Colin D Mccartney, Age 595249 S Graham St, Seattle, WA 98118

6362819, Mar 26, 2002

Oct 16, 1998

09/174083

Ketan K. Dalal - Seattle WA
Colin D. McCartney - Kirkland WA

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06F 1500

345423

A method, system and computer-readable medium for tessellating textures and mapping the resulting texture fragments onto the surface geometries of a three-dimensional model is disclosed. First, a texture is fragmented into texture fragments based on rasterization requirements. Then, the corresponding surface geometry of the three-dimensional model is fragmented so as to correspond to the texture fragments and each texture fragment is mapped to a corresponding surface geometry fragment. This process is repeated for each viewable geometric surface of the three-dimensional model that is to be textured. Thereafter, the three-dimensional model is displayed with the texture fragments mapped to the surface geometries. Prior to the mapping, the polygons, e. g. , triangles, that define the surface geometries that are divided by the boundaries between texture image fragments are reconstituted as new, smaller triangles.

6363404, Mar 26, 2002

Jun 26, 1998

09/105831

Ketan K. Dalal - Seattle WA
Anthony L. Willie - Kirkland WA
Colin D. McCartney - Kirkland WA
Robert M. Heddle - Kirkland WA

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06F 1720

707513, 345582, 345760, 345848

A method, system and computer-readable medium for providing user-interfacing within textures of three-dimensional models. A processor with hardware and software components stores one or more markup documents with one or more user-interface element that may be a link element in one or more texture image files of predefined three-dimensional model(s). Then, the processor generates a three-dimensional model(s) for display on a display device based on predefined three-dimensional model information, predefined viewpoint information and the one or more markup documents stored in the one or more texture image files. Users can cause the processor to generate a new markup documents as texture by selecting a link element displayed within the three-dimensional models texture.

6496864, Dec 17, 2002

Dec 29, 1998

09/222062

Colin McCartney - Kirkland WA

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06F 1200

709226, 709104, 709205, 709206, 709223, 709238, 709239

The present invention relates to systems and methods for freeing shared resources that remain allocated to a particular resource allocating process after the resource allocating process has terminated. The invention is useful in a computer system where shared hardware is accessed via a shared hardware driver layer. The shared hardware driver layer interfaces with either a shared API layer or a nonshared API layer. Processes wishing to access the shared hardware access the hardware through either the shared or nonshared API layer. To release resources and destroy objects in either the shared API layer or the shared hardware driver layer, the present invention uses a helper process that cleans up after termination of the resource allocation process. The helper process first calls a cleanup function in the shared API layer to release resources and destroy objects in the shared API layer and associated hardware driver. The helper process then loads a copy of the nonshared API layer and makes a call to a similar cleanup function to release any remaining resources and destroy any remaining objects.

7038690, May 2, 2006

Feb 12, 2002

10/074286

Nicholas P. Wilt - Sammamish WA, US
Colin D. McCartney - Seattle WA, US

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06F 13/00

345537, 345535, 345539, 345503, 345629

Disclosed are methods and systems for interfaces between video applications and display screens that allow applications to intelligently use display resources of their host device without tying themselves too closely to operational particulars of that host. A graphics arbiter provides display environment information to the video applications and accesses the applications' output to efficiently present that output to the display screen, possibly transforming the output or allowing another application to transform it in the process. The graphics arbiter tells applications the estimated time when the next frame will be displayed on the screen. Applications tailor their output to the estimated display time, thus improving output quality while decreasing resource waste by avoiding the production of “extra” frames. The graphics arbiter tells an application when its output is fully or partially occluded so that the application need not expend resources to draw portions of frames that are not visible.

7239324, Jul 3, 2007

Feb 15, 2002

10/077568

Nicholas P. Wilt - Sammamish WA, US
Stephen J. Estrop - Carnation WA, US
Colin D. McCartney - Seattle WA, US

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06F 13/00

345535

Disclosed are methods and systems that allow video applications to merge their outputs for display and to transform the outputs of other applications before display. A graphics arbiter tells applications the estimated time when the next frame will be displayed on a display screen. Applications tailor their output to the estimated display time. When output from a first application is incorporated into a scene produced by a second application, the graphics arbiter “offsets” the estimated display time it gives to the first application in order to compensate for the latency caused by the second application's processing of the first application's output. A set of overlay buffers parallels the traditional buffers used to prepare frames for the display screen. In composing a frame, the screen merges video information from a traditional buffer with that from an overlay buffer, conserving display resources at the final point in the display composition process.

7315307, Jan 1, 2008

May 20, 2004

10/850129

Nicholas P. Wilt - Sammamish WA, US
Stephen J. Estrop - Carnation WA, US
Colin D. McCartney - Seattle WA, US

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06T 1/60

345530

Disclosed are methods and systems that allow video applications to merge their outputs for display and to transform the outputs of other applications before display. A graphics arbiter tells applications the estimated time when the next frame will be displayed on a display screen. Applications tailor their output to the estimated display time. When output from a first application is incorporated into a scene produced by a second application, the graphics arbiter “offsets” the estimated display time it gives to the first application in order to compensate for the latency caused by the second application's processing of the first application's output. A set of overlay buffers parallels the traditional buffers used to prepare frames for the display screen. In composing a frame, the screen merges video information from a traditional buffer with that from an overlay buffer, conserving display resources at the final point in the display composition process.

7315308, Jan 1, 2008

May 21, 2004

10/850793

Nicholas P. Wilt - Sammamish WA, US
Stephen J. Estrop - Carnation WA, US
Colin D. McCartney - Seattle WA, US

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G06T 1/60

345530

Disclosed are methods and systems that allow video applications to merge their outputs for display and to transform the outputs of other applications before display. A graphics arbiter tells applications the estimated time when the next frame will be displayed on a display screen. Applications tailor their output to the estimated display time. When output from a first application is incorporated into a scene produced by a second application, the graphics arbiter “offsets” the estimated display time it gives to the first application in order to compensate for the latency caused by the second application's processing of the first application's output. A set of overlay buffers parallels the traditional buffers used to prepare frames for the display screen. In composing a frame, the screen merges video information from a traditional buffer with that from an overlay buffer, conserving display resources at the final point in the display composition process.

7439981, Oct 21, 2008

Oct 21, 2004

10/970261

Nicholas P. Wilt - Sammamish WA, US
Colin D. McCartney - Seattle WA, US

Microsoft Corporation - Redmond WA

G09G 5/399

345539, 345545, 345589, 345530

Disclosed are methods and systems for interfaces between video applications and display screens that allow applications to intelligently use display resources of their host device without tying themselves too closely to operational particulars of that host. A graphics arbiter provides display environment information to the video applications and accesses the applications' output to efficiently present that output to the display screen, possibly transforming the output or allowing another application to transform it in the process. The graphics arbiter tells applications the estimated time when the next frame will be displayed on the screen. Applications tailor their output to the estimated display time, thus improving output quality while decreasing resource waste by avoiding the production of “extra” frames. The graphics arbiter tells an application when its output is fully or partially occluded so that the application need not expend resources to draw portions of frames that are not visible.