Geo-fence Server Cache Tile Segmentation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current geo-fencing systems face inefficiencies in calculating the relative distance of a mobile device from a large number of geo-fences, leading to high computational and battery power usage, especially as the number of geo-fences and mobile devices increases exponentially, with existing methods unable to manage the load effectively.
Innovation Solution
A method for geo-fence management that uses a geo-fence server to determine grid tiles and pages of information, reducing the number of geo-fences sent to mobile devices by using cache memory to store and provide only relevant pages, and dynamically adjusting grid sizes based on location updates to minimize data transfer and processing load.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a large number of geo-fences are stored and retrieved for mobile devices, then the coverage and functionality of geo-fencing applications is improved, but the computational load and battery power usage on mobile devices increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the large set of geo-fences into multiple pages, where each page contains a subset of geo-fences. The server determines which pages are relevant based on the mobile device's current location and only retrieves those specific pages, rather than retrieving all geo-fences. This segmentation reduces the computational load on mobile devices while maintaining comprehensive geo-fence coverage.
2Measurement precision
If all geo-fence data is transferred to mobile devices, then local processing accuracy is improved, but data transfer volume and network bandwidth consumption increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the necessary subset of geo-fence data (specific pages) from the complete geo-fence database based on the mobile device's current location. The server calculates which pages contain geo-fences relevant to the device's position and retrieves only those pages, rather than transferring all geo-fence data. This extraction approach maintains local processing accuracy while significantly reducing data transfer volume.
3Ease of operation
If the server manages all geo-fence calculations, then mobile device processing requirements are reduced, but server computational load and memory requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the geo-fence database into multiple pages and implements a caching mechanism on the server side. The server maintains cached copies of relevant pages in memory, allowing it to quickly serve multiple mobile devices without recalculating from the complete database each time. This segmentation and caching approach reduces server computational load and memory requirements while still providing centralized management.
4Speed
If geo-fence pages are cached on the server, then retrieval speed for multiple devices is improved, but server memory consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements selective caching where the server caches only those geo-fence pages that are currently relevant to active mobile devices, rather than caching all pages. The caching strategy adapts to local conditions by monitoring which pages are frequently requested and caching only those. This local quality approach improves retrieval speed for relevant data while controlling server memory consumption by not allocating memory for all possible pages.
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments are directed to geo-fencing and methods for ensuring the number of elements in a given cache entry in a geo-fence server is consistent, and managing requests to retrieve cache elements from the geo-fence server for use by a mobile computer device. Having determined whether the grid tile within which a mobile computer is located is wholly within the page boundary of a page of geo-fence data, a geo-fence server provides the page to the mobile computer device if the number of geo-fences in the page does not exceed a predetermined number of geo-fences. Otherwise, the size of the grid tile is reduced by a depth index. The geo-fence server then determines if the new smaller grid tile is with the page boundary and performs repeats the process until the appropriate page having an appropriate number of geo-fence data therein can be provided to the mobile computer device.