Abstract:
The invention relates to the information providing system, information providing device, pervasive device and the method for providing the subscribed service relative to geographical locations. The location information providing device generates a task relating to a subscription service request responsive to the subscription service request on a pervasive device sent from a requester, the pervasive receives the task from the location service information providing device, self-positions and calculates based on the location to execute the task to generate the subscribed information and transmits the generated subscribed information to the requester. The invention makes fully use of the resource of the pervasive device so that the loads among the location service information providing device, the network and the pervasive device included in the location service system are balanced.

Description:
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION  
         [0001]    The present invention relates to an information providing system, an information providing apparatus, a pervasive device and an information providing method, and more particularly, relates to an information providing system, an information providing apparatus, a pervasive device and an information providing method for providing subscription service information relative to a geographical location.  
         BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
         [0002]    With the development of the network and the communication, the human beings depend, more and more, on the modern communicating tools to obtain prompt information. It becomes a hot issue in the art to provide the subscription service relative to locations to mobile users by means of Global Positing System (GPS).  
           [0003]    [0003]FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an information service system providing information relative to locations in the prior art.  
           [0004]    Typically, a location service information providing device  105  receives the subscription service requests on the requestee  1 ,  2  or M, sent from the requester  1 , 2  or N, via a network  101 . The requestee may be, for example, a pervasive device such as a mobile telephone or a PDA; the subscription service requests may be, for example, the request where the requestee i (1≦i≦M, i and M are positive integers)is in at certain time or during certain time period, sent by the requester j (1≦j≦N, j and N are positive integers); or the request relating to the special and/or temporal condition based on the location of the requestee i, such as when the requestee i is located at the gate of certain hotel. The requester may be the user holding the mobile telephone or the PDA; or the other users interested in the tracks of the users owning the requestees, such as the parents of their children, the taxi company that the taxi drivers belong to.  
           [0005]    [0005]FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram showing a location service information providing device  105  for providing the subscribing service relative to a location. Typically, a location tracking and positioning unit  201 , for example a GPS, detects the current location of the requestee i via a network  110 . A location based information calculating unit  205  calculates to obtain the service information satisfying the request condition included in the location service request, based on the current location of the requestee i and the request condition. A location based transmitting unit  210  provides the calculated subscription service information to the corresponding requester j.  
           [0006]    In the above prior art, the location service information providing device  105  needs to bear heavy burdens, such as tracking and positioning the requestee, calculating based on the positioned location information. In addition, the network loads are also increased because of the exchange of the positioning information between the location service information providing device  105  and the requestees, so that the performance of the whole system is aggravated. The situation will be come worse if the subscription service requests increase sharply.  
           [0007]    The processing capabilities of the pervasive devices become more powerful but the cost thereof is decreased, with the development of the hardware of the load-in processor and the memory. Then many calculations may be performed in the pervasive devices, which otherwise are done in the service information providing device. Such a change does not increase the cost of the system as a whole. On the other hand, many pervasive devices may position themselves by self-positioning system, with the development of the positioning system such as the GPS.  
           [0008]    The location based information providing system may be improved by considering the above techniques.  
         SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
         [0009]    To solve the above problems, one object of the invention is to provide an information providing system for providing the subscription service relative to a geographical location, in which a pervasive device can self-position, calculate based on the location positioned, and generate subscription information.  
           [0010]    Another object of the invention is to provide an information providing device which provides the subscription service relative to a geographical location.  
           [0011]    Another object of the invention is to provide a pervasive device which can self-position, calculate based on the location positioned, and generate subscription information.  
           [0012]    Another object of the invention is to provide an information providing method for providing the subscription service relative to a geographical location, in which a pervasive device can self-position, calculate based on the location positioned, and generate subscription information.  
