Patent Application
20050207241
The present invention relates to digital data processing, and more particularly to a method for realizing information prompt semiconductor storage and an apparatus thereof.
With the rapid development of computer technique, the requirement for data storage and apparatus thereof, especially for the removable storage, is much higher. The conventional removable storage devices, such as floppy disks, are gradually eliminated due to their small capacity, slow speed, requirement of a driver, easy to be damaged, poor reliability, etc. The development of semiconductor storage technology starts a new era in the field of removable data storage. Chinese Patent No. ZL99117225.6, entitled “A flash electronically external storage method for the data processing system and an apparatus thereof”, discloses an external apparatus using the flash memory as the storage medium. The semiconductor removable storage apparatus based on this patented technology is widely accepted by users because of the advantages of its smaller size, large capacity, high speed access, portability, stability of performance, durability, non-necessity of driver, instant plug-and-play, and convenience to be used as storage device in the computer, and its application becomes more and more broad. Nonetheless, while the semiconductor removable storage apparatus are used widely, thereby gradually replacing floppy disks, there are several disadvantages in such apparatus. 1) It lacks of identification or authentication of legitimate holder, and thus it is difficult to identify the legitimate holder of the semiconductor storage apparatuses when the products are about the same, and have the same or similar appearance. Sometimes, the legitimate holder cannot be identified until the storage data content is revealed. Although the information of the legitimate holder and other things can be indicated by way of a tag or sign stuck on the case of the semiconductor removable storage apparatus, the tag or sign is likely to be damaged, and it affects the appearance of the apparatus as well. In the working group, such identical or similar profile may easily cause misuse with each other, damage or loss of the apparatus. Therefore, it not only causes the reduction of work efficiency, but also likely cause the irreparable loss, such as, leakage of technical know-how, trade secret, scope of authorization and responsibility, personal privacy or other information. 2) In use, it is not clear as to the state of reading and/or writing of the semiconductor storage apparatus. The operational state of the present semiconductor storage apparatus is generally indicated by an indication device, that is, typically LED. Such an indication device can show only roughly the operational state of the semiconductor storage apparatus. For instance, LED is blinking when the data is read or written. However, the user does not know whether the semiconductor storage apparatus is reading or writing the data. The response of such read-write indication of the data delays significantly. 3) The information in the semiconductor storage apparatus cannot be known instantaneously, and it can only become known through the operation of a host after the apparatus is connected with a data processing system. It is very inconvenient for the users having several semiconductor storage apparatuses because the respective semiconductor storage apparatus are difficult to be distinguished from one another and it may cause confusion sometimes.
An object of the present invention is to provide a method for realizing information prompt in semiconductor storage and an apparatus thereof to overcome the aforesaid defects in the prior art.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for realizing information prompt in semiconductor storage through the following technical solution, comprising:
The object of the present invention can also be realized by the following technical solution of providing and using a semiconductor storage apparatus for realizing the information prompt, which comprises an information prompt module in addition to the controller module, the interface module and the semiconductor storage medium module, that are connected electrically with the controller module respectively. The information prompt module comprises a display component, an acoustic generating component and/or a vibration component. The aforesaid respective modules may be present individually or combined to one or several modules. The semiconductor apparatus can be removable, fixed or in any other states.
The semiconductor storage apparatus for realizing the information prompt according to the present invention has the following advantages in comparison with the prior art. The legitimate holder can be identified without knowing the actual contents of the stored data, and there is no confusion among semiconductor storage apparatus of different users. The information in the semiconductor storage apparatus can be readily known even without connection with a data processing system such that there is no confusion for the user having several semiconductor storage apparatuses, and the read and/or write state can be indicated clearly.
The preferable embodiment will be further described in respect of the accompanying drawings.
A method for realizing information prompt in semiconductor storage, as shown in
The “acquisition” herein refers to obtaining the information from the data processing system or from the semiconductor storage apparatus itself actively or passively.
The semiconductor storage medium used in the semiconductor storage medium module of the present invention comprises, but not limited to the Flash Memory, DRAM, EEPROM, SRAM, FRAM, MRAM or Millipede, and it can use one or more semiconductor chips. The Millipede is the technological product of the recent development announced by the IBM researchers, that is, super-density storage technology, which is similar to the punched card of the early computer. This new technology is conceived by two scientists working in the IBM Zurich Research Laboratory, named Millipede. Peter Vettiger, as the leader of this storage research project and concept of the storage technology, said that this idea occurred when he was drinking the beer after a weekly football game of the company. The prototype of the Millipede Laboratory can store data 20 times greater than that of the tape storage medium of the current computer, and data of about 25 million pages of the text in a space of the size equivalent to a stamp. Vettiger predicted that this storage card would begin to replace the flash memory card in the laptop computer and the mobile telephone before 2005. IBM said that a Millipede device could store a million or trillion information in a square inch. It is different from the conventional punched card because this new device is re-writeable, and it means that it can delete the data and rewrite it repeatedly. Vettiger said that it had been tested to be rewritten at least hundreds to thousands times.
