Patent Application
20080068130
A more complete understanding of the present invention may be derived by referring to the detailed description and claims when considered in conjunction with the following figures, wherein like reference numbers refer to similar elements throughout the figures.
The following detailed description is merely illustrative in nature and is not intended to limit the invention or the application and uses of the invention. Furthermore, there is no intention to be bound by any express or implied theory presented in the preceding technical field, background, brief summary or the following detailed description.
The invention may be described herein in terms of functional and/or logical block components and various processing steps. It should be appreciated that such block components may be realized by any number of hardware, software, and/or firmware components configured to perform the specified functions. For example, an embodiment of the invention may employ various integrated circuit components, e.g., radio-frequency (RF) devices, memory elements, digital signal processing elements, logic elements, look-up tables, or the like, which may carry out a variety of functions under the control of one or more microprocessors or other control devices. In addition, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the present invention may be practiced in conjunction with any number of data transmission protocols and that the system described herein is merely one exemplary application for the invention.
For the sake of brevity, conventional techniques related to signal processing, data transmission, signaling, network control, the 802.11 family of specifications, wireless networks, RFID systems and specifications, and other functional aspects of the system (and the individual operating components of the system) may not be described in detail herein. Furthermore, the connecting lines shown in the various figures contained herein are intended to represent example functional relationships and/or physical couplings between the various elements. Many alternative or additional functional relationships or physical connections may be present in a practical embodiment.
Without loss of generality, in the illustrated embodiment, many of the functions usually provided by a traditional access point (e.g., network management, wireless configuration, etc.) and/or traditional RFID readers (e.g., data collection, RFID processing, etc.) are concentrated in a corresponding RF switch. It will be appreciated that the present invention is not so limited, and that the methods and systems described herein may be used in conjunction with traditional access points and RFID readers or any other device that communicates via RF channels.
The present invention relates to an improved user interface for real-time location determination, configuration, and coordination of RFID as well as WLAN components. The system provides user-friendly methods of determining the location of objects, such as RFID tags and mobile units, and provides various health monitoring information (self-healing status, “heat maps” for associated antennae, redundancy group status, intrusion detection, and health statistics).
Referring to
A number of RFID tags (or simply “tags”) 104 are distributed throughout the environment. These tags are read by a number of RFID readers (or simply “readers”) 108 having one or more associated antennas 106 provided within the environment. The term “tag” refers, in general, to any RF element that can be communicated with and has a ID that can be read by another component. Readers 108, each of which may be stationary or mobile, are suitably connective via wired or wireless data links to a RF switch 110.
A particular AP 120 may have a number of associated MUs 130. For example, in the illustrated topology, MUs 130(a) and 130(b) are associated with AP 120(a), while MU 130(c) is associated with AP 120(b). One or more APs 120 may be coupled to a single switch 110, as illustrated.
RF Switch 110 determines the destination of packets it receives over network 104 and 101 and routes those packets to the appropriate AP 120 if the destination is an MU 130 with which the AP is associated. Each WS 110 therefore maintains a routing list of MUs 130 and their associated APs 130. These lists are generated using a suitable packet handling process as is known in the art. Thus, each AP 120 acts primarily as a conduit, sending/receiving RF transmissions via MUs 130, and sending/receiving packets via a network protocol with WS 110. AP 120 is typically capable of communicating with one or more MUs 130 through multiple RF channels. This distribution of channels varies greatly by device, as well as country of operation. For example, in one U.S. embodiment (in accordance with 802.11(b)) there are fourteen overlapping, staggered channels, each centered 5 MHz apart in the RF band.
A particular RFID reader 108 may have multiple associated antennas 106. For example, as shown in
In general, RFID tags (sometimes referred to as “transponders”) may be classified as either active or passive. Active tags are devices that incorporate some form of power source (e.g., batteries, capacitors, or the like), while passive tags are tags that are energized via an RF energy source received from a nearby antenna. While active tags are more powerful, and exhibit a greater range than passive tags, they also have a shorter lifetime and are significantly more expensive. Such tags are well known in the art, and need not be described in detail herein.
Each antenna 106 has an associated RF range (or “read point”) 116, which depends upon, among other things, the strength of the respective antenna 106. The read point 116 corresponds to the area around the antenna in which a tag 104 may be read by that antenna, and may be defined by a variety of shapes, depending upon the nature of the antenna (i.e., the RF range need not be circular or spherical as illustrated in
It is not uncommon for the RF ranges or read points to overlap in real-world applications (e.g., doorways, small rooms, etc.). Thus, as shown in
Switch 102 may comprise one or more processors accompanied by storage units, displays, input/output devices, an operating system, database management software, networking software, and the like. Such systems are well known in the art, and need not be described in detail. Switch 102 may be configured as a general purpose computer, a network switch, or any other such network host. In a preferred embodiment, controller 102 is modeled on a network switch architecture but includes RF network controller software (or “module”) whose capabilities include, among other things, the ability to allow configure and monitor readers 108 and antennas 106.
Referring to
The tags 210 are preferably distributed throughout environment 202 such that at least one of tags 210 is within the operational range of the mobile devices that are used in environment 202. In this regard, it is preferred that tags 210 are substantially stationary (e.g., secured to walls, floors, ceilings, or other internal structures), but in various embodiments may be relocated or portable, depending upon the application. In one embodiment, one or more tags 210 are placed within other electronic components within environment 202, such as wireless switches, routers, access ports, access points, and the like. Tags 210 may be distributed in a uniform, geometrical pattern (e.g., a grid), or may be placed in any suitable non-uniform arrangement that provides the desired coverage (as shown in
Tags 210—which may be active or passive—include one or more security codes that may be read by an RFID reader in the conventional matter. These security codes may be of any suitable alphanumeric form, and may be encoded or un-encoded. [Ajay: What do you expect the security code to look like? Do you have any additional details?]. In any event, it is preferred that valid codes are known by the mobile devices—or can be determined by the mobile device (e.g., over a network connection)—so that the mobile device can determine whether it is within or substantially within environment 202.
More particularly, a mobile device operating within environment 202 (e.g., a hand-held RFID reader 108 as illustrated) is configured to read RFID tags within an operational range 116. For the purposes of simplicity, the mobile devices are illustrated as RFID readers 108 in
In this regard,
Referring again to
Device 108 may be disabled if (1) it does not find any tags having a security code within its operational range, or (2) it finds a tag having a security code within its operation range, but that code is not a “valid” code. Device 108 preferably knows, a priori, the set of all valid codes. Alternatively, it may request and receive such codes over the network (e.g., network 104 including RF switch 110, as shown in
There are three devices 108 illustrated in
“Disabling” the mobile device might mean a variety of things, depending upon the application and desired effect. For example, disabling operation of the mobile device might simply involve reducing its functionality—i.e., preventing certain input/output operations. Alternatively, the device might be turned “off” entirely, such that the user cannot power up the device before certain steps have been taken. In one embodiment, the mobile device is disabled such that any information in its memory cannot be read by the operator. This prevents the mobile device from being stolen for the purposes of acquiring stored data.
It should be appreciated that the example embodiment or embodiments described herein are not intended to limit the scope, applicability, or configuration of the invention in any way. Rather, the foregoing detailed description will provide those skilled in the art with a convenient road map for implementing the described embodiment or embodiments. It should be understood that various changes can be made in the function and arrangement of elements without departing from the scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims and the legal equivalents thereof.
