Patent Grant
7460021
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material, which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent files or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever. The following notice applies to the software and data as described below and in the drawings hereto: Copyright © 2005, The Weather Channel, All Rights Reserved.
This invention generally relates to the field of computing devices. In particular, the present invention is directed to a system for conveying weather-related information to a user of a computing device.
Conventional weather information products provide information with a limited level of detail and functionality. Many conventional products are pre-configured to display to mass audiences, and therefore, are not easily customized by users for their personal requirements or preferences. Because of this, it is often hard for users to gain detailed information. In addition, many of these products operate in a limited viewing space, such as a portion of a web page or a window on the user's desktop. Thus, it would be advantageous if there was a weather information product that is easily customized and provides a high level of detail. In addition, it would be advantageous if the weather information product operates in a large viewing area.
The present invention is directed to systems and methods for providing a desktop wallpaper map a user's PC desktop to provide an indication of weather conditions. The map displays weather information such as local, regional or national radar, satellite map, five day forecast, current conditions, etc. In a passive mode, the map is displayed in the background on a user's desktop. In an interactive mode, the map is preferably moved up to the foreground and additional weather data is provided, which may be customized by the user. The user may pan, zoom and change locations via controls that are provided on the desktop. A control icon is provided to toggle the map to and from passive and interactive modes.
Additional features and advantages of the invention will be made apparent from the following detailed description of illustrative embodiments that proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings.
The foregoing summary, as well as the following detailed description of preferred embodiments, is better understood when read in conjunction with the appended drawings. For the purpose of illustrating the invention, there is shown in the drawings exemplary constructions of the invention; however, the invention is not limited to the specific methods and instrumentalities disclosed. In the drawings:
The present invention is directed to an improved wallpaper map that includes, e.g., current meteorological conditions and local content of interest, such as, restaurant listings, nightlife, special events, news, etc., related to wallpaper map events. In addition, the wallpaper map is presented on, e.g., a user's desktop, and is accessible without requiring the user to launch a separate wallpaper map application. Referring to
When a user connects to retrieve documents/data, the browser or thin client 20 points to a specified URL of the document/data to be retrieved. A TCP/IP connection is established with the web server 10 and a request is issued for the document stored at the specified URL by issuing an HTTP request to the server 10. In addition to HTML (XML) code, this document can incorporate other information content, such as images, audio, video, executable programs, etc. The document 12 and images are stored as files in a file system of the web server 10. The document 12 may incorporate the images using HTML tags that specify the location of files or other Internet resource containing the images on the Internet 16. In addition, the thin client 20 may receive data through XML and images and render the content directly on the desktop.
Referring now to
Servers 102-110 provide data, application downloads and licensing to the desktop framework 100 via a wide area network (WAN) such as the Internet 16. In the present embodiment, weather data is served by an XML Server 102, images come from a Map Server 104, and videos would be produced by a Video Server 106. There would also be a collection of client applications that are stored on download servers 108. A payment gateway 110 provides a communications connection with a third party payment service to enable end users to purchase additional applications and services. Collectively, these servers may be referred to herein as the web server 10. (In accordance with an aspect of this invention, the server 102 may also provide information from a database of events and forecasts).
The components, libraries and user interface elements of the desktop framework 100 will now be described. The framework components themselves are divided between a system-level user interface and collection of shared libraries implementing desktop application services. These services include the retrieval, storage, and presentation of weather data, the browsing, install; and updating of desktop applications; and the authentication and verification of downloaded files prior to installation.
A weather.framework 112 component is an application framework that provides the core libraries that are installed on the user's computer. The weather.framework 112 provides the ability for other programs to request weather data in one or more of the operating system's native formats. The weather.framework 112 encapsulates system level access to current and cached weather data from weather.com's services. Using only a single instance of weather information on the user's computer increases consistency and improves efficiency of both the client and server.
The weather.framework 112 state engine maintains the current state of the data model and tasks that need to be executed according to predefined rules. An example of a state-related task is the need to fetch current conditions every 30 minutes. A weather.framework cache holds weather data locally on the user's machine in accordance with rules defining the aging of the cache. This reduces load on the server and allows applications to use some information even when the computer is not connected to the Internet.
The weather.framework 112 resources include icons and translation tables to correctly present the weather data. Having the resources locally reduces the server load and bandwidth and allows the icons and imagery to be used when the computer is not connected to the Internet. Framework Meta-APIs are language independent specifications of the functions and data types for a given framework. External APIs then implement these functions and data types in a given language and for a given Operating System. For example, desktop framework applications may access weather data through weather framework APIs such as: C++ (Windows, Linux), Net (Windows), Cocoa (Macintosh), JavaScript (DHTML) and Java (Server Applications).
The user interface for the weather.framework 112 is a set of dialog boxes that collect user preferences for system-wide weather configuration. A preferences dialog collects user information such as: Location, Units, and Display of Severe Weather Alerts. A weather.framework key may be used that is a cryptographic license verifying the identity of the framework and allowing it access to the weather.com services.