The interface module 2 is a universal interface, which can be the wire universal interface or wireless universal interface, such as USB interface, IEEE1394 interface, Bluetooth interface, IrDA infrared interface, HomeRF interface, IEEE802.11a or IEEE802.11b interface, wide area/local area wire network interface and/or wide area/local area wireless network interface, etc. mainly used for connecting with the data processing system.
The information prompt display comprises, but not limited to the liquid crystal display (LCD), light-emitting diode matrix (LED Matrix), Field Emission Display (FED) and/or Organic -Electroluminescence (OEL) to display the characters and/or patterns, and/or the speaker, buzzer and/or crystal acoustic generator as the acoustic prompt, and/or the vibrator as the vibration prompt. The information comprises, but not limited to the static information and/or dynamic information, wherein the static information refers to the users' information, device information and storage content information or a part of the above-mentioned three kinds of information. The static information is further classified as the manufacturer information, the users' names, the users' codes, the users' passwords, the product types, the product serial numbers, the product barcodes, the descriptions of the storage contents, the total storage capacity of the semiconductor storage apparatus, the numbers of the storage media, the storage capacity of each storage medium, and/or the manufacturer of the storage media, and the like. The dynamic information refers to the reading and writing state of the device, the state information of the write protection, the property of the storage disk, the property of the accessed file, the used space, the free space, the temperature, the humidity, the index of noise, the date, the time, and/or the index of air, etc. The means of displaying the character and/or pattern can be the static display and/or dynamic display, etc. The present invention is also provided with a manual control component for realizing the manual control of the information prompt.
The semiconductor storage apparatus is provided with a prompt information storage region to store the prompt information. The prompt information storage region can be provided in the semiconductor medium module 3, the information prompt module 5 and/or the controller module 1. The prompt information storage region can be accessed or be write-protected. The prompt information storage region has an independent or universal encryption/decryption module to encrypt the data stored in the prompt information storage region, and to decrypt the data read from the prompt information storage region. The independent or universal encryption/decryption module can or cannot have the function of masking. The present invention can have the function of write-protection that can be realized by the “hard” protection and/or “soft” protection. The hard protection can be realized by switch devices and the like, and the soft protection can be realized by firmware and/or drivers of semiconductor apparatus.
As shown in
The software running in the data processing system comprises:
A semiconductor storage apparatus for realizing information prompt, as shown in
As shown in
The apparatus of the present invention further comprises a power source module 4, and the module 4 comprises the voltage adapter circuit and/or self-contained power source. It is provided with the power source control switch when it has a self-contained power source. The self-contained power source comprises, but not limited to a PV cell, primary cell and/or rechargeable cell. The power source module 4 may be provided with a conversion circuit to charge the self-contained rechargeable cell.
As shown in
As shown in
The information content and/or the operational mode of the information prompt module 5 can be defined and modified through the software running in the data processing system host, for instance, the definition or modification of the users' names, the users' codes, the users' passwords, the product types, the product serial numbers, the product barcodes, the description of the storage contents, the description of information of the device and other personal information defined by the user, and can be used to define or modify what the information prompt should display, the sequence for displaying the prompt information, display mode, display format, and the like. The defined or the modified information is written into the information prompt storage region of the semiconductor storage apparatus. The software flow charts are shown in
As shown in
As shown in
The liquid crystal display component 54 uses a 128×32 dot matrix character type liquid crystal display, as shown in
When the semiconductor storage apparatus is not connected with the data processing system and the battery power source switch apparatus 43 is turned on, the semiconductor storage apparatus gets driven by the battery power source, and the controller module 1 is initialized, that is, runs the firmware in the microprocessor chip U3. The firmware detects and obtains the capacitor, free space and other information of the storage medium module 3, including the device information, user's information (user's name, code, etc.), the stored information content, the date and the time, etc. of the information prompt storage region 31, and converts the above-mentioned information into the special control command to transmit it to the liquid crystal display (LCD) module. The liquid crystal module displays the above-mentioned information. The above-mentioned information cannot be completely displayed at once due to the limitation of the size of the liquid crystal module (LCM) 52, and thus the dynamic display can be set or the manual control display is performed by the manual control component 53 (e.g. button, switch, etc.) of the semiconductor storage apparatus. Then, the user or possessor can know clearly of the above-mentioned information of the semiconductor storage apparatus. Certainly, the user can also cut off the battery power source switch 43 to switch off the power source, and turn off the display to save the battery power source.
