Abstract:
A method for verifying an operation in a wireless remote control system is disclosed, comprising the following steps: receive a control command with a server, and store the control command in the server; upon receiving an inquiry command from a relay device, the control command is sent to the relay device, and then sent to a home appliance to operate the home appliance accordingly; a state information is generated by the home appliance after performing the operation, and is sent to the server by the relay device; determine whether the server receives the state information; if so, a corresponding relation between the state information and the control command is established in the server; otherwise, the relay device is required to return the state information again, until the server does receive the state information. Whereby, the operation of the home appliance could be verified.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0001]    1. Technical Field 
         [0002]    The present invention relates generally to a system for controlling home appliances, and more particular to a method for verifying an operation in a wireless control system. 
         [0003]    2. Description of Related Art 
         [0004]    A remote control is a commonly seen component in present days to operate a home appliance wirelessly from a short distance. Typically, one remote control is matched with one home appliance in a one-to-one relation, which means that each home appliance has a specific remote control to control it. Therefore, with more home appliances in a home, there would be more remote controls to be placed. Furthermore, home appliances of the same type usually have similar looking remote controls, which may confuse the user. 
         [0005]    In light of this, a remote control system having a relay device is developed, which allows the user to access the system with an electronic device such as a computer or a mobile phone through a network. Within such a remote control system, the user could input a command on an electronic device, and this command would be then transmitted to the relay device. Upon receiving the command, the relay device would convert it into a control signal, and transmit the control signal to a specific home appliance. In this way, the user is able to control various home appliances with one single electronic device as a remote control. 
         [0006]    A server is required while transmitting such a command from an electronic device to a relay device through a network. However, after the server sends out the control signal, whether a corresponding operation of the home appliance is exactly performed might be unknown for the user. In all aspects, how to verify the operation of a home appliance in this type of remote control system has become a major issue in the industry. 
       BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0007]    In view of the above, the primary objective of the present invention is to provide a method for verifying an operation in a wireless remote control system, which may verify the operation of a home appliance corresponding to a control command is indeed performed. 
         [0008]    The present invention provides a method for verifying an operation in a wireless remote control system, wherein the wireless control system comprises a server, a relay device, and at least one home appliance. The server is connected to the relay device through a network. The relay device is wirelessly connected to the at least one home appliance. The method comprising the steps of: 
         [0009]    A. Receiving at least one control command with the server, and saving the at least one control command in the server; 
         [0010]    B. Generating an inquiry command by the relay device, and sending the inquiry command to the server; 
         [0011]    C. Sending the at least one control command stored in the server to the relay device according to the inquiry command; 
         [0012]    D. Sending the at least one control command from the relay device to the at least one home appliance to operate the at least one home appliance accordingly, and generating a corresponding state information by the at least one home appliance after performing a corresponding operation; 
         [0013]    E. Sending the state information from the at least one home appliance to the relay device; 
         [0014]    F. sending the state information from the relay device to the server; 
         [0015]    G. determining whether the server receives the state information; 
         [0016]    If so, establishing a corresponding relation between the state information and the at least one control command in the server; 
         [0017]    Otherwise, repeating step F and step G. 
         [0018]    Therefore, by sending the control command to the relay device and the home appliance by the server, receiving the state information from the home appliance, and establishing the corresponding relation between the state information and the control command, the operation of the home appliance could be verified whether to be performed or not. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0019]    The present invention will be best understood by referring to the following detailed description of some illustrative embodiments in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which 
           [0020]      FIG. 1  is a schematic diagram of the remote control system of an embodiment of the present invention; 
           [0021]      FIG. 2  is a block diagram of the control unit of the embodiment of the present invention; 
           [0022]      FIG. 3  is a block diagram of the relay device of the embodiment of the present invention; and 
           [0023]      FIG. 4  is a schematic diagram, showing the transmission of the control command and the state information. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
       [0024]      FIG. 1  shows a wireless control system applied with a method for verifying an operation in the wireless control system of an embodiment of the present invention, wherein the wireless control system includes a plurality of home appliances  10 , a relay device  20 , an access point  30 , an electronic device, which is a tablet  40  as an example, and a server  50 . 
         [0025]    In the embodiment, the home appliances  10  are home appliances installed at a user terminal, including an air condition, a fireplace, and a water heater. Each home appliance  10  includes a control unit  12 . As shown in  FIG. 2 , the control unit  12  has an RF transceiver  122 , a control circuit  124 , and a memory  126 . The RF transceiver  122  is adapted to transmit and receive radio frequency (RF) signals. The control circuit  124  is electrically connected to the RF transceiver  122  to receive RF signals sent from the RF transceiver  122 . Furthermore, the control circuit  124  would retrieve commands in the received RF signals to control the home appliances  10  accordingly, whereby the home appliances  10  could perform operations such as turning on/off and adjusting the temperature. The control circuit  124  would further compile and encapsulate a state information of each of the home appliances  10  into an RF signal, which would be then transmitted to the relay device  20  through the RF transceiver  122 . The state information may include a status of being on/off, a current temperature, an error code, etc. A plurality of appliance codes are stored in the memory  126 , wherein each of the appliance codes corresponds to one of the home appliances  10 . In the embodiment, each of the appliance codes contains a model and a series number of the corresponding home appliance  10 , wherein the model and the series number of each of the home appliances  10  are provided by the manufacturer, and are all different from each other. In other words, each of the appliance codes is unique. While compiling and encapsulating the state information of each of the home appliances  10 , the control circuit  124  would also incorporate the corresponding appliance code in, which could be used for identification. 
