Patent Description:
Accordingly, the statements of this section are to be read in this light and are not to be understood as admissions about what is in the related art or what is not in the related art.

In the field of data calibration, one solution is that data is written to transfer buffer (TB) during power-off, and the data will only take effect after power-up, thus it may need many times power off/on during calibration. <FIG> shows an operation process of this solution. <FIG> shows an operation process of another solution, in <FIG>, factory test mode (FTM) is used, in this solution, the operation is more complicated, and much memory size is needed to implement this solution.

<CIT> discloses a lighting unit having a micro-controller, an embedded NFC chip, a power supply and an lighting element. The embedded NFC circuit has a memory shared between the micro-controller and an NFC tool such as an NFC tag <NUM> or an external NFC reader/writer. The micro-controller can store operational data such as faults in the shared memory and the NFC tool can read out the operational data and if necessary write new parameter data to the memory.

Inventors of this disclosure found that, in the related art, calibration data can be written to Near Field Communication (NFC) tag offline, and the data will only take effect after power cycle. However, it may need many times power cycle if multi-parameters are to be calibrated. On the other hand, calibration data can be written to NFC tag when driver is powered off, and the data will only take effect after next power cycle. Thus it may need many times power cycle if multi-parameters are to be calibrated.

In general, embodiments of the present disclosure provide a data calibration method and a driver. In the embodiments, the calibration data are written to NFC tag any time when driver is powered on, the data take effect immediately after calibration, and there is no need to power cycle the driver to make the data take effect.

In a first aspect, there is provided a data calibration method for calibrating an LED driver by a NFC reader, as defined by claim <NUM>.

In another embodiment, the NFC reader is a NFC application configured in an electronic device.

In another embodiment, the NFC tag is configured in the LED driver, and a transfer buffer of the NFC tag contains three fields, which are status field, data field, and CRC field.

In another embodiment, the data calibration method further includes:.

informing a process result after processing the feedback.

In a second aspect, there is provided a data calibration method for calibrating an LED driver, as defined by claim <NUM>.

In another embodiment, a transfer buffer of the NFC tag contains three fields, which are status field, data field, and CRC field.

In a third aspect, there is provided an electronic device as defined by claim <NUM>.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided an LED driver as defined by claim <NUM>.

According to at least one of the various embodiments of the present disclosure, there is no need to power cycle the driver, and it can be much faster if more parameters are to be calibrated, especially for those which need to calibrate step by step. Therefore, the production efficiency is improved.

According to at least one of the various embodiments of the present disclosure, command is simpler than before, operations are easier, and there is no need to power on/off repeatedly. When the present disclosure is used for calibration of current for production, calibration time during production is saved, and production efficiency is improved. Furthermore, compared with FTM, the code size is reduced, and the memory size is saved. And the present disclosure is easy to implement for software.

The above and other aspects, features, and benefits of various embodiments of the disclosure will become more fully apparent, by way of example, from the following detailed description with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which like reference numerals or letters are used to designate like or equivalent elements.

The present disclosure will now be discussed with reference to several example embodiments.

As used herein, the terms "first" and "second" refer to different elements. The terms "comprises," "comprising," "has," "having," "includes" and/or "including" as used herein, specify the presence of stated features, elements, and/or components and the like, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, elements, components and/or combinations thereof. The term "based on" is to be read as "based at least in part on. " The term "one embodiment" and "an embodiment" are to be read as "at least one embodiment. " The term "another embodiment" is to be read as "at least one other embodiment. " Other definitions, explicit and implicit, may be included below.

A data calibration method is provided in the first aspect of embodiments.

<FIG> is a schematic diagram of a data calibration process of the present disclosure, <FIG> is a flowchart of the data calibration process of the present disclosure. As shown in <FIG>, when the driver is powered on, initial processing is performed, and in the production mode, the calibration data may be written to NFC tag for calibration, thus the calibrated current changes immediately, and there is no need to power on/off the driver to calibrate.

<FIG> is a schematic diagram of a data calibration method of an embodiment of the present disclosure.