The connection between the weather framework 112 and the Weather Servers 102-108 could be on-demand or always-open, allowing for true push alerts and even push-weather. The weather.framework 112 also implements a local weather database with cached results to previous queries. As an alternative, the weather.framework 112 may implement peer-to-peer connections between clients to collect and distribute weather data in order to reduce the bandwidth and resource burden on the servers 102-108.
A download.framework 114 component is responsible for maintaining the versions of the software installed on the user's computer. The download.framework 114 updates the weather.framework 112 as new versions of files are released and allows users to install new software without using a web browser or other connection to the Internet.
The download.framework 114 contains the core user interface and system processes to download and install new and updated applications. The User Interface provides the user dialogs to register, download, and configure framework applications from the application catalog. A System Preferences dialog preferably conforms to the Operating System's standards for control-panels and contains global configuration settings such as: Username, Password, Address, Age, Gender, Auto-Update, Auto-Notify, and Network Settings. In addition to being stored locally, the information may be communicated back to an XML URS database server. The URS database server is a Universal Registration System. It contains all user and product preferences in a centralized database at weather.com (or other service provider). Framework products preferably collect data from the user and send it to URS for centralized storage and authentication.
A Software Catalog displays all of the software available for that Operating System and indicate what software is currently installed. Additionally, the catalog will provide descriptions of the products. If the user has selected to be notified when new versions of the installed software are available, an Update Notification dialog will alert them when the software catalog is updated. If the user has selected to be notified when new software is added to the catalog, a New Application Notification dialog will alert them when the software catalog is updated.
A Version Checker uses the framework's list of installed applications on the user's computer and checks periodically with the download server 108 to determine if there are new or updated products available for that Operating System. If new or updated software is available, the software is either automatically installed or the user is notified of the update. A Downloader downloads new applications and software updates to the user's computer. It can do this interactively, when the user chooses to install new software form the Catalog, or in the background, when an update becomes available for software that is already installed. A Verifier uses checksums and encryption keys to verify that the downloaded software is authentic and not corrupt before it is installed.
An Installer installs new or updated software on the user's computer. It will also uninstall any framework software the user wants to remove. A Download Framework key is used to verify the authenticity of the framework components, since the Download Framework has the ability to update itself. A Framework Uninstaller is a separate, external program that allows the user to uninstall all desktop framework components.
A license.framework 116 component is responsible for keeping track of data use and registration information. Some data may be provided free of charge and other data may require a subscription. Similarly, some allocations may require registration and opt-in co-registration, while others may have paid advertising in them. The license.framework 116 component interacts with URS and billing to maintain the user's profile and, in the case of subscription products, bill them accordingly.
The license.framework 116 provides an interface to or its own implementation of, standard cryptographic libraries necessary for SSL and other encrypted network communications. Also, it provides an interface to or its own implementation of the client components of a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) that allows authentication and verification of programs downloaded to a user's computer. The license.framework 116 also provides the framework for securing access to desktop framework data and restricting the programs that use the framework APIs.
The download.framework 114 communicates with the download services over SSL and the registration and co-registration transactions for individual application use SSL to protect user data. The content provided may generate its own SSL certificates for the SSL transactions. The content provider may also have its own certifiers and will issue certificates to each Framework and framework application. The frameworks will be able to verify the validity of an application using its public key and allow or deny access to the data accordingly. The license.framework 116 will also have its own key to verify its authenticity.
Thus, the framework components 112-116 in this embodiment reside on top of the services architecture (i.e., servers 102-110). By using common services and assets such as the weather XML feeds, maps, and URS, the desktop framework 100 will remain current with other services and leverage the web, wireless, and broadband development efforts.
Many different desktop applications may be developed to interact with the desktop framework 100. The exemplary applications are shown as reference numerals 118-132 and are not intended to limit the scope of the present invention as many additional applications may interoperate with the desktop framework 100.
It is noted that the applications and other facets of the desktop framework are intended to be installed on a personal computer. The operation of a personal computer is well known by those of ordinary skill in the art. Examples of well known computing systems, environments, and/or configurations that may be suitable for use with the invention include, but are not limited to, personal computers, server computers, hand-held or laptop devices, multiprocessor systems, microprocessor-based systems, set top boxes, programmable consumer electronics, network PCs, minicomputers, mainframe computers, distributed computing environments that include any of the above systems or devices, and the like.
In accordance with the present invention, an application provided in the framework 100 is a wallpaper map application 118 that provides a weather map as wallpaper on a user's desktop. The map may be customized and updated. The updates may automatically occur in the background to provide a current view of the weather conditions. The map may be toggled between an interactive mode and a passive mode, as described below.
Referring to
Referring now to
Clicking the control icon 302 in
The wallpaper map application 118 may be implemented on a personal digital assistant (PDA), mobile telephone, or other handheld devices as well. Here, the wallpaper map application 118 may interact directly with the server 102 to retrieve data without the need for the desktop framework 100 in order to accommodate memory and processor limitations of handheld devices. The wallpaper map application 118, as applied to handheld devices, would operate substantially as noted above with regard to
While the present invention has been described in connection with the preferred embodiments of the various Figs., it is to be understood that other similar embodiments may be used or modifications and additions may be made to the described embodiment for performing the same function of the present invention without deviating therefrom.
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