System and Program

Abstract

To provide a user-friendly system and program even for a user having no administrator rights on an operating system when executing a viewer application of a drive recorder.SOLUTION: In a method, a user first selects a card reader targeted for the assignment of an authority from among a card reader list displayed on a pull-down menu by, for example, clicking an acquisition button of a device name selection part, and selects a drive in a drive selection dialog displayed by, for example, clicking a selection button. When the user then performs an operation such as clicking an authority assignment button, a personal computer rewrites a registry so that an authority is assigned to the combination of the card reader and the drive selected by the user. When a view application reads a SD card of a drive recorder, an operating system references this registry to inhibit the request of administrator rights in reading by the card reader.SELECTED DRAWING: None

Description

Technical Field

[0001] The present invention relates to a system, a program, and the like.

Background Art

[0002] For example, a drive recorder that records vehicle status information (such as front view images, speed, acceleration, etc.), which is information obtained by a vehicle, on a recording medium has been widely installed in vehicles for transportation such as trucks, and commercial vehicles such as taxis and buses. Furthermore, it is being increasingly installed in general vehicles.

[0003] There are drive recorders that constantly record vehicle status information, for example, when the vehicle is running, and those that record vehicle status information at any time for a certain period before and after an accident or sudden braking.

[0004] Recording of vehicle status information by such drive recorders is performed on a removable recording medium such as a memory card like an SD card that can be attached to and detached from the drive recorder. And analysis of vehicle status information is generally performed by the processing of a viewer application software (hereinafter referred to as a viewer app) that operates on a personal computer.

[0005] At the time of analysis, this recording medium is removed from the vehicle's drive recorder and inserted into a memory card reader connected to an analysis personal computer in an office or the like. On the personal computer, the vehicle status information of the recording medium inserted into the memory card reader is read by the processing of the viewer app and the information is visualized and displayed on the screen (for example, Patent Document 1). Thus, confirmation and analysis of vehicle status information can be performed based on the information visualized on the screen.

Prior Art Documents

Patent Documents

[0006]

Patent Document 1

Summary of the Invention

[0007] Incidentally, there are various recording formats for storage media that can be read by a personal computer. For example, there are recording formats that can be read by the standard functions of the personal computer's operating system, and recording formats that cannot be read by the standard functions of the personal computer's operating system, but can be read by running a dedicated reading program on that operating system. For example, Microsoft's Windows (registered trademark; the same applies hereinafter) supports recording formats such as FAT and NTFS (hereinafter also called file systems) by default, but does not support recording formats such as ext4 by default.

[0008] The recording format used by dashcams is typically a format that can be read by the operating system on which the viewer application runs. For example, if the operating system on which the viewer application runs is Windows, a type of FAT file system (such as FAT32), which is a standard format that can be read by various devices, is used.

[0009] However, in a configuration where the drive recorder records information to the recording medium in a format that the operating system can read using its standard functions, it becomes easy to delete the recorded files using the operating system's own file management software, or to read or rewrite the information recorded by the drive recorder using other software running on the same operating system.

[0010] Therefore, in cases where there is a need to prevent such rewriting of information recorded by a drive recorder, such as vehicle status information, using other software, it is conceivable to intentionally use a recording format that cannot be read by the standard functions of the operating system for all or part of the recording area of ​​the recording medium, and to store the drive recorder information such as vehicle status information in that format.

[0011] However, some recording media containing areas with recording formats that cannot be read by the standard functions of such operating systems require administrator privileges to read them due to the operating system's security features. In such cases, we have found a problem: if the user of the viewer application does not have such administrator privileges for the operating system, they will not be able to read and visualize the information recorded by the drive recorder, such as vehicle status information, using the viewer application.

[0012] Therefore, the present invention aims to solve these problems and provide a system and program that is easy to use even for users who do not have administrator privileges, which are a predetermined privilege in the operating system. [Means for solving the problem]

[0013] (1) The system should have a function to control the operation of an application program that has the function to read information stored by a drive recorder in a designated area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system, so as not to display a request for administrator privileges by the operating system.

[0014] This approach makes it difficult to tamper with information recorded by the dashcam, and also prevents application programs that read the recorded information from the dashcam from requesting administrator privileges from the operating system. As a result, even users without such administrator privileges (e.g., regular users) can read and use the information recorded by the dashcam through this application program.

[0015] A certain area that is not supported for reading by the operating system's standard functions may be, for example, an area with a recording format not supported by the operating system's standard functions.

[0016] The operation may include, for example, the operation of an application program, and in particular, the operation may include the process of the application program reading information stored by the drive recorder in a predetermined area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system. For example, the operation of the application program may also include access by other programs other than the operation of the application program. Preferably, the system should be configured to prevent the operating system from displaying a request for administrator privileges only when the application program is accessing the system.

[0017] The administrator privileges required for the operating system should be those necessary to read information stored by the drive recorder in a designated area where reading is not supported.

[0018] It is preferable to have a system that includes a function to read information stored by a drive recorder in a designated area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system, and to control the operation of an application program that has the function to read information stored by a drive recorder in a designated area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system, and to enable notification of the information stored in that area.

[0019] (2) The predetermined area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system is a predetermined area in the recording medium, and the function that controls the operation to not display a request for administrator privileges is preferably a function that controls the operation to not display a request for administrator privileges when reading with a specific reading device.

