Patent ID: 8107446

Claim:
A method for managing a set of tag readers by an access point, the access point having a coverage area for monitoring the set of tag readers, each tag reader having a coverage area for monitoring a set of tags, the method comprising: determining groups of tag readers, wherein each tag reader within a group has a coverage area that overlaps coverage areas of other tag readers in the group and tag readers from different groups do not have coverage areas that overlap each other, wherein said determination is based on (i) a range of the coverage area of each tag reader and (ii) a distance between each particular tag reader and a closest tag reader to the particular tag reader; for each particular group, configuring all tag readers within the particular group to sequentially transmit read requests to the set of tags in the coverage area of each tag reader in order to prevent simultaneous read requests being sent to a particular tag that is positioned in overlapping coverage areas of at least two tag readers; and configuring a plurality of tag readers that do not belong to a same group to transmit read requests in parallel.