Patent ID: 8300010

Claim:
A method of communicating information from a host computer with a haptic device, comprising: a) Transmitting from the host computer to the haptic device an Initialize packet, where an Initialize packet comprises a sequence of bits having subsequences, in the following order: i) A subsequence indicating the start of a packet; ii) A subsequence identifying this packet as an Initialize packet; iii) A subsequence indicating a start code value for a sequence of code values; iv) A subsequence indicating a message; v) A subsequence indicating the end of a packet; b) After transmitting the Initialize packet, then transmitting from the host computer to the haptic device a Start packet, where a Start packet comprises a sequence of bits having subsequences, in the following order: i) A subsequence indicating the start of a packet; ii) A subsequence identifying this packet as a Start packet; iii) A subsequence indicating the start code value; iv) A subsequence indicating a message; v) A subsequence indicating the end of a packet; c) After a packet has been received from the haptic device at the host computer after the transmission of the Start packet, then transmitting from the host computer to the haptic device a first Command packet; where a Command packet comprises a sequence of bits having subsequences, in the following order: i) A subsequence indicating the start of a packet; ii) A subsequence identifying this packet as a Command packet; iii) A subsequence indicating the code value in the sequence of code values having a predetermined relationship to the code value in the previous packet transmitted from the host computer to the haptic device; iv) A subsequence indicating a message; v) A subsequence indicating the end of a packet; d) After a packet has been received at the host computer after the transmission of the preceding Command packet, then transmitting from the host computer to the haptic device a subsequent Command packet.