[0020] In this configuration, when reading recording media from a dashcam using this specific reader, administrator privileges of the operating system are no longer required, while administrator privileges are maintained for reading devices other than this specific reader. For example, if the operating system as a whole is configured to prevent the request for administrator privileges when reading from such recording media, administrator privileges become largely unnecessary. On the other hand, if the operating system is configured to prevent the request for administrator privileges for each recording media, it becomes necessary to configure each medium to not request administrator privileges, and it becomes necessary to ask someone with administrator privileges to grant privileges each time a new medium is added. This configuration solves these problems as well. In particular, it is desirable to configure the system to display the request for administrator privileges of the operating system when reading with readers other than the specific reader.

[0021] The recording medium may be, for example, a portable medium between a drive recorder and a computer having this system. For example, it may be a USB memory or the like, but it is preferably a card-type recording medium, for example, an SD card or the like.

[0022] The reading device may be, for example, a card reader or the like. In this way, only when reading this recording medium with a specific card reader, even a general user can view information by an application program. The reading device is preferably configured to be detachable from the computer having this system. For example, it may be a USB-connected card reader or the like.

[0023] It is preferable that a plurality of reading devices are configured to be detachable from the computer having this system, and it is preferable to control so that a request display for administrator authority is not performed when reading with a specific reading device among such a plurality of reading devices. Also, for example, when the reading device includes one built into the computer having this system and one externally attached, it is preferable to have a function of designating the built-in one as a specific reading device. In this way, the risk that a malicious third party or the like can read without administrator authority using an externally attached reading device can be reduced.

[0024] Whether it is a specific reading device or not may be determined based on, for example, identification information of the type of the reading device, identification information of the individual of the reading device, etc. It is preferable to use the identification information that can be obtained by the computer of the system and the operating system. For example, for a USB-connected card reader, if the operating system is Windows 8, since the card reader can be identified for each type of card reader (or for example, for each type of device driver required by the operating system), it is preferable to use the identification information of the type of the reading device.

[0025] However, with such a configuration, problems may occur, such as the inability to identify each individual among the reading devices identified as the same type. Therefore, the control to prevent the request display for the administrator authority of the operating system during the reading by a specific reading device may be performed, for example, based on the physical identification information of the reading device for identifying the reading device physically connected to the computer on which the operating system is executed. However, the following method is particularly preferable.

[0026] (3) The control to prevent the request display for the administrator authority of the operating system during the reading by the specific reading device may have a function of being performed based on both the physical identification information of the reading device for identifying the reading device physically connected to the computer on which the operating system is executed and the logical identification information recognized and assigned to the reading device by the operating system.

[0027] By doing so, for example, when multiple devices with the same physical identification information of the reading device are connected, it is possible to more reliably identify the individual reading devices that do not display the request for administrator authority, so that the request display for the administrator authority of the operating system is not performed during the reading by the reading device. At the same time, it is possible to identify an individual that has the same physical identification information as the reading device but is not the target for which the request display for the administrator authority is not to be performed, and to cause the request display for the administrator authority of the operating system to be performed during the reading by that individual.

[0028] For example, it is preferable to use a drive letter as the logical identification information assigned to the reading device by the operating system. By doing so, even in a case where it is difficult to identify an individual based only on the identification information possessed by the reading device, it becomes possible to more reliably determine whether the individual is a reading device to which the administrator authority has been granted. (4) It is preferable to have a function for allowing the user to select the specific reading device from among the plurality of reading devices connected to the computer having the system.

[0029] In this way, the user can decide which of the multiple readers connected to the computer will be controlled so as not to display the request for administrator privileges from the operating system. Readers not selected by the user should not be designated as the specific reader mentioned above.

[0030] The function for allowing a user to select a specific reader from among multiple readers connected to a computer having the system may include, for example, obtaining information from the reader to identify the multiple readers connected to the computer having the system, displaying it in a list, and determining that the reader selected by the user's operation from the displayed list is the specific reader selected.

[0031] (5) The function to control the operating system so that it does not request administrator privileges may be a function that rewrites the information in the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges.

[0032] In this way, it can be easily achieved without developing operating system device drivers or other programs that the operating system runs with administrator privileges, and without adding any processing to prevent them from requesting administrator privileges.

[0033] The information in the registry area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges should be rewritten to information that controls the operating system not to request administrator privileges. For example, in Microsoft's Windows 8, this could be done by rewriting the information in the registry area used to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges.

[0034] (6) The information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges should be an area that is not erased even when the operating system is shut down.

[0035] In this way, simply running the program that rewrites this information area once will eliminate the need for administrator privileges. Subsequently, for example, there will be no need to repeatedly run the program that rewrites this information area before running the aforementioned application program.

[0036] (7) The function for rewriting the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges should be executed before the function for reading the information recorded by the drive recorder.

[0037] This approach prevents problems such as the need to request administrator privileges when trying to read information recorded by a dashcam, requiring the user to contact someone with operating system administrator privileges, thus preventing the immediate access to the recorded information when needed.

[0038] As a configuration in which the function to rewrite the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges is executed before the function to read the information recorded by the drive recorder, for example, when preparing for the operation of an application program that has a function to read information stored by the drive recorder in a predetermined area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system, the state of said storage area is first checked, and if it is in a state where administrator privileges are required, the process of rewriting the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges is performed before the function to read the information recorded by the drive recorder. The preparation for operation may be, for example, when the application program is first started, but it is particularly good to do so when the application program is installed.

