Personal Navigation Device Restricted Area Alerting
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Solution Overview
Problem
Personal navigation devices (PNDs) lack effective methods to notify users of restricted areas and points of interest, such as diet-relevant or habit-related locations, and fail to provide timely alerts for promotions like low gas prices or weather conditions along their routes.
Innovation Solution
A method in PNDs that determines the user's position and compares it against a list of restricted points of interest, activating alerts based on customizable distance thresholds, and filters data to notify users of promotions or hazards along their route, using position and route data to trigger notifications such as alerts, emails, or SMS messages.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If the PND provides basic navigation functions, then the device complexity remains low, but the device cannot notify users of restricted areas and points of interest
Solution Approach 1:
The PND integrates multiple functions including position determination, route calculation, and notification services into a single device. The notification module can handle various types of alerts (restricted areas, promotions, weather conditions) using a unified alert mechanism, allowing the device to perform diverse functions without proportionally increasing complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a notification module as an intermediary component that bridges the position determination module and the user interface. This module receives position data, compares it with stored points of interest, and triggers appropriate alerts, thereby adding notification capability without directly complicating the core navigation functions.
2Measurement precision
If the PND monitors position continuously against multiple points of interest, then the notification accuracy improves, but the energy consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system pre-loads and stores points of interest and restricted areas in the PND's memory before the user begins navigation. By having this data readily available, the device can perform quick comparisons with current position without needing to continuously query external sources or perform complex calculations, thereby maintaining notification accuracy while reducing energy consumption.
Solution Approach 2:
The notification module performs position comparisons only when necessary - specifically when the user is near restricted areas or points of interest. The system uses threshold-based triggering where full monitoring activation occurs only when proximity to significant locations is detected, rather than maintaining constant high-precision monitoring of all points of interest.
3Ease of operation
If the PND provides detailed notifications about promotions and weather conditions, then the user interaction quality improves, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The notification system provides customized, location-specific information based on the user's current position and preferences. Different types of notifications (restricted areas, promotions, weather) are delivered with appropriate detail levels and formatting tailored to each context, enhancing user interaction quality without requiring a uniformly complex notification system for all scenarios.
Data Source
AI summary
To help a user avoid potentially harmful purchases, performing notification in a personal navigation device (PND) includes determining position of the PND, comparing the position against a plurality of restricted points of interest according to a predetermined setting, and activating an alert when the position is within a threshold distance of one of the restricted points of interest.