Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer conferencing – Cooperative computer processing
Reexamination Certificate
1996-03-29
2001-01-09
An, Meng-Ai T. (Department: 2783)
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer conferencing
Cooperative computer processing
C345S215000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06173315
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to the field of application program sharing between computer systems. More particularly, this invention relates to communicating conference notifications to all participants within a computer conferencing session.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
A set of personal computers interconnected on a network can be effectively used as a data conferencing system. In such a system, each conference participant typically comprises a personal computer user having a computer, a screen display, a computer network interface and typically a mouse or cursor control device. Conference participants are linked together by a computer network. This network may comprise either a hardwired local area network (LAN) such as Ethernet, a telephone modem link or other conventional data communications network. Because the conference participants are linked via a computer network, the participants do not need to be located in the same physical space. Rather, an effective conference may be carried out as participants view common information on their local screen displays and manipulate information using their local cursor control devices or other input devices. The conference participants can concurrently communicate with each other via phone lines.
Several problems are present in these prior art conferencing systems. In a typical conferencing application, a group of conference participants linked via a network share common information pertaining to a particular meeting or topic under discussion. By sharing information between conference participants, each participant is able to view and manipulate the information dispersed during the meeting.
At times it is desirable for certain messages to be displayed to all participants of the conference. For example, a conference notification that a new participant has joined the conference is desirable. One prior art way of displaying a notification message is for each computer system to independently display its own dialog box, or dialog, to its screen display. Subsequently some users may use their input devices, such as a mouse, to acknowledge and remove the dialog. This may result in each participant viewing a different screen display from that of the other participants, and this may cause confusion among the participants.
FIG. 1
is a block diagram of the computer system hardware used in a computer system of the computer conference. The computer system
5
comprises a Bus
100
for communicating information between computer system components. These components coupled to Bus
100
include Processor
101
, which can be, for example, an i486™ or Pentium® brand microprocessor manufactured by Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, Calif. The i486 and Pentium marks are trademarks of Intel Corporation. Other system components include Random Access Memory (RAM)
102
, Read Only Memory (ROM)
103
, and mass storage device or disk drive
104
. The computer system
5
also includes display device
105
coupled to the Bus
100
for displaying information to a computer user, an alphanumeric input device
106
coupled to the Bus
100
for communicating information and command selections to the Processor
101
, a pointing device or cursor control device
107
coupled to the Bus
100
for communicating information and command selections to Processor
101
, and a signal generation device
112
coupled to the Bus
100
for communicating command selections to the Processor
101
. Display device
105
may be a liquid crystal device, cathode ray tube, or other suitable display device. Alphanumeric input device
106
is typically an alphanumeric or function key keyboard. Pointing device or cursor control device
107
is typically a mouse or trackball device allowing the computer user to dynamically signal the two dimensional movement of a visible symbol (i.e. cursor) on the screen display of display device
105
. Many implementations of the cursor control device
107
are well known in the art, including trackball, mouse, joystick, or special keys on the alphanumeric input device
106
capable of signaling movement in a given direction. Signal generation device
112
is typically implemented as a button or switch located on or near the cursor control device
107
.
The computer system
5
also includes a communication interface
108
. Communication interface
108
is coupled to communication medium
110
. Communication interface
108
provides a means for the computer system to communicate with a network of other computer systems. A variety of ways to network computers are well known in the art. These communication media
110
include well known Local Area Networks (LAN) such as Ethernet, Wide Area Networks (WAN), telephone modem links, or other well known and conventional computer networking technologies. The configuration and interconnection of computer system components as illustrated in
FIG. 1
is well known to those of ordinary skill in the art.
Computer system
5
is networked to one or more other computer systems
10
via the communication media
110
. The other computer systems
10
include hardware similar to that of computer system
5
.
In one configuration of a computer conference system, the computer system
5
is a host computer system and the other computer systems
10
are guest computer systems. The host computer system selects certain application programs for sharing with the guest computer systems. The data resides on the host computer system and graphics information corresponding to the data is communicated to the guest computer systems. In another conferencing configuration, shared data may reside on all computer systems.
FIG. 2
is a representation of the interaction of the software and operation systems of the host computer system
5
and the guest computer systems
10
. In one conferencing configuration, the host computer system
5
includes a message-driven operating system
220
, such as one of the Windows™ operating systems developed by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash. Windows is a trademark of Microsoft, Inc. In this conferencing configuration, the operating system is multitasking such that one task may run for a while, then another task may run for a while, and so on. Each task, or application program, will have an associated context, which may include register information, along with privilege information, segmentation, and/or paging information, as is well-known. Information about tasks and their context can be found in various texts, for example, “Windows™ Internals,” by Matt Pietrek, published by Addison-Wesley Publishing Co. (1993), in particular, Chapter 3: Modules and Tasks.
The host computer system
5
includes one or more application programs
230
-
235
, which include application code
230
a-
235
a.
Application code
230
a
is associated with an application message queue
230
b,
application code
231
a
is associated with an application message queue
231
b,
and so forth. In one conferencing configuration, application message queues
230
b-
235
b
are part of the operating system
220
.
Application codes
230
a-
235
a
and the application message queues
230
b-
235
b
are interactively coupled together. Each time one of the application codes
230
a-
235
a
is ready for processing a new message, it requests from the operating system the next message of its associated message queue. The operating system in turn accesses the appropriate application message queue and provides the next message in the appropriate message queue to the corresponding application code.
The host computer system includes a host application sharing engine (HASE)
240
, which is an application program. The HASE
240
is coupled to the operating system
220
and display drivers
250
.
Each of the guest computer systems
10
include a guest application sharing engine (GASE)
260
, an operating system
270
, and display drivers
280
. The GASE
260
is interactively coupled to the operating system
270
, and the operating system
270
is interactively coupled to the display drivers
280
. The guest computer systems may also include
An Meng-Ai T.
Blakely , Sokoloff, Taylor & Zafman LLP
Intel Corporation
Patel Gautam R.
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