Patent Application
20180357073
Tablets, laptops, phones (e.g., cellular or satellite), mobile (vehicular) or portable (personal) two-way radios, and other communication devices are now in common use by users, such as first responders (including firemen, police officers, and paramedics, among others), and provide such users and others with instant access to increasingly valuable additional information and resources such as vehicle histories, arrest records, outstanding warrants, health information, real-time traffic or other situational status information, and any other information that may aid the user in making a more informed determination of an action to take or how to resolve a situation, among other possibilities.
Many such communication devices further comprise, or provide access to, electronic digital assistants (or sometimes referenced as “virtual partners”) that may provide the user thereof with valuable information in an automated (e.g., without further user input) or semi-automated (e.g., with some further user input) fashion. The valuable information provided to the user may be based on explicit requests for such information posed by the user via an input (e.g., such as a parsed natural language input or an electronic touch interface manipulation associated with an explicit request) in which the electronic digital assistant may reactively provide such requested valuable information, or may be based on some other set of one or more context or triggers in which the electronic digital assistant may proactively provide such valuable information to the user absent any explicit request from the user.
As some existing examples, electronic digital assistants such as Siri provided by Apple, Inc.® and Google Now provided by Google, Inc.®, are software applications running on underlying electronic hardware that are capable of understanding natural language, and may complete electronic tasks in response to user voice inputs, among other additional or alternative types of inputs. These electronic digital assistants may perform such tasks as taking and storing voice dictation for future reference and retrieval, reading a received text message or an e-mail message aloud, generating a text message or e-mail message reply, looking up requested phone numbers and initiating a phone call to a requested contact, generating calendar appointments and providing appointment reminders, warning users of nearby dangers such as traffic accidents or environmental hazards, and providing many other types of information in a reactive or proactive manner.
The accompanying figures, where like reference numerals refer to identical or functionally similar elements throughout the separate views, which together with the detailed description below are incorporated in and form part of the specification and serve to further illustrate various embodiments of concepts that include the claimed invention, and to explain various principles and advantages of those embodiments.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of embodiments of the present invention.
The apparatus and method components have been represented where appropriate by conventional symbols in the drawings, showing only those specific details that are pertinent to understanding the embodiments of the present invention so as not to obscure the disclosure with details that will be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having the benefit of the description herein.
In many cases, the user must speak directly to an electronic digital assistant and request the electronic digital assistant to perform a particular task. Furthermore, officers in the field and other users, such as retail workers or transportation drivers, may be in a position in which they must keep the eyes up and/or hands down, and may have a limited ability to change a user interface of a portable or mobile computing device at their disposal.
Thus, there exists a need for an improved technical method, device, and system for an electronic digital assistant to detect a user's natural language speech transmissions to one or more other users, and to infer from that speech, and without requiring further manual interaction such as touch-screen or keyboard interaction, a change in assignment status that can be correspondingly applied to automatically modify a user interface of a mobile or portable device computing device at their disposal.
In one embodiment a process at an electronic digital assistant computing device for natural language detection of a user status change and corresponding modification of a user interface includes: monitoring, at an electronic computing device, one of a private voice call and a talkgroup voice call associated with an in-field user; detecting, by the electronic computing device over the one of the private voice call and the talkgroup voice call associated with the in-field user, first user speech from the in-field user; identifying, by the electronic computing device, a current status of the in-field user of one of an on-assignment related status and a not-on-assignment related status; determining, by the electronic computing device, that the first user speech is indicative of one of (i) a first status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status and (ii) a second status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the not-on-assignment related status; and when the determining, by the electronic computing device, is that the first user speech is indicative of the first status change, responsively: causing, by the electronic computing device, one of a mobile and a portable computing device associated with the in-field user to automatically and responsively swap a foreground not-on-assignment related application with a not-previously-in-foreground on-assignment related application; and when the determining, by the electronic computing device, is that the first user speech is indicative of the second status change, responsively: causing, by the electronic computing device, one of the mobile and the portable computing device associated with the in-field user to automatically and responsively swap a foreground on-assignment related application with a not-previously-in-foreground not-on-assignment related application.
In a further embodiment, a computing device implementing an electronic digital assistant for natural language detection of a user status change and corresponding modification of a user interface includes a memory storing non-transitory computer-readable instructions; a transceiver; and one or more processors configured to, in response to executing the non-transitory computer-readable instructions, perform a first set of functions comprising: monitoring one of a private voice call and a talkgroup voice call associated with an in-field user; detect, over the one of the private voice call and the talkgroup voice call associated with the in-field user, first user speech from the in-field user; identify a current status of the in-field user of one of an on-assignment related status and a not-on-assignment related status; determine that the first user speech is indicative of one of (i) a first status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status and (ii) a second status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the not-on-assignment related status; and when the determining is that the first user speech is indicative of the first status change, responsively: cause one of a mobile and a portable computing device associated with the in-field user to automatically and responsively swap a foreground not-on-assignment related application with a not-previously-in-foreground on-assignment related application; and when the determining is that the first user speech is indicative of the second status change, responsively: cause one of the mobile and the portable computing device associated with the in-field user to automatically and responsively swap a foreground on-assignment related application with a not-previously-in-foreground not-on-assignment related application.
Each of the above-mentioned embodiments will be discussed in more detail below, starting with example communication system and device architectures of the system in which the embodiments may be practiced, followed by an illustration of processing steps for achieving the method, device, and system for an electronic digital assistant. Further advantages and features consistent with this disclosure will be set forth in the following detailed description, with reference to the figures.
a. Communication System Structure
Referring now to the drawings, and in particular
System 100 may also include a vehicle 132 associated with the user 102 having an integrated mobile communication device 133, an associated vehicular video camera 134, and a coupled vehicular transceiver 136. Although
Each of the portable radio 104, RSM video capture device 106, laptop 114, and vehicle 132 may be capable of directly wirelessly communicating via direct-mode wireless link(s) 142, and/or may be capable of wirelessly communicating via a wireless infrastructure radio access network (RAN) 152 over respective wireless link(s) 140, 144 and via corresponding transceiver circuits. These devices may be referred to as communication devices and are configured to receive inputs associated with the user 102 and/or provide outputs to the user 102 in addition to communicating information to and from other communication devices and the infrastructure RAN 152.
