Data processing: measuring – calibrating – or testing – Measurement system – Orientation or position
Reexamination Certificate
2000-02-16
2003-01-14
Bui, Bryan (Department: 2863)
Data processing: measuring, calibrating, or testing
Measurement system
Orientation or position
C702S188000, C702S189000, C706S010000, C706S011000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06507802
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to real-time location and positioning systems as well as to real-time communication of location and position-related data among multiple system users. More specifically, this disclosure presents a method and an apparatus for determining common interests among multiple system users by correlating direction vectors and direction fields supplied by the users.
(2) Background of the Invention
Systems for assisting the coordination of activities based on common interests, or on the focus toward a common goal, have long been in existence. These systems and their respective embodiments include a wide variety of techniques and apparatuses, and vary widely in their particular goals. For example, common interest determination has long been performed through the use of explicit statements of interests or by survey. Recently, many interest correlation systems have been developed for common interest determination over a computer network such as the Internet. Common interest determination systems range from those requiring an explicit input of interests, similar to a survey, to those that automatically correlate user activity patterns. In addition to these interest correlation systems, which operate by means such as tracking user activities on a computer system; tracking the items which a person has checked out at a point of purchase such as a store or a library; or analyzing explicit user input such as by survey, there is also a need to track and correlate the physical activity of a group of people. These activities may be tracked in terms of user visual patterns. Historically, the determination of common interests in a three-dimensional space involved the passage of information explicitly through such means as speech, radio communication, and gestures. One example of an activity coordination system based on common interests, or the focus toward a common goal, is that involving a small unit military operation requiring coordination among a dispersed group of individuals, such as a SWAT team, where coordination among a dispersed group of individuals is critical. Unfortunately, historical forms of information exchange suffer from several important drawbacks. First, oral communication may be undesirable in situations where a significant distance separates soldiers, as vocal noise may reveal their location, or simply may not be feasible. Second, radio communication, while suffering, to some degree, from the same noise-related problems as oral communication, introduces the need to consciously utilize a piece of equipment that may detract from the user's ability to concentrate on the task at hand. Third, in order to interpret and decipher hand signals, the soldiers must be within a close, line of sight proximity of one another. Fourth, with all of these forms of communication there exists an inherent barrier to communication because of the need to orally or symbolically describe an object of interest. Fifth, the need to communicate orally or symbolically also leads to a communication lag time, which may lessen the effectiveness of a team, and may even place them in danger. Similar difficulties exist in situations involving police work, fire fighting, search and rescue, and in military-type gaming situations. In some situations, particularly with regard to firefighting, the problem is often further complicated by the fact that physical equipment may preclude the ability to communicate orally. This problem exists in any situation where oral communication is impossible, such as with the use of gas masks, or even in underwater operations involving the use of breathing equipment such as that used by SCUBA divers.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to overcome these difficulties by providing a means for correlating direction vectors generated based on a physical direction tracked by a device such as a hand-held pointer or mounted pointing device such as a gun sight or a helmet-mounted vision-tracking device. The system correlates these vectors to determine intersections in three-dimensional space, which indicate spatial regions of common interest.
References
“Digital Image Processing Techniques”, p. 257-287, Ed. By M. P. Ekstrom, Academic Press, Inc. (1984).
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the present invention to provide mobile user collaborator discovery method and system that tracks and correlates user position and gaze direction information in a physical environment in order to determine common interests. The physical environment is represented by an array divided into a plurality of elements, each representing a particular physical area of the environment. The array may be overlaid with information regarding the specific geography of an area including features and landmarks. The mobile user collaborator discovery method and system includes an activity monitor to track user position and gaze direction information, an entry processor to process the user position and gaze direction information to determine the elements of the array corresponding to physical areas viewed by the user, and to provide the information to a match database, and a matcher to correlate information regarding elements of the array corresponding to physical areas viewed by the user in order to determine portions of the array representing areas of common interest to the users. The method and system tracks areas of long-term and short-term interest to users by tracking the length of time and the number of times an individual has viewed a particular area. The method and system also provides a means for decaying the level of a particular user's interest for a particular element over time, and eliminating the association between a particular user and a particular element in the array once the level of interest has become sufficiently decayed, thereby clearing the match database of unnecessary entries. Furthermore, the method and system may provide a means for communication between users, such as an electronic display, so that users can determine common interests either among other members of the group or between a particular user and others sharing common interests with the particular user.
More specifically, the method for mobile user collaborator discovery among a plurality of users viewing portions of an area comprises the steps of:
(a) collecting a set of user views for the plurality of users, with the set of user views including a plurality of entries, with each entry including a user identity associated with a particular one of the plurality of users, a location within the area for the particular one of the plurality of users, and a view direction including a portion of the area for the particular one of the plurality of users;
(b) uniquely associating at least one scent score from the location of the particular one of the plurality of users to a portion of the area included in the view direction of the particular one of the plurality of users;
(c) storing the at least one scent score from step (b), along with information regarding the identification of the user with which the at least one scent score that was associated in step (b), in a computer memory; and
(d) determining a set of scent match scores by correlating the scent scores from at least a portion of the plurality of users to provide a set of users sharing points of common viewing as determined by overlaps in the areas for which scent scores were associated in step (b), whereby overlapping user views are utilized to determine a set of users which have viewed portions of the area in common.
The collecting step may be performed by monitoring and recording the real-time locations and view directions of the plurality of users, and the view direction of each of the plurality of users is in the form of a field-of-view cone having a vertex at the location of, and being centered along, the view direction of the particular one of the plurality of users, whereby the field-of view cone simulates the field-of-view of the user with respect to the area alo
Daily Mike
Payton David W.
Bui Bryan
HRL Laboratories LLC
Tope-McKay + Associates
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