252 results about "Trip planning" patented technology

One or more embodiments may include a trip planning system for planning a trip based on the charge of an electric vehicle battery. The trip planning system may include one or more computers located remotely from an electric vehicle which may have one or more battery packs for powering the electric vehicle. The computer(s) may be configured to receive geographic parameters defining a trip and a battery charge status of the one or more electric vehicle battery packs. The computer(s) may be further configured to determine that the trip cannot be completed based on the battery charge status. The computer(s) may additionally be configured to present a battery charge requirement for completing the trip.

A trip planner is provided for creating, modifying, categorizing, and sharing online trip plans. A trip plan includes a list of items such as hotels, restaurants, and tourist attractions selected from a travel guide or provided by a user. An item can have a street address for positioning the item on a map, an image and description of the item, and other metadata assigned by the user, such as tags and notes. The trip planner can generate an itinerary listing the items, and a corresponding map showing the locations of the items. A trip plan can be shared with other users, who can locate the trip plan by searching for the tags or other metadata.

Methods, systems and computer readable code for travel planning are provided. According to some embodiments, a travel planning engine schedules a plurality of activities within one or more time intervals and generates a travel plan, where each activity is associated with a physical location and optional time parameters. Alternatively or additionally, the travel planning is implemented by receiving manual travel planning directives through a user interface. According to some embodiments, the activities are scheduled so as to satisfy specific constraints and / or travel benefit parameters. According to some embodiments, the travel plan includes information about traveling between relevant locations. Some embodiments of the present invention include a method of comparing and / or presenting a plurality of travel options, wherein each travel option is associated with a respective mode of transportation. Some embodiments of the present invention provide a system, method or computer readable code for customizing a travel itinerary for a traveler. Some embodiments of the present invention provide a system, method or computer readable code for presenting information about pricing of at least three targeted travel services on a single screen including a plurality of distinct bundling combinations.

Interactive, Internet-based, Trip Planning, Travel Resource, Travel Community, Virtual Travel, Travel-based Education, Travel-related Gaming and Virtual / Live Tour System, Methods, and Processes, emphasizing a user's ability to tailor complete travel, trip, route, and touring choices to unique, user-specified personal interests, preferences, and special requirements for self and companions throughout a particular trip or for gaming or virtual (including live, passive, interactive, individual, group, and scheduled, reserved or on-demand) tours, and including methods and processes related to scheduling games, tours, site visits and other travel-events, making related reservations and obtaining confirmations and e-tickets, and on-line banking services to process ticket, membership and merchandise payments and advertising, reservation and ticket and merchandise transactions for vendors.

A method is disclosed which enables travelers to discover other travelers with similar and compatible travel plans, for purposes of contacting them and negotiating shared travel agreements. Travel plans are characterized quantitatively, enabling numerical measurement of the match between a pair of plans. Dependence upon similarity of place names is eliminated. The temporal difference between plans is converted to an equivalent distance difference and summed with the origin and destination differences to yield a single number ranking the match. Plans are ordered by this ranking against a search specification. The method is more compatible than the prior art with computer automation, and is accessible via the Internet.

A client-server system for corporate travel planning, expense reporting and travel management that utilizes a corporate database server to enable accurate and timely pre-travel and post-travel decision making that is fed by a travel planning process and an expense reporting process, plus a SABRE data feed of all booked data and back office system data as well as a hand-off of exchange and void ticket information that comprises a Travel Planning module, a Travel Decision Maker module, and a Travel Expense Reporting module. The system uses a corporate database environment communicating with a real-time CRS data feed that enhances the Travel Planning module by offering the traveler live choices of air, car, and hotel availability based upon company travel policy as well as live access to current or company negotiated fares while also allowing the Travel Decision Maker module to make comparisons between booked information and actual current travel data.

To provide remote services, including dynamic, interactive assistance to electric vehicle (EV) users, a central server is arranged for electronic communications with EVs (15) and with client devices (11). The server also communicates with at least one EV charging station network, which in turn communicate with individual charging stations (30). Remote services may include trip planning, locating charging stations, checking availability and suitability of charging stations, making reservations at charging stations, and updating plans en route. The server collects data from the EV and analyzes the data to determine various statistics. The system advises a user on readiness of the EV to complete a proposed trip before recharging the EV batteries. Client devices may include smart phones, computers, or a head unit in the EV. Application software programs are executable on the client devices to provide user interfaces for accessing the remote services and for communicating with the central server.

A public transit travel planning system and methodology that uses an extensive pre-processing approach of transit information prior to query time on order to determine optimal public transit routes for journeys. At query time, since the transit information has already been processed by the system, very little computation is needed in order to fulfill the query. The system then provides users with public transit directions in response to the queries for public transit journeys.