           [0013]    To achieve the above objects, the invention provides an information providing system, an information providing device, a pervasive device and a method for providing the subscribed service relative to geographical location. The location information providing device generates a task relating to a subscription service request, in response to the subscription service request on a pervasive device sent from a requester; the pervasive receives the task from the location service information providing device, self-positions and calculates based on the location to execute the task to generate the subscribed information and transmits the generated subscribed information to the requester.  
           [0014]    The present invention has an advantage that the location positioning and the related calculation usually executed by the location service information providing device are executed by the pervasive device, so that the load of the location service information providing device is reduced.  
           [0015]    The present invention has another advantage that the location positioning and the related calculation usually executed by the location service information providing device are executed by the pervasive device, so that the information exchange between the location service information providing device and the pervasive device is reduced, that is, the information transmission in the network is decreased so that the load of the network is cut down.  
           [0016]    The present invention has another advantage that the location positioning and the related calculation usually executed by the location service information providing device are executed by the pervasive device, so that the source of the pervasive device is fully utilized, and then the loads among the location service providing device, the network and the pervasive device are leveraged.  
           [0017]    The present invention has another advantage that it can provide flexible subscription information to a requester, according to different subscription service request.  
           [0018]    The object and the advantage of the invention will be more apparent by reference to the preferred embodiments in accompanying with the drawings. 
       
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0019]    [0019]FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an information service system providing location based subscription service in the prior art;  
         [0020]    [0020]FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram showing a location service information providing device in the information service system in the prior art;  
         [0021]    [0021]FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an information service system providing location based subscription service according to the invention;  
         [0022]    [0022]FIG. 4 is a functional block diagram showing a location service information providing device according to the invention;  
         [0023]    [0023]FIG. 5 is a functional block diagram showing a pervasive device according to the invention;  
         [0024]    [0024]FIG. 6 is a flow chart showing the process of handling the received subscription service request according to the location service information providing system;  
         [0025]    [0025]FIG. 7 is a flow chart showing the process of handling the received subscription service request according to the location service information providing device;  
         [0026]    [0026]FIG. 8 is a flow chart showing the process of the pervasive device;  
         [0027]    [0027]FIG. 9 is a flow chart showing the process of the task application. 
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION  
       [0028]    The information providing system for providing the subscription service relative to a location according to the invention will now be described, by referring to FIG. 3.  
         [0029]    As shown in FIG. 3, the information service system according to the invention comprises a location service information providing device  305 , which generates a task relating to a subscription service request, in response to a subscription service request based on a location of a pervasive device (also named a requestee)  310  sent from a requester J. The subscription information corresponding to the subscription service request may be generated, after the task is executed. The subscription service request include the spacial and/or temporal related condition(s)relating to location(s)(herein after named as trigger(s), the spacial and/or temporal related condition(s) relating to one location is named as one trigger), as well as the identifier of the pervasive device  310 . It will describe how to generate a task in details in the later.  
         [0030]    The pervasive  310  receives the generated task from the location service information providing device  305 , executes the task, generates the subscription information corresponding to the subscription service request, and sends the generated subscription information to the requester j. It will describe the process of the pervasive device  310  in the later.  
         [0031]    [0031]FIG. 6 is a flow chart showing the process of handling the received subscription service request according to the location service information providing system.  
         [0032]    At step S 600 , the location service information providing device  305  receives the subscription service request based on the location of the pervasive device  310  sent from the requester j.  
         [0033]    At step S 601 , the location service information providing device  305  generates the task relating to the subscription service request, in response to the subscription service request based on the location of the pervasive device  310  sent from the requester j.  
         [0034]    Then, at step S 605 , the location service information providing device  305  downloads the generated task into the corresponding pervasive device  310 , according to the identifier of the pervasive device  310 .  
         [0035]    At step S 610 , the pervasive device  310  executes the task, generates the subscription information corresponding to the subscription service request, and sends the generated subscription information to the requester j.  
         [0036]    According to the information service system of the invention, the location positioning and the related calculation usually executed by the location service information providing device are executed by the pervasive device, so that the load of the location service information providing device is reduced.  
