Smart Home Visitor Response Using Context-Aware Greeting Actions
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Solution Overview
Problem
Home monitoring systems face challenges in accurately identifying and categorizing visitors at entryways, leading to unnecessary alerts and difficulties in responding appropriately, as they often cannot distinguish between welcome guests, unwelcome visitors, and passersby, and provide limited options for user interaction.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a method that uses facial recognition and contextual information gathered through sensors and cameras to determine if a visitor is approaching, allowing for relevant actions to be initiated before the visitor reaches the entryway, such as alerting authorities or unlocking doors, based on whether the visitor is known or unknown.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a general alert is initiated upon person detection, then the system provides comprehensive monitoring coverage, but the system generates unnecessary alerts and cannot distinguish between different types of visitors
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the monitoring system into multiple functional modules: detection module, recognition module, and response module. The recognition module further divides visitor identification into known visitor recognition (via facial recognition) and unknown visitor detection, allowing differentiated alert generation based on visitor type.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary facial recognition and visitor categorization before generating alerts. By identifying whether a visitor is known or unknown in advance, the system can pre-determine the appropriate alert level and type, avoiding unnecessary alerts for known visitors while maintaining comprehensive monitoring.
2Adaptability or versatility
If the system provides limited response options, then the system maintains simple operation, but the system cannot provide appropriate responses for different visitor types
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic response option generation based on visitor classification. The system automatically adjusts the set of available response actions according to whether the visitor is known or unknown, adapting the interface complexity to the specific situation rather than providing fixed options for all scenarios.
Solution Approach 2:
Different response options are provided for different visitor types. Known visitors receive personalized responses (e.g., greeting messages, unlock commands), while unknown visitors receive security-focused responses (e.g., alert notifications, surveillance activation). Each local context receives appropriately tailored functionality.
3Productivity
If the system waits for visitor arrival at entryway, then the system maintains simple processing, but the system reduces user response time and efficiency
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs visitor recognition, facial analysis, and response preparation in advance while the visitor is still approaching the entryway. This preliminary processing allows the user to receive pre-prepared information and options before the visitor arrives, enabling immediate response without processing delays when the visitor reaches the door.
Data Source
AI summary
A method of presenting appropriate actions for responding to a visitor to a smart home environment via an electronic greeting system of the smart home environment, including detecting a visitor of the smart home environment; obtaining context information from the smart home environment regarding the visitor; based on the context information, identifying a plurality of appropriate actions available to a user of a client device for interacting with the visitor via the electronic greeting system; and causing the identified actions to be presented to the user of the client device.