Patent Grant
11425261
There is a growing need to allow people to conduct conference calls in a cost-effective manner.
Methods, systems, and mobile communication devices as illustrated in the specification and/or the claims.
There may be provided a mobile communication device that may include a microphone, a speaker, an input output port and one or more modules; wherein the microphone may be configured to receive, during a conference call, (a) an acoustic signal from a first person, and (b) a cross echo from a speaker of another mobile communication device that participates in the conference call, the cross echo may be generated as a result of the acoustic signal from the first person; and wherein the one or more modules may be configured to cancel the cross echo based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person.
The input output port may be configured to receive a digital leakage signal; wherein the one or more modules may be configured to cancel the digital leakage signal based, at least in part, on the acoustic signal of the first person; and wherein the digital leakage signal may result from the acoustic signal from the first person and may be an output of a feedback path that may include the mobile communication device, the other mobile communication device and a mixer.
The microphone may be configured to receive an echo from the speaker, wherein the echo resulted from the digital leakage signal; and wherein the one or more modules may be configured to cancel the echo from the speaker based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person.
The digital leakage signal may result from a reception, by a mixer, of a digital output signal from the other mobile communication device; wherein the digital output signal may be generated by the other mobile communication device in response to the acoustic signal from the first person.
The microphone may be configured to receive an echo from the speaker; and wherein the echo resulted from the acoustic signal from the first person and may be an output of a feedback path that may include the mobile communication device, the other mobile communication device and a mixer.
The input output port may be configured to receive, from a further mobile communication device, a digital signal that may be related to acoustic signal generated by a further person.
The one or more modules may be configured to compensate for differences between delays associated with (a) a reception of traffic from the further mobile communication device by the mobile communication device and (b) a reception of traffic from the further mobile communication device by the other mobile communication device.
The one or more modules may be configured to change a signal may be provided to the speaker.
There may be provided a mobile communication device that may include a microphone, a speaker, an input output port and one or more modules; wherein the microphone may be configured to receive, during a conference call, (a) an acoustic signal from a first person, and (b) an echo from a speaker of the mobile communication device, the echo may be generated as a result of a digital leakage signal from another mobile communication device that participates in the conference call, the digital leakage signal may result from the acoustic signal of the first person; wherein the one or more modules may be configured to cancel the echo based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person.
The one or more circuits may be configured to change a signal that may be fed to the speaker.
The one or more circuits may be configured to cancel a signal that may be fed to the speaker.
There may be provided a method for participating in a conference call, the method may be executed by a mobile communication device that may include a microphone, a speaker, an input output port and one or more modules, wherein the method may include: receiving, by the microphone, during the conference call, (a) an acoustic signal from a first person, and (b) a cross echo from a speaker of another mobile communication device that participates in the conference call, the cross echo may be generated as a result of the acoustic signal from the first person; and cancelling, by the one or more modules, the cross echo based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person.
The method may include receiving by the input output port a digital leakage signal; cancelling, by the one or more modules, the digital leakage signal based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person; and
wherein the digital leakage signal may result from the acoustic signal from the first person and may be an output of a feedback path that may include the mobile communication device, the other mobile communication device and a mixer.
The method may include receiving, by the microphone, an echo from the speaker, wherein the echo resulted from the digital leakage signal; and cancelling, by the one or more modules, the echo from the speaker based, at least in part, of the acoustic signal of the first person.
The digital leakage signal may result from a reception, by a mixer, of a digital output signal from the other mobile communication device; wherein the digital output signal may be generated by the other mobile communication device in response to the acoustic signal from the first person.
The method may include receiving, by the microphone, an echo from the speaker, and wherein the echo resulted from the acoustic signal from the first person and may be an output of a feedback path that may include the mobile communication device, the other mobile communication device and a mixer.
The method may include receiving, by the input output port, from a further mobile communication device, a digital signal that may be related to acoustic signal generated by a further person.
The method may include compensating, by the one or more modules, for differences between delays associated with (a) a reception of traffic from the further mobile communication device by the mobile communication device and (b) a reception of traffic from the further mobile communication device by the other mobile communication device.
The method may include changing, by the one or more modules a signal may be provided to the speaker.