In this embodiment, the data calibration method is applied to a NFC reader, and the NFC reader may be a single device or may a NFC application (program) stored in a memory of an electronic device, this embodiment is not limited thereto.

As shown in <FIG>, the data calibration method includes:.

According to the embodiment of the present disclosure, an operator can write calibration data to NFC tag any time when driver is powered on. Microcontroller Unit (MCU) of the driver may real-time check the current change immediately, thus power cycle is not needed to make is take effect.

In an embodiment, the NFC tag is configured in the driver, and a transfer buffer of the NFC tag contains three fields, which are status field, data field, and a Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) field, in which, the status field occupies one or more bytes to indicate the communication status of the NFC tag. <FIG> is a schematic diagram of the transfer buffer of the NFC tag, shows the three fields of the NFC tag, the embodiment is not limited thereto, the transfer buffer of the NFC tag may include more fields or may include only the status field and the data field, that is, the CRC field is optional. As shown in <FIG>, the CRC is used to check whether the data in the NFC tag is correct or not, with the CRC checksum, Radio Frequency (RF) disturbance during transmission may be reduced.

In an embodiment, the status of the NFC tag is preferred to have no less than <NUM> states, which is idle, busy, ready, done, and error.

In an embodiment, "ready status" refers to that the NFC tag is prepared to do some reading/writing events. When the status of the NFC tag is ready, the MCU may update the status to a second status and read data from the NFC tag. In this embodiment, the ready state is referred to as a first status.

In an embodiment, "busy status" refers to that the NFC tag is doing some reading/writing events. In this embodiment, the busy state is referred to as a second status.

In an embodiment, "done status" refers to that the NFC tag has finished the data processing and the result is correct, "error status" refers to that the NFC tag has finished the data processing but the result is incorrect. In this embodiment, the done status or the error status is referred to as a third status.

In an embodiment, "idle status" refers to that the NFC tag is starting up and waiting to do save events. In idle status, calibration process of this time has been finished, the current takes effect immediately, and the process goes to the normal work mode.

In operation <NUM>, at the beginning of the calibration process, the NFC reader writes data to the NFC tag when the driver is powered on. The data may be various parameters related to calibration, thus by only one step, calibration speed are fasted when more parameters are to be calibrated, the production efficiency is improved.

In operation <NUM>, after writing data to NFC tag, the NFC reader updates the status of the NFC tag to the first status, such as ready status, thus, the MCU may read data from the NFC tag.

In operation <NUM>, the NFC reader keeps checking the status of the NFC tag until it is the third status, that is done status or error status, thus, the NFC reader may perform the subsequent processing. In operation <NUM>, in an embodiment, the NFC reader reads the status byte in the NFC tag and judges whether the status is done or error, when it is judged YES, the NFC reader deems that the status of the NFC tag is the third status and the process goes to operation <NUM>; and when it is judged NO, the NFC reader deems that the status of the NFC tag is not the third status and it continues to read the status byte in the NFC tag and judge the status of the NFC tag.

In operations <NUM> and <NUM>, when the status of the NFC tag is done or error, the NFC reads feedback from the NFC tag and process the feedback. The feedback is in the data field of the NFC tag and which is written by the MCU of the driver.

In operation <NUM>, since the status of the NFC tag is done or error, the feedback corresponding to different status are different, the NFC reader processes the feedback corresponding to different status, a particular processing method is not limited in the present disclosure, which is omitted here.

In operation <NUM>, after or before the NFC reader processes the feedback, the NFC reader updates the status of the NFC tag to a fourth status, that is the idle status, thus this time of calibration process is finished.

In an embodiment, the NFC reader may also inform a process result to a processing entity after processing the feedback, which is not limited in the present disclosure.

In the embodiment of the present application, the execution order of the operations of the method of <FIG> is not limited, for example, the execution order of operations <NUM> and <NUM> may be interchanged, and in <FIG>, some operations may be added or some operations may be reduced, it depends on the implementation.

<FIG> is a schematic diagram of a data calibration method of another embodiment of the present disclosure.