[0039] Furthermore, in addition to the application program (hereinafter referred to as the "information reading app") which has the function of reading information stored by the drive recorder in a designated area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system, it is preferable to configure a separate application program (hereinafter referred to as the "configuration app") which has the function of rewriting the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges, and to run the configuration app first, and then run the information reading app.

[0040] (8) It is preferable to configure a program that enables the computer to rewrite an information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges, and an application program that has the function of reading the information recorded by the drive recorder, as separate executable files.

[0041] This approach makes it easier to run a program on a computer that modifies the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges, specifically on computers where administrator privileges are not desired. At the same time, it allows for the program to be avoided on computers where administrator privileges are desired, thereby increasing security.

[0042] (9) The function of reading information recorded by the drive recorder through the operation of the computer by the application program should be configured to request access to the information recorded by the drive recorder, which is different from the administrator privileges of the operating system.

[0043] Administrator privileges for a computer's operating system are typically granted to the computer's administrator. However, we have found that access rights to information recorded by a dashcam are not necessarily granted to the computer's administrator. Therefore, by incorporating a function into the drive recorder reading function that requests access rights to information recorded by the dashcam—a function distinct from the computer's operating system administrator privileges—it becomes easy to designate the two as different entities.

[0044] (10) When an application program that has the function to read information stored by a drive recorder in a predetermined area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system is operated, it is preferable to have a function to disable the function that controls the operating system not to display a request for administrator privileges of the operating system.

[0045] In this way, the operating system can be configured to display a request for administrator privileges. For example, it is possible to temporarily disable the request for administrator privileges from the operating system, and then revert to the original state where the request for administrator privileges is displayed.

[0046] For example, in a configuration where a function to control whether the operating system requests administrator privileges is a function that rewrites the information in the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges, if the information in the information area used by the operating system to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges has been rewritten to information that controls the operating system not to request administrator privileges, it would be good to have a function to change this information back to information that requests administrator privileges.

[0047] (11) When an application program that has the function to read information stored by a drive recorder in a predetermined area that is not supported for reading by the standard functions of the operating system is operated, if the version of the operating system does not display a request for administrator privileges, it is preferable to configure the system so that the operating system does not display a request for administrator privileges.

[0048] In particular, due to recent security enhancements in operating systems, we have found that there are cases where administrator privileges are required in newer versions of the operating system, whereas they were not necessary in older versions. (12) For example, it may be structured as a program to enable a computer to implement the functions described in (1) to (11) above. [Effects of the Invention]

[0049] According to the present invention, it is possible to provide a user-friendly system and programs, etc., even for users who do not have administrator privileges, which are a predetermined privilege in the operating system. [Brief explanation of the drawing]

[0050] [Figure 1] An explanatory diagram illustrating the transfer of an SD card between a dashcam and a computer. [Figure 2] An explanatory diagram illustrating an example of installing a dashcam in a vehicle. [Figure 3] A block diagram illustrating an example of the basic electrical configuration of a dashcam. [Figure 4] A block diagram illustrating a schematic electrical configuration example of a personal computer and devices connected to it. [Figure 5] This diagram illustrates an example of a screen displayed on the monitor when the viewer application is run, due to processing performed by the viewer application program on the computer. [Figure 6] An explanatory diagram showing an example of an administrator privileges request screen that appears when you do not have the necessary permissions. [Figure 7] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 8] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 9] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 10] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 11] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 12] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 13] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 14] An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 15]An explanatory diagram showing an example of a screen displayed by a permission change application. [Figure 16] An illustrative diagram of the dialog box for setting the sensitivity of a dashcam, which is an example of the viewer app's functionality. [Modes for carrying out the invention]

[0051] The following description will explain an embodiment of the present invention, based on an example in which the system is implemented using a personal computer and a program executed on that personal computer.

[0052] As shown in Figure 1, an SD card that has been installed in the drive recorder 1 and on which vehicle status information has been recorded by the drive recorder 1 is removed from the drive recorder 1 and inserted into an SD card reader / writer 36 connected to the PC 35, and the PC 35 performs the following operations, which constitutes one embodiment of this system. On PC 35, Windows 8 is running as the operating system.

[0053] The SD card has a capacity of 16GB. The first 1GB is partitioned in FAT32 (hereinafter referred to as the first format), which is supported by the standard functions of the Windows 8 operating system running on PC 35. The remaining 15GB is partitioned in a format that is neither FAT32 nor NTFS, which is not supported by the standard functions but is supported by drive recorder 1 (hereinafter referred to as the second format).

[0054] The first partition's first format area contains an installer file that includes the executable file for a viewer application, which is an application program for displaying vehicle status information on the monitor of the PC 35, as shown in the display example in Figure 5. The volume label of the first partition is recorded as "DRIVEREC1" to identify that the SD card is for this system.

[0055] As shown in Figure 2, the drive recorder 1 is fixed to the vehicle's windshield 3 at the upper part of the windshield, near the center in the left-right direction, on the passenger side, adjacent to the rearview mirror 4, using mounting materials such as double-sided tape. The drive recorder 1 is fixed with its camera lens pointed in a direction that captures the area in front of the vehicle. The drive recorder 1 is connected to the cigarette lighter socket 5 and power cable 6, and receives power from the vehicle when the vehicle's accessory power is on.

