Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Toshihiko Oda

Eiichi Katoh

All the devices connected to a network are detected and profiles comprising information relating to categories of the detected devices are extracted. Integrated profile comprising information obtained by integrating the profiles of the devices is created. A table containing priority rankings for the use of the devices is created. A user interface enabling necessary categories to be selected from the categories which comprise the integrated profile is created, the execution conditions required by the user are input via this user interface and a device to be used is selected out of all the devices based on the selected categories and the table containing the priority rankings.

Method and apparatus for selecting a device and a computer product

An operation of describing a document link for linking a first document of a link source and a second document of a linking destination. An abstract link is described in the first document of the link source, and the abstract link describes a link establishing condition for determining the document link between the first document of the link source and the second document of the linking destination on a basis of a retrieval of document information of the first document of the link source and the second document of the linking destination.

Document link description/generation method, apparatus and computer program product

A storage management is carried out in an information processing system in which a program including functions each treating a list structure data is executed. The storage management method includes the steps of generating list cells in a cell storage area so that the list cells are successively arranged therein while a function is being executed, and of collecting disused list cells from the cell storage area when execution of the function is completed, each of the disused cells being defined as a list cell that will not be used in the program, so that the disused list cells may be reclaimed in the cell storage area.

Method of garbage collection performed upon completion of function

A fault diagnosis expert system for locating and eliminating sources of a machine trouble. The system comprises a storage part for storing an expert knowledge constructed in a hierarchical search tree structure in which cause-to-effect links connecting high-level effect events to low-level cause events are pre-defined and all possible low-level cause events are pre-enumerated for each high-level effect event, a user interface part for providing a user with questions and responses regarding the state of the machine trouble, an inference part for inferring a cause of the machine trouble with the expert knowledge and the user information, and an outputting part for allowing inference results from the inference part to be displayed for the user. The expert knowledge includes a cause candidate criterion pre-defined as an event used for selection of searching paths when the inference part makes a decision as to which path of the search tree should be traced back. The cause-to-effect links include an identifier indicative of a difference between self-dependency causes and other-dependency causes.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Toshihiko Oda