LIGHTING CONTROL NETWORK

• US 20110295389A1
• Filed: 02/15/2010
• Published: 12/01/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 02/19/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: McCormack, James Joseph Anthony
• Granted Patent: US 8,755,913 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 700/19
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/282 based on user interaction within the home receiver circuitry for displaying additional information being controlled by a remote control apparatus H04N21/42204
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/285 Generic home appliances, e.g. refrigerators
• CPC Class Codes: H05B 47/19 via wireless transmission

Abstract

A control system (10) comprises:

a controlled device (15) controlled by a controller (30) having receiving means (34) for receiving command signals (40), and having a first, second and third storage locations (31, 32, 33) for storing a personal ID or address (PID), network ID (NID), and the ID (RCID) of a remote control device, respectively;

at least one user-operable remote control device (17), designed for transmitting command signals.

A command signal comprises a target address code, a network ID code, a sender address code, and a command code.

Normally, the controller only responds to control signals if target address code, network ID code, and sender address code match with the information in memory.

The controller is capable of operating in a NO NETWORK mode (200), in which the controller responds to a reset command irrespective of target address code, the network ID code, and the sender address code.

Claims

1. Control system comprising:

at least one controlled device controlled by a controller having receiving means for wirelessly receiving command signals, and having a first storage location for storing a personal ID or address, a second storage location for storing a network ID, and a third location for storing the ID of a remote control device;

at least one user-operable remote control device designed for transmitting command signals;

wherein a command signal comprises at least a first data portion containing a target address code, a second data portion containing a network ID code, a third data portion containing a sender address code, and a fourth data portion containing a command code;

wherein the controller is capable of operating in a normal mode in which the controller, in response to receiving a control signal, reads the target address code from the first data portion and compares it with its personal ID in the first storage location, reads the network ID code from the second data portion and compares it with the network ID in the second storage location, and reads the sender address code from the third data portion and compares it with the remote control ID in the third storage location, and, if any one of these comparisons shows a mismatch, ignores the command code contained in the fourth data portion or otherwise executes the command code contained in the fourth data portion;

wherein the controller is further capable of operating in a special NO NETWORK mode, in which the controller, in response to receiving a control signal having a reset command code contained in the fourth data portion, executes a response procedure irrespective of the contents of the first, second and third data portions.

2. System according to claim 1, wherein the controller, after power up, is designed to report itself to the network and to enter the NO NETWORK mode if it does not receive any response from any device having the same network ID.

3. System according to claim 1, wherein the controlled device is a lamp, and wherein the controller, after entering the NO NETWORK mode, is designed to start blinking of the lamp.

4. System according to claim 1, wherein the controlled device is a lamp, and wherein the controller, after having received the reset command in the NO NETWORK mode, is designed to start blinking of the lamp and to be responsive to a confirm command for executing the response procedure.

5. System according to claim 1, wherein the response procedure includes performing a reset, which involves deleting the network ID from the second memory location and returning all settings to their “

factory new”

values.

6. System according to claim 1, wherein the response procedure includes replacing the network ID in the second memory location by the code contained in the second data portion of the reset command and/or replacing the deletes the sender code in the third memory location by the code contained in the third data portion of the reset command.

7. System according to claim 1, wherein the remote control device is designed to transmit any reset command signal at a relatively low power, i.e. a power lower than the power used for other command signals.

8. System according to claim 1, wherein the remote control device, in order to prevent other lamps to respond to the reset command, is designed to use in the first data portion a code that is normally not used as an address for a lamp, and/or to use in the second data portion a code that is normally not used as a network code or is at least different from its actual network code, and/or to use in the third data portion a code that is normally not used as a sender code or is at least different from its actual sender code.