         [0037]    Additionally, the location positioning and the related calculation usually executed by the location service information providing device are executed by the pervasive device, so that the information exchange between the location service information providing device and the pervasive device is reduced, that is, so that the load of the network is cut down.  
         [0038]    The present invention fully utilizes the resource of the pervasive device, so that the loads among the location service providing device, the network and the pervasive device are leveraged.  
         [0039]    It will be understood for those skilled in the art that the requestee is not limited to a pervasive device and all the terminals having the capability of self-positioning, calculating and networking may be regarded as the requestees, although the pervasive device is regarded as the requestee in the invention.  
         [0040]    In FIG. 3, the subscription information sending from the pervasive device  310  to the requester j is transferred along the path of the pervasive device  310 →the network  110 →the location service information providing device  305 →the network  101 →the requester j. This transferring path is especially appropriated to the situation when the pervasive device  310  itself is not the terminal belonging to the requester j. however, when the pervasive device  310  itself is the terminal belonging to the requester j, the subscription information need not to be transferred along the path. The subscription information, in turn, may be presented to the requester j in the form of voice, text or image. Moreover, when pervasive device  310  itself is not the terminal belonging to the requester j, the subscription information may be sent to the requester j by the way of sending a short message to the terminal designated by the requester j from the pervasive device  310 . The invention may utilize all the prior art for sending the subscription information to the requester j to realize the process of feeding back the subscription information.  
         [0041]    In addition, Although two networks are used in, for example, in FIG. 3, the network  101  and the network  110  are used to represent the network connection between the requester j and the location service information providing device  305 , and the network connection between the location service information providing device  305  and the pervasive device  310 , respectively. It will be understood for the persons in the art that, the network  101  and the network  110  may be the same network, especially when the pervasive device  310  itself is the terminal belonging to the requester j, and the requester j and the pervasive  310  are located in the same place. In this situation, the requester j may input a subscription request through the pervasive device  310 , and receive the subscription information through the pervasive device  310 .  
         [0042]    In addition, the requester j may input a subscription service request via an input interface not shown, which may be provided by the service provider running the location service providing device  305  and downloaded to the requester.  
         [0043]    The operation of the location service information providing device according to the invention will be described in detail, by referring to FIG. 4.  
         [0044]    [0044]FIG. 4 is a function block diagram of the location service information providing device according to the invention.  
         [0045]    The location service information providing device  305  comprises a subscription service request receiving unit  401 , a geographical information extracting unit  405 , a task generator  410 , a geographical information storage unit  415 , a task application storage unit  420  and a subscription information transmitting unit  425 .  
         [0046]    The subscription service request receiving unit  401  receives the subscription service request from the requester j, specifies the data relative to the geographical location included in the subscription service request information based on the subscription service request information, such as the place name and the building name, and sends the specific geographical location data to the geographical information extracting unit  405 . Further, the subscription service request receiving unit  401  sends the subscription service request to the task generator  410 . It will be understood for the persons in the art that the subscription service request may be in the form of voice or text; and the operation of specifying the geographical location data may be implemented by known character recognizing, image recognizing or voice recognizing technique.  
         [0047]    The geographical information storage unit  415  stores the spacial geographical location information within the range being able to be tracked and positioned by the tracking and positioning system inside the pervasive device  310 . For example, the geographical information storage unit  415  stores the spacial geographical location information about the city A, if the range that can be tracked and positioned by the tracking and positioning system such as a GPS inside the pervasive device  310  is the city A. The spacial geographical location information may include various kinds of spacial geographical data, such as the travel sites location information, the traffic paths location information, the hotels location information and the shopping centers location information.  
         [0048]    The embodiment is illustrated by using one pervasive device  310 . However, the geographical information storage unit  415  may store the spacial geographical location information within the ranges being able to be tracked and positioned by the tracking and positioning systems inside the pervasive devices  310  respectively, if there are several pervasive devices  310  capable of receiving tasks from the location service information providing system according to the invention.  
