Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Randal James Ramig

Michael P Calligaro

Akhilesh Kaza

Nimesh I Amin

Shawn T Oster

Jonathan D Sheller

Seana Seraji

Gunjan A Shah

Chee Heng Chew

Abolade Gbadegesin

David William Voth

Vinay Krishnaswamy

David B Wecker

Shawn Patrick Burke

Dominique Fortier

Jason William Fuller

Peter J Torr

Darin Miller

Jorge I Raastroem

Kunal Gandhi

Scott Andrew Borton

Aaron Samuel Filner

Rachel Jiang

Steven Bourne

Vijayendra Gopalrao Vasu

Timothy Michael Kurtzman

Anil Dhawan

Matthew G Lyons

Eric Lawrence Albert Lantz

Roberto Cazzaro

Alan C T Liu

Alper Selcuk

Vinoo Cherian

Alan Ct Liu

Diane L Curtis

A runtime management system is described herein that allows a hosting layer to dynamically control an underlying runtime to selectively turn on and off various subsystems of the runtime to save power and extend battery life of devices on which the system operates. The hosting layer has information about usage of the runtime that is not available within the runtime, and can do a more effective job of disabling parts of the runtime that will not be needed without negatively affecting application performance or device responsiveness. The runtime management system includes a protocol of communication between arbitrary hosts and underlying platforms to expose a set of options to allow the host to selectively turn parts of a runtime on and off depending on varying environmental pressures. Thus, the runtime management system provides more effective use of potentially scarce power resources available on mobile platforms.

Controlling runtime execution from a host to conserve resources

The subject disclosure is directed towards a technology by which background application code (e.g., provided by third-party developers) runs on a mobile device in a way that is constrained with respect to resource usage. A resource manager processes a resource reservation request for background code, to determine whether the requested resources meet constraint criteria for that type of background code. If the criteria are met and the resources are available, the resources are reserved, whereby the background code is ensured priority access to its reserved resources. As a result, a properly coded background application that executes within its constraints will not experience glitches or other problems (e.g., unexpected termination) and thereby provide a good user experience.

Constrained execution of background application code on mobile devices

A declared origin policy may be provided. First a plurality of records comprising addresses that an application is allowed to access may be received. The received plurality of records may be placed in a manifest. Then, a request containing an address may be received and compared to the plurality of records in the manifest. Access to the address may be allowed when one of the plurality of records in the manifest matches the address or when an ambiguity is encountered as to whether the one of the plurality of records in the manifest matches the address. Access to the address may be denied when none of the plurality of records in the manifest matches the address. Moreover, any request to change any of the plurality of records in the manifest may be denied when the application is updated, uninstalled, or reinstalled.

Declared origin policy

Dynamically magnifying search results and enabling motion-based review of the search results. The user enters a query to search the content of a document. As the characters of the query are entered by the user, the search results are identified and magnified such that all the search results after any given input character are visible in the user interface. The user advances through the search results by moving the computing device in a predefined manner. In an embodiment, the user searches the content of a web page rendered in a browser executing on a mobile computing device such as a telephone.

Motion-based data review and zoom

A security element is displayed that provides information to a user to help ensure that they are not confused or misled into believing that content originates from a trusted source when in fact it does not. The security element shows the user the source of the content and is displayed in such a manner that the source of the content is easily viewable. For example, according to one embodiment, the security element is shown within the title bar of a window. The security element may also be temporarily shown. Providing the user with more information about the site being accessed helps them to make an intelligent decision about their browsing experience. The security element includes at least part of a domain name that identifies the source of the content. The security element may also include the entire domain name. For example, the security element may overlay the screen.

Displaying a security element to help detect spoofing

A communication protocol for use between serially chained portable pendant peripherals and a portable host device. The bus communications system protocol enables multiple low power input/output peripherals to communicate over a bi-directional data line with a portable host device such as a PDA or cellular phone. A message packet data structure for use in the bus communications system includes a device identifier, a packet type identifier, and message data bits. The packet type identifier describes the actions associated with the packet. A method determines whether the message packet received by a device is intended for the device by evaluating if the device identifier is zero. If the device identifier is other than zero, the method modifies the device identifier and communicates the message packet to another device in the bus communications system.

System and method for pendant bus for serially chaining multiple portable pendant peripherals

Host name data is 'looped-back' from a native host name resolver included in a requesting computer system to a name resolution port that is also included in the requesting computer system. A replacement host name resolver monitors the name resolution port for host name data that is incompatible with name resolution techniques utilized by a network. The replacement host name resolver modifies the otherwise incompatible host name data for compatibility with name resolution techniques utilized by the network. Modifying host name data may include changing a transmission protocol associated with the host name data or formatting non-secure host name data for resolution with secure host name resolution techniques. The replacement host name resolver redirects compatible host name data to a module that may cause the host name data to be resolved into a network address. The network address may be provided to the native host name resolver.

Resolving host name data

A trusted component on a device includes a secure HWID therein and is verified by obtaining a key from the device, and verifying each signed component of the operating system of the device therewith. A driver table is examined to locate a HWID driver which is verified as containing a pointer back to an address inside a kernel. The verified operating system is called to obtain the secure HWID from a HWID component by way of the HWID driver and to return same to the trusted component. Thereafter, the returned HWID is verified as matching the HWID included with the trusted component.

Providing a secure hardware identifier (HWID) for use in connection with digital rights management (DRM) system

Upgrading a non-volatile memory image such as a flash ROM is accomplished by partitioning the flash ROM into a plurality of flash ROM regions. One of the flash ROM regions is selected to receive the software upgrade, which can then be directly overwritten without having to overwrite the flash ROM image in its entirety. Through the use of an image buffer, which stores information about the ROM regions, it is possible to move ROM regions, delete ROM regions, add ROM regions, expand/contact ROM regions, update ROM regions, and enable/disable ROM regions without having to modify the entire ROM image or shadow parts of the ROM image in RAM. Additionally, security and registry information can also be logically linked to a particular region.

System and method for updating contents of a flash ROM

Growing community of inventors

Seattle, WA, United States of America

Randal James Ramig