[0056] Figure 3 shows the schematic electrical configuration of the drive recorder 1. As shown in Figure 3, the drive recorder 1 includes a controller MC, a CCD camera 13, an interface 33, a GPS receiver 24, an SD card reader 31, an acceleration sensor 15, a database 32, etc. The controller MC is connected to the interface 33, which is connected to the CCD camera 13 and converts the video signal from the CCD camera 13 into a digital signal that can be input to the controller MC, as well as the acceleration sensor 15, GPS receiver 24, SD card reader 31, and database 32.

[0057] The controller MC is composed of a microcontroller with a well-known CPU, memory such as ROM and RAM, timers, and other peripheral circuits. The ROM of the controller MC stores various programs, including a GPS information processing program that saves GPS information received by the GPS receiver 24 to the SD card, an image processing program that saves images captured by the CCD camera 13 to the SD card, an acceleration recording program that saves acceleration information detected by the acceleration sensor 15 to the SD card over time, and an OS (Operating System). The controller MC realizes various functions by executing these programs.

[0058] The GPS receiver 24 detects the vehicle's current position information based on instructions from the controller MC. In this embodiment, the detection timing is every second. The controller MC performs a position history recording process every second, storing the history of position information (hereinafter referred to as position history data) into the SD card via the SD card reader 31. The position information includes the time, vehicle's position, speed, latitude, longitude, and altitude, all determined based on signals from GPS satellites. The controller MC performs a process to record the history of these various data based on signals from GPS satellites. The acceleration sensor 15 is a three-axis type sensor that detects acceleration and tilt in each of the three axes (X, Y, Z), and constantly outputs the detected values ​​to the controller MC. Every 10ms, the controller MC performs an acceleration history recording process, associating this three-axis acceleration information with time information to store the history of acceleration information (hereinafter referred to as acceleration history data) into the SD card via the SD card reader 31. The SD card reader 31 reads data from the SD card inserted through the slot 18 or updates the data on the SD card based on the control of the controller MC. The database 32 is a non-volatile memory (e.g., EEPROM) externally attached to the controller MC. The CCD camera 13 continuously outputs captured video information to the controller MC via the interface unit 33, which performs digital conversion of the captured images. The controller MC performs continuous recording processing, storing the video information input via the interface unit 33 as video information associated with time (hereinafter referred to as continuously recorded video data) in the SD card via the SD card reader 31. In addition, it temporarily saves the video information in memory (20 seconds of video in this embodiment), and if the acceleration detected by the acceleration sensor 15 corresponds to the acceleration corresponding to the impact of an accident, it performs event recording processing, storing data (referred to as event recorded video data) which is created by combining the video information temporarily saved for 20 seconds before the impact and the video information for 20 seconds after the impact, and associating this with the time information, in the SD card via the SD card reader 31.

[0059] Through these processes performed by drive recorder 1, location history data, acceleration history data, continuously recorded video data, and event recorded video data are recorded in the second formatted area of ​​the second partition on the SD card.

[0060] Personal computer 35 is a typical notebook computer running Windows 8, and Figure 4 is a schematic diagram illustrating a part of it and the devices connected to it. As shown in Figure 4, personal computer 35 is equipped with an MPU (Micro Processing Unit) 37, which is a control device. ROM 38 and RAM 39 are connected to the MPU 37. A hard disk drive 40, a keyboard 42, a touchpad (not shown), and a monitor 45 are connected to the MPU 37 via their respective interfaces (not shown). A mouse 43, a printer 44, and an SD card reader / writer 36 are connected to the USB ports of personal computer 35. The hard disk in the hard disk drive 40 stores Windows 8 (the operating system's programs and data) and various application programs and data that run on Windows 8.

[0061] The user can launch various programs by operating the touchpad or mouse 43 (hereinafter referred to as the pointing device) and double-clicking the icon for launching an application program, thereby utilizing the functions of the operating system. The launched application program will then be executed by the personal computer 35, which will then perform the predetermined function. Hereinafter, clicking the mouse 43, tapping the touchpad, pressing the Enter key on the keyboard 42, etc., will be referred to as clicks, etc.

[0062] The user removes the SD card containing the recorded data from drive recorder 1 and inserts it into the SD card reader / writer 36 connected to the computer 35. The operating system of the PC 35 accesses the SD card via the USB port when the SD card is inserted into the SD card reader / writer 36.

[0063] The operating system recognizes the first partition of the SD card with the first format supported by standard features and displays a list of files within it. As a result, the viewer application installer file appears in the list. If the viewer application has not yet been installed, the user will run this installer file by double-clicking it on a pointing device or similar method. Once the installation is complete, the viewer application's executable application will appear in the operating system.

[0064] Once the viewer application has been installed, or if it is already installed, the user can launch the viewer application by double-clicking the viewer application icon displayed on the monitor 45's desktop by the operating system. The operating system detects this launch operation and starts the viewer application.

[0065] When the viewer application is launched, a folder browsing dialog similar to that shown in Figure 10 is displayed. The user selects the drive corresponding to the drive into which the SD card is inserted from among the drives recognized by the operating system that are displayed. Here, we assume that the drive with the volume label "DRIVEREC1" and the drive letter "i:" is the drive into which the SD card is inserted. When the viewer application detects the user's selection of "DRIVEREC1 i:" by clicking on the pointing device, and then detects a click of the "OK" button, it requests the operating system to access the event recording video data stored in the second partition of the drive with the drive letter "i:". The operating system receives this request from the viewer application and attempts to access the event recording video data stored in the second partition. However, it determines that the second partition is in a format not supported by default. The operating system then checks whether the registry information used to determine whether to request administrator privileges for each device of the card reader on this drive is set to a value that prevents the request from being made. If the value is not set to prevent the request from being made, it checks whether the user account currently logged into this operating system has administrator privileges. If the user account does not have administrator privileges, it returns information indicating that administrator privileges are required for the viewer application. The viewer application requests the operating system to display an administrator privilege request dialog as shown in Figure 6. On the other hand, if the user account has administrator privileges, the viewer application is granted access to the second partition.

