Patent ID: 8228808

Claim:
A communication device comprising: a discovery unit that discovers other communication devices on a network, wherein the discovery unit performs a plurality of discovery protocols of a plurality of types; a managing unit that manages the other communication devices by relating identifiers of the other communication devices to a discovery protocol type used by each of the other communication devices, according to a result of the discovery operation performed by the discovery unit using the plurality of discovery protocols; a determination unit that determines a target communication device which has been selected by a user among the other communication devices managed by the managing unit; and a selecting unit that selects a discovery protocol type used by the target communication device which is determined as the target communication device by the determination unit, wherein, during performing the plurality of discovery protocols, the discovery unit stops a sending process for sending an inquiry message by a discovery protocol type other than the discovery protocol type selected by the selecting unit and does not stop a receiving process for receiving a network-participation-notification message by the discovery protocol type other than the discovery protocol type selected by the selecting unit, and the discovery unit does not stop a sending process for sending an inquiry message by the discovery protocol type selected by the selecting unit and does not stop a receiving process for receiving a network-participation-notification message by the discovery protocol type selected by the selecting unit.