         [0049]    The geographical information extracting unit  405  extracts the spacial geographical information relating to the specified geographical location data from the geographical information storage unit  415 , based on the specified geographical location data received from the subscription service request receiving unit  401 .  
         [0050]    The task application generation module storage unit  420  stores the task application generation modules for generating task applications. The task application generation modules may be those shared generation modules for generating individual task application based on one or more spacial and/or temporal related triggers generated from a subscription service request.  
         [0051]    The task generator  410  generates one or more spacial and/or temporal related triggers, from the subscription service request received from the subscription service request receiving unit  401 . The operation for generating the triggers may be implemented by known character recognizing, image recognizing or voice recognizing technique. In the invention, one trigger is relative to certain or uncertain location and the spacial and/or temporal related condition based on the location. For example, the subscription service request sent from a requester may include two triggers, one is when the requestee arrives at the hotel A, the other is where the requestee is at 12:00 AM.  
         [0052]    The corresponding task application generation module(s) is/are called from the task application generation module storage unit  420 . The module may be, for example, the module for generating the task based on spacial related trigger(s), the module for generating the task based on temporal related trigger(s) and the module for generating the task based on spacial and temporal related trigger(s). One or more task applications are generated based on the generated spacial and/or temporal related trigger(s), by using the task application generation module(s). The task applications, in essential, are the programs for generating the subscription information responding to the subscription service request of the requester when running. The task applications include the process for controlling when to detect the current geographical location where the pervasive device locates based on the trigger(s), and the process for generating the subscription information satisfying the spacial and/or temporal triggers by calculating based on the detected geographical location. The process of the task applications will be described in details later.  
         [0053]    [0053]FIG. 7 is the flow chart showing the process to handle the received subscription service request by the location service information providing device.  
         [0054]    At step S 701 , the subscription service request receiving unit  401  receives the subscription service request from the requester j.  
         [0055]    At step S 705 , the subscription service request receiving unit  401  specifies the data relating to the geographical location such as the location name and the building name in the subscription service request information, and sends the specified geographical location data to the geographical information extracting unit  405 .  
         [0056]    At step S 705 , the subscription service request receiving unit  401  also sends the subscription service request to the task generator  410 .  
         [0057]    At step S 710 , the geographical information extracting unit  405  extracts the spacial geographical information relating to the specified geographical location data from the geographical information storage unit  415 , based on the specified geographical location data received from the subscription service request receiving unit  401 .  
         [0058]    At step S 715 , the task generator  410  generates one or more spacial and/or temporal triggers, based on the subscription service request received from the subscription service request receiving unit  401 , calls the corresponding task application generation module(s) from the task application generation module storage unit  420 , and generates one or more task applications, according to one or more spacial and/or temporal triggers by utilizing the task application generation module(s).  
         [0059]    At step S 720 , the task generator  410  generates a task, based on the generated task applications and the spacial geographical information extracted by the geographical extracting unit  405 , and sends the task to the pervasive device  310  via the network  110 .  
         [0060]    According to another embodiment of the invention, the task generator  410  will executes the above steps several times to generate several tasks and sends them to the pervasive device  310  via the network  110 , when several subscription service requests are sent to the same pervasive device  310  by one requester.  
         [0061]    When there is a spacial requirement on the subscription service requests from the requester, for example, when the requester has the priorities on the response with respect to the several triggers or several subscription service requests, the task generator  410  also sets the controlling program for controlling the priorities of running the several task applications or sets other controlling program corresponding to the specific requirement when generating the tasks. The controlling program may be integrated into the task and sent to the pervasive device or separately sent to the pervasive device.  
         [0062]    The subscription information transmitting unit  425  sends the subscription information received from the pervasive device  310  to the requester as needed. The subscription information transmitting unit  425  is employed when the pervasive device  310  itself is not the terminal belonging to the requester j.  