[0066] The administrator privileges request dialog is a dialog that prompts the user to enter the username and password for an administrator account. If the user of the viewer application enters the administrator account username and password and clicks "Yes," the operating system determines whether the entered username and password combination matches one already registered in the operating system as an administrator account. If they match, the operating system grants the viewer application access to the second partition area; otherwise, it denies the viewer application access to the second partition area.

[0067] The viewer application determines whether it has received permission from the operating system to access the second partition area. If permission is not granted, it displays an error dialog similar to the one shown in Figure 11, and if it detects an "OK" click or similar action, it terminates the viewer application. In this way, the data stored in the second partition area cannot be displayed by the viewer application unless the administrator account username and password are entered.

[0068] Furthermore, when determining whether or not to request administrator privileges for each card reader device of this drive, as described above, the registry information used to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges is set to a value that does not require administrator privileges. If the registry information used to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges for each card reader device of this drive is set to a value that does not require administrator privileges, the system does not determine whether or not the user account currently logged into this operating system has administrator privileges, and does not return information indicating that administrator privileges are required for the viewer application. As a result, even users without administrator privileges can obtain access permission and continue the operation of this application.

[0069] The viewer application includes a program for accessing a second format area. This program may be configured to access an area of ​​its own format, or it may incorporate a program for accessing a file system in a format that is not supported by standard Windows but is supported by other existing operating systems.

[0070] If access permission is granted, the viewer application uses a program for accessing its own second-format file system to access the data stored in the second partition area, and reads and displays the location history data, acceleration history data, continuous recording video data, and event recording video data recorded by drive recorder 1 in the second-format area of ​​the second partition on the SD card.

[0071] Figure 5 shows an example of the viewer screen displayed on the monitor 45 as a result of this process. A menu bar 52 for performing various operations is located at the top of the viewer screen 51. To the lower left of the menu bar 52, from top to bottom, are the video display area 53, which displays playback video of either continuously recorded video data or event recorded video data stored on the SD card; the driving speed display area 55, which displays speed information from the location history data; the acceleration display area 56, which displays acceleration information from the acceleration history data; the latitude / longitude display area 57, which displays latitude / longitude information from the location history data; the video drive buttons located above the acceleration history display area 59, from left to right, which include buttons for rewinding, cueing, reverse playback, pause, play, last forward, and fast forward; and the acceleration history display area 59, which displays the 3-axis acceleration for 20 seconds before and after the playback time of the acceleration history data as line graphs. To the lower right of the menu bar 52, from top to bottom, are the playlist 60 and the map area 61. Furthermore, playback displays for each area will be synchronized using the same time information contained in their respective data (hereinafter, this synchronization of playback using this information will be referred to as synchronized playback).

[0072] Playlist 60 displays a list of event recording video data. This list is recorded as a single event recording video data (in this embodiment, 40 seconds before and after the impact) (hereinafter referred to as an event unit), and the start time information is displayed for each unit (event unit). Each section displaying the time information is a button, and the user looks at the time of each event displayed in Playlist 60 and clicks the button of the event they want to play.

[0073] The viewer app initiates synchronized playback of events triggered by user clicks or other actions. The first image displayed is a still image of the event recording video data from the moment the event was determined to have occurred. Upon detection of operation of the video drive button, playback of the captured image is initiated. During playback, the driving speed display area 55, acceleration display area 56, and latitude / longitude display area 57 display data for the time corresponding to that image, respectively, and the map area 61 displays a map of the surrounding area including the location where the image was taken at that time. The acceleration history display area 59 displays the acceleration history in the three axes of the captured image for the duration of the saved time (total 40 seconds), and plots the acceleration position at the time currently displayed in the video display area 53 as a vertical bar.

[0074] By operating the video drive button, the user can display a still image of any position within a 40-second period of the captured video file in the video display area 53, and can also display a moving image within that 40-second period. When displaying a moving image, the displays in the driving speed display area 55, acceleration display area 56, latitude / longitude display area 57, acceleration history display area 59, and map area 61 also change in sync with the movement. Furthermore, if the "Close" button below the playlist 52 is detected to be pressed, the video display area 53 switches to a state where it continuously displays the recorded video data, and also has a function to play back from any position by operating the video drive button. With administrator privileges in place, it is possible to play back and display the data recorded by drive recorder 1 on the SD card.

[0075] However, as mentioned above, if you launch the viewer app without logging in with an account that has administrator privileges to the operating system, an administrator privileges request dialog will usually appear, prompting you to enter the username and password of the administrator account.

[0076] For example, in a company organization, administrator privileges for a computer's operating system are only held by specific individuals who have been granted so-called system administrator privileges, and users of viewer applications may not have administrator privileges.

[0077] To prevent users from being repeatedly asked for administrator privileges, system administrators can, for example, run the permission modification application described below before installing the aforementioned viewer application, thereby preventing the administrator privilege request dialog from appearing when the viewer application accesses the second partition.