There may be provided a method for participating in a conference call, the method may be executed by a mobile communication device that may include a microphone, a speaker, an input output port and one or more modules, wherein the method may include receiving, by the microphone, during a conference call, (a) an acoustic signal from a first person, and (b) an echo from a speaker of the mobile communication device, the echo may be generated as a result of a digital leakage signal from another mobile communication device that participates in the conference call, the digital leakage signal may result from the acoustic signal of the first person; and cancelling, by the one or more modules, the echo based, at least in part, on the acoustic signal of the first person.
The method may include changing, by the one or more modules a signal may be provided to the speaker.
The method may include cancelling, by the one or more modules a signal may be provided to the speaker.
It will be appreciated that for simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements shown in the figures have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements may be exaggerated relative to other elements for clarity. Further, where considered appropriate, reference numerals may be repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements.
In the following detailed description, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the invention. However, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that the present invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known methods, procedures, and components have not been described in detail so as not to obscure the present invention.
The term “comprising” is synonymous with (means the same thing as) “including,” “containing” or “having” and is inclusive or open-ended and does not exclude additional, unrecited elements or method steps.
The term “consisting” is a closed (only includes exactly what is stated) and excludes any additional, unrecited elements or method steps.
The term “consisting essentially of” limits the scope to specified materials or steps and those that do not materially affect the basic and novel characteristics.
In the claims and specification any reference to the term “comprising” (or “including” or “containing”) should be applied mutatis mutandis to the term “consisting” and should be applied mutatis mutandis to the phrase “consisting essentially of”.
In the claims and specification any reference to the term “consisting” should be applied mutatis mutandis to the term “comprising” and should be applied mutatis mutandis to the phrase “consisting essentially of”.
In the claims and specification any reference to the phrase “consisting essentially of” should be applied mutatis mutandis to the term“comprising” and should be applied mutatis mutandis to the term “consisting”.
Any reference in the specification to a method should be applied mutatis mutandis to a system capable of executing the method.
Any reference in the specification to a system should be applied mutatis mutandis to a method that may be executed by the system.
The terms “cancellation”, “suppression” are used in an interchangeable manner.
The term “substantially” or “about” can refer to an accuracy (or deviation) of any value between 1 and 20 percent.
The term “proximate” may refer to a range of distances that may span, for example, between a fraction of a millimeter and less than 5 centimeters.
Any combination of any components of any of the devices and/or systems illustrated in any of the figures may be provided.
Any device, network, mixer, module and/or system that is illustrated in any of the figures may include additional components, may include alternative components, may include fewer components, may be limited to the components illustrated in the figure or may be essentially limited to the components illustrated in the figure.
There is provide a method for conducting conference calls using mobile devices and an additional mixer and/or network that may convey signals between the mobile device.
The mobile device may be a smartphone. Baby monitor, mobile devices used by public security officers, mobile gaming consoles, but any other mobile device that includes a speaker, a microphone and compensation modules (as illustrated below) can be used for conducting conference calls.
In various figures three persons participate in the conference call, wherein the first and second persons are at the same space/can be heard by each other. This is only for brevity of explanation. The number of participants in a conference call may exceed three. The participants may be arranged in other manners. For example—more than three participants may be located in the same room and more than a single participant may be located at another room.
Some of the various figures illustrates a single talking participant and other figures illustrated two persons that talk. It is noted that any combination of participants may talk at the same time.
In the various figures the first and second persons 11 and 12 are located at the same room and may be referred to as near end participants. The third person is located at another room and is referred to as a far end participant.
It should be noted that the persons may be located at any location—in or out a room.
The following signals illustrate various signals. The signals were named by names that may refer to (a) the person that either generated the signal or resulted in the generation of the signal, (b) the device that either received the signal or generated the signal, (c) a type of the signal—acoustic, digital, leakage or converted signal.
A converted signal may be outputted from a microphone and represents an acoustic signal received by the microphone. The converted signal may have also been processed by one or more modules such as signal processing modules including but not limited to filters and the like.
TABLE 1 lists some of the signals that are illustrated in the drawings:
First device 21 includes first microphone 41, first speaker 31 and first input output (I/O) port 51. Second device 22 includes second microphone 42 and second speaker 32 and second I/O port 52. Third device 23 includes third microphone 43 and third speaker 33 and third I/O port 53.
