Did You Know...
...that several people are credited with the invention of the flush toilet? Most people have heard of Thomas Crapper (1837-1910), the sanitary engineer who invented the valve-and-siphon arrangement that made the modern toilet possible. Another claimant to "the throne" was British inventor Alexander Cumming who patented a toilet in 1775. Then there's a nameless Minoan (a native of ancient Crete) who lived 4,000 years ago who supposedly was ahead of his time and created the first flush toilet!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 7921090 | Cluster delta push Methods and apparatuses for providing access to data in a cluster database are described. Embodiments of the invention include identifying situations in which many nodes require relatively equal access to a data block, and taking appropriate measures to improve the ... | 04/05/2011 |
| 7860940 | System and method for bus transmission cancellation A transmission cancellation section is provided on a bus connecting a master and a slave. During a reset of the master, the transmission cancellation section blocks the bus so that an invalid command flowing on the bus does not reach the slave and executes, instead ... | 12/28/2010 |
| 7844584 | System and method for persistently storing lock state information A system and method persistently stores lock state information associated with a file system within a storage system. Received operations that modify lock state information are stored in a non-volatile log (NVLog) within a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM) o... | 11/30/2010 |
| 7743039 | File operations with multiple level file locking techniques File systems which provide several different and improved locking capabilities. An application on a client workstation communicates through a client driver to a server which interfaces with a metadata database, which contains locking information about the files. App... | 06/22/2010 |
| 7640315 | Implementing locks in a distributed processing system A messaging scheme to synchronize processes within a distributed memory multiprocessing computer system having two or more processing nodes interconnected using an interconnect structure of dual-unidirectional links. Each unidirectional link forms a point-to-point i... | 12/29/2009 |
| 7562124 | Systems and methods for determining completion of building a presentation space in a TN3270 environment A method, system and article of manufacture for determining whether a presentation space (PS) is completely built in a TN3270 environment. In general, a TN3270 client is provided with an indication from a TN3270 server that a Systems Network Architecture (SNA) appli... | 07/14/2009 |
| 7389327 | Control and monitoring system for power system The object of the present invention is to make information necessary for judging whether control output is possible closer to the latest information than in the conventional method or made the latest, and shorten the time from control start to control execution. In ... | 06/17/2008 |
| 7369902 | Slave units and network system as well as slave unit processing method and device information collecting method A network system is constructed by connecting a safety PLC constituting a master unit and safety slaves 2 to each other through a safety network 3. The safety slaves each have a device information storage unit 25 for storing individual informati... | 05/06/2008 |
| 7363404 | Creation and management of destination ID routing structures in multi-host PCI topologies System and method for managing routing of data in a distributed computing system, such as a distributed computing system that uses PCI Express protocol to communicate over an I/O fabric. A physical tree that is indicative of a physical configuration of the distribut... | 04/22/2008 |
| 7343432 | Message based global distributed locks with automatic expiration for indicating that said locks is expired Described is a distributed lock processing technique that may be used to coordinate access to globally accessed resource between endpoints using the connecting message fabric. Processors in a data storage system communicate using the message switch of the message fa... | 03/11/2008 |
| 7328263 | Controlling access of concurrent users of computer resources in a distributed system using an improved semaphore counting approach A method of controlling concurrent users of a distributed resource on a network is disclosed. In one aspect, there are one or more local lock managers executing on corresponding hosts and cooperating as a distributed lock manager. The resource is limited to a maximu... | 02/05/2008 |
| 7313612 | Information management method in network system A terminal apparatus is capable of efficiently managing the status of shared device(s) on the network in a unified manner, constantly, with the latest status information, thereby permitting a user easily to understand the status of the desired shared device. For eac... | 12/25/2007 |
| 7293130 | Method and system for a multi-level memory A method and system is provided for a multi-level memory. The system includes an internal memory and an external memory. Data packets are received through one or more input ports and initially stored in the internal memory. A control unit determines whether there is... | 11/06/2007 |
| 7283621 | System for speech-enabled web applications Systems, methods, and structures are discussed that enhance media processing. One aspect of the present invention includes a data structure to enhance media processing. The data structure includes a terminal data structure to instantiate terminal objects and a speec... | 10/16/2007 |
| 7277972 | Data processing system with peripheral access protection and method therefor One embodiment of the present invention provides a flexible peripheral access protection mechanism within a data processing system (10) in order to obtain a more secure operating environment. For example, the data processing system may include a combination o... | 10/02/2007 |
| 7257619 | Bar code scanner and software interface interlock for performing encrypted handshaking and for disabling the scanner or input device in case of handshaking operation failure An interlocking architecture for a software interface and a bar code scanner. Upon power-up, a handshaking operation is performed between a scanner (1600) having a scanner processor (2600) and a computer processor (2612) of a computer (302 | 08/14/2007 |
| 7254452 | Distributed input/output control systems and methods Apparatus and methods for controlling a system that operates responsive to a plurality of input control signals are disclosed. During operation the system generates a plurality of output status/control signals. A master controller has at least first and second contr... | 08/07/2007 |
| 7248603 | Asynchronous pattern A system and method for converting code associated with synchronous method calls to code that can be employed to perform asynchronous method calls and for supporting such asynchronous method calls is provided. The system includes a pattern generator that can break c... | 07/24/2007 |
| 7246052 | Bus master and bus slave simulation using function manager and thread manager The system simulator comprises master simulators 1f, 1s, 2f and 2s for simulating a bus master, a slave simulator L for simulating a bus slave, a function manager F for sequentially actuating the master simulat... | 07/17/2007 |
