System and Method for Managing Touch Screen Multiplayer Poker

Abstract

An method invention is disclosed where a network of touch screen computers used to play poker against other people who may or may not also be using touch screen computers is managed. The invention provides a mechanism to manage said network of touch screen poker computers from any location using a Web browser. The invention allows the graphics, animation and textual information displayed on said touch screen poker computers to be updated within minutes without intervention at the location of the touch screen poker computer.

1 . A method in a data processing system for managing touch screen enabled online poker devices from a central location comprising: A database for storing information on touch screen poker devices; A collection of program modules presented as web pages for accessing and maintaining information on touch screen poker devices; An internet Web server used to communicate with the database; An interface program running on touch screen poker devices to communicate with the database service via the Internet Web server; A communication language to receive commands from the internet Web server to processing by the interface program.  
   
   
       2 . The method as in  claim 1  wherein each touch screen poker device contains a unique identification number that identifies the device.  
   
   
       3 . The method as in claims  1  and  2  wherein a record is stored in a database for each touch screen poker device which is uniquely identified by the unique identification number referred to in  claim 2 .  
   
   
       4 . The method as in  claim 3  wherein the record stored in the database contains information related to the physical location of the device and a reference to a record identifying the images and programmable regions on the touch device.  
   
   
       5 . The method as in  claim 1  wherein a record is stored in the database that defines all information required to acquire and display images on the touch screen poker device.  
   
   
       6 . The method as in claims  1  and  5  wherein a string of commands is transferred from the internet Web server to the interface program running on the touch screen poker devices at one time that includes all action commands required to display graphics, animation, and textual information on the screen and process information received by the interface program when the user touches a screen.  7 . The method as in claims  1  and  6  wherein the interface program running on the touch screen poker computer processes the string of commands transferred to it can continue operations without additional configuration commands from the network until changes are made to the configuration command string.  
   
   
       7 . The method as in claims  1  and  6  wherein the interface program running on the touch screen poker computer processes the string of commands transferred to it can continue operations without additional configuration commands from the network until changes are made to the configuration command string.  
   
   
       8 . The method as in claims  1 ,  5 , and  6  wherein the interface program running on the internet web server determines whether the string of commands referred to in  claim 6  needs to be retransmitted do to changes in database information.  
   
   
       9 . The method as in claims  1 ,  2 ,  3 , and  4  where the software installation process required to put the interface program on the touch screen poker computer automatically creates the unique identification number referred to in  claim 2  and the database record referred to in  claim 3 .  
   
   
       10 . The method as in claims  1 ,  5 , and  6  allowing an administrator of the system to define the images, animation and programming events required to display information on the touch screen poker computer using a Web browser.