CODE REPLACEMENT FOR IRRIGATION CONTROLLERS

• US 20130190935A1
• Filed: 03/11/2013
• Published: 07/25/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 12/23/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rain Bird Corporation
• Original Assignee: Rain Bird Corporation
• Inventors: Nickerson, Harvey J., Leatherman, Russel Dean, Musselman, James R., Nguyen, Andrew M., Lapshov, Nicholas N.
• Granted Patent: US 8,738,188 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 700/284
• CPC Class Codes: A01G 25/16 Control of watering
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/0426 Programming the control sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/23312 Load program from attached device to control that device
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/23339 Update diskette, cassette initiates bootstrap program to load eeprom, flash
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/25314 Modular structure, modules
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/2625 Sprinkler, irrigation, watering
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 7/0617 specially adapted for fluid materials
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 7/0676 by action on flow sources G05D7/0688, G05D7/0694 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: Y10T 137/86389 Programmer or timer

Abstract

Some embodiments provide irrigation controllers comprising: a housing; a control unit including a first microcontroller configured to execute irrigation programs and a first set of code; and a removable plug-in device that removably mates with a portion of the irrigation controller and communicationally couples to the first microcontroller, wherein the plug-in device comprises a memory storing a second set of code to replace at least a portion of the first set of code, wherein the plug-in device is configured to re-flash at least a portion of the first set of code allowing a copy of the second set of code to overwrite at least the portion of the first set of code; wherein the first set of code comprises a bootloader that writes the copy of the second set of code over the first set of code with the exception of the bootloader that is not written over.

Claims

1. An irrigation controller comprising:

a housing;

a control unit within the housing, the control unit including a first microcontroller configured to execute stored irrigation programs and a first set of code of the control unit; and

a removable plug-in device that removably mates with a portion of the irrigation controller such that the removable plug-in device is communicationally coupled to the first microcontroller, wherein the removable plug-in device comprises a memory storing a second set of code to replace at least a portion of the first set of code of the control unit, wherein the removable plug-in device is configured to re-flash at least a portion of the first set of code allowing a copy of the second set of code to be transferred to the control unit to overwrite at least the portion of the first set of code of the control unit;

wherein the first set of code of the control unit comprises a bootloader that when implemented writes the copy of the second set of code over the first set of code of the control unit with the exception of the bootloader that is not written over.

2. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the memory allows the copy of the second set of code to overwrite less than all of the first set of code of the control unit.

3. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the removable plug-in device further comprises a second microcontroller, the second microcontroller configured to communicate with the bootloader using a first protocol to transfer the copy of the second set of code, and the second microcontroller further configured to communicate with the first microcontroller using a second communication protocol while the control unit implements the irrigation programs.

4. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the first microcontroller is configured to implement the transfer of the copy of the second set of code to the control unit when a version of the second set of code is newer than a version of the first set of code of the control unit.

5. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the memory of the removable plug-in device further stores additional functionality code that when implemented provides additional functionality usable by the control unit;

and

the second set of code includes operating code that when the copied second set of code is utilized by the control unit allows the control unit to utilize the additional functionality of the removable plug-in device that could not be utilized by the control unit without the copy of the second set of code.

6. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the control unit further comprises a key that is used to decrypt the copy of the second set of code.

7. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the copy of the second set of code is transferred and is stored overwriting the at least the portion of the first set of code of the control unit without user interaction.

8. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the first microcontroller receives a signal from the removable plug-in device indicating the presence of the removable plug-in device to the control unit and identifying that the removable plug-in device contains the second set of code.

9. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the removable plug-in device includes code to measure fluid flow and report the measured fluid flow to the control unit.

10. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the first set of code comprises an operating code and the second set of code is configured to replace at least a portion of the operating code of the control unit.

11. The irrigation controller of claim 10, wherein the first set of code comprises first firmware and the second set of code comprises second firmware, wherein the second firmware is configured to replace at least a portion of the first firmware.

12. The irrigation controller of claim 11, wherein the first firmware of the control unit comprises the bootloader code that when implemented by the control unit causes the control unit to implement the re-flash to replace at least the portion of the first firmware of the control unit with the second firmware.

13. The irrigation controller of claim 12, wherein the bootloader code is protected and configured to be activated even when a version of the first firmware of the control unit becomes corrupt or is incompletely replaced, and the bootloader code is further configured to control a replacing of the portion of the first firmware of the control unit, which does not include the bootloader code, with the second firmware.

14. The irrigation controller of claim 12, wherein the second set of code comprises an alternate bootloader code configured to be copied to a memory within the housing and accessible by the control unit such that the control unit is reactivated to access the alternate bootloader code instead of the bootloader code, and wherein the alternate bootloader code is configured to initiate the re-flash of the first firmware with the second firmware.

15. The irrigation controller of claim 10, wherein the second set of code is configured to be activated to identify a version of the first firmware of the control unit, to determine whether the second firmware is a newer version of firmware, and to activate the re-flash of at least the portion of the first set of code to be overwritten by the copy of the second set of code.

16. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein the second set of code does not include irrigation programs.

17. The irrigation controller of claim 1, wherein first set of code does not include the stored irrigation programs.

18. A method of implementing irrigation, the method comprising:

activating a first microcontroller of a control unit positioned within a housing;

storing, in a controller memory of the control unit communicationally coupled with the first microcontroller, one or more irrigation programs and a first set of code of the control unit, wherein the first microcontroller is configured to implement the one or more irrigation programs and to execute the first set of code;

receiving a removable plug-in device that mates to a portion of the irrigation controller, wherein the plug-in device when mated is communicatively coupled with the first microcontroller, wherein the removable plug-in device stores a second set of code configured to replace at least a portion of the first set of code of the control unit; and

re-flashing at least a portion of the controller memory copying the second set of code from the removable plug-in device and overwriting at least the portion of the first set of code of the control unit with a copy of the second set of code transferred from the removable plug-in device to the control unit;

wherein the re-flashing at least the portion of the controller memory comprises executing a bootloader code of the first set of code that implements the overwriting the first set of code with the copy of the second set of code over the first set of code of the control unit with the exception of the bootloader code that is not written over.

19. The irrigation controller of claim 18, further comprising:

implementing, by the first microcontroller, the copied second set of code;

accessing, by the first microcontroller while implementing the copied second set of code, additional functionality code stored in memory of the plug-in device that could not be utilized by the control unit without the copy of the second set of code; and

utilizing, by the first microcontroller, the additional functionality of the removable plug-in device that could not be utilized by the control unit without the copy of the second set of code.

20. The irrigation controller of claim 18, wherein the first set of code comprises first firmware and the second set of code comprises second firmware, wherein the second firmware is configured to replace at least a portion of the first firmware.