In this embodiment, the data calibration method is applied to a MCU of the driver, the driver also includes the above NFC tag, the NFC tag may be a chip connected to the MCU or a memory coupled to the MCU, this embodiment is not limited thereto. In this embodiment, the above description for the NFC tag is incorporated herein, which is omitted herein. In this embodiment, the driver may be used in a power supply for production, and this embodiment is not limited thereto.

In operation <NUM>, the MCU keeps checking the status of the NFC tag, when the status of the NFC tag is the first status, that is the ready status, the process goes to operation <NUM>. In operation <NUM>, similar as operation <NUM>, the MCU may read the status byte in the NFC tag and judge whether the status is ready, when it is judged YES, the MCU deems that the status of the NFC tag is the first status and the process goes to operation <NUM>; and when it is judged NO, the MCU deems that the status of the NFC tag is not the first status and it continues to read the status byte in the NFC tag and judge the status of the NFC tag.

In operations <NUM> and <NUM>, when the status of the NFC tag is the first status, the MCU deems that the calibration process is ready, it updates the status of the NFC tag to the second status, that is the busy status, and begins to read data from the NFC tag. The data is stored in the DATA field of the transfer buffer of the NFC tag, which has been described above, which is omitted here.

In operations <NUM> and <NUM>, the MCU processes the data and writes feedback to the NFC tag based on the processing result. a particular processing method is not limited in the present disclosure, which is omitted here.

In operation <NUM>, the MCU updates the status of the NFC tag to the third status, such as done status or error status, which depends on the processing result and is omitted here.

In order to make the method of the embodiment of the present disclosure more clear and understandable, the method of the embodiment of the present disclosure will be described below with reference to the <FIG>, <FIG> and <FIG>. In the following description, the first state is ready status, the second state is busy status, the third state is done or error status, and the fourth state is idle status is taken as an example.

<FIG> is a schematic diagram of information interaction between a NFC reader and a MCU, <FIG> is a flowchart of a process of the NFC reader, and <FIG> is a flowchart of a process of the MCU.

As shown in <FIG>, <FIG> and <FIG>, the NFC reader writes data to NFC tag (<NUM>) and updates the status byte in NFC tag to READY (<NUM>). The MCU reads the status byte in the NFC tag (<NUM>) and checks whether the status is ready (<NUM>), when it is judged YES by the MCU, it updates the status byte in NFC tag to BUSY (<NUM>), reads data from the NFC tag (<NUM>), processes the data (<NUM>), and writes feedback to the NFC tag (<NUM>). The NFC reader reads the status byte in the NFC tag (<NUM>) and checks whether the status is DONE or ERROR (<NUM>), when it is judged YES by the NFC reader, it reads feedback from the NFC tag (<NUM>), processes the feedback (<NUM>) and updates the status byte in the NFC tag to IDLE (<NUM>).

An electronic device is provided in the second aspect of embodiments. The electronic device may be a mobile phone, a tablet PC, a portable digital camera, a media player, a portable game device, a PDA, a computer, or the like, and this embodiment is not limited thereto.

<FIG> is a function block diagram of the electronic device, as shown in <FIG>, the electronic device <NUM> includes a memory <NUM> and a processor <NUM>, the memory <NUM> stores a NFC program, the processor <NUM> couples to the memory and is configured to execute the NFC program to:.

In the embodiment, the above processing of the processor <NUM> is same as that of the NFC reader in <FIG>, the above description for <FIG> is incorporated in the embodiment, which is omitted here.

As shown in <FIG>, the electronic device <NUM> may further include a communication module (communication interface) <NUM>, a camera <NUM>, an input unit <NUM>, a display <NUM> and a power supply <NUM>, which being connected to the processor <NUM> and functioning under control of the processor <NUM>. The communication module <NUM> may function as a receiver to receive data from external device, such as the driver, or, the communication module <NUM> may function as a transmitter to send data to the external device. The camera <NUM> may be any type of cameras. The input unit <NUM> may be a keyboard or a mouse or the like.

