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Limiting device function

1. R I Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 5 of 8 US 2003 0133573 1 20 PC ADAPTER CARD 0 DEVICE SPECIFY FEATURES OF ELECTRONIC DEVICES THAT MUST BE CONTROLLED IN A CERTAIN ENVIRONMENT SPECIFY WHAT POWER LEVEL THE SPECIFIED FEATURES MAY USE TRANSMIT POWER CONTROL MESSAGES AT A GIVEN FREQUENCY FROM A CONTROLLER IN THE ENVIRONMENT TO ELECTRONIC DEVICES HAVING A RECEIVER SET TO THE SAME FREQUENCY HAS THE ENVIRONMENT CHANGED FIG 7 US 2003 0133573 A1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 6 of 8 Patent Application Publication 6 Old SNOLVLINTT 13A3 1 YIMOd ANY HLM 9N0TV 391A30 OL NOLLONYLSNI 2 WOISAHd SONIS U3ARIG 391 30 071 J9VSSJW SNLVLS YOUYF HLIM W31SAS ONILVYIdO ON OL GNOdS3H 01135 9V14 50 15 YIMOd 9V14 11915 YIMOd SLI S193dSNI HAC FOIAIC 83 80 FOIAIC 0 1 FHL OL GNYWIWOJ 52 55 W31SAS 9NIIVd3d0 WILSAS 9 2 0 FHL 01 453 7027 JHL SANIS ONY FOIAIC 0 1 FHL ASN OL LSINOFY S31VH3N39 NY avus 8 9H JOINIG 9INOULO313 FHL NI 3f 34 HOV 401 SOV H SNLVIS INIYENI 6125 YIN 73 237 SS3THUIM YING u341934 SSTTHUIM FHL OL JOVSSAN TOHINOO FHL ILVIINNNNOD 29 55 47 TOYLNOD H3MOd V 199130 77 2377 FHL 5304 AON
2. US 20030133573A1 as United States a2 Patent Application Publication Pub No US 2003 0133573 A1 Himmel et al 43 Pub Date Jul 17 2003 54 LIMITING DEVICE FUNCTION Publication Classification OD Int O istos entes H04L 9 00 75 Inventors Maria Azua Himmel Yorktown 52 U Sly recette tbe 380 258 Heights NY US Herman Rodriguez Austin TX US Newton James Smith 57 ABSTRACT DS Jay A system method and computer program product that send wireless control messages to electronic devices such as audio and video recorders cameras radios televisions Correspondence Address mobile phones portable or handheld computers and per Jeffrey L Streets sonal digital assistants that have come within an environ Suite 355 ment or that are in an environment that changes In such an 13831 Northwest Freeway environment a wireless receiver in the mobile electronic Houston TX 77040 US device receives the control messages In a hardware imple mentation electronic gates are set to disable the one or more 73 Assignee INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS features of the device In a software implementation current MACHINES CORPORATION power status flags are set in a memory device within the ARMONK NY US mobile electronic device to a reduced power setting Outside the environment the electronic gates or power status flags 21 Appl No 10 046 998 revert to full power The device driver for each feature of the mobile electron
3. 17 2003 then communicates the instruction to set one or more electronic gates wherein setting the one or more electronic gates determines whether the one or more components can be operated Preferably the method further includes reset ting the one or more electronic gates to a default condition if the wireless receiver has not received the instruction to limit operation within a preset time period The electronic device may be mobile or stationary and is preferably selected from a telecommunication device such as a phone camera audio recorder video recorder pager and a com puter 0009 In an alternative embodiment the method com prises broadcasting a wireless control message within a broadcast range or environment established by a controlling system wherein the control message includes an instruction to limit operation of one or more components or functions within the mobile electronic device When the mobile elec tronic device is located within the designated broadcast range the wireless receiver of the mobile electronic device receives the limiting instruction The limiting instruction is then communicated from the wireless receiver to one or more device drivers in the mobile electronic device that operate the one or more components Device drivers in the mobile electronic device are configured to receive com mands from the operating system to specifically control a device Commands or programming instructions that are delive
4. Internet browser programs and so forth Device drivers 33 are also provided in memory for controlling operation of the display 26 keyboard 28 audio generator 38 and other I O devices not shown 0037 The H PC 20 has a power supply 34 which is implemented as one or more batteries or fuel cells The power supply 34 might further include an external power source that overrides or recharges the built in batteries such as an AC adapter or a powered docking cradle 0038 FIG 3 is a schematic diagram of a first embodi ment of a computer 120 having a wireless digital receiver 128 for receiving control messages from a transmitter 130 of a control system 122 Similar to the handheld computer of FIG 2 the computing device 120 has a processor 22 an interrupt controller 23 an internal or external memory 24 a display device 26 and an alphanumeric input device 28 such as an optional keyboard An operating system 30 one or more applications 32 and one or more device drivers 33 are resident in the memory 24 and executed on the processor 22 The components of the computer 120 communicate over the internal bus 25 0039 The control system 122 includes a digital transmit ter or transceiver 130 and an input output controller 132 such as a computer that operates the transmitter The input output controller 132 is responsible for managing the control messages that are broadcast by the digital transmit ter 0040 FIG 4 is a schematic diag