When the semiconductor storage apparatus is connected with the data processing system, such as a computer, through USB interface, a fixed or removable storage disk occurs in the data processing system host, and can be used as a hard disk or a floppy disk.
When the semiconductor storage apparatus is connected with the USB interface of the host, the firmware of the processor chip U3 of the controller module 1 is activated, and initialized. The above-mentioned information is defined and displayed on the liquid crystal module (LCM) 52, and if necessary the read-write state information of the data (for instance, the read-write state information is “idle” or “waiting” here) is displayed thereon. In addition, the controller module 1 feedbacks the initialized information and the driver of the semiconductor storage apparatus to the host operation system through the USB interface, and the operation system performs the corresponding operation according to different feedback information or the property state.
After the initialization of the firmware, it detects first the manufacturer and the product type information of the storage medium chip of the semiconductor storage medium module, calculates the total capacity of the storage disk, and then reads out FAT table in the storage disk, calculates the used space and the free space, and then reads the contents in the prompt information storage region, including but not limited to the manufacturer information, the user's name, the user's code, the user's password, the product type, the product serial number, the product barcode, the description of the storage content, etc. Then, the acquired information is displayed on the liquid crystal module in accordance with the predetermined format. After the above-mentioned steps, the firmware in the controller module 1 enters the waiting state immediately to wait for the operation request from the host.
The data processing system sends the operation request of the universal interface to the storage apparatus through the driver, and the firmware in the apparatus processes the received standard operation request of the universal interface, and returns the result or state information to the data processing system. Thus, an information exchange path is established between the data processing system and the apparatus.
When the host operation system requests the read operation for the data, it will send the operation command to the driver; and the driver packages the read operation command via USB, and sends it to the firmware in the controller module 1 through the operation system. The firmware performs the read operation, that is, the firmware converts the logical address in the read command into the physical address in the semiconductor storage medium module 3, reads the data from the semiconductor storage medium according to the physical address and returns it to the data processing system. At the same time, it implements the information simultaneously prompt of the read operation state using LED indication lamp and the liquid crystal module 52, if necessary, to finish the read operation.
When the host operation system requests the write operation for the data, it will send the write operation command to the driver; and the driver packages the write operation command via USB, sends it to the firmware in the controller module 1 through the operation system. The firmware performs the read operation, that is, the firmware converts the logical address in the write command into the physical address in the semiconductor storage medium module 3, receives the data from the data processing system and writes the data into the semiconductor storage medium according to the physical address, and the driver returns the perform state information of the write operation to the operation system, and implements simultaneously the information prompt of the write operation state using LED indication lamp and the liquid crystal module 52, if necessary, to finish the write operation.
The firmware also supports the command request for the password verification of the prompt information storage region. The firmware receives the password that the host requests to be verified from the universal interface, and reads the password from the prompt information storage region, and then compares them. If they are the same, the password verification is passed; otherwise, it fails. Then, the firmware returns the verified result to the data processing system through the universal interface.
The firmware also supports the command request for setting up the password of the prompt information storage region. The firmware receives the password that the host requests to be set from the universal interface, and determines whether or not the password verification is passed. If passed, the new password is written into the prompt information storage region; otherwise, the modification is rejected. Then, the firmware returns the modified result to the data processing system through the universal interface.
The firmware also supports the command request for writing the prompt information storage region, and the firmware receives the information that the host requests to be written into the prompt information storage region, and then determines whether or not the password verification is passed. If passed, the new information will be written into the prompt information storage region; otherwise, the writing is rejected. Then, the firmware returns the result to the data processing system through the universal interface.
The firmware also supports the command request for reading the prompt information storage region, and the firmware determines whether or not the password verification is passed. If passed, it will read the data from the prompt information storage region and then send it into the host; otherwise, the reading is rejected. Then, the firmware returns the result to the data processing system through the universal interface.
The firmware can receive the button information from the manual control component. The prompt information of different pages is displayed on LCD component according to the information of different buttons. The button can be combined with the power source switch.
