The present invention relates to mobile terminals, such as cellular radiotelephones and the like, and particularly relates to incorporating intuitive remote control functionality into such terminals.
Multiple remote controls lying around are a hallmark of modern life. Greater interest in more sophisticated home entertainment systems accounts in large measure for the increased number of individual remote controls in the home. For example, a typical home theater system commonly includes at least a television, a stereo, a DVD player, and some type of set-top box. In the traditional paradigm of remote controls, four components from four different manufacturers equals four different remote controls.
The ability of each device manufacturer to tailor its corresponding remote control to the features and capabilities of its device represents one advantage of this approach to providing consumers with remote controls. That is, a remote control specially intended for controlling a given device, or a given class of devices, generally offers its user a more straightforward and intuitive control layout, as compared to “universal” remote controls.
Universal remote controls attempt to integrate remote control functions from a variety of device types or classes of devices, so that the consumer needs only one remote control to control all of his or her audio/video (A/V) equipment. While the consolidation of multiple remote controls into one universal remote control is good in theory, and does offer certain practical advantages, it is not without its detractions.
For example, one approach to providing increased functionality takes the straightforward, if inelegant, approach of simply adding as many buttons as there are different functions to support. Many people are familiar with this class of universal remote control, festooned with its many small, and sometimes indecipherable, buttons. More sophisticated universal remote controls provide multifunction buttons that take on different control tasks depending on the mode or setting of the universal remote control.
While the reuse of buttons for multiple functions does reduce the overall button count, it sometimes forces a compromise in terms of the intuitiveness of the layout, and the sheer range of devices intended to be controlled by most universal remote controls still requires a significant number of buttons in the control layout.
The potentially cleaner approach involves the use of display screens to provide varying sets of soft buttons on an LCD screen or the like. Generally, these approaches suffer in that the soft button layouts are not intuitive or matched to the control layout intended for a particular device to be controlled. Moreover, the use of LCD screens in universal remotes drives up their cost significantly.
A method of supporting remote control of other devices by a mobile terminal comprises downloading a virtual remote control to the mobile terminal for a device to be controlled by the mobile terminal, displaying the virtual remote control on a display screen of the mobile terminal, and transmitting commands to the device responsive to receiving user inputs directed to the virtual remote control. The virtual remote control includes a graphical interface corresponding to the device to be controlled, such that a user of the mobile terminal is presented with a graphic representing at least a portion of a control layout of a dedicated remote control associated with the device to be controlled.
In at least one embodiment, the graphic comprising the virtual remote control is a graphical “skin” representing all or part of the dedicated remote control. Thus, the user of the mobile terminal is presented with a facsimile of the remote control associated with the device, and a number of different skins may be downloaded and stored in the mobile terminal, for a variety of devices, such as for multiple pieces of ANV equipment in a home theater system.
In the context of the above method, downloading the virtual remote control may comprise receiving the virtual remote control from the device to be controlled, through a local communication link between the mobile terminal and the device. That link may be infrared, or may be another type of short-range interface, including Bluetooth, WiFi, or the like. In other embodiments, the mobile terminal may download the virtual remote control from a wireless communication network that stores, or otherwise has access to, virtual remote control information. In such embodiments, the mobile terminal uses its cellular communication interface to obtain virtual remote controls from a database or server accessible through the cellular network.
In other embodiments, the mobile terminal provides a local communication interface that is configured to communicate with a computer, and receives the virtual remote control through a computer based downloading process. This approach allows the user to access a web page or the like from which virtual remote controls may be downloaded and transferred to the mobile terminal.
Regardless of such variations, according to the methods taught herein, a mobile terminal displays a virtual remote control as a graphic representing the control layout of at least a portion of a remote control intended for a particular device to be controlled, or classes of devices to be controlled, using the mobile terminal's display screen. The user thus is presented with a facsimile of the device's control layout, thereby providing the user with a familiar set of controls for the device. Advantageously, the mobile terminal's display screen is configured as a touch screen display, such that the user simply presses locations on the touch screen corresponding to the various displayed controls.
Of course, the present invention is not limited to the above features and advantages. Indeed, those skilled in the art will recognize additional features and advantages upon reading the following detailed discussion, and upon viewing the accompanying drawings.
The virtual remote control 18 includes a graphical interface corresponding to the device to be controlled by the mobile terminal 10. More particularly, the mobile terminal 10 displays the virtual remote control 18 on the display screen 16 as a graphic representing at least a portion of the control layout of a dedicated remote control associated with the device to be controlled. In this context, the term “dedicated” remote control generally connotes the remote control from the device's manufacturer, or otherwise connotes a remote control intended to control a given type of device.
The graphic may be a graphical “skin” representing all or part of the dedicated remote control. Indeed, the display screen 16 may comprise a graphical color display, allowing a realistic depiction of all or part of the dedicated remote control. As such, the mobile terminal 10 presents its user with a virtual remote control 18 offering a control layout that presumably is already familiar to the user.