One embodiment of the present invention includes a system and method for managing a travel plan. In response to a travel plan being identified for a traveler, a search is performed for one or more persons based on a predetermined relation to the traveler. In response to identifying one or more persons based on the predetermined relation to the traveler, it is determined if the one or more such persons is to be present at a location in proximity to the traveler's location according to the travel plan. If the one or more such persons is to be present at a location in proximity to the traveler's location, an opportunity is presented to modify the travel plan to accommodate those persons.

An Internet-based system which enhances the safety of travelers, operated via website or mobile messaging text messages. The user provides identity and contact details for himself / herself and a contact person. The user then provides travel plan information and an alert time, thus arming a monitoring process which monitors for alert time expiry. If the user disarms the system no alert notification will occur. Should the user fail to disarm before the alert time, or if an emergency activation message is received from the user, the contact person is alerted by email and / or text message and notification information is made available on a secure notification website. Other embodiments are described.

An autonomous mobile robot system having plural mobile robots and integrative planning means to plan the moving zone of the plural mobile robots, wherein: the integrative planning means is installed on the plural mobile robots including a main mobile robot to travel autonomously and a subordinate mobile robot to travel on the basis of the instructions of the main mobile robot; and each of the plural mobile robots is provided with, at least, measurement means to measure the situation of ambient environment, communication means to communicate between the integrative planning means and the other mobile robot, main device position recognition means to recognize the position of the mobile robot, subordinate device position recognition means to recognize the position of the other mobile robot, travel planning means to plan travel routes of the mobile robot and the other mobile robot, and travel control means to control a drive mechanism in accordance with the travel planning means. A guided vehicle and a truck or the like can travel autonomously and cooperatively while obtaining information on ambient environment without mechanical connection and can automatically be separated from and merged with each other.

Disclosed herein is a system and method, utilizing a proprietary content database and associated support services, for providing comprehensive, customized trip planning and related mapping and routing services.

A method and apparatus for purchasing an airline ticket and other travel services that includes entering into a computer, information describing a service such as a flight desired by a consumer. The present invention is embodied via a graphical user interface for a travel planning system is described. The graphical user interface is implemented as a web page and includes a tabular region of the graphical user interface that displays summarized travel options and comprises a plurality of cells that act as controls.

One embodiment provides a method, that may be implemented on a system, for providing the travel schedule of traveler's contacts. One embodiment of the method comprises receiving a travel itinerary for a traveler; identifying at least one travel segment option corresponding to the travel itinerary of the traveler; identifying from one or more of the traveler's sets of contacts, one or more contacts that have selected the travel segment option identified for the traveler; and presenting for selection the travel segment option for the traveler, and presenting the one or more contacts that have selected the travel segment option identified for the traveler.

A method and system is described for providing a traveler with the ability to query an electronic social network for travel related information. The traveler, and related individuals, enter future travel plans into the system. The traveler leverages this information by querying the system to determine which related individuals will be at the same travel location for a future date. The traveler is also able to query the system to determine when next a related individual will be at a particular location. The travel can also query the system to determine where related individuals will be for a future date.

Messages are targeted to travelers based on travel itineraries. Targeting may also be based on real-time travel status information. The targeted messages communicate their purpose and priority to respective travelers within the context of the travel itineraries. A disclosed method includes accessing a travel itinerary database including a plurality of travel itineraries. Each travel itinerary is associated with a traveler and defines itinerary segments of a corresponding travel schedule. A message is associated with a set of targeting rules used to identify a subset of itineraries in the travel itinerary database. The targeting rules may be used with real-time travel status information to identify the subset of itineraries.

A system and method of processing a travel plan request from a customer includes (1) receiving customer information from a customer; (2) storing in a database the customer information; (3) sending to an agent a notification by an email, the notification including a link to the website, wherein the agent can access package request details by navigating to the link; (4) sending to the agent periodic re-notifications if the agent fails to respond within a first predetermined period of time; (5) displaying to the agent the package request details on the website; (6) receiving via the website a response to the email from the agent; (7) storing in the database the response from the agent; (8) sending to the customer a notification of the response from the agent; (9) sending a re-notification to the customer if the customer fails to respond within a second predetermined period of time; (10) displaying to the customer a package quotation based on the response from the agent, wherein the package quotation includes any combination of budget, destination, origin, departure and return dates, preference of hotel type, preference of hotel room, preference of meal type, preference of flight type, flight class, number of passengers (adults, children, infants), additional remarks; (11) from the customer receiving a response indicating an acceptance or a rejection; (12) upon acceptance, sending an email to the agent with details of customer acceptance.