An input output (I/O) port may be any communication port—especially not an acoustic port. The I/O port may be, for example a wireless or wired communication port. The I/O port may be used for outputting digital signals and/or representations of digital signals. The/O port may be used to convey radio frequency (RF) signals and/or other signals.
There may be delays between the transmission and/or reception of signals between the mixer and each one of the first and second devices.
A difference between network delays from the mixer to the first and second device is denoted reception delay difference (Drx).
A difference between network delays from the first and second devices to the mixer is denoted transmitted delay difference (Drx).
The mixer may be located elsewhere, and may be replaced by one or more networks.
In
Near-end network may be a short-range network such as but not limited to Bluetooth, BLE, WI-FI, PROSE Relay from PSLTE, voice over IP etc.
As indicated above there may be a delay difference of Drx between signals 1131 and 1132. Unless compensated signals 1031 and 1032 may suffer from a delay difference of Drx.
The perceived speech quality and intelligibility decreases due to Drx.
Drx should be estimated and compensated in each near-end device or at least in one of the first and second devices
Drx may be estimated in various manners. For example—Drx may be estimated by cross correlation between signals 1031 and 1032 which are received by the microphones of both devices as echo. Additionally or alternatively, the correlation between 1031 and 1131 in the first device can be used to estimate the delay.
In circuit switched networks, this delay can be constant. In packet switched network (e.g. VOIP, VOLTE) the delay can be time variant and estimated continuously
Estimation module can get info from jitter buffer module that manages dynamic delays to avoid packet losses.
The jitter buffer mentioned above may be in the communication processor, in the Rx path, as an interface between the network. It is used to synchronized the order of received packets from the networks. The jitter buffer may be used to apply dynamic buffering to get rid of network delay variations.
Each one of the mentioned above or below AEC modules may operate on the digitally sampled audio signals of the communication device. The transfer function of the acoustic environment from the loudspeaker to the microphone on the device is estimated to cancel the received echoes from the microphone signal. The AEC may be or may include an adaptive filter. An adaptive filter is used in voice echo cancellation to accommodate the time varying nature of the echo path. The filter learns the path when the far-end speaker is talking and the near-end speaker is silent and adjusts its coefficients (transfer function) according to the algorithm optimization criterion.
Any AFC module may apply Non-Linear Processing. Non-linear processing is the removal of residual echo left by the adaptive filter (echo cancellation). Residual echoes are the un-modeled components of the echo path. Most adaptive filters are linear and can only cancel the linear portions of the echo path. Thus the nonlinear portions cannot be removed via the adaptive filter and a residual echo suppressor follows the filter to handle nonlinear portions of the echo that remain.
Drx estimation module 61 may estimate Drx using, for example correlation between converted third user second cross echo 1052′ and converted third user first device echo 1041′.
Additionally or alternatively, the correlation between 1031 and 1131 in the first device can be used to estimate the delay.
Delay unit Drx 62 may delay converted third user first device echo 1041′ before it is fed to first speaker in order to generate a third user first speaker acoustic signal 1031 that is Drx compensated.
The Drx compensation may be performed by the first device, by the second device or by both first and second devices.
There may be a delay difference of Dtx between signals 1111 and 1112. Without Dtx compensation the mixer 25 may mix time shifted signals and the third person will eventually receive a mixture of time shifted signals. The perceived speech quality and intelligibility decreases due to Dtx.
Dtx should be estimated and compensated in at least one of the first and second devices.
The first and second device may not be aware of Dtx but may estimate Dtx based on Drx.
The third device may can apply de-reverberation techniques to solve the problem.
The third device may estimate Dtx by analyzing signal 1310 and may send feedback to the first and second devices.
Dtx estimation module 63 may estimate Trx using, for example correlation between converted third user second cross echo 1052′ and converted third user first digital input signal 1131′.
Delay unit Trx 64 may delay a converted first user first microphone acoustic signal (converted by microphone from first user first microphone acoustic signal 1011) before it is fed to mixer in order to generate a first user first device digital signal that is Trx compensated.
The Trx compensation may be performed by the first device, by the second device or by both first and second devices.
In a hand-free mode there may be an echo due to the acoustic coupling between the microphone and the speaker of each device.