| 7243131 | Information processing system using remote control, with device and method therefor A personal computer that is a controller transmits a reserve request for reserving a remote control. An MD recorder/player that is a target sets a reserve mode corresponding to the reserve request. The MD recorder/player prohibits another controller from performing ... | 07/10/2007 |
| 7236974 | System and method for a multi-level locking hierarchy in a database with multi-dimensional clustering A multi-level locking hierarchy for a relational database includes a locking level applied to a multi-dimensionally clustering table, a locking level applied to blocks within the table, and a locking level applied to rows within the blocks. The hierarchy leverages t... | 06/26/2007 |
| 7228547 | Method, system, and program for enabling access to a plurality of services Provided is a method, system, and program for enabling access to a plurality of services. A plurality of service class implementations is provided for services from different vendors, wherein each service class implementation provides an implementation of methods an... | 06/05/2007 |
| 7197585 | Method and apparatus for managing the execution of a broadcast instruction on a guest processor A method and apparatus for managing the execution on guest processors of a broadcast instruction requiring a corresponding operation on other processors of a guest machine. Each of a plurality of processors on an information handling system is operable either as a h... | 03/27/2007 |
| 7174410 | Method, apparatus and computer program product for write data transfer A first device is operable to communicate on an bus according to a first protocol. A bridge is also operable to communicate on the bus according to the first protocol. A second device is coupled to the bus via the bridge and operable to communicate according to a se... | 02/06/2007 |
| 7155516 | Method and apparatus for overflowing data packets to a software-controlled memory when they do not fit into a hardware-controlled memory A system for managing packets incoming to a data router has a local packet memory (LPM) mapped into pre-configured memory units, to store packets for processing, an external packet memory (EPM), a first storage system to store packets in the LPM, and a second storag... | 12/26/2006 |
| 7152125 | Dynamic master/slave configuration for multiple expansion modules A computing system having expansion modules. One of the expansion modules is identified as a master module. The other modules act as slaves to the master module. The central processing unit routes a task to either the master module for portioning out or to all of th... | 12/19/2006 |
| 7137028 | Method and apparatus for improving reliability in microprocessors A method and system provides an increased robustness and protection against the occurrence of soft errors in parallel connect functional redundancy checking processors. This is achieved by predicting in advance the likely occurrence of a soft error and its impact on... | 11/14/2006 |
| 7120505 | Safety network system, safety slave, and safety controller A safety network system is constructed by connecting a safety PLC to a safety slave through a safety network. The safety slave obtains safety input informations from a plurality of safety devices connected thereto and transmits information based on the plurality of ... | 10/10/2006 |
| 7110830 | Microprocessor system and method for protecting the system from the exchange of modules A microprocessor system includes a plurality of modules, among them a microprocessor and at least one storage module for storing the code and/or data for the microprocessor. Stored, in a non-changeable manner, in at least one of the modules, referred to as exchange-... | 09/19/2006 |
| 7110905 | Universal automated circuit board tester An apparatus and method for automatically testing circuit boards, such as computer system boards and the like. The circuit board device under test (DUT) is loaded into an automated test apparatus (tester), which includes a mechanism for automatically connecting test... | 09/19/2006 |
| 7109876 | Battery capacity indicator in a portable computing device Systems and methods for indicating the status of a battery in a portable computing device are disclosed. The methods include retrieving battery status data from a basic input-output system (BIOS) on the computing device, and comparing the retrieved battery status da... | 09/19/2006 |
| 7099978 | Method and system of completing pending I/O device reads in a multiple-processor computer system A method and system for completing pending I/O device reads by periodically stalling the issuance of I/O device accesses by a program in a multiple-processor computer system. ... | 08/29/2006 |
| 7093230 | Lock management thread pools for distributed data systems A distributed data system may include a plurality of nodes one or more of which may include at least one multi-threaded process operable to access portions of distributed data. A lock mechanism may grant locks to the multi-threaded processes for portions of the dist... | 08/15/2006 |
| 7089504 | System and method for embedment of emotive content in modern text processing, publishing and communication Aspects of the invention provide ways to include emotive content in written communication. The emotive content serves many needs not currently addressed in written word computer applications and text generation aids such as word processors, web publishers, email, fi... | 08/08/2006 |
| 7085867 | Methods and structure for SCSI2 to SCSI3 reservation protocol mapping Methods and associated structures for transparently mapping SCSI2 reservation protocol exchanges into corresponding SCSI3 reservation protocol exchanges. A mapping element may be operable within host systems that support SCSI2 reservation protocols. The mapping elem... | 08/01/2006 |
| 7082480 | Managing bus transaction dependencies A combination of techniques to prevent deadlocks and livelocks in a computer system having a dispatcher and multiple downstream command queues. In one embodiment, a broadcast transaction that requires simultaneously available space in all the affected downstream com... | 07/25/2006 |
| 7062750 | Accessing remote stores of source and symbol data for use by computing tools A system and method in which a remote network source maintains source code and symbol files for debugging purposes with automatic downloading of the correct files when they are needed. Files are remotely maintained based on unique data associated with that file (uni... | 06/13/2006 |
| 7050860 | Safety network system, safety slave, and communication method The safe PLC1 and the safe slaves 2 are connected with each other via the safe network 3. The safe PLC has the function of transmitting a request of safety information by broadcast message to the safe slaves. The safe slaves are each provided wi... | 05/23/2006 |
| 7013339 | Method to control a network device in a network comprising several devices A method to control a network device in a network comprising several devices includes a first controller that operates to prevent another controller from performing an unwanted overtaking of a network device that is currently controlled by the first controller. In o... | 03/14/2006 |
| 7002964 | Communication system, method for a communication system and controller for a communication system The present invention realizes a communication system and a method for a communication system including a source node, one or more destination nodes and a controller. The controller is adapted to notify the source node and the one or more destination nodes of first ... | 02/21/2006 |
