603 results about "Digital mapping" patented technology

Digital mapping techniques are disclosed that provide more flexibility to the user through the use of multiple views of map information, including a secondary map and a main map. The secondary map can provide the user with either a zoomed out or in relative to the main map, or a different type of map view (e.g., satellite images). The secondary map can be turned on and off by the user. The secondary map may include one or more viewing frames that indicate views (e.g., current and alternate views) of the main map. The user can move the main map, viewing frame, or secondary map to achieve desired map views. During such movement, the relationship between the main and secondary maps can be synchronous, partially synchronous, or serial.

The present invention is designed to seamlessly deliver localized content to users on a network corresponding to each users' geographic area. In particular, the present invention considers a user's geographic location information (such as an address) in the determination of which geographic areas, if any, correspond to the user, and automatically delivers content associated with those geographic areas. By associating a unique spatial identity with a user, the present invention may use various known digital mapping spatial techniques to provide the user with information relevant to the user's location.

Various methods, systems and apparatus for displaying content associated with a point-of-interest (“POI”) in a digital mapping system, are disclosed. One such method may include detecting a change in the zoom level of an electronic map displayed on a computing device, determining if the new zoom-level is at a pre-determined zoom level (e.g. at maximum zoom), identifying a POI on the map, retrieving content associated with the POI (“POI content”) and displaying the POI content. The method may further include detecting a change in the zoom, or pan, of the digital map while POI content is displayed, and removing the POI content in response. One apparatus, according to aspects of the present invention, may include means of detecting a change in the zoom level in a digital map displayed through an application (e.g. a web browser, an application on web-enabled cellular phones, etc., displaying a map generated by a service such as Google Maps®, Yahoo! Maps®, Windows Live Search Maps®, MapQuest®, etc.) on a computing device (e.g. personal computer, workstation, thin client, PDA, cellular phone/smart phone, GPS device, etc.) means of identifying a POI at the pre-determined zoom level, means of obtaining content associated with the POI, and means of displaying the POI content. POI content may be retrieved from a database (e.g. internet-based database); or, in an alternate embodiment, gathered by crawling websites associated with the POI. In one embodiment, POI content may be displayed as an image (e.g. a PNG file, GIF, Flash® component, etc.) superimposed on the digital map (e.g. as an overlay object on the map image.) In alternate embodiments, POI content may replace the digital map and may contain links to other content.

A vehicle navigation system that is capable of learning user habits/preferences, mistakes in a digital map database, and new roads that may have been added or constructed after release of the digital map database is disclosed. The vehicle navigation system monitors a driver's habits and updates a database to thereby cause the vehicle navigation system to have a preference for the driver's habits. The vehicle navigation system may also monitor the geographic position of the vehicle and allow the driver to update or change data contained in the digital map database if an error exists. The vehicle navigation system is also capable of learning new roads that exist that are not included in the road network map of the digital map database and is also capable of adding these new roads to the digital map database.

Digital mapping techniques are disclosed that provide visually-oriented information to the user, such as driving directions that include visual data points along the way of the driving route, thereby improving the user experience. The user may preview the route associated with the driving directions, where the preview is based on, for example, at least one of satellite images, storefront images, and heuristics and/or business listings.

Various methods, systems and apparatus for displaying content associated with a point-of-interest (“POI”) in a digital mapping system, are disclosed. One such method may include detecting a change in the zoom level of an electronic map displayed on a computing device, determining if the new zoom-level is at a pre-determined zoom level (e.g. at maximum zoom), identifying a POI on the map, retrieving content associated with the POI (“POI content”) and displaying the POI content. A POI may be a specific point of interest; or, an entire geographic region of a map displayed at a high zoom level. The method may further include detecting a change in the zoom, or pan, of the digital map while POI content is displayed, and removing or repositioning the POI content in response. One apparatus, according to aspects of the present invention, may include means of detecting a change in the zoom level in a digital map displayed through an application (e.g. a web browser, an application on web-enabled cellular phones, etc., displaying a map generated by a service such as Google Maps®, Yahoo! Maps®, Windows Live Search Maps®, MapQuest®, etc.) on a computing device (e.g. personal computer, workstation, thin client, PDA, cellular phone/smart phone, GPS device, etc.) means of identifying a POI at the pre-determined zoom level, means of obtaining content associated with the POI, and means of displaying the POI content. POI content may be retrieved from a database (e.g. internet-based database); or, in an alternate embodiment, gathered by crawling websites associated with the POI. In one embodiment, POI content may be displayed as an image (e.g a PNG file, GIF, Flash® component, etc.) superimposed on the digital map (e.g. as an overlay object on the map image.) In alternate embodiments, POI content may replace the digital map and may contain links to other content.

A system aggregates entity location information from multiple documents distributed among multiple locations in a network. The system searches the entity location information to identify a first set of entities located within the entirety of a first geographic region selected by a user. The system provides a first digital map to the user via a network, the first digital map including the first geographic region and further including visual representations of the first set of identified entities and their associated geographic locations.

Optical character recognition (OCR) for images such as a street scene image is generally a difficult problem because of the variety of fonts, styles, colors, sizes, orientations, occlusions and partial occlusions that can be observed in the textual content of such scenes. However, a database query can provide useful information that can assist the OCR process. For instance, a query to a digital mapping database can provide information such as one or more businesses in a vicinity, the street name, and a range of possible addresses. In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, this mapping information is used as prior information or constraints for an OCR engine that is interpreting the corresponding street scene image, resulting in much greater accuracy of the digital map data provided to the user.