AEC165 may apply one or more linear and/or non-linear echo cancellation processes. Additionally or alternatively, AEC1 may apply linear and/or non-linear echo suppression processes. Non-linear echo components may result from non-linearity of the speaker transfer function and/or from vibrations of the device.
The third user first device echo 1041 is received by first microphone and is converted to converted third user first device echo 1041′. The third user first device echo 1041 is generated by first speaker 31 in response to third user first device digital input signal 1131. AEC1 performs echo cancellation after being fed by third user first device digital input signal 1131 and converted third user first device echo 1041′. The output of AEC165 is sent from first I/O port 51 to mixer 25.
A cross acoustic echo problem exists due to acoustic coupling between the speaker or one device and a microphone of another device. This is especially true when the first and second devices are expected to be at the same room and relatively proximate to each other (for example—less than 10 meters)—as the first and second persons need to use these devices during the conference call and may also need to hear each other without the aid of these devices.
The cross echo may be cancelled using at least one linear and/or non-linear echo cancel processes and at least one linear and/or non-linear echo suppression processes.
In addition, Drx should be compensated in the Rx path.
The non-linear cross echo is due to speaker non-linearity and non-linear differences due transmission links (between first and second device, mixer and third device) that may include vocoders and time-variant network delays.
Direct echo cancellation (AEC1) and cross echo cancellation (AEC2) can be done jointly using the same module when the delay is compensated correctly.
For example, assuming signals 1131 and 1132 are the same but with delay difference because of different network delays. First microphone 21 gets both the echo of 1131 and an echo of 1132. AEC1 aims to cancel the 1131-21 coupling while AEC2 aims to cancel 1132-21 coupling. Since 1131 and 1132 are the same with different delays, we can use a joint AEC to cancel jointly 1131-21 and 113-21 coupling using 1131 as reference to AEC.
The first microphone 41 may sense third user second cross echo 1052 and output a converted third user second cross echo 1052′. The converted third user second cross echo 1052′ may be fed to AEC2.
When the first person (or the second person) talks his speech (acoustic signal) is captured by first and second microphones of first and second devices (signals 1011 and 1012), causes digital signals 1111 and 1112 to be outputted from first and second devices to be sent to mixer and causes digital leakage signals 1141 and 1142 to reach second and first devices respectively. These digital leakage signals cause first and second speakers to output acoustic leakage signals 1013 and 1014.
The first and second persons perceives the acoustic leakage signals as unwanted delayed echo and can make the participation in the conference call impossible or non-tolerable.
The acoustic leakage signals may be cancelled by AEC3 using at least one linear and/or non-linear echo cancel processes and at least one linear and/or non-linear echo suppression processes.
AEC3 is the same module with AEC1. (Use of AEC3 is the most innovative part of the patent)
AEC3 may perform the echo cancellation and/or suppression using the correlation between the original speech (signals 1011 and 1012) and the output acoustic leakage signals 1013 and 1014.
AEC3 can be implemented a correlator as feedback detector and attenuator whenever feedback exists.
AEC3 may benefit from receiving an estimate of Dn. Dn may be estimated using cross correlation or any other method and need to be compensated.
Dn is the time for the transmission of: 1012-1112-1142 using the fact that 1011=1012. It is estimated by correlating converted version of 1011 and 1142.
The output of first microphone 41 is fed to delay unit Dn that sends a delayed signal (delayed by Dn) to AEC367. AEC3 also receives signal 1111 and perform echo cancellation and/or echo suppression to provide an output signal to speaker.
Dn estimation module 68 may estimate Dn by correlating between signals 1111 and 1142.
AEC2 may be the same as AEC1 and the same as AEC3. Regarding AEC3—AEC3 manipulates the input signal to the speaker and can even mute the speaker, because the first and second users may hear each other without the assistance of their devices—and thus can improve the echo cancellation in a substantial manner.
When first person talks and if the feedback is not cancelled with AEC3 or there exists some residual feedback, an echo signal (such as signals 1043 and 1044) from a speaker is received by the microphone of the same device. The content of the residual feedback depends on whether there is an AEC3 or not and if there—on the output of AEC3.
