Patent ID: 7974959

Claim:
A map update data supplying apparatus supplies update data files used for updating target map data, the map update data supplying apparatus comprising: an update-purpose map database stores a plurality of update versions of update-purpose map data, each update version of update-purpose map data being divided into a plurality of sections; a version table stores information related to guaranty versions in correspondence with section groups, each of the section groups being a set made up of a different one of the sections in the update-purpose map data and another section that is positioned adjacent thereto, and each of the guaranty versions being an oldest update version that is able to guarantee integrity between the sections that constitute a corresponding one of the section groups; and a controller configured to: extract update requiring sections with respect to an update requesting section that is one of sections request requesting that the target map data be updated; obtain the information related to the guaranty versions respectively corresponding to the extracted update requiring sections by referring to the version table, the update requiring sections each being one of the sections that needs to be updated in order to guarantee integrity between the sections that are positioned adjacent to each other after the update requesting section has been updated; and generate, based on the update-purpose map database, one of the update data files regarding the update requesting section as well as other ones of the update data files regarding the update requiring sections and having the update versions indicated as the guaranty versions.