A system and method for automatically contacting one or more contacts when a user makes travel plans. A profile is used to determine to which contacts messages are sent. One of the contacts can be a home automation system that is registered with an email system to enter an at-home or a traveling environment based on the message. The home automation system receives instructions from the user's profile passed through an email system. Contacts can be grouped into classes of contacts so that each class receives an appropriate level of itinerary detail based upon the sensitivity level of the class. For example, a high sensitivity class may include the user's family and secretary. The high sensitivity class is sent detailed itinerary information regarding the user's travel plans. A medium sensitivity class may include business colleagues of the user. The medium sensitivity class may receive itinerary information including the user's travel destination but may not include detailed hotel and flight information. Finally, a low sensitivity class may include customers and clients of the user and may only receive a message that the user is away from the office without any detailed destination information.

An activity-based itinerary planning tool permits a trip planner to incrementally build an itinerary, starting at a selected entry point and adding activities in a step-by-step manner, by taking into account commute times for different types of transportation and entry / exit conditions for particular activities / facilities, in order to present the user with lists of all activities / facilities that can be reached from the entry point or from already-selected activities / facilities. Also, an electronic marketplace for consumers and suppliers of activities to meet and exchange. Consumers are given search tools for narrowing all possible activities to those a consumer can actually perform and attend, based on their proximity and performance criteria. Suppliers are given tools to enter activities into a central repository, and set constraints to prevent unqualified consumers from purchasing. Detection change monitors the activities of the database for changes that will invalidate original recommendations, and provides consumer notification.

A computer based system for processing travel requests directed to a specific venue from individual members of a sponsored group. The system comprises a database containing a venue file including information regarding the specific venue, a group member file for each individual member of the group, a travel policy file containing information on preselected vendors of various travel services, and a city code file containing codes corresponding to a plurality of city airport locations. Data is entered and information displayed to an individual group member making a travel request via a terminal, such as a personal computer. A central processing unit is in communication with a plurality of airline computer inventories via the Internet. The CPU is programmed to select an individual group member itinerary for the specific venue which includes specific airline flights, and if necessary, specific hotel accommodations and specific rental car services.

A portable device for planning a vacation / business travel itinerary, which begins with customizable itinerary templates that utilize a stored database of destination information, including a country's regions / cities, tourist sites, and other sites of interest located therein, and a corresponding photographic library. One such template returns itineraries based upon: duration, arrival / departure cities, total number of cities to be visited, and intensity of touring. The software assists users during travel by providing cueing of itinerary segments, along with directions, and on-demand pre-recorded audio tours to enhance site tour experiences. En route detours from planned sites are supported for spontaneous additions / substitutions. Country-specific information includes city / regional maps, public transportation information, key word / phrase language translation capability, and yellow / white page phone listings. Password protected device-to-device linking permits family members to track each other by GPS location of the other's device. Internet capability permits inclusion, within itineraries, of reservation-specific information for air-travel, hotels, and events.

Systems, methods, and computer program products are provided for generating, updating, and managing a cache of price and availability information for a plurality of travel packages and components. The cache of price and availability information may then be searched by an online travel planning service to provide customers with a list of available travel products. More particularly, embodiments of the present invention provide a cascading cache system including a cache of price and availability data related to travel components and a cache of price and availability data related to travel packages. Changes made to the component cache can affect information stored in the package cache, and changes made to the package cache can affect information stored in the component cache. Furthermore, the cache system updates the package and component caches based on information received from a purchase of a package or component, as well as by proactively polling one or more travel reservation systems.

The invention relates to a travel route and scheduling generation method and a server. The method comprises the following steps: the server receives starting time, ending time, a starting place and a destination of traveling; the server searches geographical positions of the starting place and the destination on an electronic map, and calculates the first route between the starting place and the destination; the server selects scenic spots on the electronic map, wherein, the distance between the positions of the scenic spots and the first route meet a preset distance range, and arranges the scenic spots in a sequential order; the server calculates the second route starting from the starting place to the destination through the ordered scenic spots according to the road information on the electronic map; and the server establishes the schedule from the starting time to the ending time according to the travel time on each road and the touring time of each scenic spot as well as lunch time and accommodation time on the second route. The invention can help a user generate the travel route, scheduling and other travel plans.

Apparatus and methods related providing city services, such as parking, are described. Methods and apparatus for providing parking rewards programs are described. The methods and apparatus can include maintaining accounts for participants in the rewards program, tracking purchases of parking and other participant activities and determining parking awards based upon the activities. The parking rewards programs can be used to incentivize behaviors that balance the use of the parking space commodity according to the needs of different stakeholders, such as the city, residents, merchants and visitors. For example, parking awards and the criteria used for earning awards can be used to encourage particular behaviors while a parking space is being utilized, such as shopping, the use of public transportation or efficient trip planning.

Disclosed is a system for facilitating provisioning of social networking data to a mobile device. Further, the system may include a communication device configured for receiving at least one location information corresponding to a tour, receiving at least one selection corresponding to a plurality of filtering icons corresponding to a filtered social networking data, and transmitting a travel plan to the mobile device. Further, the system may include a processing device configured for filtering social networking data based on the at least one location information to generate the filtered social networking data, and generating the travel plan based on the at least one selection.