System and method for a thin-client terminal system with a local screen buffer using a serial bus

A thin-client system, comprising:

• a thin-client server system;
• and
• a thin-client terminal system comprising:
• a serial bus interface circuit configured to:
• communicate with the thin-client server system via a serial bus cable;
• and
• decode output data received from the thin-client server system that is Ethernet data encoded in a serial bus data format;
• and
• a thin-client control system communicatively coupled to the serial bus interface circuit and configured to:
• receive the decoded output data from the serial bus interface circuit;
• distribute the decoded output data for processing to a video processing system in the thin-client terminal system, the video processing system comprising a graphics display processing path and a full-motion video processing path;
• distinguish between video graphics data and full-motion video data within the decoded output data;
• process the video graphics data by the graphics display processing path;
• process the full-motion video data by the full-motion video processing path;
• receive input data from at least one serial interface connection in the corresponding thin-client terminal system;
• provide the input data to the serial bus interface circuit, the serial bus interface circuit being further configured to transmit the input data to the thin-client server system;
• and
• wherein the thin-client terminal system includes at least one of:
• a first thin-client terminal system directly connected to the thin-client server system, and
• a second thin-client terminal system including at least one of a USB connector and an Ethernet interface, through which the second thin-client terminal system connects to the thin-client server system via at least one of a USB hub, an Ethernet hub, and an Ethernet switch, and
• the thin-client server system configured to generate and transmit the output data to the thin-client terminal system.

A method of supporting a thin-client terminal system, wherein the thin-client terminal system includes at least one of:

• a first thin-client terminal system directly connected to a thin client server-system,
• a second thin-client terminal system including at least one of a USB connector and an Ethernet interface through which the second thin-client terminal system connects to the thin-client server system via at least one of a USB hub, an Ethernet hub, and an Ethernet switch, and
• wherein the thin-client server system is configured to generate and transmit output data to the thin-client terminal system, the method comprising:
• receiving, at a serial bus interface device of the thin-client terminal system, output data and commands from a thin-client server system, the output data corresponding to Ethernet data encoded according to a serial bus data format, the commands encoded according to a serial bus data format;
• decoding the output data and commands;
• distributing decoded video data for processing to a video processing system, the video processing system comprising a graphics display processing path and a full-motion video processing path;
• distinguishing between video graphics data and full-motion video data within the decoded video data;
• processing the video graphics data by the graphics display processing path;
• processing the full-motion video data by the full-motion video processing path;
• receiving input data from at least one serial interface connection in the thin-client system;
• providing the received input data to the serial bus interface circuit, the serial bus interface circuit being configured to transmit the received input data to the server system;
• encoding the received input data according to the serial bus data format;
• and
• transmitting, by the serial bus interface device, the encoded input data to the server system.