Patent ID: 8078742

Claim:
A method of recognizing in a network a plurality of simple and complex devices, each including at least one of a plurality of device types and a simple device description, the method comprising acts of: a first device of the plurality of simple and complex devices discovering at least one other device of the plurality of simple and complex devices, the plurality of complex devices including an extended device description; the first device requesting a simple device description for each discovered device for which the simple device description is required and receiving from the discovered device a simple device description message of a defined length, the message including the device type of the discovered device, the device types forming a predetermined hierarchy including one or more subsidiary device types depending on at least one other subsidiary device type and at least one basic device type, devices having a hierarchically lower device type are capable of controlling devices having hierarchically higher device type; and the first device requesting an extended device description from each discovered device for which the extended device description is required when the simple device description indicates that the extended device description is available, and receiving from the discovered device the extended device description message of a variable length, wherein the simple device description message is in the form of a token-compressed message compressed from a human-readable message format, each of the subsidiary device types inheriting properties of higher level device types on which the subsidiary device type depends.