Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

N. V. Philips' Gloeilampenfabricken

Yukiko Hase

Masao Ikezaki

Shotaro Tanaka

Hiroshi Sasanuma

Remote-controlled electronic equipment with a transmitting function is disclosed which comprises a remote-control signal receiving section for receiving a remote-control signal containing a device address of a desired piece of electronic equipment to be controlled and command information on a desired instruction, and a communication section for transmitting a signal frame assembled on the basis of decoded data of the remote-control signal. Further disclosed is a remote-control signal transmitter for use in controlling the electronic equipment wherein a remote-control signal transmitted from the transmitter contains a device address of a desired piece of the electronic equipment to be controlled and command information on a desired instruction. The present invention still further provides a distributed remote-control system comprising at least two pieces of the electronic equipment mentioned above, a common remote-control signal transmitter mentioned above, and a signal transmission line for connecting the electronic equipments to each other, wherein the desired piece of the electronic equipment is either directly controlled when a remote-control signal from the remote-control signal transmitter is received by the desired piece of the electronic equipment, or indirectly controlled when the remote-control signal is received by another piece of the electronic equipment connected to the desired piece of the electronic equipment through the signal transmission line.

Remote-controlled electronic equipment with a transmitting function

A communication control method for use in a communication system including a plurality of communication control apparatuses interconnected through an information transmission path, each of the communication control apparatuses including a packet transmission/reception unit, a timer unit and a controller unit. When a first communication control apparatus has become unable to perform communication due to accidental power-off or a power supply failure or the like in the course of communication with a second communication control apparatus (which has been brought into a locked state by the first communication control apparatus), the invention prevents the second communication control apparatus from being left permanently in the locked state. In that case, the second communication control apparatus transmits a lock confirmation packet to the first communication control apparatus to make lock confirmation as to whether the locked state is to be maintained, when the second communication control apparatus does not receive any communication packet from the first communication control apparatus for a predetermined period of time. When no reply to the lock confirmation is received or alternatively when an unlock authorization packet is received by the second communication control apparatus, the second communication control apparatus releases itself from the locked state.

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Machida, Japan

Yukiko Hase