         [0063]    [0063]FIG. 5 is the functional block diagram of the pervasive device  310  according to the invention.  
         [0064]    The pervasive device  310  comprises the task receiving unit  501 , the task executing engine  505 , the subscription information transmitting unit  510 , the task application storage unit  520 , the geographical information storage unit  515  and the self-positioning unit  525 .  
         [0065]    The task receiving unit  501  receives the task generated by the task generator  410  and downloaded from the location service information providing device  305  via the network  110 , stores the task application included in the task into the task application storage unit  520  and stores the spacial geographical information included in the task in the geographical information storage unit  515 . In addition, the task receiving unit  501  notifies the task executing engine  505  the message of receiving the task, and sends the controlling program to the task executing engine  505  when there is a controlling program.  
         [0066]    The task executing engine  505  generally controls the execution of the task in the pervasive device. For example, it schedules the task application and coordinates with the location information providing device  305 . It controls, in response to the message of receiving the task, to call the one or more task applications in the task application storage unit  520 , and run the applications to generate the subscription information.  
         [0067]    In addition, the task executing engine  505  also executes the controlling process in response to the special requirement of the requester based on the controlling program, when it receives the special controlling program.  
         [0068]    The task application sends a request to the self-positioning unit  525  to detect the current geographical location of the pervasive device, when it is needed to detect the current geographical location of the pervasive device based on the trigger(s).  
         [0069]    The self-positioning unit  525  detects the current geographical location of the pervasive device, in response to the request of the task application, and provides it to the task application. The self-positioning unit  525  may be any kind of devices capable of self-positioning, such as a GPS or a device receiving the positioning service from a third party.  
         [0070]    According to another embodiment, the self-positioning unit  525  continuously self-positions, and stores the positioned information in a current geographical location storage unit (not shown) in the pervasive device, or updates the location information in the pervasive device, so that the most recently current location information may be obtained directly from the storage unit when the task application needs.  
         [0071]    The task application calculates based on the current geographical location information provided by the self-positioning unit  525  to generate the subscription information satisfying the trigger(s).  
         [0072]    The subscription information transmitting unit  510  sends the generated subscription information generated by the task applications to the requester, in the form of voice, image or text etc.  
         [0073]    [0073]FIG. 8 is the flow chart showing the operation of the pervasive device.  
         [0074]    At step S 801 , The task receiving unit  501  downloads the task generated by the task generator  410  from the task generator  410  of the location service information providing device  305  via the network  110 .  
         [0075]    At step S 805 , the task receiving unit  501  stores one or more task applications included in the task into the task application storage unit  520  and stores the spacial geographical information included in the task in the geographical information storage unit  515 . In addition, the task receiving unit  501  notifies the task executing engine  505  the message of receiving the task and/or the controlling program.  
         [0076]    At step S 810 , the task executing engine  505  controls, in response to receiving the message and/or the controlling program to call the one or more task applications in the task application storage unit  520 , and run the applications to generate the subscription information.  
         [0077]    At step S 815 , the subscription information transmitting unit  510  sends the subscription information generated by the task application(s) to the requester.  
         [0078]    [0078]FIG. 9 is the flow chart of a task application.  
         [0079]    At step S 901 , the task application monitors the trigger. At step S 905 , it detects whether or not the trigger is on. And if it is needed to detect the current geographical location of the pervasive device, it proceeds to step S 910 . At this step, a request is sent to the self-positioning unit  525  to detect the current geographical location of the pervasive device. At setp S 915 , it receives the current geographical location of the pervasive device detected by the self-positioning unit  525  in response to the request of the task application. At step S 920 , the task application calculates based on the current geographical location information to generate the subscription information satisfying the trigger.  
         [0080]    The invention has been described with reference to the embodiments and the drawings which are not used to limit the invention. And the invention can be modified and improved without departing the spirit and the scope of the claims.