5. the control message includes an instruction to limit operation of one or more components within the elec tronic device receiving the instruction in the wireless receiver when the device is located within the broadcast range Jul 17 2003 communicating the instruction from the wireless receiver to one or more device drivers that operate the one or more components and refusing commands delivered to the one or more device drivers that violate the instruction 7 The method of claim 6 further comprising restoring full operation of the one or more components if the wireless receiver does not receive a further instruc tion to limit operation within a preset time period 8 The method of claim 6 wherein one of the components is a power supply 9 The method of claim 6 wherein the instruction sets a power level for one or more components 10 The method of claim 6 wherein the command origi nates from an application program to request use of one of the components 11 The method of claim 6 wherein the instruction limits operation of two or more of the components 12 The method of claim 6 wherein the instruction provides messages to two or more device drivers and wherein the messages are selected from enable a driver disable a driver or combinations thereof 13 The method of claim 12 further comprising automatically enabling each of the device drivers when the wireless receiver has device drivers that have not receiv
6. However unlike FIG 9 the process involves the use of gates between the system bus and the individual I O devices or features of the mobile electronic device Accordingly after the operat ing system issues a command to the I O device driver in state 232 the I O device in state 260 sends a physical I O US 2003 0133573 A1 operation instruction addressed to the physical I O device In state 262 it is determined whether the gate is closed I O device enabled from the system bus to the I O device to which the I O operation instruction is directed If the gate is not closed I O device disabled then no further action is taken in state 238 If the gate is closed then in state 264 the I O device or feature receives and executes the operation instruction This process is repeated each time an application generates an I O request since the status of the gates may change at any time in accordance with the process in FIG 10 0050 It will be understood from the foregoing descrip tion that various modifications and changes may be made in the preferred embodiment of the present invention without departing from its true spirit It is intended that this descrip tion is for purposes of illustration only and should not be construed in a limiting sense The scope of this invention should be limited only by the language of the following claims What is claimed is 1 A method for external control over operation of an electronic device havin
7. a computerized notepad or the like 0034 Handheld computing device 10 has a casing 12 and an LCD liquid crystal display 14 with a touch sensitive screen mounted in the casing 12 A stylus 16 may be used with the device to enter data through the touchscreen display 14 The handheld computing device 10 can also be imple mented with a wireless transceiver internal such as an IR infrared transceiver and or an RF radio frequency trans ceiver coupled to antenna 18 0035 FIG 2 5 a block diagram showing the functional components of the handheld computing device 20 It has a processor 22 a memory 24 a display 26 an optional keyboard 28 and a communications port 36 in communi cation with an internal system bus 25 The memory gener ally includes both volatile memory 24 e g RAM and non volatile memory 35 e g ROM PCMCIA cards hard disk drives An operating system 30 is resident in the memory 24 and executes on the processor 22 The H PC 20 preferably runs the Palm OS operating system from Palm Computing Incorporated However the handheld computing device may be implemented with other operating systems such as Windows CE or Linux 0036 One or more application programs 32 are loaded into memory 24 and run on the operating system 30 Examples of applications include email programs schedul ing programs PIM personal information management pro Jul 17 2003 grams word processing programs spreadsheet programs
8. 10084 222 22 77 YITIOUINOD AV1dSIQ LdNYYILNI 30 3 IndW Nga LENGTE 22 mam em ia mum dan se am AY m ums ov ms US 2003 0133573 A1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 4 of 8 Patent Application Publication 1 J i 1 t 4 1 i 4 1 4 i 1 1 1 t i 4 J 1 1 n i 1 t i 1 i ee m XA L 308844 111 0 1 3O0V4U31NI di 73 737 tn vm 1 1 1 4 YFTIOULNOD 22 SNE 9 U3LIMWSNVUL TVLISIG l amp 3AH934 WLI 1 1 I I I I I 1 1 i 1 I 1 I I I t i 1 I i 1 1 1 I I 1 i 1 i I 3 i I 1 1 1 1 I I i j 1 H 1 i 1 L OE W31SAS TOHLNOD 1
9. 3 2 Description of the Related Art 0004 The improvements to mobile electronics devices such as portable CD players mobile telephones and hand held computers has led to their widespread use without regard for the location of use The ability of these mobile electronics devices to be taken and used almost anywhere is very convenient but there are times and places where use of these devices is inappropriate or dangerous Warning signs and announcements are typically used to instruct users to turn off these devices in restricted areas but compliance with these instructions is primarily left to the user 0005 Examples of areas where use of mobile electronics devices is inappropriate include concert halls movie the atres and libraries Examples of areas where use of mobile electronics devices is dangerous include aircraft hospitals and automobiles While self policing of usage restrictions has been the primary means for limiting use of these devices there have also been a few attempts to impose electronic restrictions on the devices themselves 0006 Presently there are a few systems suitable for the very limited purpose of limiting radio wave communica tions Even though some of the methods accomplish this result through the use of interference signals of different or even stronger radio waves none of these attempts addresses the larger problem of limiting the use of a variety of mobile electronics devices without creating secon