The echo may be cancelled and/or suppressed by first echo cancellation unit (AEC1) 65 that may apply one or more linear and/or non-linear echo cancellation processes. Additionally or alternatively, AEC1 may apply linear and/or non-linear echo suppression processes.
It should be noted that successful implementation of AEC3 may avoid the generation of acoustic leakage signals 113 and 1014.
The first user first device echo 1043 is received by first microphone and is converted to a converted first user first device echo that is fed to AEC165. AEC1 also receives first user second device digital leakage signal 1142.
When the first person talks signals 1031 and 1032 are received by the microphones of the first and second devices.
Digital leakage signals 1141 and 1142 may be used by the AEC1 of the first and second devices as echo references.
If the digital leakage signals 1141 and 1142 are not cancelled with any AEC3 then the desired signal (signals 1011 and 1012) may be suppressed by the AEC1 of the first and second devices due to the existence of non-zero value echo references-which are the digital leakage signals.
In AEC1, output of AEC3 which gets 1142 as input is used as reference signal. So when AEC3 does not cancel the signal completely, AEC1 will try to cancel the echo of the output of AEC3. On the other hand, the first person is still talking and generating 1011 as input to AEC1.
This generates a double talk situation which always exists when the first person is talking where AEC1 will do echo suppression and suppress the desired signal of the first person.
AEC1 should apply a double talk detection which can also detect feedback situation in order not to clip the desired speech of the first person,
This unwanted suppression of signals 1011 and 1012 may result in a reception, by the third person, of clipped and not intelligible speech signal 1410.
While using AEC3 the feedback will be cancelled and feedback-free signal will be used as reference to avoid clipping of the speech of the first person.
AEC1 may include additional control mechanism to avoid this clipping
The output of first microphone 41 is fed to AEC165. AEC165 is also fed with the output of AEC367. AEC165 outputs first user first device digital device output signal 1111.
AEC367 receives the first user second device digital leakage signal 1142 and receives (from delay unit Dn 69) a Dn-delayed first user first device digital device output signal 1111.
Delay unit Dn receives the estimate of Dn from Dn estimation module 68.
When the first person talks and if the feedback is not cancelled with AEC3 of the other device or there exists still some residual feedback, it is played to the speaker of one device out of the first and second devices and is received as a cross echo of a microphone of another device out of the first and second device. A first feedback path includes first microphone, first device to mixer, mixer to second device and second speaker—signals 1011, 1111, 1141 and 1054. A second feedback path includes second microphone, second device to mixer, mixer to first device and first speaker—signals 1012, 1112, 1141 and 1053.
There feedback paths result in a howling effect.
A cross echo (out of 1053 and 1054) may exist if the AEC3 of the device that outputted that cross echo did not exist or did not cancel the feedback completely.
Successful implementation of AEC3 in each of the first and second devices may avoid the generation of the cross echoes and thus avoid feedback and howling.
The howling may be cancelled by using linear and/or non-linear acoustic feedback canceller.
Feedback path includes 1011-1111-1141-1054 and feedback cancellation is done between 1011 and 1054—which is a delayed version of 1011.
Additionally or alternatively, the echo cancelling may be executed on 1111 (that results from 1011) and delayed version of 1111 (tat results from 1054).
Non-linear feedback is due to speaker non-linearity, vocoder and time-variant delay
The network delay need to be estimated using cross correlation or any other method.
An alternative method is a special linear and non-linear echo cancellation (AEC4) since the digital leakage signals 1142 and 1141 are correlated to the cross echoes 1053 and 1054.
AEC470 is fed by the converted signal from first microphone (a converted first used second device cross echo) and by a first user second device digital leakage signal 1142 and perform echo cancellation and/or echo suppression to output first user first device digital output signal 1111.
AFC 71 is fed by the converted signal from first microphone (a converted first used second device cross echo) and by delayed (by Dn) first user first device digital output signal 1111.
The input of delay unit Drx 62 is fed by first device input digital signals such as 1131. Delay unit Drx 62 performs Drx compensation. The duration of Drx can be learnt by Drx estimation module 61 that is coupled to Delay unit Drx 62.
The output of Delay unit Drx 62 is coupled to a first input of AEC367. AEC367 is also fed by the output of Delay unit Dn 69.