[0078] The permission change application is stored on a USB memory stick and distributed to the system administrator. The system administrator inserts this USB memory stick into a USB port on the PC 35. The operating system recognizes this USB memory stick and displays the icon for launching the permission change application on the monitor 45.

[0079] The system administrator can launch the permission change application (an application program that runs on the operating system) by double-clicking this icon. Refer to Figures 7 through 15 to explain how the permission change application works.

[0080] Figure 7 shows the confirmation screen that is initially displayed when the permission change application is executed. This confirmation screen displays text information indicating that the application will grant permission to users without administrator privileges to view data using the viewer application, that the system administrator must have administrator privileges on the operating system to run this application, that it may affect other software, that the user should be aware of the information of the devices connected to this computer (although not shown in the figure, it would be good to display information such as the model number of the SD card reader / writer 36), and a disclaimer. It also displays text information indicating the operation instructions for agreeing and disagreeing, and below these text information, it displays "Agree" and "Disagree" buttons.

[0081] If the user (the user of this application is the system administrator) operates their pointing device and clicks the "Agree" button or similar action is detected, the main screen shown in Figure 8 will be displayed, allowing the user to select the device and drive to be modified in terms of permissions, grant permissions, and perform initialization operations. This main screen is a window that includes a device name selection section with the text "Device Name" displayed in Figure 8, a pull-down menu to its right, and a "Get" button to its right; a drive name selection section below that with the text "Drive Name" displayed, a selected drive display section labeled "Please select a drive" in Figure 8, and a "Select" button to its right; and below that, from left to right, a button to restore to default values ​​labeled "Restore to default," a permission grant button labeled "Grant permissions," and an exit button labeled "Exit."

[0082] First, the user clicks the "Get" button in the device name selection section to display a list of card readers in a pull-down menu, from which they select the card reader to which they want to grant permissions. Then, they click the "Select" button to display a drive selection dialog, select the drive, and click the "Grant Permissions" button to grant permissions to the selected card reader and drive combination. On the other hand, clicking the "Restore Defaults" button removes the permissions granted to the selected card reader and drive combination, returning it to a state where permissions are requested for that combination. Finally, clicking the "Exit" button will close the application. Further details about the processing performed by this application will be explained.

[0083] When the system detects a user clicking the "Get" button in Figure 8, it requests the operating system to retrieve a list of card reader / writers connected to the PC 35. This list is then received and placed in a pull-down menu (see Figure 9). As a result, the user can select a specific card reader from the pull-down menu list. When a specific card reader is selected, the text displayed in the pull-down menu (when not pulled down) is changed to show the name of the selected card reader. For example, Figure 9 shows an example where four types of card reader / writers are connected (physically one device, but equipped with four media slots, and recognized by the operating system as four different card reader / writers). Here, we will mainly explain an example where the card reader / writer "BUFFALO BSCR20TU3 -CF / MD USB Device (Disk Drive, USBSTOR\DiskBUFFALO_BSCR20TU3_-CF / MD1.00\dDevice\00000096)" is selected. When this card reader is selected, the text display of the device name in the un-dropped-down menu in Figure 8 will show only the portion of "BUFFALO BSCR20TU3 -CF / MD USB Device (Disk Drive,USBSTOR\DiskBUFFALO_BSCR20TU3_-CF / MD1.00\dDevice\00000096)" that can be displayed within the text display width.

[0084] When a user clicks a selection button or similar action is detected, a drive selection dialog box, as shown in Figure 10, is displayed. The drive selection dialog box includes text prompting the user to select a drive to which permissions should be changed, a drive list display section showing a list of drives on the PC 35, and OK and Cancel buttons. If a click of the Cancel button or similar action is detected, the system returns to the main screen. The system administrator, who is the user, selects the drive to which permissions should be granted. For example, the user can easily identify and select drive I, which has the label "DRIVEREC1" on the SD card volume label indicating that it belongs to this system, from other drives unrelated to this system. Once a drive is selected from the list of drives displayed in the drive list display section, the OK button becomes clickable.

[0085] When the OK button is clicked or similar action is detected, the system determines whether the selected drive is a valid drive. If it is not a valid drive, an error dialog box containing text indicating that it is not a valid drive is displayed, as shown in Figure 11. If the OK button in the error dialog is clicked or similar action is detected, the system returns to the drive selection dialog box shown in Figure 10. The system determines whether a drive is valid by querying the operating system to determine whether the drive selected in the drive selection dialog box is a drive for the card reader. For example, if "BD-ROM drive (G:)" is selected, it is not a drive for the card reader, so an error dialog box is displayed.

[0086] On the other hand, when determining whether the selected drive is a valid drive, if it is, the drive name of the selected drive is displayed in the selected drive display section of Figure 8 in the drive selection dialog. Here, we will mainly explain the case where "DRIVEREC1 i:" is selected. In this case, the display in the selected drive display section, which currently says "Please select a drive" as shown in Figure 8, will change to display "DRIVEREC1 i:".

[0087] When a click of the grant permission button or similar action is detected, the system determines whether the currently selected device and drive are a valid device and drive combination. This determination is made, for example, by querying the operating system to determine which drive the selected device is assigned to, and checking whether the assigned drive matches the selected drive.

[0088] If the device and drive combination is not valid, a second error dialog box, as shown in Figure 12, will be displayed. The second error dialog box contains text information indicating that a valid device and drive combination has not been selected, and that a valid device and drive combination must be selected, along with an OK button. If a click of this OK button or similar action is detected, the user will return to the main screen.