10. 3n0341 TOUINOO FHL JV G9A9038 S39VSS3AI TOYLNOD 807 3 237 7 FHL YOLINOW 2905 01 13471 5 70 2 00 143 LNOIWIL Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 7 of 8 US 2003 0133573 1 216 210 BE TIMEOUT PERIOD THE CONTROL FREQUENCY 250 CLOSE ALL GATES TO H0 DEVICES DEVICES NABLED DOES THE RECEIVER DETECT A CONTROL MESSAGE COMMUNICATE THE CONTROL MESSAGE TO THE GATES WIRELESS RECEIVER SETS GATE FROM SYSTEM BUS I O DEVICE FOR EACH FEATURE IN THE ELECTRONIC DEVICE FIG 10 Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 8 of 8 US 2003 0133573 1 AN APPLICATION GENERATES A REQUEST TO USE THE 1 0 DEVICE AND SENDS THE REQUEST TO THE OPERATING SYSTEM OPERATING SYSTEM ISSUES COMMAND TO THE 1 0 DEVICE DRIVER 0 DEVICE DRIVER SENDS PHYSICAL YO OPERATION INSTRUCTION ADDRESSED TO THE PHYSICAL 1 0 DEVICE IS THE GATE FROM RESPOND TO THE SYSTEM BUS TO NO OPERATING SYSTEM THE 1 0 DEVICE CLOSED WITH ERROR OR DEVICE ENABLED STATUS MESSAGE YES 1 0 DEVICE RECEIVES AND EXECUTES THE OPERATION INSTRUCTION FIG 11 US 2003 0133573 A1 LIMITING DEVICE FUNCTION BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 0001 1 Field of the Invention 0002 The present invention relates to methods and appa ratus for limiting the use of electronic devices in a certain environment or location 000
11. communication with a control system 0018 FIG 5 is a schematic diagram of the digital trans ceiver in a handheld computer receiving a control message from a control transmitter 0019 FIG 6 is a schematic diagram of a PC adapter card that embodies the hardware embodiment of the present invention 0020 FIG 7 is a flowchart for a method used by a control system to transmit control messages 0021 FIG 8 is a flowchart for a first embodiment of a control management process for use by a handheld com puter 0022 FIG 9 is a flowchart for a first embodiment of a method for using an input output device that is in commu nication with the handheld computer 0023 FIG 10 is a flowchart for a second embodiment of a control management process for use by a handheld com puter 0024 FIG 11 is a flowchart for a second embodiment of a method for using an input output device that is in com munication with the handheld computer DETAILED DESCRIPTION 0025 The present invention provides a system that sends wireless control messages to mobile electronic devices within a given range or environment As the mobile elec tronic device is brought within the range or environment a wireless receiver in the mobile electronic device receives the control messages and restricts the use of one or more features accordingly For example the control message may turn off power to the display of a mobile telephone or reduce the power level t
12. dary problems and none address restricting these devices as changes occur in the environment in which the device is operating 0007 Therefore there 15 a need for a system method and computer program product that allow a control system to impose usage restrictions upon mobile electronics devices that come within a broadcast range of the control system There is also a need to impose usage restrictions at the individual feature or component level so that other features on the same mobile electronic device that do not violate the usage restrictions can continue to be used It would be desirable if the system automatically imposed the restric tions without relying upon user intervention or program ming It would also be desirable if the system allowed the full use of individual features to be restored automatically upon removing the mobile electronics device from the restricted environment SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 0008 The present invention provides a method for exter nal control over operation of an electronic device having a wireless receiver The preferred method includes broadcast ing a wireless control message within a broadcast range established by a controlling system wherein the control message includes an instruction to limit operation of one or more components within the electronic device The instruc tion is received in the wireless receiver when the device is located within the broadcast range The wireless receiver Jul
13. e features and power levels to be controlled state 204 provides for the control system to transmit control messages at a given frequency to mobile electronic devices having a receiver set to the same fre quency In state 206 it is determined whether the environ ment has changed in a manner that would change the control message For example the environment in an aircraft is different during takeoff than it is during flight If the envi ronment has not changed in this manner then control returns to state 204 to again transmit the same control messages If the environment has in fact changed then control is passed to state 200 so that the control system can again specify the features and the power levels that should be controlled 0046 FIG 8 5 a flowchart for a software embodiment of a control management process for use by a mobile electron ics device such as a handheld computer In state 210 a receiver in the handheld computer is monitored for control messages at the control frequency It is then determined in Jul 17 2003 state 212 whether the receiver has detected a control mes sage If no control message is detected in state 212 the state 214 provides for all current status flags to be set to their previous level and state 216 provides a wait state for a timeout period However if a control message is received then in state 218 the control message is communicated to the wireless receiver driver Then in state 220 the wi
