METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING LOCATION OF TARGET DEVICE USING STATELESS USER INFORMATION

• US 20110173674A1
• Filed: 09/28/2010
• Published: 07/14/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 01/13/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CommScope Technologies, LLC (CommScope Holding Company, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Andrew LLC (CommScope Holding Company, Inc.)
• Inventors: Winterbottom, Anthony James, Thomson, Martin Wyville
• Granted Patent: US 8,689,277 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/33 containing protocol addresses or telephone numbers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/622 Layer-2 addresses, e.g. medium access control [MAC] addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/69 using geographic information, e.g. room number
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/20 Services signaling; Auxiliary data signalling, i.e. transmitting data via a non-traffic channel

Abstract

A method of providing a location of a target device to an application implementing a location based service includes receiving a request for a location of the target device from the application at a location server, the request including a location reference having a user reference referring to user information corresponding to the target device and stored in at least one data source. The method further includes retrieving the user information from the at least one data source using the user reference, determining the location of the target device based at least in part on the retrieved user information, and providing the determined location of the target device to the application.

Claims

1. A method of providing a location of a target device to an application implementing a location based service, the method comprising:

receiving a request for a location of the target device from the application at a location server, the request including a location reference comprising a user reference referring to user information corresponding to the target device and stored in at least one data source;

retrieving the user information from the at least one data source using the user reference;

determining the location of the target device based at least in part on the retrieved user information; and

providing the determined location of the target device to the application.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

initially receiving a request for the location reference from the target device at the first location server;

identifying the at least one data source in response to the request;

generating the location reference to include the identification of the at least one data source; and

providing the location reference to the target device, the target device providing the location reference to the application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the location reference comprises a uniform resource identifier (URI).

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the user reference comprises a URI.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the user information comprises authorization policy information.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein determining the location of the target device based at least in part on the user information comprises determining that the application is authorized to receive the location of the target device based on the authorization policy information.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the user information comprises device capability information.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein determining the location of the target device based at least in part on the user information comprises identifying a capability of the target device using the device capability information and selecting a location determination process for determining the location of the target device based on the identified capability.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein retrieving the user information comprises retrieving a document from the at least one data source, the document comprising a revision to previous user information.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the document comprises an extensible markup language (XML) formatted document.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the location reference further comprises basic user information, the user information referred to by the user reference comprising a revision to the basic user information.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the revision to the basic user information is in a document stored in at least one data source.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the location reference further comprises device identification information enabling identification of the target device.

14. A system for providing a location of a target device to an application implementing a location based service, the system comprising:

a location server configured to receive a request for a location of the target device from the application, the request including a location reference comprising a user reference referring to user information corresponding to the target device; and

a data source configured to store the user information,

wherein the location server retrieves the user information from the data source using the user reference, determines the location of the target device based at least in part on the retrieved user information, and provides the determined location of the target device to the application.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the data source comprises a server external to the location server.

16. The method of claim 15, the data source comprises at least one of an authorization policy server and a device capability server.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the at least one data source comprises a database internal to the location server.

18. The method of claim 14, wherein the location reference further comprises basic user information, the user information referred to by the user reference supplementing the basic user information.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the user information referred to by the user reference comprises a revision to the basic user information, the revision to the basic user information being included in a document stored in the data source.

20. A method of providing a location of a target device, the method comprising:

receiving a first location uniform resource indicator (URI) request from the target device at a first location information server (LIS);

generating a first location URI in response to the first request, the first location URI comprising device identification information identifying the target device and a user reference referring to user information corresponding to the target device and stored in at least one data source;

including the first location URI in a second location URI request to a second LIS, the second LIS generating a stateless second location URI in response to the second request, the first location URI being embedded in the second location URI;

receiving the second location URI from the second LIS;

providing the second location URI to the target device to be provided to an application requesting location information of the target device from the second LIS;

receiving a query from the second LIS requesting the location of the target device, the query including the first location URI;

identifying the target device using the device identification information in the first location URI;

retrieving the user information from the at least one data source using the user reference in the first location URI;

determining the location of the target device based at least in part on the retrieved user information; and

providing the determined location of the target device to the second LIS, which provides the determined location to the application.