The portable radio 104, in particular, may be any communication device used for infrastructure RAN or direct-mode media (e.g., voice, audio, video, etc.) communication via a long-range wireless transmitter and/or transceiver that has a transmitter transmit range on the order of miles, e.g., 0.5-50 miles, or 3-20 miles (e.g., in comparison to a short-range transmitter such as a Bluetooth, Zigbee, or NFC transmitter) with other communication devices and/or the infrastructure RAN 152. The long-range transmitter may implement a direct-mode, conventional, or trunked land mobile radio (LMR) standard or protocol such as European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) Digital Mobile Radio (DMR), a Project 25 (P25) standard defined by the Association of Public Safety Communications Officials International (APCO), Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA), or other LMR radio protocols or standards. In other embodiments, the long range transmitter may implement a Long Term Evolution (LTE), LTE-Advance, or 5G protocol including multimedia broadcast multicast services (MBMS) or single site point-to-multipoint (SC-PTM) over which an open mobile alliance (OMA) push to talk (PTT) over cellular (OMA-PoC), a voice over IP (VoIP), an LTE Direct or LTE Device to Device, or a PTT over IP (PoIP) application may be implemented. In still further embodiments, the long range transmitter may implement a Wi-Fi protocol perhaps in accordance with an IEEE 802.11 standard (e.g., 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g) or a WiMAX protocol perhaps operating in accordance with an IEEE 802.16 standard.
In the example of
In order to communicate with and exchange video, audio, and other media and communications with the RSM video capture device 106 and/or the laptop 114, the portable radio 104 may contain one or more physical electronic ports (such as a USB port, an Ethernet port, an audio jack, etc.) for direct electronic coupling with the RSM video capture device 106 or laptop 114. In some embodiments, the portable radio 104 may contain a short-range transmitter (e.g., in comparison to the long-range transmitter such as a LMR or Broadband transmitter) and/or transceiver for wirelessly coupling with the RSM video capture device 106 or laptop 114. The short-range transmitter may be a Bluetooth, Zigbee, or NFC transmitter having a transmit range on the order of 0.01-100 meters, or 0.1-10 meters. In other embodiments, the RSM video capture device 106 and/or the laptop 114 may contain their own long-range transceivers and may communicate with one another and/or with the infrastructure RAN 152 or vehicular transceiver 136 directly without passing through portable radio 104.
The RSM video capture device 106 provides voice functionality features similar to a traditional RSM, including one or more of acting as a remote microphone that is closer to the user's 102 mouth, providing a remote speaker allowing playback of audio closer to the user's 102 ear, and including a PTT switch or other type of PTT input. The voice and/or audio recorded at the remote microphone may be provided to the portable radio 104 for storage and/or analysis or for further transmission to other mobile communication devices or the infrastructure RAN 152, or may be directly transmitted by the RSM video capture device 106 to other communication devices or from the infrastructure RAN 152. The voice and/or audio played back at the remote speaker may be received from the portable radio 104 or directly from one or more other communication devices or the infrastructure RAN. The RSM video capture device 106 may include a separate physical PTT switch 108 that functions, in cooperation with the portable radio 104 or on its own, to maintain the portable radio 104 and/or RSM video capture device 106 in a monitor only mode, and which switches the device(s) to a transmit-only mode (for half-duplex devices) or transmit and receive mode (for full-duplex devices) upon depression or activation of the PTT switch 108. The portable radio 104 and/or RSM video capture device 106 may form part of a group communications architecture that allows a single communication device to communicate with one or more group members (not shown) associated with a particular group of devices at a same time.
Additional features may be provided at the RSM video capture device 106 as well. For example, a display screen 110 may be provided for displaying images, video, and/or text to the user 102 or to someone else. The display screen 110 may be, for example, a liquid crystal display (LCD) screen or an organic light emitting display (OLED) display screen. In some embodiments, a touch sensitive input interface may be incorporated into the display screen 110 as well, allowing the user 102 to interact with content provided on the display screen 110. A soft PTT input may also be provided, for example, via such a touch interface.
A video camera 112 may also be provided at the RSM video capture device 106, integrating an ability to capture images and/or video and store the captured image data (for further analysis) or transmit the captured image data as an image or video stream to the portable radio 104 and/or to other communication devices or to the infrastructure RAN 152 directly. The video camera 112 and RSM remote microphone may be used, for example, for capturing audio and/or video of a suspect and the suspect's surroundings, storing the captured image and/or audio data for further analysis or transmitting the captured image and/or audio data as a video and/or audio stream to the portable radio 104 and/or to other communication devices or to the infrastructure RAN directly for further analysis. An RSM remote microphone of the RSM video capture device 106 may be a directional or unidirectional microphone or array of directional or unidirectional microphones that, in the case of directional or arrays of microphones, may be capable of identifying a direction from which a captured sound emanated.
The laptop 114, in particular, may be any wireless communication device used for infrastructure RAN or direct-mode media communication via a long-range or short-range wireless transmitter with other communication devices and/or the infrastructure RAN 152. The laptop 114 includes a display screen for displaying a user interface to an operating system and one or more applications running on the operating system, such as a broadband PTT communications application, a web browser application, a vehicle history database application, an arrest record database application, an outstanding warrant database application, a mapping and/or navigation application, a health information database application, or other types of applications that may require user interaction to operate. The laptop 114 display screen may be, for example, an LCD screen or an OLED display screen. In some embodiments, a touch sensitive input interface may be incorporated into the display screen as well, allowing the user 102 to interact with content provided on the display screen. A soft PTT input may also be provided, for example, via such a touch interface.
Front and/or rear-facing video cameras may also be provided at the laptop 114, integrating an ability to capture video and/or audio of the user 102 and the user's 102 surroundings, or a suspect (or potential suspect) and the suspect's surroundings, and store and/or otherwise process the captured video and/or audio for further analysis or transmit the captured video and/or audio as a video and/or audio stream to the portable radio 104, other communication devices, and/or the infrastructure RAN 152 for further analysis.
The smart glasses 116 may include a digital imaging device, an electronic processor, a short-range and/or long-range transceiver device, and/or a projecting device. The smart glasses 116 may maintain a bi-directional connection with the portable radio 104 and provide an always-on or on-demand video feed pointed in a direction of the user's 102 gaze via the digital imaging device, and/or may provide a personal display via the projection device integrated into the smart glasses 116 for displaying information such as text, images, or video received from the portable radio 104 or directly from the infrastructure RAN 152. In some embodiments, the smart glasses 116 may include its own long-range transceiver and may communicate with other communication devices and/or with the infrastructure RAN 152 or vehicular transceiver 136 directly without passing through portable radio 104. In some embodiments, an additional user interface mechanism such as a touch interface or gesture detection mechanism may be provided at the smart glasses 116 that allows the user 102 to interact with the display elements displayed on the smart glasses 116 or modify operation of the digital imaging device. In other embodiments, a display and input interface at the portable radio 104 may be provided for interacting with smart glasses 116 content and modifying operation of the digital imaging device, among other possibilities.
