Data processing: generic control systems or specific application – Specific application – apparatus or process – Article handling
Reexamination Certificate
2001-02-21
2003-03-18
Ellis, Christopher P. (Department: 3651)
Data processing: generic control systems or specific application
Specific application, apparatus or process
Article handling
C414S277000, C235S385000, C700S225000, C700S226000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06535790
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a library retrieving and repositing robot that performs, in succession, the tasks of quickly retrieving individual books desired by library patrons from among many books arranged on the bookshelves of the library, and transporting them; and taking books that have been returned by library patrons, and returning them to the bookshelves one at a time, securely placing each book upright in its proper shelf location. It also relates to an automatic library system incorporating such a robot in a configuration that is fully compatible with existing the open-shelf-type book racks most commonly used in libraries today.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recent years have seen an increased awareness of the need for lifelong learning, and major growth in knowledge-based industries. Along with this, the general public has come to make greater use of existing general library facilities, and to expect a higher level of service from them. Consequently, librarians and other skilled library workers are now expected to provide many highly specialized services that require detailed knowledge of publications and library science. In the majority of the libraries in existence today, however, a large part of the normal workday of such skilled library staff members is taken up with handling library books: i.e., finding a book desired by a library patron, taking it off the shelf, and placing it in the hands of the user who requested it; and taking books that have been returned by users, carrying them to the bookracks, and returning them to their proper locations on the shelves. To improve the availability of specialized intellectual services that can only be rendered by skilled library staff demands that mechanization be employed to streamline the task of retrieving and repositing library books requested by library patrons.
Known in the art are book storage management systems that use ‘automated stock storage technology’ such as disclosed, for example, in Japanese Laid-open patent publication no. H07-81706 [(See also U.S. Pat. No. 5,690,463)] which describes a mechanized system for improving the efficiency of tasks involved in selecting desired books and withdrawing them from a book storage facility designed for extremely low-cost storage of the large book stocks maintained by libraries. Such book storage management systems, however, operate only in conjunction with specially-designed book storage facilities. They will not work with the ordinary libraries in existence today, where members of the general public frequently roam through the bookracks, picking out desired books directly, and taking them off the shelves. These prior book storage management systems are not compatible with the manual selection and removal of a desired book on the spot: Their storage areas serve simply as warehouses in which books are placed for storage.
In these conventional book storage management systems, the many books to be stored are classified in advance, and then divided for placement, by class, in a large number of containers, each of which is analogous to one section of a large book rack. To provide the most economical book storage, these many containers are then stacked one on top of the other in a stack room, to form high, closely-spaced stacks that enable as many books as possible to be stored in the smallest possible space. A large-scale conveyer system links the stack room to book users. When a library patron requests a desired book, a mechanical apparatus finds the container that contains the class of books to which the desired book is assigned. The selected container with its many books is then placed on the conveyer that carries it to a library user area, where the desired book within the class contained in that container can easily be found, and removed by hand.
To implement this large conveyer system in a common library would require costly and inconvenient construction work to remodel the existing facility. This is a major problem. Also, once the system has been installed, the conveyer placement is not something that can easily be changed. This places severe constraints on changes in the layout and configuration of the book stacks. Another problem is that in this system, there is simply no way that general library patrons could be allowed to walk freely among the stacks, removing books from the containers and replacing them by hand. Users who are accustomed to doing this in libraries in which the books are kept in open bookshelves would undoubtedly feel alienated by a book storage management system such as that described above. A library adopting such a system would also necessarily assume a major workload in terms of safety management and system maintenance, and adopting such a system would therefore not provide the needed gains in library staff efficiency through mechanization of the detailed book retrieval and repositing work performed by the staff.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for an automated library book retrieving and repositing system that can be implemented in common libraries in existence today without major remodeling of facilities, and that can also be employed in libraries in which bookracks are subject to rearrangement in a variety of configurations.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention was conceived with the above problems and the needs of existing libraries in mind. It is an object of the present invention to provide a library book management system incorporating a robot that can perform, in lieu of library staff, the tasks of locating and removing individual books, and later replacing the books, when users are finished with them, by gently reshelving individual books in their proper locations on the bookshelves. Implementing such an automated robotic library book retrieval and repositing system in conventional libraries will improve efficiency by greatly reducing the book retrieval and repositing workload of library staff, thus enhancing the level of specialized intellectual services that can be provided by those libraries. It is a further object of the present invention to reduce damage to books during robotic book removal and reshelving operations.
To solve the above problems, the present invention provides a book retrieving and repositing robot. The robot has a carriage that moves itself around the periphery of a bookrack in which are formed a plurality of shelf sections. Mounted on the carriage are a hand mechanism; a controller for controlling three-dimensional motion of the hand mechanism; and a computer for determining both the book identification information for a requested book and the requested book's prescribed shelf section storage location information, and controlling the motion of the carriage and the hand mechanism based on that information. The robot's hand mechanism includes an identification information recognition unit for detecting shelf section identification information indicated on the bookrack, as well as book identification information indicated on the library books stored in each section, and recognizing a requested book's prescribed shelf section storage location, and a requested book present at that prescribed shelf section storage location; a book pullout mechanism for pulling-out a requested book from a row of books in a shelf section; and a book-holding mechanism for grasping the pulled-out book and removing it from the bookrack. The invention is constituted such that a desired book can be retrieved from the bookracks without bothering the library staff.
Also provided is a book retrieving and repositing robot having a carriage as described above, on which are mounted a hand mechanism; a controller for controlling the three-dimensional motion of the hand mechanism; and a computer for determining a returned book's prescribed shelf section storage location information and controlling the motion of the carriage and the hand mechanism based on instructions received from a book checkout/return counter. The hand mechanis
Hayashi Yoshiki
Kihara Yusuke
Nakano Yoshiyuki
Sakimoto Katsuki
Brinks Hofer Gilson & Lione
Crawford Gene O.
Ellis Christopher P.
Kanazawa Institute of Technology
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