Start-of-Route Map Navigation Buffer for Off-Route Feedback Suppression
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing map navigation systems often provide unnecessary and confusing off-route feedback, especially when users are near the start or end of a route, leading to user frustration and navigation delays.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a buffer area around the start and end of a route where off-route feedback is suppressed, allowing users to navigate without unnecessary alerts during initial positioning or final approach, and automatically detecting when a user has joined the route to avoid misleading feedback.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If off-route feedback is provided continuously to guide users along a route, then navigation accuracy is improved, but user confusion and frustration increase near route termini due to unnecessary alerts
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by implementing different feedback behaviors in different spatial zones. A buffer area is defined around the route terminus where off-route feedback is suppressed, while outside this buffer area normal off-route feedback is provided. This creates a localized modification to the feedback system that reduces confusion near the destination while maintaining navigation accuracy in other areas.
2Reliability
If off-route feedback is provided to alert users of deviations from the route, then route adherence is improved, but unnecessary feedback occurs when users are merely positioning themselves near the start location
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by establishing a buffer area around the route terminus before the user actually reaches it. This buffer area is pre-defined and prepared, so when the user enters this zone, the system already knows to suppress off-route feedback. This prevents misleading feedback from being generated in the first place, rather than reacting after the user has deviated.
3Speed
If the navigation system provides real-time feedback for every deviation, then responsiveness is improved, but the system generates excessive alerts that do not contribute to successful navigation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies partial action by selectively applying off-route feedback suppression only in the buffer area near the terminus, while maintaining full feedback functionality elsewhere. This partial modification reduces the total number of alerts generated without completely disabling the feedback system, thus maintaining responsiveness where needed while eliminating excessive alerts that harm navigation efficiency.
Data Source
AI summary
A map navigation tool provides a start-of-route buffer area in which off-route feedback (e.g., audio or visual warnings or alerts) can be suppressed in some circumstances. For example, a mobile computing device implements a map navigation tool that can output off-route feedback when the user strays from a route, but also can suppress off-route feedback when the user is within a start-of-route buffer area. Off-route feedback can continue to be suppressed until some other event, such as the user leaving the start-of-route buffer area, occurs. Off-route feedback can be suppressed even if the user is not within a start-of-route buffer area, such as when the map navigation tool generates a route when the user is at an initial location that is far away from any part of the route and then joins the route later (e.g., at the start location or downstream from the start location).