The output of AEC367 is fed to first speaker 31.
Delay unit Dn 69 compensates for network delays and is fed by Dn estimation module 68 (that estimates Dn) and by an output of AFC 71.
The output of first microphone 41 is fed to a sequence of three compensation modules that includes AEC165, AEC266 and AFC 71.
The output of AFC 71 is also fed to Delay unit Dtx 64. Delay unit Dtx 64 performs Dtx compensation and outputs a Dtx compensated signal to first I/O port 51. Delay unit Dtx 64 is also fed by Dtx estimation module 63. Dtx estimation module 63 estimated Dtx.
Any reference to the term “comprising” or “having” should be interpreted also as referring to “consisting” of “essentially consisting of”. For example—a method that comprises certain steps can include additional steps, can be limited to the certain steps or may include additional steps that do not materially affect the basic and novel characteristics of the method—respectively.
The invention may also be implemented in a computer program for running on a computer system, at least including code portions for performing steps of a method according to the invention when run on a programmable apparatus, such as a computer system or enabling a programmable apparatus to perform functions of a device or system according to the invention. The computer program may cause the storage system to allocate disk drives to disk drive groups.
A computer program is a list of instructions such as a particular application program and/or an operating system. The computer program may for instance include one or more of: a subroutine, a function, a procedure, an object method, an object implementation, an executable application, an applet, a servlet, a source code, an object code, a shared library/dynamic load library and/or other sequence of instructions designed for execution on a computer system.
The computer program may be stored internally on a non-transitory computer readable medium. All or some of the computer program may be provided on computer readable media permanently, removably or remotely coupled to an information processing system. The computer readable media may include, for example and without limitation, any number of the following: magnetic storage media including disk and tape storage media; optical storage media such as compact disk media (e.g., CD-ROM, CD-R, etc.) and digital video disk storage media; nonvolatile memory storage media including semiconductor-based memory units such as FLASH memory, EEPROM, EPROM, ROM; ferromagnetic digital memories; MRAM; volatile storage media including registers, buffers or caches, main memory, RAM, etc. A computer process typically includes an executing (running) program or portion of a program, current program values and state information, and the resources used by the operating system to manage the execution of the process. An operating system (OS) is the software that manages the sharing of the resources of a computer and provides programmers with an interface used to access those resources. An operating system processes system data and user input, and responds by allocating and managing tasks and internal system resources as a service to users and programs of the system. The computer system may for instance include at least one processing unit, associated memory and a number of input/output (I/O) devices. When executing the computer program, the computer system processes information according to the computer program and produces resultant output information via I/O devices.
In the foregoing specification, the invention has been described with reference to specific examples of embodiments of the invention. It will, however, be evident that various modifications and changes may be made therein without departing from the broader spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims.
Moreover, the terms “front,” “back,” “top,” “bottom,” “over,” “under” and the like in the description and in the claims, if any, are used for descriptive purposes and not necessarily for describing permanent relative positions. It is understood that the terms so used are interchangeable under appropriate circumstances such that the embodiments of the invention described herein are, for example, capable of operation in other orientations than those illustrated or otherwise described herein.
Those skilled in the art will recognize that the boundaries between logic blocks are merely illustrative and that alternative embodiments may merge logic blocks or circuit elements or impose an alternate decomposition of functionality upon various logic blocks or circuit elements. Thus, it is to be understood that the architectures depicted herein are merely exemplary, and that in fact many other architectures may be implemented which achieve the same functionality.
Any arrangement of components to achieve the same functionality is effectively “associated” such that the desired functionality is achieved. Hence, any two components herein combined to achieve a particular functionality may be seen as “associated with” each other such that the desired functionality is achieved, irrespective of architectures or intermedial components. Likewise, any two components so associated can also be viewed as being “operably connected,” or “operably coupled,” to each other to achieve the desired functionality.
Furthermore, those skilled in the art will recognize that boundaries between the above described operations merely illustrative. The multiple operations may be combined into a single operation, a single operation may be distributed in additional operations and operations may be executed at least partially overlapping in time. Moreover, alternative embodiments may include multiple instances of a particular operation, and the order of operations may be altered in various other embodiments.