14. ed a wireless control message in a preset period of time 14 The method of claim 6 wherein the electronic device is selected from a phone camera audio recorder video recorder and a computer 15 A computer program product including instructions embodied on a computer readable medium the instructions comprising broadcasting instructions for broadcasting a wireless con trol message within a broadcast range established by a controlling system wherein the control message includes a limiting instruction to limit operation of one or more components within the electronic device receiving instructions for receiving the limiting instruc tion in the wireless receiver while the device is located within the broadcast range and setting instructions responsive to the limiting instruc tions for setting one or more electronic gates in the electronic device that control operation of the one or more device components 16 The computer program product of claim 15 further comprising resetting instructions for resetting the one or more elec tronic gates to a default condition if the wireless receiver has not receive the instruction to limit opera tion within a preset time period 17 The computer program product of claim 15 wherein the instruction limits operation of two or more of the components within the electronic device 18 The computer program product of claim 17 further comprising resetting instructions for automatically
15. g a wireless control message including operating limits for one or more components within the mobile electronic device communicating instruc tions for communicating the operating limits from the wire less receiver to one or more device drivers that operate the one or more components and refusing commands delivered to the one or more device drivers that violate the operating limits Optionally the computer program product will fur ther comprise restoring instructions for restoring full opera US 2003 0133573 A1 tion of the one or more components if the wireless receiver does not receive the operating limits within a preset time period 0013 The foregoing and other objects features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following more particular description of a preferred embodi ment of the invention as illustrated in the accompanying drawing wherein like reference numbers represent like parts of the invention BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 0014 FIG 1 5 an example of a prior art computer suitable for use in accordance with the present invention 0015 FIG 2 is a schematic diagram of a prior art computer system suitable for use in accordance with the present invention 0016 FIG 3 5 a schematic diagram of a first embodi ment of a wireless electronic device in communication with a control system 0017 FIG 4 is a schematic diagram of a second embodi ment of a wireless electronic device in
16. g a wireless receiver comprising broadcasting a wireless control message within a broad cast range established by a controlling system wherein the control message includes an instruction to limit operation of one or more components within the elec tronic device receiving the instruction in the wireless receiver while the device is located within the broadcast range and responsive to the instruction setting one or more elec tronic gates in the device that control operation of the one or more components 2 The method of claim 1 further comprising resetting the one or more electronic gates to a default condition if the wireless receiver does not receive the instruction to limit operation within a preset time period 3 The method of claim 1 wherein the instruction limits operation of two or more of the components within the electronic device 4 The method of claim 3 further comprising automatically resetting the one or more electronic gates to a default condition if the wireless receiver has not received a wireless control message in a preset period of time 5 The method of claim 1 wherein the electronic device is selected from a telephone camera audio recorder video recorder and a computer 6 A method for external control over operation of an electronic device having a wireless receiver comprising broadcasting a wireless control message within a broad cast range established by a controlling system wherein
17. handheld computer it should be recognized that the inven tion lends itself equally to control of other electronic devices having a wireless receiver and a processor that controls the operation of the electronic device specifically mobile tele phones It should be recognized that the present invention may be incorporated into many other types of electronic devices as well specifically including without limitation portable or handheld computers personal digital assistants cameras and audio and video recorders 0032 As used herein handheld personal computer H PC means a small general computing device having a processing unit that is capable of running one or more application programs a display and an input mechanism that is typically something other than a full size keyboard The input mechanism might be a keypad a touch sensitive screen a track ball a touch sensitive pad a miniaturized QWERTY keyboard or the like The term wireless as used herein shall be taken to include any communication means without wires such as radio frequency transmissions and infrared transmissions 0033 FIG 1 is an illustration of a handheld personal computer specifically a personal digital assistant PDA 10 such as the IBM WorkPad from International Business Machines Corporation However the invention is compat ible with other brands and types of handheld personal computers such as a personal organizer a palmtop com puter
