Patent ID: 9304511
Filing Date: 2016-04-05
CPC Classification: G01D,G05B,G06F

Claim Text:
1. A method, in a data processing system, for virtualizing physical sensors and providing sensor data to a requestor using the virtualized physical sensors, the method comprising: obtaining, in the data processing system, sensor data from a plurality of physical sensors; storing the sensor data in a virtual sensor storage system of the data processing system in at least one standardized format; receiving, in the virtual sensor storage system, a request from a requestor for a first type of sensor data, wherein the request does not specify a particular physical sensor; retrieving, by the virtual sensor storage system, a portion of the sensor data stored in the virtual sensor storage system in response to receiving the request, wherein the portion of sensor data corresponds to the type of sensor data requested in the request from the requestor; and returning, by the virtual sensor storage system, the retrieved portion of the sensor data to the requestor in a format corresponding to a physical sensor configured to provide the requested type of sensor data, wherein: the sensor data is obtained via one or more standardized sensor interfaces that provide a communication pathway between the plurality of physical sensors and the virtual sensor storage system at least by identifying a constraint associated with a subset of the sensor data as specified by a supplier of the subset of the sensor data, the request is received from the requestor via one or more standardized application programming interfaces (APIs), and storing the sensor data in a virtual sensor storage system comprises storing an identification of the constraint in association with the subset of the sensor data in the virtual sensor storage system, wherein the constraint specifies a limitation as to which requestors may be provided the associated subset of the sensor data.