[0089] If the device and drive combination is valid, the permission grant confirmation dialog shown in Figure 13 will be displayed. The permission grant confirmation dialog includes text information asking whether permission should be granted, text information for the device name of the selected device, text information for the drive name of the selected drive, and "Yes" and "No" buttons for consent / disagreement.

[0090] If a click of the "No" button or similar action is detected, the user returns to the main screen. On the other hand, if a click of the "Yes" button or similar action is detected, the information in the aforementioned registry area, which is used to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges when accessing the selected card reader, is rewritten to a value that does not require administrator privileges. Note that this rewriting requires administrator privileges from the operating system, so if administrator privileges are not available, the administrator privilege request dialog box shown in Figure 6 will be displayed, requesting administrator privileges. Once the rewriting is complete, a permission grant completion dialog box shown in Figure 15 will be displayed. As mentioned above, when Windows accesses an area with a second format that is not supported by default, it refers to the value in this registry area, which is prepared for each card reader device into which the SD card containing that area is inserted, to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges. If the value is not one that does not require administrator privileges, it performs the normal process of requesting administrator privileges, but if the value is one that does not require administrator privileges, it is configured not to perform the process of requesting administrator privileges. Therefore, by rewriting the values ​​in the registry area provided for each card reader device to values ​​that do not require administrator privileges, it is possible to prevent the display of the operating system administrator privileges request dialog shown in Figure 6 when accessing the second format area in the viewer application.

[0091] As shown in Figure 15, the permission granting completion dialog includes a text message indicating that permission has been granted, a text message requesting that the SD card reader / writer 36 be disconnected from the PC 35 and then reconnected, and an "OK" button. When the OK button is clicked or similar action is detected, the user returns to the main screen.

[0092] In this way, permissions can be granted to a specific card reader. To remove the granted permissions and return to the original state of no permissions, on the main screen in Figure 8, if the system detects that the device and drive pair whose permissions to be removed is selected using the same operations and processes as the permission granting process, and the system clicks the "Restore to Initial Value" button, it verifies whether the device and drive pair is correct using the same operations and processes as the permission granting process. If it is correct, the system rewrites the information in the registry area used to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges when accessing the selected card reader in the Windows registry area to a value that does not require administrator privileges (the operating system's default value). The differences between this permission initialization process and the permission granting process described above are that the permission initialization confirmation dialog in Figure 13 changes the text display from "Permissions will be granted to the following devices" to "Permissions for the following devices will be initialized", and the permission change completion dialog in Figure 15 is displayed instead of the permission granting completion dialog in Figure 14. Otherwise, the process is the same. If the app detects that the exit button on the main screen has been clicked, it will terminate. In this way, it is possible to grant or revoke permissions for a specific card reader.

[0093] As shown in the dialog in Figure 13, if permissions are granted, when the viewer application is launched, in the process described above, if the user selects "DRIVEREC1 i:" by clicking on the pointing device in the folder browsing dialog and clicks the "OK" button, the viewer application requests access to the event recording video data stored on the second partition of the drive with drive letter "i:" from the operating system. The operating system determines that the registry information it uses to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges for this card reader device on this drive is set to a value that does not require administrator privileges. Therefore, it does not determine whether the user account currently logged into this operating system has administrator privileges, and does not return information indicating that administrator privileges are required for the viewer application, allowing even users without administrator privileges to obtain access and continue the operation of the viewer application. Therefore, the location history data, acceleration history data, continuous recording video data, and event recording video data recorded by the drive recorder 1 can be read into the second formatted area of ​​the second partition on the SD card of this drive, and each of the data can be visualized as shown in Figure 5 above.

[0094] As described above, the permission modification application can control the operation of a viewer application equipped with the function to read information stored by drive recorder 1 on the second partition of an SD card, which is not supported for reading by the standard functions of Windows 8, so that Windows 8 does not display a request for operating system administrator privileges. Therefore, it becomes difficult to rewrite the data recorded on the second partition by the drive recorder, and the request for operating system administrator privileges is not displayed when the viewer application equipped with the function to read the information recorded by the drive recorder is operated, so that even users who are standard users of the operating system can read and use the data recorded by the drive recorder from the display shown in Figure 5 using this application program.

[0095] The process shown in Figure 8 and later includes a function to prevent the display of a request for operating system administrator privileges when reading with a specific card reader. Therefore, for SD cards recorded by drive recorder 1, operating system administrator privileges are no longer required when reading with this card reader, while other reading devices still require operating system administrator privileges. For example, if the operating system as a whole were configured to prevent the request for administrator privileges when reading from such recording media, administrator privileges would become unnecessary across the board. However, if the operating system were configured to prevent the request for administrator privileges on a per-SD card basis, it would be necessary to configure each SD card to not require administrator privileges, which would be time-consuming and require calling a system administrator, and the viewer application would not be immediately available. This system also solves these problems. When a system administrator user reads an SD card with a card reader pre-selected by the system administrator user, even a standard Windows user can view the data on the second partition using the viewer application.

[0096] As shown in Figure 13, the system controls the display of the operating system's request for administrator privileges when reading with a selected card reader. This control is based on both a physical device for identifying the card reader physically connected to the PC 35 and a drive, which is the logical identification information that the card reader is recognized and assigned by the operating system. Therefore, when multiple card readers with the same device name are connected, the system can more reliably identify the card reader that does not display the request for administrator privileges and prevent the display of the request from the operating system when reading with that card reader. At the same time, it can identify card readers with the same device name as the selected card reader but that are not subject to the restriction of not displaying the request for administrator privileges and cause the display of the request from the operating system when reading with that card reader.

