Playback Audio Notifications With Priority Queueing Across Rooms
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing systems fail to effectively distribute audio notifications from smart devices to multiple rooms or areas within a household or commercial environment, particularly when users' mobile devices are unavailable or distracted, and smart devices from different manufacturers may not communicate seamlessly with playback devices.
Innovation Solution
A playback device is configured with an application programming interface (API) to receive alert communications from smart devices, prioritize notifications based on priority levels, and adjust audio playback to output notifications corresponding to smart device alerts, ensuring they are heard by multiple people in different rooms.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If audio notifications are distributed through mobile devices, then users can receive alerts, but users may be unavailable or distracted and notifications may not reach multiple people in different rooms
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a playback device as an intermediary between smart devices and users. The playback device receives alert communications from smart devices via network and outputs audio notifications through speakers, serving as a mediator that distributes notifications to multiple locations and people simultaneously, resolving the limitation of mobile device-dependent notification delivery
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transitions notification delivery from a single-point mobile device model to a multi-location distributed audio system. By leveraging the spatial distribution of playback devices throughout the environment, the system adds a dimensional aspect to notification delivery, enabling simultaneous alert distribution across multiple physical locations and increasing both reliability and versatility
2Adaptability or versatility
If smart devices from different manufacturers communicate with playback devices, then device compatibility increases, but communication protocols and integration complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The playback device is designed with universal compatibility to receive alert communications from various types of smart devices (doorbells, thermostats, cameras, appliances) regardless of manufacturer. The device implements a standardized API interface that can process different alert formats and prioritize them according to defined criteria, enabling multi-functional integration without proportionally increasing complexity
Solution Approach 2:
The system manages complexity by changing the parameter of alert prioritization based on device type and alert characteristics. Different smart devices and alert types are assigned different priority levels, allowing the playback device to systematically handle diverse communications through a standardized prioritization framework rather than requiring custom integration logic for each device
3Reliability
If audio notifications are played back through playback devices, then notification reachability improves, but audio playback control and priority management complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary action by pre-defining priority levels for different types of smart devices and alerts before notifications are generated. This advance classification allows the playback device to automatically manage audio playback priorities without requiring complex real-time decision-making, simplifying the playback control mechanism while maintaining reliable notification delivery
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods for a playback device outputting an audio alert from a network-enabled device include (i) while the playback device is playing back audio content, receiving an alert communication from the network-enabled device, the alert communication including (a) an audio notification identifier that identifies an audio notification and (b) a priority identifier that identifies a priority level of the audio notification; (ii) responsive to receiving the alert communication, adding the audio notification to a notification queue at a particular queue position, where the particular queue position of the audio notification in the notification queue is based on the priority level of the audio notification relative to other audio content in the notification queue; (iii) adjusting playback of the audio content for playing back the audio notification; and (iv) the playback device playing back the audio notification.