Monitor, alert, control, and share (MACS) system

• US 20070024441A1
• Filed: 07/29/2005
• Published: 02/01/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: DP Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Fullpower Technologies Incorporated
• Inventors: Kinsolving, Arthur, Kahn, Philippe
• Granted Patent: US 7,839,279 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 340/539.220
• CPC Class Codes: G01D 21/00 Measuring or testing not otherwise provided for
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks

Abstract

An apparatus to provide an always-on monitor, alert, control, and share (MACS) device comprising a connection to receive intermittent updates from a real sensor device, the always-on virtual MACS device corresponding to the real sensor device, and a presentation layer to enable a user to interface with the always-on virtual MACS device, the always-on virtual MACS device providing data regardless of the status of the real sensor device.

Claims

1. An apparatus to provide an always-on monitor, alert, control, and share (MACS) device comprising:

a connection to receive intermittent updates from a real sensor device, the always-on virtual MACS device corresponding to the real sensor, monitor or device (SMD);

a presentation layer to enable a user to interface with the always-on virtual MACS device, the always-on virtual MACS device providing data regardless of a status of the real SMD.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising:

a historical database to store historical data from the SMD; and

a data mining engine to retrieve the historical data and analyze the historical data.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising:

user thresholds and alert rules to enable an authorized recipient to set alerts upon certain occurrences based on data received from the SMD.

4. The apparatus of claim 3, further comprising:

a datamining engine to use the user thresholds and alert rules, and based on historical data from a historical database in addition to the data received in the intermittent update, determine if an alert is needed.

5. The apparatus of claim 4, further comprising:

the datamining engine further to use data from other relevant SMDs, in calculating whether the alert is needed.

6. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising:

an intelligent notification engine to enable notification of recipients.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the MACS device further comprises:

a monitoring function enabling a user through the MACS virtual device to monitor data reliably from an intermittently connected actual device.”

8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the MACS device further comprises:

an alert function enabling a user to set alerts and receive alerts.

9. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the MACS device further comprises:

a control function enabling a user to control the SMD by sending commands through the MACS device.

10. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the MACS device further comprises:

a share function enabling a user to add another recipient to the list of recipients who receive access to the MACS device.

11. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein the share function comprises one of the following:

setting an alert recipient, sending a one-time data set to a recipient, or setting access rights for a recipient.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the access rights include one or more of the following:

monitoring the MACS device, ability to edit and add or remove alerts from the MACS device, controlling the SMD through the MACS device, and ability to share access to the MACS device.

13. A method to provide an always-on access to an intermittently connected sensor, monitor or device (SMD) comprising, at a server:

receiving updates from the SMD, at intermittent connection times; and

adding the updates to a constantly maintained, always-on monitoring, accessing, controlling, and sharing (MACS) device maintained within the server; and

providing access to the MACS device, which is a virtual reflection of the SMD, and is always accessible with the most current available data.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

keeping a database of historical data from the SMD; and

analyzing the historical data.

15. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

enabling an administrator to add user thresholds and alert rules to set alerts upon certain occurrences based on data received from the SMD.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

using historical data and current data with the user thresholds and alert rules to determine if an alert is needed.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

requesting data from one or more other MACS devices maintained on the server; and

integrating the data from the other MACS devices in calculating whether the alert is needed.