The smart glasses 116 may provide a virtual reality interface in which a computer-simulated reality electronically replicates an environment with which the user 102 may interact. In some embodiments, the smart glasses 116 may provide an augmented reality interface in which a direct or indirect view of real-world environments in which the user is currently disposed are augmented (i.e., supplemented, by additional computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, images, graphics, GPS data, or other information). In still other embodiments, the smart glasses 116 may provide a mixed reality interface in which electronically generated objects are inserted in a direct or indirect view of real-world environments in a manner such that they may co-exist and interact in real time with the real-world environment and real world objects.
The sensor-enabled holster 118 may be an active (powered) or passive (non-powered) sensor that maintains and/or provides state information regarding a weapon or other item normally disposed within the user's 102 sensor-enabled holster 118. The sensor-enabled holster 118 may detect a change in state (presence to absence) and/or an action (removal) relative to the weapon normally disposed within the sensor-enabled holster 118. The detected change in state and/or action may be reported to the portable radio 104 via its short-range transceiver. In some embodiments, the sensor-enabled holster 118 may also detect whether the first responder's hand is resting on the weapon even if it has not yet been removed from the holster and provide such information to portable radio 104. Other possibilities exist as well.
The biometric sensor wristband 120 may be an electronic device for tracking an activity of the user 102 or a health status of the user 102, and may include one or more movement sensors (such as an accelerometer, magnetometer, and/or gyroscope) that may periodically or intermittently provide to the portable radio 104 indications of orientation, direction, steps, acceleration, and/or speed, and indications of health such as one or more of a captured heart rate, a captured breathing rate, and a captured body temperature of the user 102, perhaps accompanying other information. In some embodiments, the biometric sensor wristband 120 may include its own long-range transceiver and may communicate with other communication devices and/or with the infrastructure RAN 152 or vehicular transceiver 136 directly without passing through portable radio 104.
An accelerometer is a device that measures acceleration. Single and multi-axis models are available to detect magnitude and direction of the acceleration as a vector quantity, and may be used to sense orientation, acceleration, vibration shock, and falling. A gyroscope is a device for measuring or maintaining orientation, based on the principles of conservation of angular momentum. One type of gyroscope, a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) based gyroscope, uses lithographically constructed versions of one or more of a tuning fork, a vibrating wheel, or resonant solid to measure orientation. Other types of gyroscopes could be used as well. A magnetometer is a device used to measure the strength and/or direction of the magnetic field in the vicinity of the device, and may be used to determine a direction in which a person or device is facing.
The heart rate sensor may use electrical contacts with the skin to monitor an electrocardiography (EKG) signal of its wearer, or may use infrared light and imaging device to optically detect a pulse rate of its wearer, among other possibilities.
A breathing rate sensor may be integrated within the sensor wristband 120 itself, or disposed separately and communicate with the sensor wristband 120 via a short range wireless or wired connection. The breathing rate sensor may include use of a differential capacitive circuits or capacitive transducers to measure chest displacement and thus breathing rates. In other embodiments, a breathing sensor may monitor a periodicity of mouth and/or nose-exhaled air (e.g., using a humidity sensor, temperature sensor, capnometer or spirometer) to detect a respiration rate. Other possibilities exist as well.
A body temperature sensor may include an electronic digital or analog sensor that measures a skin temperature using, for example, a negative temperature coefficient (NTC) thermistor or a resistive temperature detector (RTD), may include an infrared thermal scanner module, and/or may include an ingestible temperature sensor that transmits an internally measured body temperature via a short range wireless connection, among other possibilities.
Although the biometric sensor wristband 120 is shown in
The portable radio 104, RSM video capture device 106, laptop 114, smart glasses 116, sensor-enabled holster 118, and/or biometric sensor wristband 120 may form a personal area network (PAN) via corresponding short-range PAN transceivers, which may be based on a Bluetooth, Zigbee, or other short-range wireless protocol having a transmission range on the order of meters, tens of meters, or hundreds of meters.
The portable radio 104 and/or RSM video capture device 106 (or any other electronic device in
The vehicle 132 associated with the user 102 may include the mobile communication device 133, the vehicular video camera 134, and the vehicular transceiver 136, all of which may be coupled to one another via a wired and/or wireless vehicle area network (VAN), perhaps along with other sensors physically or communicatively coupled to the vehicle 132. The vehicular transceiver 136 may include a long-range transceiver for directly wirelessly communicating with communication devices such as the portable radio 104, the RSM 106, and the laptop 114 via wireless link(s) 142 and/or for wirelessly communicating with the RAN 152 via wireless link(s) 144. The vehicular transceiver 136 may further include a short-range wireless transceiver or wired transceiver for communicatively coupling between the mobile communication device 133 and/or the vehicular video camera 134 in the VAN. The mobile communication device 133 may, in some embodiments, include the vehicular transceiver 136 and/or the vehicular video camera 134 integrated therewith, and may operate to store and/or process video and/or audio produced by the video camera 134 and/or transmit the captured video and/or audio as a video and/or audio stream to the portable radio 104, other communication devices, and/or the infrastructure RAN 152 for further analysis. A microphone (not shown), or an array thereof, may be integrated in the video camera 134 and/or at the mobile communication device 133 (or additionally or alternatively made available at a separate location of the vehicle 132) and communicatively coupled to the mobile communication device 133 and/or vehicular transceiver 136 for capturing audio and storing, processing, and/or transmitting the audio in a same or similar manner to the video as set forth above.
The vehicle 132 may be a human-operable vehicle, or may be a self-driving vehicle operable under control of mobile communication device 133 perhaps in cooperation with video camera 134 (which may include a visible-light camera, an infrared camera, a time-of-flight depth camera, and/or a light detection and ranging (LiDAR) device). Command information and/or status information such as location and speed may be exchanged with the self-driving vehicle via the VAN and/or the PAN (when the PAN is in range of the VAN or via the VAN's infrastructure RAN link).
The vehicle 132 and/or transceiver 136, similar to the portable radio 104 and/or respective receivers, transmitters, or transceivers thereof, may include a location determination device integrated with or separately disposed in the mobile communication device 133 and/or transceiver 136 for determining (and storing and/or transmitting) a location of the vehicle 132.
