented in animation of the avatar. Examples of visual features include animations of laugher, smiling, clapping, whistling, and/or other animations.

Enhanced avatar animation

This disclosure is directed to migrating an avatar from a first computing device to a second computing device during a user interaction with the avatar, such as during a user-support session with the avatar. Migration includes depicting the avatar on the first device at a first time and then terminating the avatar on the first device and displaying the avatar on a second, different device at a second time. In some embodiments, the avatar may be migrated along with content. The first device may transfer data to the second device using a peer-to-peer transfer. In some embodiments, a remote computing device may facilitate the migration of the avatar and content between devices.

Multi-device user interface

Various media management techniques are described. A mobile computing device may comprise a metadata information database to store metadata, a media object database to store media objects, and a media content manager to couple to the metadata information database and the media object database. The media content manager may comprise a metadata manager to retrieve and associate metadata from the metadata information database with different media objects. The media content manager may further comprise a media object classifier to classify the media objects into hierarchical categories based on the metadata. The media content manager may still further comprise an album generator to generate a media album representing a hierarchical category. Other embodiments may be described and claimed.

Techniques for managing media content

Various embodiments of a panoramic display for a wireless device are described. In one embodiment, a wireless device may include a display comprising a plurality of display regions. The display regions may include a central display region and multiple lateral display regions arranged to provide a panoramic display. Image compression and/or scaling may be applied to media content that is to be displayed in one or more of the lateral display regions based on the proximity of the lateral display region to the edge of the display.

Panoramic display for a wireless device

A display system combines a graphic plane and a video overlay plane using color keys in the graphics plane. By time-averaging patterns of color keys in successive frames of the graphics plane, individual pixels of the graphics plane can be made to appear partially transparent. Using this technique, regions in the graphics plane (e.g., a menu) can be partially transparent with respect to the video overlay, and aliasing can be reduced by making selected pixels in the graphics plane partially transparent.

Video blending using time-averaged color keys

Presentation of advanced content items is selectively suspended and/or activated so as to manage system resources. In some embodiments, plug-in code is selectively activated based on prioritization schemes and responsive to resource usage, user input, and/or other conditions. For example, plug-in code can be selectively suspended when the advanced content being presented by the plug-in code is not in view (for example, if it has been scrolled off the screen); when the advanced content is brought into view, for example as a result of scrolling, the plug-in code is reactivated as appropriate and the presentation of the advanced content resumes. State information for suspended plug-ins can be stored so that upon reactivation, plug-in code resumes operation substantially where it left off.

Selective plug-in activation for resource-limited platforms

Various embodiments for providing directional commands for a mobile computing device are described. In one or more embodiments, a mobile computing device may comprise a keypad arranged to operate in multiple modes including a standard mode and a directional mode such as a gaming mode, for example. The standard mode may support all of the preset and programmable commands and functions typically provided for normal operation of the mobile computing device. The directional mode may associate certain directional commands with multiple keys and/or buttons of the keypad so that most keystrokes and keystroke combinations input by a user will be interpreted as a particular directional command. The directional mode may be used when running applications which respond primarily to directional commands such as gaming applications. Other embodiments are described and claimed.

Apparatus and methods for providing keypress commands and directional commands to a mobile computing device

Apparatus and methods for providing directional commands for a mobile computing device

A system, method, and article of manufacture suitable for transmitting a programmable message in place of or intermixed into a streaming media data stream to a receiving device upon receipt of an event is disclosed. The system comprises an Internet data communications network interface; at least one sending device, operatively connected to the data communications network interface and capable of transmitting a predetermined alert based on the event to a predetermined receiving device upon the occurrence of the event; a persistent data store comprising a predetermined set of selectively retrievable messages; a monitor operatively in communication with both the sending device and an Internet provider of a data stream, the monitor able to selectively access the messages resident on the persistent data store; and messaging software capable of detecting events, selecting at least one of the selectively retrievable messages based on the event, modifying the data stream in a predetermined manner with at least a portion of the selected retrievable message, and transmitting the modified data stream to a predetermined receiving device.

Method and system and article of manufacture for IP radio stream interception for notification of events using synthesized audio

Video is processed based on the color content of a video frame. A frame-specific or sequence-specific color cube is created in order to efficiently use the available bandwidth, and to efficiently carry out conventional video operations. The color cube is a statistically tuned subset of the original color space.

Video processing in PC uses statistically tuned color cube

A collection management system, or virtual jukebox, is provided for a collection of recordings that is independent of the physical media upon which the material is recorded. The system forms a part of a network that includes storage media and playback devices, and provides an easy to use system for collection cataloging, archiving, and retrieval. In a preferred embodiment, a collection management system resides on a consumer electronic (CE) device, or a personal or home computer (PC), and the collection includes recordings that are stored on one or more hard drives associated with the CE device or the PC. The collection management system includes a user interface that facilitates the retrieval of recordings for playback from one or more storage devices, based on an individual selection of genre, author, and so on. By storing the recordings on a hard disc drive or other mass storage device with an associated disk operating system, immediate access is available to each recording on the drive, and additional drives can be added to the system as new material is added to the collection.

Virtual jukebox

The instantaneous power consumption of an appliance is used to determine the status of the appliance, from which further actions may be taken. This invention is premised on the observation that most appliances have a characteristic power consumption pattern that can be used to determine the state of operation of the appliance. An electric coffee pot, for example, consumes high power substantially continuously during the brewing state, then reduces its power level, or power duration, or both, while keeping the pot warm, then terminates its power consumption when it is turned off. In like manner, the power consumption patterns of other appliances, such as toasters, washing machines, dryers, and so on may also be used to determine the state of each appliance. The communicated state may be used by a home-automation system to effect a variety of actions, including notifying the user, terminating the available power to the appliance, initiating an action by another appliance, and so on.

Growing community of inventors

Sunnyvale, CA, United States of America

Pieter Sierd Van Der Meulen