Also for example, in one embodiment, the illustrated examples may be implemented as circuitry located on a single integrated circuit or within a same device. Alternatively, the examples may be implemented as any number of separate integrated circuits or separate devices interconnected with each other in a suitable manner.
Also for example, the examples, or portions thereof, may implemented as soft or code representations of physical circuitry or of logical representations convertible into physical circuitry, such as in a hardware description language of any appropriate type.
Also, the invention is not limited to physical devices or units implemented in non-programmable hardware but can also be applied in programmable devices or units able to perform the desired device functions by operating in accordance with suitable program code, such as mainframes, minicomputers, servers, workstations, personal computers, notepads, personal digital assistants, electronic games, automotive and other embedded systems, cell phones and various other wireless devices, commonly denoted in this application as ‘computer systems’.
However, other modifications, variations and alternatives are also possible. The specifications and drawings are, accordingly, to be regarded in an illustrative rather than in a restrictive sense.
In the claims, any reference signs placed between parentheses shall not be construed as limiting the claim. The word ‘comprising’ does not exclude the presence of other elements or steps then those listed in a claim. Furthermore, the terms “a” or “an,” as used herein, are defined as one or more than one. Also, the use of introductory phrases such as “at least one” and “one or more” in the claims should not be construed to imply that the introduction of another claim element by the indefinite articles “a” or “an” limits any particular claim containing such introduced claim element to inventions containing only one such element, even when the same claim includes the introductory phrases “one or more” or “at least one” and indefinite articles such as “a” or “an.” The same holds true for the use of definite articles. Unless stated otherwise, terms such as “first” and “second” are used to arbitrarily distinguish between the elements such terms describe. Thus, these terms are not necessarily intended to indicate temporal or other prioritization of such elements. The mere fact that certain measures are recited in mutually different claims does not indicate that a combination of these measures cannot be used to advantage.
While certain features of the invention have been illustrated and described herein, many modifications, substitutions, changes, and equivalents will now occur to those of ordinary skill in the art. It is, therefore, to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all such modifications and changes as fall within the true spirit of the invention.
While certain features of the invention have been illustrated and described herein, many modifications, substitutions, changes, and equivalents will now occur to those of ordinary skill in the art. It is, therefore, to be understood that the appended claims are intended to cover all such modifications and changes as fall within the true spirit of the invention.
This application claims priority from U.S. provisional patent Ser. No. 62/306,101 filing date Mar. 10, 2016.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6853626 | Farhang-Boroujeny | Feb 2005 | B1 |
| 7302652 | Chen | Nov 2007 | B2 |
| 7916671 | Zortea | Mar 2011 | B1 |
| 8184801 | Hamalainen | May 2012 | B1 |
| 8189766 | Klein | May 2012 | B1 |
| 8259926 | Avendano | Sep 2012 | B1 |
| 8340278 | Gowreesunker | Dec 2012 | B2 |
| 8520821 | Alexandrov | Aug 2013 | B2 |
| 8908881 | Sato | Dec 2014 | B2 |
| 9053697 | Park | Jun 2015 | B2 |
| 9118396 | Gudem | Aug 2015 | B2 |
| 10594358 | Cheung | Mar 2020 | B2 |
| 11070397 | Hemo | Jul 2021 | B2 |
| 11079471 | Guarin Aristizabal | Aug 2021 | B2 |
| 20110019810 | Alexandrov | Jan 2011 | A1 |
| 20110076939 | Sato | Mar 2011 | A1 |
| 20120128168 | Gowreesunker | May 2012 | A1 |
| 20120276961 | Momma | Nov 2012 | A1 |
| 20120288079 | Burnett | Nov 2012 | A1 |
| 20140329511 | Vesa | Nov 2014 | A1 |
| 20150011266 | Feldt | Jan 2015 | A1 |
| 20160012813 | Every | Jan 2016 | A1 |
| 20160127815 | Ookuri | May 2016 | A1 |
| 20170187415 | Choi | Jun 2017 | A1 |
| 20180048768 | Spittle | Feb 2018 | A1 |
| 20190379388 | Gao | Dec 2019 | A1 |
| 20200381009 | Penniman | Dec 2020 | A1 |
| 20210392445 | Oosugi | Dec 2021 | A1 |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62306101 | Mar 2016 | US |