In some embodiments, instead of a vehicle 132, a land, air, or water-based drone with the same or similar audio and/or video and communications capabilities and the same or similar self-navigating capabilities as set forth above may be disposed, and may similarly communicate with the user's 102 PAN and/or with the infrastructure RAN 152 to support the user 102 in the field.
The VAN may communicatively couple with the PAN disclosed above when the VAN and the PAN come within wireless transmission range of one another, perhaps after an authentication takes place there between. In some embodiments, one of the VAN and the PAN may provide infrastructure communications to the other, depending on the situation and the types of devices in the VAN and/or PAN and may provide interoperability and communication links between devices (such as video cameras) and sensors within the VAN and PAN.
Although the RSM 106, the laptop 114, and the vehicle 132 are illustrated in
Infrastructure RAN 152 is a radio access network that provides for radio communication links to be arranged within the network between a plurality of user terminals. Such user terminals may be portable, mobile, or stationary and may include any one or more of the communication devices illustrated in
Infrastructure RAN 152 may operate according to an industry standard wireless access technology such as, for example, an LTE, LTE-Advance, or 5G technology over which an OMA-PoC, a VoIP, an LTE Direct or LTE Device to Device, or a PoIP application may be implemented. Additionally or alternatively, infrastructure RAN 152 may implement a WLAN technology such as Wi-Fi perhaps operating in accordance with an IEEE 802.11 standard (e.g., 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g) or such as a WiMAX perhaps operating in accordance with an IEEE 802.16 standard.
Infrastructure RAN 152 may additionally or alternatively operate according to an industry standard LMR wireless access technology such as, for example, the P25 standard defined by the APCO, the TETRA standard defined by the ETSI, the dPMR standard also defined by the ETSI, or the DMR standard also defined by the ETSI. Because these systems generally provide lower throughput than the broadband systems, they are sometimes designated narrowband RANs.
Communications in accordance with any one or more of these protocols or standards, or other protocols or standards, may take place over physical channels in accordance with one or more of a TDMA (time division multiple access), FDMA (frequency divisional multiple access), OFDMA (orthogonal frequency division multiplexing access), or CDMA (code division multiple access) technique.
OMA-PoC, in particular and as one example of an infrastructure broadband wireless system, enables familiar PTT and “instant on” features of traditional half duplex communication devices, but uses communication devices operating over modern broadband telecommunications networks. Using PoC, wireless communication devices such as mobile telephones and notebook computers can function as PTT half-duplex communication devices for transmitting and receiving. Other types of PTT models and multimedia call models (MMCMs) are also available.
Floor control in an OMA-PoC session is generally maintained by a PTT server that controls communications between two or more wireless communication devices. When a user of one of the communication devices keys a PTT button, a request for permission to speak in the OMA-PoC session is transmitted from the user's communication device to the PTT server using, for example, a real-time transport protocol (RTP) message. If no other users are currently speaking in the PoC session, an acceptance message is transmitted back to the user's communication device and the user may then speak into a microphone of the communication device. Using standard compression/decompression (codec) techniques, the user's voice is digitized and transmitted using discrete auditory data packets (e.g., together which form an auditory data stream over time), such as according to RTP and internet protocols (IP), to the PTT server. The PTT server then transmits the auditory data packets to other users of the PoC session (e.g., to other communication devices in the group of communication devices or talkgroup to which the user is subscribed), using for example, one or more of a unicast, point to multipoint, or broadcast communication technique.
Infrastructure narrowband LMR wireless systems, on the other hand, operate in either a conventional or trunked configuration. In either configuration, a plurality of communication devices is partitioned into separate groups of communication devices. In a conventional system, each communication device in a group is selected to a particular radio channel (frequency or frequency & time slot) for communications associated with that communication device's group. Thus, each group is served by one channel, and multiple groups may share the same single frequency (in which case, in some embodiments, group IDs may be present in the group data to distinguish between groups using the same shared frequency).
In contrast, a trunked radio system and its communication devices use a pool of traffic channels for virtually an unlimited number of groups of communication devices (e.g., talkgroups). Thus, all groups are served by all channels. The trunked radio system works to take advantage of the probability that not all groups need a traffic channel for communication at the same time. When a member of a group requests a call on a control or rest channel on which all of the communication devices at a site idle awaiting new call notifications, in one embodiment, a call controller assigns a separate traffic channel for the requested group call, and all group members move from the assigned control or rest channel to the assigned traffic channel for the group call. In another embodiment, when a member of a group requests a call on a control or rest channel, the call controller may convert the control or rest channel on which the communication devices were idling to a traffic channel for the call, and instruct all communication devices that are not participating in the new call to move to a newly assigned control or rest channel selected from the pool of available channels. With a given number of channels, a much greater number of groups may be accommodated in a trunked radio system as compared with a conventional radio system.
Group calls may be made between wireless and/or wireline participants in accordance with either a narrowband or a broadband protocol or standard. Group members for group calls may be statically or dynamically defined. That is, in a first example, a user or administrator working on behalf of the user may indicate to the switching and/or radio network (perhaps at a call controller, PTT server, zone controller, or mobile management entity (MME), base station controller (BSC), mobile switching center (MSC), site controller, Push-to-Talk controller, or other network device) a list of participants of a group at the time of the call or in advance of the call. The group members (e.g., communication devices) could be provisioned in the network by the user or an agent, and then provided some form of group identity or identifier, for example. Then, at a future time, an originating user in a group may cause some signaling to be transmitted indicating that he or she wishes to establish a communication session (e.g., group call) with each of the pre-designated participants in the defined group. In another example, communication devices may dynamically affiliate with a group (and also disassociate with the group) perhaps based on user input, and the switching and/or radio network may track group membership and route new group calls according to the current group membership.