For example,
Further,
Advantageously, the display screen 16 may be implemented as a touch screen display. In such embodiments, a user of the mobile terminal 10 “operates” a displayed virtual remote control 18 simply by directing touch inputs to screen locations corresponding to control elements (e.g., “buttons”) of the virtual remote control 18. Additionally, or alternatively, at least some of the virtual remote control's functions can be mapped to controls 14 of the mobile terminal 10. For example, as an added convenience, a readily accessible control input of the mobile terminal 10 may be mapped to a master volume or muting function.
Regardless of such details,
In operation, the one or more processing circuits 30 are configured to download a virtual remote control 18 via the communication interface 32, display the virtual remote control 18 on the display screen 16, and transmit remote control commands to a device 40 via the remote control interface 38, responsive to user inputs directed to the virtual remote control 18 displayed on the display screen 16.
Note that the device to be controlled 40 represents any one of a number of devices, and typically represents a selected piece of AN equipment. As noted before, the mobile terminal 10 may store and selectively display a number of virtual remote controls 18, corresponding to different pieces of AN equipment, and may include a menu system allowing the user to move between and select particular virtual remote controls 18.
The local communication interface 48 may comprise a Bluetooth interface, or other short-range wireless interface, such as WiFi or infrared (e.g., iRDA), or may comprise a computer data interface, such as USB or IEEE 1394 (Firewire). In all such cases, the local communication interface 48 may be configured to communicate with the device 40 and/or to communicate with a computer (PC).
As such, the mobile terminal 10 may be configured to download the virtual remote control 18 directly from the device 40, through the local communication interface 48, assuming that the device 40 includes a compatible communication interface and stores the necessary information. Alternatively, or additionally, the mobile terminal 10 may be configured to download the virtual remote control 18 from a supporting wireless communication network 50, which includes or is associated with a server/database 52 that includes virtual remote control information. As a further addition or alternative, the mobile terminal 10 may be configured to download the virtual remote control 18 from a computer (PC) through the local communication interface 48.
With these embodiments in mind,
Such detection may occur automatically, such as where the local communication interface 48 of the mobile terminal 10 is a Bluetooth interface that can automatically detect and establish a communication link with a compatible Bluetooth interface of the device 40. Downloading operations continue with establishment of a local communication link between the mobile terminal 10 and the device 40 (Step 102).
One advantage to this approach is that the mobile terminal 10 can acquire virtual remote controls 18, as needed, as the mobile terminal's user moves into proximity with one or more devices to be controlled—e.g., as the user walks into a home theater or entertainment room. With automatic detection and downloading, the process of obtaining needed virtual remote controls 18 can be essentially transparent to the user of the mobile terminal 10, and can be particular convenient for setting up and integrating new devices 40 into the user's entertainment system.
For example, the mobile terminal 10 could retain identifiers for equipment for which it already has virtual remote controls 18 stored, automatically detect the presence of a new device 40, and acquire the virtual remote control 18 for that new device 40, without requiring any specific user intervention. Of course, the mobile terminal 10 could be configured to prompt the user, or to otherwise request permission to carry out the process.
In any case, if a device 40 contains virtual remote control information, the mobile terminal 10 may download the virtual remote control directly from the device 40 (Step 104). Alternatively, the device 40 simply may provide the mobile terminal 10 with manufacturer's information, such as model identification numbers (Step 106). In such embodiments, the mobile terminal 10 may use the information received from the device 40 to download the virtual remote control 18 through its cellular communication interface (Step 108). For example, the mobile terminal 10 may be configured to transmit model information to a certain database 52 accessible through the supporting wireless communication network 50. The database 52 then returns the corresponding virtual remote control 18 to the mobile terminal 10.
However, in other embodiments, the mobile terminal 10 may be configured to display a pick list of manufacturer and model information, to facilitate the user identifying a particular device 40 for which a virtual remote control 18 is desired. In such embodiments, the mobile terminal 10 may locally store pick list information, or may access a server through the wireless communication network, and download pick list information from that server.
The above-described downloading process also may be carried out on a PC or other Internet-enabled device, and the virtual remote control 18 then can be transferred from the PC to the mobile terminal 10, such as through the local communication interface 48. To that end, the local communication interface 48 may include a data interface supporting PC connection (e.g., USB, iRDA, etc.).
Whether done directly through the mobile terminal 10, or done through a PC with an Internet connection, the operator of the wireless communication network 50 may control the database 52 of virtual remote controls, or it may be controlled by a third party. In either case, users may be charged flat or per-transaction rates for accessing the database and downloading virtual remote controls, and manufacturers might advertise the availability of virtual remote controls 18 for their devices as an additional selling feature. Indeed, the device manufacturers may develop sophisticated virtual remote controls 18 that provide more or improved functionality, as compared to the dedicated (physical) remote controls associated with their devices.
Of course, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the present invention is not limited to the features and advantages detailed in the foregoing description, nor is it limited by the accompanying drawings. Indeed, the present invention is limited only by the following claims, and their legal equivalents.