Patent ID: 7602756

Claim:
A process of automatically introducing a computing device into an ad hoc network of other peer computing devices, the process having an address phase, an announce phase, a discovery phase, a discovery response phase, and a device description phase, the process comprising: at the address phase, selecting by the computing device an address from a reserved range of addresses, pinging the selected address on the ad hoc network of other peer computing devices, and assigning the selected address to the computing device if there is no response to said pinging the selected address; at the announce phase, sending a multi-cast message by the computing device to said other peer computing devices on the ad hoc network of other peer computing devices announcing the address assigned to the computing device; at the discovery phase, listening by the computing device for a discovery message sent via multicast from a discovery client among said other peer computing devices, wherein the discovery message specifies a device type or capability desired by the discovery client; at the discovery response phase, upon receiving a discovery message whose specified device type or capability matches that of the computing device and having a discovery message identifier, sending a response message by the computing device identifying the address assigned to the computing device and the discovery message identifier; at the device description phase, responding by the computing device to a description request from another peer computer device on the ad hoc network of other peer computing devices with a description message defining computing device-specific protocol of data messages for interacting with the computing device to control operational functions of the computing device from the peer computer device on the ad hoc network of other peer computing devices.