In some instances, broadband and narrowband systems may be interfaced via a middleware system that translates between a narrowband PTT standard protocol (such as P25) and a broadband PTT standard protocol (such as OMA-PoC). Such intermediate middleware may include a middleware server for performing the translations and may be disposed in the cloud, disposed in a dedicated on-premises location for a client wishing to use both technologies, or disposed at a public carrier supporting one or both technologies. For example, and with respect to
The infrastructure RAN 152 is illustrated in
The infrastructure controller 156 illustrated in
The IP network 160 may comprise one or more routers, switches, LANs, WLANs, WANs, access points, or other network infrastructure, including but not limited to, the public Internet. The cloud compute cluster 162 may be comprised of a plurality of computing devices, such as the one set forth in
Database(s) 164 may be accessible via IP network 160 and/or cloud compute cluster 162, and may include databases such as a long-term video storage database, a historical or forecasted weather database, an offender database perhaps including facial recognition images to match against, a cartographic database of streets and elevations, a traffic database of historical or current traffic conditions, or other types of databases. Databases 164 may further include all or a portion of the databases described herein as being provided at infrastructure controller 156. In some embodiments, the databases 164 may be maintained by third parties (for example, the National Weather Service or a Department of Transportation, respectively). As shown in
Finally, although
b. Device Structure
While
As shown in
The microphone 220 may be present for capturing audio from a user and/or other environmental or background audio that is further processed by processing unit 203 in accordance with the remainder of this disclosure and/or is transmitted as voice or audio stream data, or as acoustical environment indications, by communications unit 202 to other portable radios and/or other communication devices. The imaging device 221 may provide video (still or moving images) of an area in a field of view of the communication device 200 for further processing by the processing unit 203 and/or for further transmission by the communications unit 202. A speaker 222 may be present for reproducing audio that is decoded from voice or audio streams of calls received via the communications unit 202 from other portable radios, from digital audio stored at the communication device 200, from other ad-hoc or direct mode devices, and/or from an infrastructure RAN device, or may playback alert tones or other types of pre-recorded audio.
The processing unit 203 may include a code Read Only Memory (ROM) 212 coupled to the common data and address bus 217 for storing data for initializing system components. The processing unit 203 may further include an electronic processor 213 (for example, a microprocessor or another electronic device) coupled, by the common data and address bus 217, to a Random Access Memory (RAM) 204 and a static memory 216.
The communications unit 202 may include one or more wired and/or wireless input/output (I/O) interfaces 209 that are configurable to communicate with other communication devices, such as the portable radio 104, the laptop 114, the wireless RAN 152, and/or the mobile communication device 133.
For example, the communications unit 202 may include one or more wireless transceivers 208, such as a DMR transceiver, a P25 transceiver, a Bluetooth transceiver, a Wi-Fi transceiver perhaps operating in accordance with an IEEE 802.11 standard (e.g., 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g), an LTE transceiver, a WiMAX transceiver perhaps operating in accordance with an IEEE 802.16 standard, and/or another similar type of wireless transceiver configurable to communicate via a wireless radio network.
The communications unit 202 may additionally or alternatively include one or more wireline transceivers 208, such as an Ethernet transceiver, a USB transceiver, or similar transceiver configurable to communicate via a twisted pair wire, a coaxial cable, a fiber-optic link, or a similar physical connection to a wireline network. The transceiver 208 is also coupled to a combined modulator/demodulator 210.
The electronic processor 213 has ports for coupling to the display screen 205, the input device 206, the microphone 220, the imaging device 221, and/or the speaker 222. Static memory 216 may store operating code 225 for the electronic processor 213 that, when executed, performs one or more of the steps set forth in
In some embodiments, static memory 216 may also store, permanently or temporarily, an application mapping indicating, as a default or perhaps on a per user basis, which application(s) should be placed in a foreground of a mobile and/or portable associated with the user (or all users) when the user (or all users) are on-assignment, and which application(s) should be placed in a foreground of a mobile and/or portable associated with the user (or all users) when the user (or all users) are not-on-assignment. Static memory 216 may also store, permanently or temporarily, a current status (including one of an on-assignment status and a not-on-assignment status) for each of one or more users. Still further, static memory 216 may also store, permanently or temporarily, user speech indications (e.g., keywords or intents) associated with a first status change from a not-on-assignment related status of the user to an on—assignment related status of the user, and user speech indications associated with a second status change from an on-assignment related status of the user to a not-on-assignment related status of the user.
The static memory 216 may comprise, for example, a hard-disk drive (HDD), an optical disk drive such as a compact disk (CD) drive or digital versatile disk (DVD) drive, a solid state drive (SSD), a flash memory drive, or a tape drive, and the like.
In some embodiments, an individual component and/or a combination of individual components of the system 100 may be referred to as an electronic computing device that implements an electronic digital assistant as mentioned above. For example, the electronic computing device may be a single electronic processor (for example, the electronic processor 213 of the portable radio 104). In other embodiments, the electronic computing device includes multiple electronic processors distributed remotely from each other. For example, the electronic computing device may be implemented on a combination of at least two of the electronic processor 213 of the portable radio 104, the electronic processor 213 of the infrastructure controller 156, and the electronic processor 213 of a back-end device cloud compute cluster 162 accessible via the IP network 160.
To use the electronic digital assistant implemented by the electronic computing device, the user 102 may, for example, provide an oral query or statement that is received by the microphone 220 of the communication device 200 and transmitted to one or more other users (e.g., a dispatcher at dispatch console 158 or another user having a same or similar portable (hip) radio or having an associated mobile (vehicular) radio). The electronic computing device receives signals representative of the oral query or statement from the microphone 220 and analyzes the signals to determine the content of the oral query or statement. For example, the electronic computing device may include a natural language processing (NLP) engine configured to determine the intent and/or content of the oral query and/or statement. The electronic computing device may also be configured to determine a response to the oral query (for example, by retrieving stored data or by requesting data from a database such as one of the databases 164) and provide the response to an output device of the communication device 200 (for example, one or more of the speaker 222 via a generated audio response and the screen 205 via a generated text based response), and/or some other action to take in light of the contents of the oral query and/or statement. In other words, one or more of the communication device 200, embodied in one or more of the communication devices of
Although an oral query and/or statement is described above, in some embodiments, the electronic computing device receives and responds to other types of queries and inputs. For example, the user 102 may submit a text query to the electronic computing device by typing the text query into a hard keyboard input device 206 or a soft keyboard input provided on the screen 205 of the communication device 200. As another example, the user 102 may use the imaging device 221 to capture an image or video of an area and press a hard or soft key to send the image or video to the electronic computing device to, for example, allow the electronic computing device to identify an object in the image or video and provide a response and/or take other actions.