18. ic device will reject I O operations incon 22 Filed Jan 16 2002 sistent with the current power status flags for that feature AN APPLICATION GENERATES A REQUEST TO USE THE 1 0 DEVICE AND SENDS THE REQUEST TO THE OPERATING SYSTEM IS POWER STATUS FLAG SETTO ON WITH ERROR OR STATUS MESSAGE 1 0 DEVICE DRIVER SENDS PHYSICAL 1 0 OPERATION INSTRUCTION TO I O DEVICE ALONG WITH ANY POWER LEVEL LIMITATIONS Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet of 8 US 2003 0133573 A1 10 16 FIG 1 Prior Art FIG 2 Prior Art US 2003 0133573 A1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 2 of 8 Patent Application Publication DH 508 TYNU3INI 201 ec AUOWSIA pz 80553909 U3IIWSNVHI YIN odd 79130 UJTIOUINOD9 66 8 7 AV 1dSIC ld NI Su3AIud 331 30 JOIN 1 021 0121545 DNUYYITO 20 SNOLLVON Idd 08 82 2 WHISAS TOYINOD HIINAdNOD 778 0 1 021 US 2003 0133573 A1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 3 of 8 Patent Application Publication YILLINSNVaL TVLOIG W3ISAS TOULNOD 1 QiuaWnNvHd TY 7 5 5 SNOLLY I TddV 0 HILNdWOD FTEYLYOd r Old TYNH3INI G2 Pe 259149 KZ HOVIN lt gt pz 8095
19. n accordance with the control message An example of a simple single frequency control message would essentially provide a series of three data bits representing the intended status of each latch For example a control message comprising on and off would indicate to have the power on and the read feature on but the write feature off When the power or feature is on the latch would be placed in such a position or condition so that the controller is in electronic commu nication with the corresponding adapter card pin that will be in communication with the bus 0044 FIG 7 is a flowchart for a method executed by a control system that includes a transmitter for broadcasting control messages In state 200 the control system specifies the features of mobile electronic devices that must be controlled in a certain environment The features specified may be the result of a user manual input to the system or a program established by a user to specify features to control on the basis of conditions or status of the environment In state 202 the control system specifies the power level that the specified features may use As with the specified features themselves the power level specified for each feature may be the result of a user manual input to the system or a program established by a user to specify the power level on the basis of conditions or status of the environment 0045 After specifying th
20. n program to request use of one of the components 25 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein the control message includes operating limits for one or more of the components 26 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein the operating limits includes operating limits for one or more of the components and wherein the operating limits are selected from enable a driver disable a driver or combina tions thereof 27 The computer program product of claim 26 further comprising enabling instructions for automatically enabling each of the device drivers when the wireless receiver has not received a wireless control message in a preset period of time 28 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein the electronic device is selected from a phone camera audio recorder video recorder and a computer
21. o a compact disc player 0026 In a software embodiment the control message received by the electronic device is used to set status flags in a memory device within the mobile electronic device in accordance with the desired control such as reduce a power Jul 17 2003 setting As the mobile electronic device is taken out of the range or environment the status flags revert to a normal or previous setting The device driver for each feature of the mobile electronic device will thus reject I O operations that are inconsistent with the current status flags for that feature 0027 Ina hardware embodiment the system may receive the control message and set one or more electronically controlled latches so that the subject I O device may not be addressed By relying upon hardware it is not necessary to change the device drivers to accept wireless control mes sages as is necessary with the software embodiment It is preferable in either the software or hardware embodiments to have the control messages transmitted at a standard frequency that is dedicated to control messages and to design the system to prevent the user from over riding the control messages 0028 The wireless control messages are transmitted from a transmitter located in the environment region location or facility where it is intended to limit operation of any or all of the mobile electronic devices Examples of locations where this ability to limit operation is useful incl