         [0026]    As shown in  FIG. 3 , the relay device  20  is located in the user terminal, and includes a RF transceiver  202 , a converter  204 , a Wi-Fi transceiver  206 , and a memory  208 , which is electrically connected to the converter  204 , wherein the RF transceiver  202 , the converter  204 , the Wi-Fi transceiver  206  are sequentially and electrically connected together. The RF transceiver  202  is adapted to receive the RF signals sent from the RF transceiver  122  of each of the home appliances  10 . The converter  204  could receive the RF signal sent from the RF transceiver  202 , retrieve the data contained in the received RF signal, and encapsulated it into a corresponding Wi-Fi signal, which would then be sent out through the Wi-Fi transceiver  206 . On the other hand, upon receiving a Wi-Fi signal, the Wi-Fi transceiver  206  would transmit the received Wi-Fi signal to the converter  204 , where the data contained in the Wi-Fi signal would be retrieved, and then encapsulated into a corresponding RF signal, which would then be sent out through the RF transceiver  202 . 
         [0027]    The Wi-Fi transceiver  206  has a MAC address, and the converter  204  would retrieve the MAC address and store it in the memory  208 . The MAC address is referred as a relay device code to exclusively represent the relay device  20 . With the MAC address as the relay device code, the relay device  20  could be distinguishable from other relay devices, if there are any. In practice, a series number designated by the manufacturer could be also stored in the memory  208  to be used as the relay device code. In addition, codes sent from the home appliances  10  and the state information of the home appliances  10  would be also stored in the memory  208 . 
         [0028]    The access point  30  is connected to the server  50  through a network, which is an Internet I, and is connected to the relay device  20  through Wi-Fi protocols. 
         [0029]    The tablet  40  is connected to the server  50  through the Internet I, wherein the tablet  40  has a built-in application, which is adapted for a user to input at least one control command (e.g. power on/off, adjusting temperature, etc.) of the home appliances  10 . The relay device code of the relay device  20  and the appliance codes of the home appliances  10  are also stored in the tablet  40 . The home appliances  10  could be controlled by the application of the tablet  40 . The inputted at least one control command could be transmitted to the server  50  through the Internet I, wherein the at least one control command transmitted by the tablet  40  includes the relay device code of the relay device  20 , at least one of the appliance codes of the home appliances  10 , and at least one command code of the to-be-controlled home appliance  10 . For example, powering on or off, adjusting temperature, and other operations all have a corresponding command code). 
         [0030]    The server  50  has a database  52  to store the at least one control command transmitted by the tablet  40 , wherein each control command has a corresponding state field in the database  52  to verify a corresponding relation between an operation of the to-be-controlled home appliance  10  and the control command. The relay device  20  communicates with the server  50  through the access point  30 . The relay device  20  would create an inquiry command at regular intervals and transmit the inquiry command to the server  50 , wherein the inquiry command includes the relay device code of the relay device  20 . 
         [0031]    With the aforementioned structures, the method of the present invention could be applied, wherein the method includes the following steps. 
         [0032]    The at least one control command is inputted through the electronic device  40  (e.g. to control one of the home appliances  10  to power on), the at least one control command includes the relay device code of the relay device  20 , the appliance codes of the corresponding home appliances  10 , and a command code (e.g. which corresponds to powering on). The at least one control command would be transmitted to the server  50  by the tablet  40 . 
         [0033]    When the server  50  receives the at least one control command, the at least one control command would be stored in the database  52  of the server  50 , and a state field corresponding to the received control command would be created in the database  52  by the server  50 . 
         [0034]    Once the relay device  20  creates the inquiry command, the inquiry command would be transmitted to the server  50  to inquire whether the server  50  has received the control command corresponding to the relay device  20 . 
         [0035]    The at least one control command in the database  52  would be compared with the relay device code in the inquiry command, when the relay device code corresponds to the at least one control command of the database  52 , the at least one control command would be transmitted to the relay device  20  through the Internet I and the access point  30 . 