Turning now to
Process 300 begins at step 302 where the electronic computing device monitors one of a private voice call and a talkgroup voice call associated with an in-field user. The voice call being monitored at step 302 may be a private voice call between a user having an associated portable radio, such as user 102 having associated portable radio 104 of
At step 304, the electronic computing device detects, in the one of the private and talkgroup voice call, first user speech from the in-field user. The electronic computing device may detect and match the first user speech as originating from the in-field user by, for example, detecting the first user speech via an integrated or communicatively coupled microphone at the electronic computing device. In one embodiment, for example, the portable radio 104 of
In still other embodiments, and where the electronic computing device executing step 304 may not be the same device as the device originally capturing the first user speech, some other mechanism may be used to identify the first user speech as being associated with the in-field user. For example, where the private or talkgroup voice call is being captured by portable radio 104 and then transmitted to infrastructure controller 156 and/or cloud compute cluster 162 for further processing, a voice print associated with the first user and previously sampled and stored may be compared directly to the first user speech, or parameters thereof compared to parameters of the first user speech, to identify the first user speech as associated with the in-field user. In still other embodiments, call signaling may be used to identify the source of the first user speech. For example, in half duplex LMR systems where a floor is requested and assigned to a single device (and associated user) at a time, an identity of the user (or device, which may then be mapped to a user using the device to user mapping noted above) may be determined based on a signal received from a floor controller computing device that determines which device (and thus user) has rights to transmit to the LMR talkgroup. Such floor ownership information may be stored, for example, at infrastructure controller 156 and accessed locally at step 304 by infrastructure controller 156, or may be provided by the infrastructure controller 156 to cloud compute cluster 162 for use at step 304. Other options are possible as well.
At step 306, the electronic computing device identifies a current status of the in-field user of one of an on-assignment related status and a not-on-assignment related status. The current status of the in-field user may be stored at the electronic computing device itself, may be stored in a user to status or device to status mapping stored at one of the electronic computing device, an infrastructure computing device such as infrastructure controller 156, or a cloud computing device such as cloud compute cluster 162, and made accessible to the electronic computing device, or some combination of the foregoing. The not-on-assignment related status may be any one of a status indicating that the in-field-user is not currently working on a particular assignment or incident or is working a general or default task or assignment as opposed to a particular assignment or task, or is working a relatively low-priority assignment or task relative to a higher priority assignment or task.
For example, a not-on-assignment related status for a police officer user may be associated with an in-field user that is working a general or default task like patrolling a neighborhood, is in the office or precinct doing paperwork or other such managerial or secretarial task, or is on a route returning to the office or precinct after completing a specific task such as working an incident such as a car crash or retail theft. In comparison, an on-assignment related status for a police officer user may be associated with an in-field user that is actively deployed (on duty) on a specific task or incident or event outside of the office or precinct (e.g., an incident such as a car crash or retail theft), or is on a route to a location of a specific task or incident outside of the office or precinct.
As another example, a not-on-assignment related status for a retail worker may be associated with an in-field user that is working a general or default task like walking aisles looking to assist customers, is in a manager's office or security office doing paperwork or other such managerial or secretarial tasks, is otherwise not currently engaged in a particular customer assistance, security, or hazardous spill task, or is on a route returning to the office after completing a specific task such as working a safety incident or engaging with an unhappy customer. In comparison, an on-assignment related status for a retail worker may be associated with an in-field user that is actively deployed on a specific task or incident outside of the office (e.g., an incident such as a reported safety hazard, customer assistance to a particular unhappy customer, a billing dispute with a particular customer, an emergency exit door opened event, or other specific deployable incidents, assignments, or events), or is on a route to a location of a specific task or incident outside of the office. Other types of users may have other types of on-assignment and not-on-assignment statuses as well.
Such various on-assignment and not-on-assignment status identifiers for a particular type of user may be stored at the electronic computing device, or may be stored elsewhere, including the an infrastructure computing device such as infrastructure controller 156, or a cloud computing device such as cloud compute cluster 162, and made accessible to the electronic computing device, or some combination of the foregoing.
At step 308, the electronic computing device determines whether the first user speech is indicative of a first user status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status. If the first user speech is not indicative of a first user status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status, processing ends after step 308 for that branch of the flow chart. On the other hand, if the first user speech is indicative of a first user status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status, processing proceeds to step 402 of
The electronic computing device may determine whether the first user speech is indicative of a first user status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the not-on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the on-assignment related status in a number of ways. For example, the electronic computing device may apply an NLP algorithm to the first user speech in order to determine an intent of the speech and, as a function of a determined current status of the in-field user, may make a determination of an intent of the in-field user to change from a not-on-assignment related status to an on-assignment related status.
In other embodiments, the electronic computing device may text-convert the first user speech to text, and reference a mapping of user speech indications (e.g., keywords) determined to be indicative of an intent of the in-field user to change from a not-on-assignment related status to an on-assignment related status based on a threshold minimum number of one or more matching keywords.
For example, a police officer user may have a current not-on-assignment status of “patrol,” during which time the electronic computing device may detect the in-field user providing first user speech in a private (e.g., to a dispatcher or commander) or group voice call (e.g., to a talkgroup for the department or precinct to which the police officer belongs or a talkgroup for incidents in general or the particular incident to which he or she is about to respond) that is indicative of an intent of the police officer to respond to an active incident, such as “Officer Perkins responding to the domestic disturbance at 123 Elm St.” The electronic computing device may then infer, via an NLP algorithm, or may detect via matching of keyword “responding” and a keyword type of incident and/or keyword address, that the in-field user is transitioning from a not-on-assignment status of “patrol” to an on-assignment status of “responding to incident” or “responding to domestic disturbance.”
As another example, a retail worker user may have a current not-on-assignment status of “walking aisles,” during which time the electronic computing device may detect the in-field user providing first user speech in a private (e.g., to a manager or shift supervisor) or group voice call (e.g., to all other retail workers at that location) that is indicative of an intent of the retail worker to respond to an active incident or event, such as “This is Joe, I'll handle the request for customer assistance in Aisle 3.” The electronic computing device may then infer, via an NLP algorithm, or may detect via matching of keyword “handle” and a keyword “request”, “customer”, and/or “assistance”, that the in-field user is transitioning from a not-on-assignment status of “walking aisles” to an on-assignment status of “customer assistance” or “responding to request for assistance.”
