User privacy preferences are consolidated for location-based services. A mobile user is able to control the service providers to which the mobile user's location is transmitted as well as control the service providers from which the user wishes to receive content. Service providers and other online vendors request the location and network identifiers of mobile users in order to provide the mobile users with content. The user's privacy preferences are described in a document that includes the loc...

A system and method is provided to display a common display page on a variety of display devices using the item's tab order property to determine the display order. Controls that are displayed on a display device typically have a tab order. When a window that has controls is displayed, the cursor is typically placed at the control with the lowest (i.e., first) tab order. When the user presses the tab key, the cursor moves to the control corresponding to the next lowest tab order. This allows the...

A user's media preferences can be obtained and stored for later use in setting up a currently-available media device. The media device inputs are programmed based on the media device's capabilities and the available media sources for the particular geographic area in which the user is currently located. Media device inputs may be set by the media device itself or by a computer attached to the media device, either directly or via a network. Device data, including information such as the number of...

An end-user or administrator is allowed to couple portlets in a portal through user interface events taking place on the portal display itself. When the portal is displayed, if the user actuates a control corresponding to a property in a portlet, a menu of actions that can be performed with that data by other portlets is provided to the user. In addition to this "conventional" manner, an alternative manner of actuating the component is provided to the user such that if the user actuates the cont...

An efficient testing method is provided for internationalized software executed in a plurality of language environments. The method includes mock-translating an externalized resource file written in a first language of the internationalized software by converting characters of the first language to characters of a second language based on a conversion table; and displaying output information from the internationalized software that performs processing by referring to the mock-translated test res...

Techniques are disclosed for efficiently updating rendered content (such as content of a Web page) using a "slow-loading" content element, such as a slow-loading image. A reference is embedded within the markup language notation for the content to be rendered, where this reference identifies the source of the slow-loading content element. Delivery of the slow-loading content therefore begins automatically, when the content is rendered. Event handling attributes are specified with the reference, ...

Techniques are disclosed for enabling users to define one or more areas of a graphical user interface ("GUI") as being "glue-like". When the user moves a pointing device (e.g., a mouse, joystick, track ball, etc.) and as a result, the graphical pointer moves into a painted area, the speed at which the graphical pointer will then traverse the GUI is programmatically slowed. Upon exiting the painted area, the graphical pointer speed is preferably restored to its prior setting. In this manner, the ...

Services deployed in a network computing environment (such as a Web services implementation model) are transparently extended. Preferably, handler components in an engine that processes requests and responses provide the extensions. A handler for outgoing messages adds the extensions to a response message that is created responsive to receiving a request message that asks for a service's available operations. A client receiving this response message can then invoke one of the extensions, without...

Techniques are disclosed for deterring theft of media recording devices. Input received from a sensor, or some portion of the input, is encrypted prior to storing a media file. A decryption key must be provided when the media file is to be played back. If the key is not provided, then the file is preferably still played back, but is played back in a degraded manner. For example, a background color or other filler may be rendered in place of the encrypted portion. Additional parts of the file may...

An output mechanism of a character recognition device includes a category classifier for classifying image data of characters to be recognized for each category recognized in character recognition processing, a clustering processor for determining feature values related to shapes of characters included in the image data in each category classified by the category classifier, and for classifying the image data into one or more clusters based on the feature values, and a screen creator for creatin...