COMMUNICATION AND FILTERING OF EVENTS AMONG PEER CONTROLLERS IN THE SAME SPATIAL REGION OF A SENSOR NETWORK

• US 20080136605A1
• Filed: 12/07/2006
• Published: 06/12/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 12/07/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Snap, Inc.
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Palmer, Jake, Hunt, Christian L.
• Granted Patent: US 8,035,490 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 340/286.02
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 17/0022 arrangements or provisious for transferring data to distant stations, e.g. from a sensing device "transfer between computer elements G06F13/00 "; data-transmission H04L

Abstract

In a wireless tag identification and processing architecture and infrastructure, a method and system that eliminates redundant reporting and processing of the same event observed by different reader/sensors. Reader/sensors and their respective connected controllers are configured as peers when they observe or cover the same spatial region. When an event is observed within the spatial region, the first controller to receive the event data reports the electronic tag data and event data to the next higher processing domain and to its peer controllers. Then when the same electronic tag data or other event data indicating that a subsequent event is actually the same event as observed earlier is received by another peer controller, the another peer controller does not report nor process the electronic tag data and other event data to the next higher processing domain or to its peer controllers.

Claims

1. A method of establishing peer controllers in a spatial region of a sensor network, the method comprising the steps of:

connecting each of a plurality of reader/sensors in a spatial region of the sensor network to a respective one of a plurality of controllers;

assigning the spatial region to the plurality of controllers;

informing each of the plurality of controllers of every other of the plurality of controllers in the spatial region; and

initializing communication among the plurality of controllers.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of initializing communication among the plurality of controllers further comprises establishing a peer-to-peer connection between each of the plurality of controllers.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of initializing communication among the plurality of controllers further comprises establishing communication through a broker and each of the plurality of controllers subscribes to the broker, and a subscription topic to which the plurality of controllers are subscribed is the address of the plurality of controllers in or a unique identifier of the spatial region.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising reporting an event in the spatial region, wherein the steps of reporting an event further comprises:

one of the plurality of reader/sensors observes an event in the spatial region;

the observant reader/sensor transmits tag data and data of the event to its respective controller;

the respective controller determines that the event is a new event;

the respective controller reports the tag data and the new event data to a higher processing domain;

the respective controller informs all others of the plurality of controllers in the spatial region of the new event; and

all others of the plurality of controllers in the spatial region add the new event data to their respective list of preexisting events.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the respective controller stores the tag information data and the new event data in its local memory.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the respective controller stores the new event data in its list of preexisting events.

7. The method of claim 4, wherein the list of preexisting events is a subscription topic through a broker and each of the plurality of controllers subscribes to the broker.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining that an observed event has been reported, wherein the steps of determining that an observed event has been reported further comprises:

one of the plurality of reader/sensors observes an event in the spatial region;

the observant reader/sensor transmits data of the event to its respective controller;

the respective controller determines that the event is in a list of preexisting events;

the respective controller does not report the event to a higher processing domain.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising the respective controller storing the data of the event.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the list of preexisting events is a topic stored on a broker to which the respective controller subscribes.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the list of preexisting events is stored in a memory on the respective controller.

12. A computer program product in a computer-readable medium comprising a computer usable medium having computer usable program code, wherein the computer usable program code, when loaded into the internal memory of a processing device, causes the processing device to:

assign a spatial region in a sensor network to a plurality of controllers, each of the controllers having a connected reader/sensor that observes the spatial region;

inform each of the plurality of controllers of every other of the plurality of controllers in the spatial region;

initialize communication among the plurality of controllers.

13. The computer program product in a computer-readable medium of claim 12, wherein the processing device is in a higher processing domain than a domain of the plurality of controllers.

14. The computer program product in a computer-readable medium of claim 12 comprising a computer usable medium having computer usable program code, wherein the computer usable program code, when loaded into the internal memory of a processing device, causes each of the plurality of controllers to:

receive tag data and event data from its respective reader/sensor of an event occurring in the spatial region;

determining the event is a new event;

reporting the tag data and event data to a higher processing domain;

reporting at least the event data to all other of the plurality of controller in the spatial region; and

adding the event data to its list of preexisting events.

15. The computer program product in a computer-readable medium of claim 12 comprising a computer usable medium having computer usable program code, wherein the computer usable program code, when loaded into the internal memory of a processing device, causes each of the plurality of controllers to determine if an observed event has been reported to a higher processing domain by:

receiving tag data and event data from its respective reader/sensor of an event occurring in the spatial region;

determining that at least the tag data or event data is in a list of preexisting events;

not reporting the tag data or event data to a higher processing domain; and

not reporting the tag data or event data to every other of the plurality of controllers.

16. A tag identification infrastructure and architecture incorporated into a sensor network, comprising:

a reader/sensor domain having a plurality of reader/sensors capable of observing an event and acquire electronic tag data of the event in one of a plurality of spatial regions comprising the sensor network;

a controller domain having a plurality of controllers, each of the plurality of controllers connected to a respective one of the reader/sensors in the reader/sensor domain and to receive and process the electronic tag data and event data, all of the plurality of controllers in each respective one of the spatial regions configured as peer controllers;

a premises domain having a premises server to receive and process data processed by and from the controller domain;

at least one integration server comprising a business process integration domain, a business application domain, and an object directly domain, all architected to received and process data from the premises domain,

whereby a respective one of the plurality of controllers in the controller domain receives and processes the electronic tag and event data of the event from its connected reader/sensor;

reports the electronic tag and event data to the premises domain;

reports at least the event data to its respective peer controllers and further wherein the respective peer controllers do not report the electronic tag and event data of subsequent occurrences of the same event to the premises domain.

17. The tag identification infrastructure and architecture incorporated into a sensor network of claim 16, wherein the respective peer controllers do not report the electronic tag and event data of subsequent occurrences of the same event to other peer controllers.

18. The tag identification infrastructure and architecture incorporated into a sensor network of claim 16, wherein the premises server further comprises an information broker and the peer controllers are subscribers to a plurality of topics on the premises server, the topics comprising the electronic tag data and event data of events occurring the spatial region, and identification of other peer controllers in the spatial region.

19. A service contract for processing electronic tag data, the service contract comprising:

configuring each of a plurality of controllers and each respective one of a plurality of reader/sensors connected to each of the plurality of controllers as a spatial region, the plurality of controllers in a same spatial region configured as peer controllers;

one of the plurality of reader/sensors transmitting electronic tag data associated with an event in the spatial region to its respective one of the plurality of controllers;

determining if the electronic tag data had been received by another one of the plurality of controllers earlier;

if not, processing the electronic tag data in the respective one of the plurality of controllers connected to the reader/sensor transmitting the electronic tag data;

if not, reporting the processed electronic tag data and data of the event to a higher processing domain; and

if not, reporting the processed electronic tag data and data of the event to other peer controllers.

20. The service contract for processing electronic tag data of claim 19, the service contract further comprising:

determining that the electronic tag data had been received by another one of the plurality of controllers earlier;

not reporting the processed electronic tag data and data of the event to a higher processing domain; and

not reporting the processed electronic tag data and data of the event to other peer controllers.