As shown in
The flow chart of the software for setting the information prompt storage region is shown in
When the content of the prompt information storage region is modified, the program receives the new prompt information content inputted by the user that needs to be set or modified, sends the written prompt information request and the new information prompt to be written to the storage apparatus, obtains the result processed by the apparatus, and displays the result on the screen. When the password of the prompt information storage region is set, the program receives the new password inputted by the user, sends the password setting request and the new password to be set to the apparatus, and obtains the result processed by the apparatus, and displays the result on the screen.
As shown in
The flow chart of the software for setting up the prompt information storage region is shown in
The content stored in the prompt information region may be the character information and/or the pattern information; and the program can also convert the character information into the pattern information to store it in the prompt information storage region.
The most preferable embodiment of the present invention is to use a microprocessor with the USB, a LCD module with the function of self-control, a flash memory and a USB interface. Moreover, the LCD module may not have the function of self-control, and it is controlled by the microprocessor. The present invention may set the operation state of LED in addition to setting the LCD display module.
The present invention is further designed with the data protection and data retrieval functions such that the data stored in the storage apparatus cannot be damaged even when the user cuts off the connection between the storage apparatus and the data processing system host, or the power lost or the death of the computer occurs suddenly during the data is being written into the storage apparatus, and the damage of the data being written can be minimized. The way to realize the above function may be: 1. first searching a free new block of data in the semiconductor storage medium when the data is written into the semiconductor storage medium, such as flash memory, then writing the data to be written into the new block of data, and possibly recording the logical address corresponding to the new block of data in the new block of data if necessary. If the data in the original block of data is not completely covered, the uncovered data therein should be copied to the new block of data, and then the original block of data is cleared. During the above-mentioned writing operation, the different writing states are marked, if necessary, for the data retrieval. The data retrieval can perform at the next power-up. The way to achieve the above function can also be: 2. storing the original block of data where the covered data is present into the buffer of the storage medium first, clearing the original block of data if necessary, writing the new data into the original block of data, and then copying the uncovered data of the original block of data from the buffer to the original block of data. During the above writing progress, the different writing states are marked, if necessary, for the data retrieval.
When the storage medium is a flesh memory, the block of data is typically a block of the flash memory, sized 8 KB (KB=KBYTE), 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB, 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB, 1024 KB, etc. The content obtained by the aforesaid way is displayed on the screen. When the content of the prompt information storage region is modified, the program receives the new prompt information inputted by the user that needs to be set or modified, sends the write request for the prompt information and the new prompt information to be written to the storage apparatus, obtains the result processed by the apparatus, and displays the result on the screen.
The content stored in the prompt information region may be the character information and/or the pattern information; and the program can also convert the character information into the pattern information to store it in the prompt information storage region.
The most preferable embodiment of the present invention is to use a microprocessor with USB function, a LCD display module with the self-control function, flash memory and USB interface. Moreover, the LCD display module may not have the self-control function, and its control function is realized by the microprocessor. The present invention may set the operation state of a LED in addition to setting the LCD display module.
The present invention is further designed with the data protection and data retrieval functions such that the data stored in the storage apparatus cannot be damaged even when the user cuts off the connection between the storage apparatus and the data processing system host, or the power lost or the death of the computer occurs suddenly during the data is being written into the storage apparatus, and the damage of the data being written can be minimized. The way to realize the above function may be: 1. first searching a free new block of data in the semiconductor storage medium when the data is written into the semiconductor storage medium, such as flash memory, then writing the data to be written into the new block of data, and possibly recording the logical address corresponding to the new block of data in the new block of data if necessary. If the data in the original block of data is not completely covered, the uncovered data therein should be copied to the new block of data, and then the original block of data is cleared. During the above-mentioned writing operation, the different writing states are marked, if necessary, for the data retrieval. The data retrieval can perform at the next power-up. The way to achieve the above function can also be: 2. storing the original block of data where the covered data is present into the buffer of the storage medium first, clearing the original block of data if necessary, writing the new data into the original block of data, and then copying the uncovered data of the original block of data from the buffer to the original block of data. During the above writing progress, the different writing states are marked, if necessary, for the data retrieval.
When the storage medium is a flesh memory, the block of data is typically a block of a flash memory, sized 8 KB (KB=KBYTE), 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB, 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB, 1024 KB, etc. The aforesaid way can ensure that the user's data would not be completely damaged.
The data processing system referred to by the present invention comprises, but not limited to the computer, PDA, mobile telephone, MP3, digital camera, digital video, palm apparatus, etc.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 02134290.3 | Jun 2002 | CN | national |
| Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/CN03/00021 | 1/13/2003 | WO | 5/16/2005 |