At step 402 of process 400 in
For example, where the in-field user at step 402 is a police officer and the on-assignment status an in-incident status and the not-on-assignment status a not-in-incident status, the electronic computing device may cause a portable and/or mobile computing device associated with the police officer transitioning from a not-on-assignment status of “on patrol” to an on-assignment status of “responding to incident” to swap a foreground application associated with the “on patrol” status (e.g., such as a mapping application providing a patrol route for the police officer to follow, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with all other police officers in a same organization as the police officer, a task list setting forth one or more tasks related or unrelated to the patrol route that the police officer may choose to perform or accept, an incident list setting forth one or more current or past incidents associated with the police officer or the organization to which the police officer belongs, a status indicator application setting forth a status of the police officer and/or the other police officers in the same organization to which the police officer belongs, a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other police officers or other employees of the same organization to which the police officer belongs, a general note taking application in which the police officer may record notes relative to the patrol route, and/or other not-on-assignment related applications) and replace it with a not-previously-in-foreground different application (or different type of application) associated with the “responding to incident” status (e.g., such as a mapping application providing an incident route for the police officer to follow to arrive at the incident, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with all other police officers (and/or other persons) associated with the incident, a task list setting forth one or more tasks relating to the incident, an incident timeline setting forth events (and perhaps indicating summary, type, importance, who entered the event, etc.) associated with the incident, a status indicator application setting forth a status of the police officer and/or the other police officers or other persons associated with the incident, a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other police officers or other employees or persons associated with the incident, an incident-specific note taking application in which the police officer may record notes relative to the incident, and/or other on-assignment related applications).
While the police officer and his or her associated example portable radio 604 remains in the “on patrol” status state, the portable radio 604 receives a voice call (private call or talkgroup call) from a dispatcher and plays back speech indicating that a “Domestic Distance with Injuries” has occurred at “123 Elm St.” as indicated in voice text bubble 606. In response, the police officer associated with the portable radio 604 keys up and indicates “Perkins Responding” as indicated in voice text bubble 608, which is then transmitted by the portable radio 604 to the dispatcher, perhaps via a same or different private or talkgroup voice call as that over which the voice text bubble 606 contents were received. As a result of the electronic digital assistant processing the first user speech contents indicated in voice text bubble 608, perhaps at same or similar steps as steps to steps 302-306 above, the electronic digital assistant causes the portable radio 604 to transition 650 and swap at least one of the “on patrol” related foreground applications 612-616 with a different (or different type of) on-assignment (i.e., in-incident in this case) application that was not previously in the foreground. As shown in
However, the “on patrol” related list of current incidents application 614 that listed one or more current incidents associated with the Zonel patrol beat or perhaps associated with the officer's organization as a whole was replaced (i.e., swapped) with another not-previously-in-foreground on-assignment (e.g., in-incident in this case) related incident route mapping application 654 providing the officer a route to the domestic disturbance incident with which the officer had decided to respond, responsive to the inferred intent of the officer extracted from his voice speech provided on the private or talkgroup voice channel to the dispatcher. As a result, the officer can immediately proceed to respond to the indicated domestic disturbance incident without having to manually interface with the example portable radio 604 and draw his or her attention away from responding to the incident quickly and efficiently. Although only one application is illustrated as being swapped out in
Although the example above uses public safety related applications as examples, in other embodiments, on-assignment and not-on-assignment related applications could similarly be applied for other types of users. For example, for a retail user, not-on-assignment related applications may include a mapping application providing a route for a retail worker to follow indoors to ensure that his or her department is covered and visible to customers, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with all other employees of a same department or store as the retail user, a task list setting forth one or more tasks that the retail user may choose to perform or accept, an incident list setting forth one or more current or past security, customer, or hazardous spill incidents associated with the retail user or the organization to which the retail user belongs, a status indicator application setting forth a status of the retail user and/or the other retail users in the same organization (e.g., availability, location, seniority, title, assigned department, assigned task, etc.), a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other retail users or other employees of the same organization to which the retail user belongs, a general note taking application in which the retail user may record notes relative to the indoor department route, and/or other not-on-assignment related applications), and on-assignment related applications may include an indoor mapping application providing a route for the retail user to follow to arrive at a location at which a customer has requested assistance, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with a particularly assigned task associated with a retail incident (e.g., security staff for an assigned security task, web service staff for an assigned online order task, etc.), a task list setting forth one or more sub-tasks associated with a particularly assigned task (e.g., customer service request may include a task of meeting with the customer requesting assistance and a task of documenting the request and the assistance provided), a status indicator application setting forth a status of the retail user and/or the other retail users or other persons associated with a same assigned retail task, a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other retail users or other employees or persons associated with a same assigned retail task, a task-specific note taking application in which the retail user may record notes relative to the assigned task, and/or other on-assignment related applications.
Other types of users, such as security, transportation, or health care users, could have other associated on-assignment and not-on-assignment related applications.
Returning now to
The electronic computing device may determine whether the first user speech is indicative of a second user status change of the in-field user in which the current status of the in-field user is the on-assignment related status and the first user speech is indicative of a change to the not-on-assignment related status in a same or similar number of ways as already set forth above with respect to the first user status change.
For example, a police officer user may have a current on-assignment status of “responding to domestic disturbance,” during which time the electronic computing device may detect the in-field user providing first user speech in a private or group voice call that is indicative of an intent of the police officer to convey that the active incident has completed, such as “Suspect in custody” or “heading back to HQ.” The electronic computing device may then infer, via an NLP algorithm, or may detect via matching of keyword “suspect” and “custody” (or “heading back” and “HQ”) that the in-field user is transitioning from an on-assignment status of “responding to domestic disturbance” to a not-on-assignment status of “patrol” or “returning to headquarters.”
As another example, a retail worker user may have a current on-assignment status of “responding to request for assistance,” during which time the electronic computing device may detect the in-field user providing first user speech in a private or group voice call that is indicative of an intent of the retail worker to end the specific incident or event, such as “Heading back to the office” or “Handled that request.” The electronic computing device may then infer, via an NLP algorithm, or may detect via matching of keyword “heading back” and “office” (or “handled” and “request”), that the in-field user is transitioning from an on-assignment status of “responding to request for assistance” to a not-on-assignment status of “walking aisles” or “in the office.”
