Patent Publication Number: US-2005144353-A1

Title: Wireless virtual storage device

Description:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION  
      The present invention relates to a wireless virtual storage device, especially to combine with USB Dongle flash disk and providing USB Dongle wireless feature, which is able to support an external host PC to access the wireless virtual USB flash disk of the network file system on the wireless network by executing the network file system software via USB interface.  
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
      The portable storage devices such as different types of USB flash disks, are very popular for several applications and usages due to their small space and easy portability. Although there are so many advantages of USB flash disks, they also comprise some disadvantages: 
          1. Limitation of storage size: in current market, the storage space of the USB flash disks can be up to millions of Mega bytes due to the built-in or plugged flash memory (in general, the storage size is 128 MBytes or 256 Mbytes). It will be very inconvenient to use a USB flash disk to store huge amount of data.     2. Not easy for multi share: every user will have a copy of local data under multi share status. If users need to share the same data, data version will not be easy to control.        

      Based on the convenience of data exchange and share, it will be very convenient by using WLAN (Wireless Local Area Network). However, USB Dongle WLAN can only support the basic WLAN access feature for the plugged host PC; for accessing the file data from the WLAN, this host PC has to comprise the supporting of network file system software for itself.  
      Because of the extremely request of the USB Dongle flash disk in the current market, if we can combine with the WLAN accessing feature of USB Dongle WLAN and solve the disadvantages of storage size limitation and multi data sharing, we should be able to enhance the characteristics and features of this type of product.  
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
      An objective of the present invention is to provide a solution that uses software to combine with the network disk and the file architecture together as a virtual flash disk with WLAN feature, and increases a using mode on the USB WLAN products.  
      Another objective of the present invention is, under this new mode, the usage still likes a general USB flash disk, but the real storage device is located at the remote storage media of the network file system.  
      Another objective of the present invention is to solve the disadvantages of storage size limitation and inconvenience of data multi sharing of the traditional USB flash disks.  
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION  
      According to the present invention, a wireless virtual storage device comprises:  
      an interface having a plug and play feature for connecting with a host PC;  
      a wireless network unit for supporting a wireless network accessing feature and accessing with a wireless network; and  
      a control unit for communicating with the interface and the wireless network unit, and executing a network file system software to access a network file system on the wireless network by the wireless network unit in order to support the host PC to get the access control of the network file system&#39;s storage media via the interface.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the interface can be a serial interface, and the serial interface can be a USB (Universal Serial Bus) interface.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the wireless network unit can be a WLAN (Wireless Local Area Network) Unit.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the control unit comprises a memory for storing the network file system software.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the control unit also comprises a storage media controller to read the network file system software in the memory to execute, and access the network file system on the wireless network via the wireless network unit, so as to support the host PC to get the access control of the network file system&#39;s storage media via the interface.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the storage media controller is a flash memory controller.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the network file system&#39;s storage media could be a remote storage.  
      In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, the device could be a wireless virtual USB flash disk.  
      The present invention may best be understood through the following description with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       FIG. 1  shows the system block diagram of the wireless virtual storage device according to the present invention. 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT  
       FIG. 1  shows the system block diagram of the wireless virtual storage device according to the present invention. In this figure, the wireless virtual storage device is a wireless virtual USB flash disk  11  and comprises a USB Interface  111 , a control unit  112 , and a WLAN unit  113 . In the present invention, the USB interface  111  is able to support the plug and play feature, that is able to electrical connect with an external host PC  12  for data transmission. The WLAN unit  113  is able to support wireless network accessing feature. The control unit  12  is able to communicate with USB interface  111  and WLAN unit  113 , and comprises a virtual flash memory controller  1121  and a memory  1122  having a network file system software  1122 .  
      The usage of the wireless virtual USB flash disk  11  provides the host PC  12  to access the remote storage  141  through the wireless network  13  by USB interface  111 , and is as convenient as a traditional USB flash disk, and it is not necessary to install the driver of WLAN unit  113  for network accessing due to the plug and play feature of the host PC  12 . The electrical theory of the wireless virtual USB flash disk  11  is, when the USB interface  111  is plugged into the host PC  12 , virtual flash memory controller  1121  can be able to read the source codes of the network file system software  11221  in the memory  1122  and executes it. The network file system software  11221  can be able to use WLAN unit  113  to access the remote storage  141  of the network file System  14  through the wireless network  13 . At this moment, by executing the network file system software, the host PC  12  is able to access the remote storage  141  by virtual accessing the flash disk via USB interface  111 . The control unit  112  can communicate with USB interface  111  and the WLAN unit  113 .  
      Of course, the control unit  112  can be designed to meet the real requirements. But, any unit that comprises the controlling feature for the storage media such as the virtual flash memory can be used as a control unit  112  to access a file of the host PC  12  through the wireless network  13  by the network file system software  11221 . The control unit  12  comprises a memory to store the network file system software and is able to execute it so as to access the remote storage  141  of the network fie system  14  as the traditional access method of flash disk. Therefore, the host PC  12  can access network file system  14  connecting to the wireless network  13  via USB interface  111  and the WLAN unit  113 . All what the host PC  12  accesses the network file system  14  by means of traditional interfaces such as USB, CF, SD, miniSD, and etc., through a WLAN unit  113  connecting to a wireless network  13  are belonged to the disclosure of the present invention.  
      To sum up, the present invention improves the traditional technique by the software solution, to combine the network disk with the file architecture as a wireless virtual storage device. If using the technique of USB interface and flash memory controller, then the usage will be the same as a general USB flash disk, but the real storage device is located at the remote storage in the network file system from the wireless network. The advantage of the present invention is, to store the data into the remote storage media but not the entity of this device to improve the storage size limitation of the general USB flash disk, and also to provide multiple sharing functions for the stored data and to keep an exact data version in the file system. Above all, the usage is still the same as a general USB flask disk so as to access the remote storage of the wireless network by wireless network accessing. The present invention is such a portable storage device to provide users more flexibilities and storage spaces.  
      While the invention has been described in terms of what are presently considered to be the most practical and preferred embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention need not be limited to the disclosed embodiment. On the contrary, it is intended to cover various modifications and similar arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the appended claims which are to be accorded with the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and similar structures.