22. operating system 238 However if the power status flag is then in state 240 the I O device driver sends a physical I O operation instruction to the I O device along with any power level limitations This process is repeated each time an application generates an I O request since the power status flags may change at any time in accordance with the process in FIG 8 0048 FIG 10 is a flowchart for a second embodiment of a power management process for use by a handheld com puter The flowchart is substantially similar to the flowchart of FIG 8 and like numerals have been used to reference like steps However unlike FIG 8 the process involves the use of gates between the system bus and the individual I O devices or features of the mobile electronic device Accord ingly if the receiver does not detect a control message in state 212 then in state 250 the gates to the I O device are closed so that communication is allowed and the device is enabled Furthermore after communicating the instructions to the gates in state 251 the receiver sets the gates leading from the system bus to the I O device for each feature in the electronic device in state 252 0049 FIG 11 is flowchart for a second embodiment of a method for using an input output device that is in com munication with the handheld computer The flowchart is substantially similar to the flowchart of FIG 9 and like numerals have been used to reference like steps
23. ram of a second embodi ment of a computer 140 in wireless communication with the control system 122 The computer 140 is substantially similar to the computer 120 of FIG 3 except that the digital receiver 128 is in communication with an expansion bus 126 such as a USB or PCI bus that is in turn in commu nication with the internal bus 25 through a bridge 124 rather than communicating directly with the internal bus 25 By communicating with the expansion bus 126 the digital receiver 128 may take the form of an adapter card 0041 FIG 5 is a schematic diagram of the digital receiver 128 in the computer and the digital transmitter 130 in the control system It can be seen from the figure that the input output 150 address locations 152 and data 154 are carried from the I O controller of the control system to the FIFO buffer 158 which sends the data on to the multiplexer 160 under the control of the bus interface controller 162 The bus interface controller then directs information to the serializer 164 The serializer 164 then sends information to the transmitter driver 166 which then goes out as a wireless transmission 170 such as radio frequency waves or infrared light 0042 Incoming wireless transmissions 170 enter a receiver amplifier 172 and are deserialized in the deserial izer 174 Under the control of the bus interface controller 162 the deserializer 174 sends the deserialized data to the demultiplexer 176 The data then goes f
24. red from an application program or operating system to the one or more device drivers may then be refused by the device drivers if the commands violate the limiting instruc tions Application programs communicate with operating systems or device drivers rather than communicating directly with the device 0010 The method may further comprise restoring full operation of the one or more components if the wireless receiver does not receive the instruction to limit operation within a preset time period One of the components may be a power supply or other individual components or features of the wireless device Further the instruction may set a power level for one or more components 0011 The method may provide an instruction that limits operation of two or more of the components Optionally the instruction provides messages to two or more device drivers wherein the messages are selected from enable a driver disable a driver or combinations thereof It is preferred to automatically enable each of the device drivers when the device drivers have not received a wireless control message in a preset period of time Examples of mobile electronic devices include a mobile telephone camera audio recorder video recorder and a computer 0012 The present invention also provides a computer program product including instructions embodied on a com puter readable medium The instructions comprise receiv ing instructions for receivin
25. reless receiver driver sets current status flags for each feature in the mobile electronics device perhaps within individual I O device drivers It should also be recognized that since the control message is broadcast to a variety of types of mobile electronics devices it is preferred for the control message to include a full set of instructions for all features that should be controlled in any device Accordingly mobile electronic devices without one or more features will simple ignore that portion of the message and implement only the remaining portions of the message that are application to the device The process is repeated continuously while the mobile electronic device is turned on 0047 FIG 9 is a flowchart for a method of using an input output device that is in communication with the com puter In state 230 an application that is being executed in the processor of the computer generates a request to use the I O device and sends the request to the operating system In state 232 the operating system issues a command to the I O device driver Then in state 234 the I O device driver inspects its associated power status flag that was set in accordance with the process in FIG 8 A determination is made in state 236 whether the power status flag is set to on If the power status flag is not on then no further action is taken toward implementing the command made upon the I O device driver and a message is returned to the
