SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR OBTAINING AND USING INFORMATION FROM MAP IMAGES

• US 20080052638A1
• Filed: 08/06/2007
• Published: 02/28/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 08/04/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Piece Future Pte., Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Metacarta, Inc.
• Inventors: SCHMIDT, Christopher, FRANK, John
• Granted Patent: US 9,721,157 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/808
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/422 Technical drawings; Geographical maps

Abstract

Under one aspect, an interface program stored on a computer-readable medium causes a computer system with a display device to perform the functions of: displaying an image of a region of a metric vector space; obtaining a set of pixel extents in the image that contain apparent textual annotations; for each pixel extent of the set, obtaining a confidence score that the pixel extent actually contains a textual annotation; and displaying the set of pixel extents in a ranked list based on the corresponding confidence scores. In some embodiments, the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, for at least one pixel extent of the set, at least one of automatically generating a text string based on the apparent textual annotation, and accepting user input entering a text string based on the apparent textual annotation.

Claims

1. An interface program stored on a computer-readable medium for causing a computer system with a display device to perform the functions of:

displaying an image of a region of a metric vector space;

obtaining a set of pixel extents in the image that contain apparent textual annotations;

for each pixel extent of the set, obtaining a confidence score that the pixel extent actually contains a textual annotation; and

displaying the set of pixel extents in a ranked list based on the corresponding confidence scores.

2. The interface program of claim 1, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, for at least one pixel extent of the set, at least one of automatically generating a text string based on the apparent textual annotation, and accepting user input entering a text string based on the apparent textual annotation.

3. The interface program of claim 2, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of at least one of accepting user input modifying the text string and accepting user input validating the text string.

4. The interface program of claim 2, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of storing the pixel extents and the text strings.

5. The interface program of claim 4, wherein the pixel extents and text strings are stored in at least one of a gazetteer database and a searchable location-related database.

6. The interface program of claim 1, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of at least one of accepting user input modifying the confidence scores corresponding to the pixel extents and displaying the confidence scores corresponding to the pixel extents.

7. The interface program of claim 1, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of obtaining coordinates for a location in the metric vector space depicted by the image and associated with a pixel extent.

8. The interface program of claim 7, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of storing the pixel extent and the coordinates.

9. The interface program of claim 8, wherein the pixel extent and coordinates are stored in at least one of a gazetteer database and a searchable location-related database.

10. The interface program of claim 1, wherein the pixel extents comprise raster label extracts.

11. The interface program of claim 1, wherein the image of the region comprises a scanned paper map.

21. The method of claim 1, further comprising, for at least one pixel extent of the set, at least one of automatically generating a text string based on the apparent textual annotation, and accepting user input entering a text string based on the apparent textual annotation.

22. The method of claim 21, further comprising accepting user input modifying the text string and accepting user input validating the text string.

23. The method of claim 21, further comprising storing the pixel extents and the text strings.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the pixel extents and text strings are stored in at least one of a gazetteer database and a searchable location-related database.

12. An interface program stored on a computer-readable medium for causing a computer system with a display device to perform the functions of:

obtaining an image of a region of a metric vector space, wherein the image includes apparent textual annotations;

for each apparent textual annotation, obtaining a text string based on that apparent textual annotation;

for each text string, determining whether the text string corresponds to a name of a known location in the metric vector space; and

if the text string corresponds to the name of the known location;

displaying information about the known location;

displaying the image of the region; and

accepting user input indicating whether the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location.

13. The interface program of claim 12, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, creating a ground control point in the image of the region.

14. The interface program of claim 12, wherein the information about the known location comprises an image of the known location.

15. The interface program of claim 14, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, accepting user input relating a pixel region in the image of the region to a pixel region in the image of the known location.

16. The interface program of claim 12, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, executing a projection function on the image of the region that relates the image of the region to the known location.

17. The interface program of claim 16, wherein the program further causes the computer system to perform the functions of, after executing the projection function on the image of the region, obtaining location coordinates based on the relationship between the image of the region and the known location, and storing the coordinates and the text string.

18. The interface program of claim 12, wherein the image of the region comprises a scanned paper map.

19. The interface program of claim 12, wherein obtaining the text string based on the apparent textual annotation comprises obtaining a set of pixel extents in the image that contain the apparent textual annotations and, for each pixel extent of the set, at least one of accepting user input entering a text string based on the apparent textual annotation and automatically generating a text string based on the apparent textual annotation.

20. A method of obtaining information about an image of a region of a metric vector space, the method comprising:

displaying an image of a region of a metric vector space;

obtaining a set of pixel extents in the image that contain apparent textual annotations;

for each pixel extent of the set, obtaining a confidence score that the pixel extent actually contains a textual annotation; and

displaying the set of pixel extents in a ranked list based on the corresponding confidence scores.

25. The method of claim 20, further comprising accepting user input modifying the confidence scores corresponding to the pixel extents and displaying the confidence scores corresponding to the pixel extents.

26. The method of claim 20, further comprising obtaining coordinates for a location in the metric vector space depicted by the image and associated with a pixel extent.

27. The method of claim 26, further comprising storing the pixel extent and the coordinates.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein the pixel extent and coordinates are stored in at least one of a gazetteer database and a searchable location-related database.

29. The method of claim 20, wherein the pixel extents comprise raster label extracts.

30. The method of claim 20, wherein the image of the region comprises a scanned paper map.

31. A method of obtaining information about an image of a region of a metric vector space, the method comprising:

obtaining an image of a region of a metric vector space, wherein the image includes apparent textual annotations;

for each apparent textual annotation, obtaining a text string based on that apparent textual annotation;

for each text string, determining whether the text string corresponds to a name of a known location in the metric vector space; and

if the text string corresponds to the name of the known location;

displaying information about the known location;

displaying the image of the region; and

accepting user input indicating whether the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location.

32. The method of claim 31, further comprising, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, creating a ground control point in the image of the region.

33. The method of claim 32, wherein the information about the known location comprises an image of the known location.

34. The method of claim 33, further comprising, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, accepting user input relating a pixel region in the image of the region to a pixel region in the image of the known location.

35. The method of claim 31, further comprising, if the user input indicates that the apparent textual annotation actually refers to the known location, executing a projection function on the image of the region that relates the image of the region to the known location.

36. The method of claim 35, further comprising, after executing the projection function on the image of the region, obtaining location coordinates based on the relationship between the image of the region and the known location, and storing the coordinates and the text string.

37. The method of claim 31, wherein the image of the region comprises a scanned paper map.

38. The method of claim 31, wherein obtaining the text string based on the apparent textual annotation comprises obtaining a set of pixel extents in the image that contain the apparent textual annotations and, for each pixel extent of the set, at least one of accepting user input entering a text string based on the apparent textual annotation and automatically generating a text string based on the apparent textual annotation.