Techniques are disclosed that enable users to access and use digital mapping systems with constrained-resource services and/or mobile devices (e.g., cell phones and PDAs). In particular, latency of a mapping application on high-latency and low-throughput networks is minimized. One embodiment utilizes volatile and non-volatile storage of the mobile device to cache pre-computed map images (e.g., map tiles). An asynchronous cache can be used to prevent delays caused by potentially slow non-volatile storage. Meta-data about each map image and usage patterns can be stored and used by the cache to optimize hit rates.

A system and method of providing multiple participants with a centrally accessible content portal for geographic point of interest (POI) data, for subsequent use in creating map-based or spatial applications. Different entities can dynamically upload, update, retrieve, and use digital map and POI data. Additional features include the ability to handle the large amounts of POI data needed by multiple Application Developers, including data that is dynamic, or frequently changing; the ability to update POI attribute information and deliver it to the Application Developers; the ability to associate multiple points of entry (POE) with a POI, and to aggregate data from multiple Content Providers; and the use of a common geocoding engine and common digital map reference across all Content Providers, which ensures the consistency of the geocoding throughout all the POI data.

Probe data is analyzed to derive Longitudinal Speed Profiles (LSPs) and an Optimal Longitudinal Speed Profile (18) for each road segment or link in a digital map network. The Longitudinal Speed Profiles (LSPs) profiles are calculated during defined time spans whereas the Optimal Longitudinal Speed Profile (18) is based on the LSP for the time span corresponding only to free flow traffic conditions. All of the LSPs can used to create a respective energy cost for each time span, or only the OLSP (18) can be used (or alternatively the RRDSL 16 or LRRDSL 17) to calculate an energy cost for the free flow conditions only. The energy cost can be used to predict the energy required by a vehicle to traverse the link Navigation software can use the energy cost to plan the most energy efficient route between two locations in the digital map. Sensory signals can be activated if a driver strays from the Optimal Longitudinal Speed Profile (18) to achieve extremely high levels of energy efficiency.

Methods, devices and systems for recognizing an object in an image are provided, in which the object is recognized by evaluation of both image data and digital map information that corresponds to an area represented by the image. Evaluation of the image data and the digital map information may involve various methods of evaluation including cross-checking, in which the digital map information is utilized to verify correct object recognition in the image data; prediction, in which digital map information is utilized to predict a feature of an object to facilitate object recognition in the image data; or modeling in which a generic model of an object is compared with the image data.

A combined map scale and measuring tool can be used in digital mapping systems. In the scale mode, the scale indicates the correct scale, for example, at the center of the map. It can be updated with every pan, zoom or resize operation the user performs, and can further update to compensate for map distortion caused by the map projection. The tool mode is entered once the user drags one or both of the scale endpoints onto the map. The distance between two endpoints of the tool can be displayed. A new point can be added each time the user drags a line between existing endpoints of the tool. Info windows can be opened that include relevant information about the endpoints (e.g., latitude/longitude, geo code), and provide option to convert the tool segments to driving directions. A drag and drop location marker is also provided.

A Weather Information Network Enabled Mobile System for providing information to a user regarding an emergency event. The WINEMS system receives location data, such as from a GPS system, and correlates the location data with the emergency alert to display a map showing both a location of the WINEMS system and a location of the emergency event. Preferably, the locations are displayed on a digital map.

A digital elevation database is compressed to create a compressed digital map database which is used by a digital computer system for displaying three-dimensional terrain data in the form of polygons. The compressed digital map database is produced from a database of elevation points by selecting every mth row and every nth column, thereby resulting in a reduction of database storage requirements. During program run-time the intersection of rows and columns forms cells with four corners. The elevation value of a center elevation point for each cell is formed by various methods, thereby creating a cell made up of four three-dimensional triangles. One method for creating the elevation of the center elevation point uses the elevations of the four corners of the cell. Another method uses extrapolated elevation values from the cell's extended diagonals. The three-dimensional triangles formed from the center elevation point are then transformed and projected using standard computer graphics methods on a digital computer to produce a three-dimensional projected display.

Probe data collected at times of low traffic density is analyzed to derive a Raw Road Design Speed Limit (RRDSL, 16) for each road segment or group of segments in a digital map. The RRDSL (16), comprised of longitudinally distributed Pt speeds, is associated with the road segment and stored in a digital medium to indicate the limits of the road section in free flow traffic. The longitudinally distributed speeds may be limited by local speed limits or other business logic to establish a Legal Raw Road Design Speed Limit (LRRDSL, 17). Either the RRDSL (16) or the LRRDSL (17) can be further modified to smooth acceleration and deceleration rates between changes in the longitudinally distributed speeds to create an Optimal Longitudinal Speed Profile (OLSP, 18), which represents optimized energy consumption. A signal can be produced if a driver's current speed rises unacceptably above a longitudinally distributed speed in real time. The signal can be audible, visible and/or haptic. Real-time traffic density information can be inferred by comparing current speed data to the longitudinally distributed speed for that position. If the current speed is consistently lower than the longitudinally distributed speed for that position, an inference is drawn that the road section is inefficient. Road efficiency assessments can be transmitted to a service center and/or other vehicles, and used by navigation software.

A method and apparatus are disclosed that enable an over-the-horizon-radar (OTHR) system to detect and track multiple target classes simultaneously, where target classes are defined by the speed and acceleration of the tracked objects. The OTHR is tasked in a staring mode, with a bandwidth and waveform repetition frequency that enable detection of Doppler shifts from all target types, with sufficient clutter reduction and range resolution. The backscattered echoes are buffered for each target class and processed independently. The output of an automatic tracking algorithm then preferentially plots target progress on a single digital map for all target classes.