26. resetting the one or more electronic gates to a default condition if the wireless receiver has not received a wireless control message in a preset period of time US 2003 0133573 A1 19 The computer program product of claim 15 wherein the electronic device is selected from a telephone camera audio recorder video recorder and a computer 20 A computer program product including instructions embodied on a computer readable medium the instructions comprising receiving instructions for receiving a wireless control message including operating limits for one or more components within the electronic device communicating instructions for communicating the oper ating limits from the wireless receiver to one or more device drivers that operate the one or more compo nents and refusing commands delivered to the one or more device drivers that violate the operating limits 21 The computer program product of claim 20 further comprising restoring instructions for restoring full operation of the one or more components if the wireless receiver does not receive the operating limits within a preset time period 22 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein one of the components is a power supply Jul 17 2003 23 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein the operating limits set a power level for one or more components 24 The computer program product of claim 20 wherein the command originates from an applicatio
27. rom the demulti plexer 176 to the FIFO buffer 178 to be made available to the portable computer s bus It should be noted that while the system of FIG 5 could be implemented as software rather than hardware the performance might be slower Furthermore both the control system transmitter 130 and the portable computer receiver 128 could also be provided in the US 2003 0133573 A1 form of transceivers The operation and use of the digital transceivers is described in U S Pat No 5 877 882 which patent is hereby incorporated by reference herein The architecture shown in FIG 5 permits clock variation between the computer and the wireless peripheral device Communication with devices made by different manufac turers is easily achievable since any device that conforms to the wireless link requirements can communicate with the computer 0043 FIG 6 is a schematic diagram of a PC adapter card that illustrates the hardware embodiment of the present invention The PC adapter card 50 includes a receiver 52 a controller 54 and an input output device 56 that is for purposes of illustration capable of both read and write operations Examples of such I O devices would include without limitation memory and external CD ROM drives The receiver 52 is in communication with a number of gates or latches shown here including a power latch 58 a read latch 60 and a write latch 62 The receiver receives the control message and sets the latches i
28. tter capability for the embodiments described herein 0030 In a software embodiment the digital protocol for the digital message may include any existing or future wireless communications protocol such as BLUETOOTH a trademark of Bluetooth SIG Inc which provides a short range transmission The BLUETOOTH Protocol Architec ture was developed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group to provide specifications for different protocol stacks having a common BLUETOOTH data link and physical layer BLUETOOTH is suitable for implementing close proximity wireless communications between devices Interoperable application programs can be written onto the BLUETOOTH protocol stack to provide customized usage models While BLUETOOTH is the preferred protocol other existing and future wireless protocols may also be implemented within the scope of the invention US 2003 0133573 A1 0031 The present invention may be implemented to control electronic devices having a wireless receiver and a microprocessor controller capable of executing an operating system When the electronic device is within proximity of a wireless control signal transmitter one or more features or devices of the electronic device can be controlled The electronic device receives the wireless control signals so long as the electronic device is within the range of the wireless transmissions While much of the following dis cussion describes the invention as implemented to control a
29. udes without limitation aircraft concert halls libraries and hos pitals The wireless control messages may include instruc tions for setting the power level of the entire mobile elec tronic device or setting the power levels of one or more individual features of the mobile electronic device Examples of individual features for which it may be desir able to limit power or otherwise control include without limitation speakers microphones transmitters and dis plays Furthermore these features may be included in vari ous mobile electronic devices including without limitation audio and video recorders cameras radios televisions mobile phones portable or handheld computers and per sonal digital assistants It is preferred that the transmitter broadcast the wireless control messages throughout the entire environment so that any and all of the mobile elec tronic devices entering the environment receive and imple ment the control messages As dictated by the dimensions or contents of the environment a plurality of transmitters may be used to broadcast the same or different control messages 0029 While it is possible to implement the control mes sage as an analog signal it is preferred to transmit the message as a digital signal Accordingly the mobile elec tronic device includes a receiver which may be implemented on a stand alone receiver or 8 transmitter receiver trans ceiver that does not make use of the transmi

Limiting device function

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