At step 502 of process 500 in
For example, where the in-field user at step 502 is a police officer and the on-assignment status an in-incident status and the not-on-assignment status a not-in-incident status, the electronic computing device may cause a portable and/or mobile computing device associated with a police officer to transition from an on-assignment status of “responding to incident” to a not-on-assignment status of “on patrol” or “returning to station” to swap a foreground application associated with the “responding to incident” status (e.g., such as a mapping application providing an incident route for the police officer to follow to arrive at the incident, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with all other police officers (and/or other persons) associated with the incident, a task list setting forth one or more tasks relating to the incident, an incident timeline setting forth events (and perhaps indicating summary, type, importance, who entered the event, etc.) associated with the incident, a status indicator application setting forth a status of the police officer and/or the other police officers or other persons associated with the incident, a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other police officers or other employees or persons associated with the incident, an incident-specific note taking application in which the police officer may record notes relative to the incident, and/or other on-assignment related applications) and replace it with a not-previously-in-foreground different application associated with the “on patrol” or “returning to station” status (e.g., such as a mapping application providing a patrol route for the police officer to follow or providing a route back to the station/headquarters, a PTT application for speaking to a talkgroup associated with all other police officers in a same organization as the police officer, a task list setting forth one or more tasks related or unrelated to the patrol route that the police officer may choose to perform or accept, an incident list setting forth one or more current or past incidents associated with the police officer or the organization to which the police officer belongs, a status indicator application setting forth a status of the police officer and/or the other police officers in the same organization, a contact list setting forth identities of one or more other police officers or other employees of the same organization to which the police officer belongs, a general note taking application in which the police officer may record notes relative to the patrol route, and/or other not-on-assignment related applications).
While the police officer and his or her associated example mobile radio 733 remains in the “in incident” status state, the police officer uses mobile radio 733 to make a voice call (private call or talkgroup call) to a dispatcher or some other user or group of users, and states that “suspect John Brown under arrest, returning to precinct” as indicated in voice text bubble 748 including the illustrated second user speech. As a result of the electronic digital assistant processing the second user speech contents indicated in voice text bubble 748, perhaps at same or similar steps as steps to steps 302-306 above, the electronic digital assistant causes the mobile radio 733 to transition 750 and swap at least one of the “in incident” related foreground applications 742-746 with a different (or different type of) not-on-assignment (i.e., not-in-incident in this case) application that was not previously in the foreground. As shown in
However, the in-incident status application 742 that allowed the police officer to track an on-going status of a current incident was replaced (i.e., swapped) with another not-previously-in-foreground not-on-assignment (e.g., not-in-incident in this case) related return route mapping application 762 providing the office a route back to the station/headquarters.
Furthermore, the in-incident timeline application 744 that gives a time-wise tracking of events associated with the current incident was replaced (i.e., swapped) with another not-previously-in-foreground not-on-assignment (e.g., not-in-incident in this case) related list of current incidents application 764 that lists one or more current incidents associated with the police officer or perhaps associated with the police officer's organization as a whole (and in some embodiments including a current status and/or distance from the police officer).
As a result, the police officer can immediately proceed back to the station/headquarters and/or determine which next incident to aid or respond to without having to manually interface with the example mobile radio 733 and draw his or her attention away from driving the vehicle and/or responding to the next incident quickly and efficiently. Although two applications are illustrated as being swapped out in
In some embodiments, instead of automatically and responsively swapping the applications as set forth in steps 402 and 502 of
Furthermore, although
Still further, the not-previously-in-foreground application in either of steps 402 or 502 may be an application that is stored but was not previously running at the portable and/or mobile computing device and is newly executed to replay the application being swapped out of the foreground, or may be an application that was already previously running as a background process (including possibly receiving application state or data updates as a background process) at the portable and/or mobile computing device, and is swapped into the foreground as a result of step 402 or 502.
In the foregoing specification, specific embodiments have been described. However, one of ordinary skill in the art appreciates that various modifications and changes may be made without departing from the scope of the invention as set forth in the claims below. Accordingly, the specification and figures are to be regarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense, and all such modifications are intended to be included within the scope of present teachings.
The benefits, advantages, solutions to problems, and any element(s) that may cause any benefit, advantage, or solution to occur or become more pronounced are not to be construed as a critical, required, or essential features or elements of any or all the claims. The invention is defined solely by the appended claims including any amendments made during the pendency of this application and all equivalents of those claims as issued.
Moreover in this document, relational terms such as first and second, top and bottom, and the like may be used solely to distinguish one entity or action from another entity or action without necessarily requiring or implying any actual such relationship or order between such entities or actions. The terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “has,” “having,” “includes,” “including,” “contains,” “containing” or any other variation thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion, such that a process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises, has, includes, contains a list of elements does not include only those elements but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, article, or apparatus. An element proceeded by “comprises . . . a,” “has . . . a,” “includes . . . a,” or “contains . . . a” does not, without more constraints, preclude the existence of additional identical elements in the process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises, has, includes, contains the element. The terms “a” and “an” are defined as one or more unless explicitly stated otherwise herein. The terms “substantially,” “essentially,” “approximately,” “about” or any other version thereof, are defined as being close to as understood by one of ordinary skill in the art, and in one non-limiting embodiment the term is defined to be within 10%, in another embodiment within 5%, in another embodiment within 1% and in another embodiment within 0.5%. The term “coupled” as used herein is defined as connected, although not necessarily directly and not necessarily mechanically. A device or structure that is “configured” in a certain way is configured in at least that way, but may also be configured in ways that are not listed.
It will be appreciated that some embodiments may be comprised of one or more generic or specialized processors (or “processing devices”) such as microprocessors, digital signal processors, customized processors and field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and unique stored program instructions (including both software and firmware) that control the one or more processors to implement, in conjunction with certain non-processor circuits, some, most, or all of the functions of the method and/or apparatus described herein. Alternatively, some or all functions could be implemented by a state machine that has no stored program instructions, or in one or more application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), in which each function or some combinations of certain of the functions are implemented as custom logic. Of course, a combination of the two approaches could be used.
Moreover, an embodiment may be implemented as a computer-readable storage medium having computer readable code stored thereon for programming a computer (for example, comprising a processor) to perform a method as described and claimed herein. Examples of such computer-readable storage mediums include, but are not limited to, a hard disk, a CD-ROM, an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, a ROM (Read Only Memory), a PROM (Programmable Read Only Memory), an EPROM (Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory), an EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory) and a Flash memory. Further, it is expected that one of ordinary skill, notwithstanding possibly significant effort and many design choices motivated by, for example, available time, current technology, and economic considerations, when guided by the concepts and principles disclosed herein will be readily capable of generating such software instructions and programs and ICs with minimal experimentation.
The Abstract of the Disclosure is provided to allow the reader to quickly ascertain the nature of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims. In addition, in the foregoing Detailed Description, it may be seen that various features are grouped together in various embodiments for the purpose of streamlining the disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimed embodiments require more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive subject matter lies in less than all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thus the following claims are hereby incorporated into the Detailed Description, with each claim standing on its own as a separately claimed subject matter.