         [0036]    When the Wi-Fi transceiver  206  of the relay device  20  receives a Wi-Fi signal which has the at least one control command, the converter  204  retrieves the at least one control command, and encapsulates the at least one control command into a corresponding RF signal to be sent out through the RF transceiver  202 . As shown in  FIG. 4 , in the embodiment, the at least one control command would be transmitted to the home appliances  10  from the relay device  20  for three times by the converter  204 . A first interval T 1  is defined as the time interval between the time points when the control command is sent out for a first time and for a second time. Another first interval T 1 ′ is defined as the time interval between the time points when the control command is sent out for at the second time and for a third time. The first intervals T 1 , T 1 ′ are randomly decided by the converter  204  to prevent a conflict between the state information transmitted from the home appliances  10  and the control commands sent from the relay device  20 , which may cause the home appliances  10  to miss the control commands. Each of the first intervals T 1 , T 1 ′ respectively includes a first waiting time T 1   w , T 1 ′ w  and a first random time T 1   n , T 1 ′ n , wherein each of the first waiting times T 1   w , T 1 ′ w  is a reaction time for the RF transceiver  202  to ensure the previous control command is already sent. The first waiting time T 1   w , T 1 ′ w  respectively included in each of the first intervals T 1 , T 1 ′ is always the same in every round, while the first random time T 1   n , T 1 ′ n  respectively included in each of the first intervals T 1 , T 1 ′ is randomly decided. 
         [0037]    When the control circuit  124  of the control unit  12  of the home appliances  10  receives the at least one control command, the at least one control command would be decoded. If the appliance code in the at least one control command accords with the appliance code of one of the home appliances  10 , this home appliance  10  would perform a corresponding operation according to the command code, and would create the corresponding state information after performing the operation (e.g. powering on). For each of the home appliances  10 , if the appliance code in the at least one control command does not accord with the appliance code of the home appliances  10 , the home appliances  10  would simply ignore the received control command. 
         [0038]    Then, the operating home appliance  10  would send the state information to the relay device  20 . As shown in  FIG. 4 , in the embodiment, the state information would be transmitted to the relay device  20  from the home appliance  10  for three times by the control circuit  124 . A second interval T 2  is defined as the time interval between the time points when the state information is sent out for a first time and for a second time. Another second interval T 2 ′ is defined as the time interval between the time points when the state information is sent out for the second time and for a third time. The second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ are randomly decided by the control circuit  124  to be respectively different from the first interval T 1 , T 1 ′ to prevent a conflict between the control command sent from the relay device  20  and the state information sent by the operating home appliance  10 , which may cause the relay device  20  to miss the state information. Each of the second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ includes a second waiting time T 2   w , T 2 ′ w  and a second random time T 2   n , T 2 ′ n , wherein the second waiting time T 2   w , T 2 ′ w  is a reaction time for the RF transceiver  122  to ensure the previous state information is already sent by the RF transceiver  122 . The second waiting time T 2   w , T 2 ′ w  respectively included in each of the second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ is always the same, while the second random time T 2   n , T 2 ′ n  respectively included in each of the second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ is randomly decided. Therefore, even if the control command sent out for the first time and the state information sent out for the first time are both sent out at the same time, a time point when the control command is sent out for the second time would be different from a time point when the state information is sent out for the second time, which could prevent the conflict between the control command and the state information, for the first intervals T 1 ,T 1 ′ and the second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ are randomly decided to be different. 
         [0039]    In other embodiments, the control command and the state information could be transmitted for one, two, or more than three times. Transmitting the control command and the state information for at least two times could prevent the conflict between the control command and the state information. In practice, when the at least one control command corresponds to many home appliances  10 , the randomly decided second intervals T 2 , T 2 ′ could prevent a conflict between each state information generated by each corresponding home appliance  10 , therefore the relay device  20  would not miss the state information. 
         [0040]    When the relay device  20  receives the state information, the state information would be stored in the memory  208 , until the relay device  20  generates another inquiry command. The received and stored state information and the another inquiry command would be sent to the server  50  through the access point  30  and the Internet I. In addition, when the server  50  receives another control command from the tablet  40  during the aforementioned steps, the server  50  could store the another control command in the database  52 . 
         [0041]    When the server  50  receives the another inquiry command, the server  50  would determine whether the another control command is stored in the database  52 . If so, the stored another control command would be sent to the relay device  20 , and then sent to the home appliances  10  from the relay device  20  to operate the corresponding home appliance  10 . If the database  52  does not have the another control command, the server  50  would reply to the relay device  20  that the server  50  does not receive the another control command at this time. 
         [0042]    The server  50  would determine whether the server  50  receives the state information corresponding to the control command. 
         [0043]    If the server  50  receives the state information corresponding to the control command, the received state information would be written to the corresponding state field to establish the corresponding relation between the control command and the state information, which could be used to verify an operation of the home appliances  10 , and the state information would be sent to the tablet  40  to update a condition of the corresponding home appliance  10  through the application thereof. 
         [0044]    If the server  50  does not receive the state information, the server  50  would generate a nonresponsive command, and send the nonresponsive command to the relay device  20  upon receiving a next inquiry command from the relay device  20 . When the relay device  20  receives the nonresponsive command, the state information would be repeatedly sent to the server  50 , and the server  50  would determine whether the server  50  receives the state information until the server  50  does receive the state information. 
         [0045]    In summary, the method of the present invention could effectively verify the operation in the wireless control system by sending the control command from the server  50  to the home appliances  10  and the relay device  20  at the user terminal, and establishing the corresponding relation between the control command and the state information when the state information is sent to the server  50 . 
         [0046]    It must be pointed out that the embodiments described above are only some preferred embodiments of the present invention. All equivalent methods which employ the concepts disclosed in this specification and the appended claims should fall within the scope of the present invention.