It should be noted that <FIG> may only illustrate a part of the structure of the electronic device <NUM>. The electronic device <NUM> does not necessarily include all the components shown in <FIG>. And furthermore, the electronic device <NUM> may include components not shown in <FIG>, and the related art may be referred to. It should be noted that this figure is illustrative only, and other types of structures may also be used, so as to supplement or replace this structure and achieve a telecommunications function or other functions.

As can be seen from the above mentioned embodiments, an operator can write calibration data to NFC tag any time when driver is powered on. Microcontroller Unit (MCU) of the driver may real-time check the current change immediately, thus power cycle is not needed to make is take effect.

A driver is provided in the third aspect of embodiments.

<FIG> is a function block diagram of the driver, as shown in <FIG>, the driver <NUM> includes a NFC tag <NUM>, a memory <NUM> and a processor <NUM>, the memory <NUM> stores a plurality of instructions and functions as an information storage, the processor <NUM> couples to the memory <NUM>, functions as a controlling unit and is configured to execute the plurality of instructions to:.

In the embodiment, the above processing of the processor <NUM> is same as that of the MCU in <FIG>, the above description for <FIG> is incorporated in the embodiment, which is omitted here.

As shown in <FIG>, in some embodiments, the driver <NUM> further includes a driving circuit <NUM>, which is controlled via the controlling unit <NUM> to commission external device, such as a lighting system (LED). To control the driving circuit <NUM>, the information storage <NUM> is used to store configuration information.

As shown in <FIG>, in some embodiments, the driver <NUM> further includes an electronic interface (such as a communication interface) <NUM>, which is configured to retrieve configuration information from a configuring device.

In some embodiments, as shown in <FIG>, the electronic interface <NUM> includes a wireless communication interface <NUM>, which is used to receive the configuration information sent from the configuring device. The wireless communication interface <NUM> may include a storage unit, e.g. EEPROM or FLASH memory, to store the received configuration information.

In some embodiments, as shown in <FIG>, the electronic interface <NUM> includes a wired communication channel <NUM>, which might be an l<NUM>C-interface or SPI-interface. The wired communication channel <NUM> is used to provide the received configuration information to the information storage <NUM> of the driver <NUM>.

In some embodiments, the wired communication channel <NUM> is preferably used to provide the received configuration information to the controlling unit <NUM> of the driver <NUM> in an operation mode of the driver <NUM>. Preferably the electronic interface <NUM> may read out the configuration information stored in the storage unit of the wireless communication interface <NUM> through the wired communication channel <NUM> when the driver <NUM> is powered on.

It should be noted that <FIG> may only illustrate a part of the structure of the driver <NUM>. The driver <NUM> does not necessarily include all the components shown in <FIG>. And furthermore, the driver <NUM> may include components not shown in <FIG>, and the related art may be referred to. It should be noted that this figure is illustrative only, and other types of structures may also be used, so as to supplement or replace this structure and achieve a telecommunications function or other functions.

The driver <NUM> is an LED driver, and the above calibration data is the nominal LED current (programming of the nominal LED (= output) current amplitude at <NUM>% operation) of the driver <NUM>. In these embodiments, after calibration, the driver <NUM> can be used to program the nominal LED current of the driver <NUM>.

Such programming of the nominal LED current can be done during production of the driver <NUM>, but also during assembly of the driver <NUM> into a luminaire (LED) or after installation of the luminaire (LED). For example, this function can be performed by an operator having the necessary access rights.

Claim 1:
A data calibration method for calibrating an LED driver by a NFC reader, wherein the LED driver contains a NFC tag, comprising the following steps carried out by the NFC reader:
writing (<NUM>) data to the NFC tag when the LED driver is powered on, wherein the data comprises parameters related to the calibration of the LED driver;
updating (<NUM>) a status of the NFC tag to a first status, wherein the first status is a ready status;
checking (<NUM>) the status of the NFC tag until it is a third status, wherein the third status is a done or an error status;
reading (<NUM>) a feedback from the NFC tag;
processing (<NUM>) the feedback; and
updating (<NUM>) the status of the NFC tag to a fourth status, wherein the fourth status is an idle status.