[0097] As shown in Figure 8, the main screen initially displays a blank list in the pull-down menu, rather than pre-retrieving and displaying a list. The list is retrieved and displayed only when the "Get" button is clicked. This configuration helps to raise awareness among system administrators about connecting and verifying the card readers to which they are granted permissions.

[0098] Furthermore, it has a function that allows the user to select a specific card reader from among multiple card readers connected to the PC 35, so a system administrator can decide which card reader from among the multiple card readers connected to the PC 35 will be controlled so as not to display the Windows 8 administrator privileges request.

[0099] Furthermore, because the configuration involves rewriting information in the registry area used by Windows 8 to determine whether or not to request administrator privileges, it can be easily implemented without developing a Windows 8 device driver or other program that the operating system runs with administrator privileges, thus preventing the request for administrator privileges.

[0100] Furthermore, since the registry area is recorded on non-volatile storage media such as hard disks, it is not erased even when the operating system is shut down. Therefore, simply running the permission change application once and rewriting this registry area will prevent the administrator privilege request from being displayed. As a result, there is no longer any need to repeatedly run the permission change application before running, for example, a viewer application. The permission modification app should have a feature that allows it to run before the viewer app.

[0101] It would be beneficial to configure the viewer app installer to include a function that allows it to run a permission change application. This prevents the problem of not being able to immediately view data recorded by the dashcam when trying to use the viewer app, such as when administrator privileges are requested when running the viewer app, requiring the user to contact a system administrator.

[0102] In this embodiment, the permission change application and the viewer application are configured as separate executable files. Therefore, it is easy for a system administrator to run the permission change application only on computers where administrator privileges are not required. Conversely, it is also easy to prevent the permission change application from running on computers where administrator privileges are required, thereby enhancing security.

[0103] The viewer application should include a feature that allows only the operations manager, designated separately from the system administrator, to view the data in the second partition area. For example, immediately after the viewer application starts, a screen could be displayed to enter the operations manager's ID and password. If the ID and password match those of a pre-registered operations manager, the application could proceed to display a folder browsing dialog similar to that shown in Figure 10. This would make it easy to designate different roles for the system administrator and the operations manager within the organization. The operations manager could be, for example, the person who manages the vehicle on which drive recorder 1 is installed, or the person who manages the driver of that vehicle. The permission change app now includes a function to reset the granted permissions, allowing it to display a request for administrator privileges.

[0104] The permission modification application should be configured to check the Windows version and, if that version does not display a request for administrator privileges, not perform the registry modification described above. This process is unnecessary in Windows XP.

[0105] As one embodiment of the present invention, the system has been described based on an example in which it is implemented using a personal computer and a program executed on that personal computer. However, it is also possible to configure it as a program that runs on a terminal running a multi-user operating system, for example.

[0106] Drive recorder 1 is configured to include a camera that records the area in front of the vehicle, but it may also be configured without a camera. If a camera is included, the recording location may be the rear, side, or a combination of these, rather than the front. The recording location may also be the interior of the vehicle rather than the exterior, or both the interior and exterior may be recorded. However, it is particularly desirable to have a function to record the interior of the vehicle. This configuration is highly effective in acquiring vehicle status information for driver management.

[0107] This embodiment describes a configuration in which, if the user account does not have administrator privileges, the operating system displays an administrator privilege request dialog as shown in Figure 6. However, a configuration in which the application obtains from the operating system whether such an administrator privilege request is necessary and terminates or interrupts the application's processing if an administrator privilege request is required also has the effect of eliminating the need for administrator privileges.

[0108] You can configure the system so that clicking the "Restore Defaults" button or similar action removes all previously granted permissions, returning it to a state where the permission-changing application is not running at all.

[0109] The second partition area is suitable for recording the settings data of the drive recorder 1. For example, when a click of the gear-shaped icon at the far right of the menu bar 52 of the viewer application in Figure 5 is detected, the settings screen for the operation of the drive recorder 1 is displayed as shown in Figure 16. When a click of the OK button or similar action is detected, the settings of the settings items on this screen are stored in the second partition area as the settings data for the drive recorder 1. When the power is turned on, the drive recorder 1 reads the settings data stored in this second partition and processes each setting item referenced in the drive recorder 1's operation using these settings. This prevents tampering with the settings data and allows users without administrator privileges to easily view and modify the settings data.

[0110] The present invention is not limited to the configurations described in the embodiments above. The components of each embodiment described above can be arbitrarily selected and combined within the range of possible combinations. Furthermore, any component described in the means for solving the invention can be combined with any component within the range of possible combinations.

Claims

1. A program for a viewer application that enables a computer to implement a function for displaying information recorded on the second partition of a recording medium, which comprises a first partition that is a first format partition supported by the standard functions of the operating system and a second partition that is a second format partition not supported by the standard functions of the operating system but supported by the drive recorder, on a display means of the computer on which the operating system is running. It is run with administrator privileges on the operating system. The system includes a function to display a list of card readers connected to the computer to the user, and to perform processing so that the viewer application does not request administrator privileges when accessing a combination of a card reader selected by the user from the displayed list and a drive selected by the user. A program characterized by the following.

2. When this program is executed, it has a function to display a confirmation screen that grants permission to allow a user without administrator privileges to display data using a viewer application. The program according to claim 1, characterized by the following:

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