The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jul. 31, 2001
Filed:
Mar. 12, 1999
Richard Arthur Bickers, Bristol, GB;
Hewlwtt-Packard Company, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Abstract
The present invention provides methods and apparatus for locating target positions within an encoded data stream, where the encoded data stream incorporates special, reserved codewords to represent host data structure information, such as file marks and record boundaries. The encoded data stream can also only be read or decoded in the forwards direction. Incorporation of the special codewords obviates an index associated with the encoded data to support navigation within the encoded data stream. The methods and apparatus locate target positions by decoding the data until the target position is encountered, and provide mechanisms to enable location of target positions that are specified as being backwards, relative to a current position in the encoded data stream.