METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR MONITORING AND PROCESSING SENSOR DATA FROM AN ELECTRICAL OUTLET

• US 20140006506A1
• Filed: 01/08/2013
• Published: 01/02/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ubiquiti Inc.
• Original Assignee: Ubiquiti Networks, Inc. (Ubiquiti Inc.)
• Inventors: Frei, Randall W., Cheng, Linker, Pera, Robert J.
• Granted Patent: US 10,536,361 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/204
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/26 Power supply means, e.g. regulation thereof for memories G11C
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/10 Program control for peripheral devices G06F13/14 - G06F13/42 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 25/01 characterised by the transmission medium
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2803 Home automation networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2809 indicating that an appliance service is present in a home automation network monitoring functionality H04L43/0817; discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services, H04L67/51
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/281 indicating a format for calling an appliance service function in a home automation network for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2818 from a device located outside both the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; arrangements for transmitting signals characterised by the use of a wireless eletrical link G08C17/00; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with remote control systems H04M11/007
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2825 Reporting to a device located outside the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with telemetering systems H04M11/002
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/024 using relational databases for representation of network management data, e.g. managing via structured query language [SQL]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/065 related to network devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/046 Interoperability with other network applications or services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/58 Message adaptation for wireless communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/256 NAT traversal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2575 using address mapping retrieval, e.g. simple traversal of user datagram protocol through session traversal utilities for NAT [STUN]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/5061 Pools of addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/125 : involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/141 : Setup of application sessions admission control or resource allocation in data switching networks H04L47/70
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/289 : Intermediate processing functionally located close to the data consumer application, e.g. in same machine, in same home or in same sub-network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 : Push-based network services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/14 : Short messaging services, e.g. short message services [SMS] or unstructured supplementary service data [USSD]
• CPC Class Codes: Y02B 70/10 : Technologies improving the efficiency by using switched-mode power supplies [SMPS], i.e. efficient power electronics conversion e.g. power factor correction or reduction of losses in power supplies or efficient standby modes
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 : Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A load-monitoring interfacing device obtains and processes sensor data from an electrical load. The interfacing device can include at least one power outlet to provide power to a corresponding electrical load. During operation, the interfacing device can obtain sensor data from a local power outlet coupled to an electrical load, such that the sensor data can indicate an electrical measurement associated with the electrical load. The interfacing device selects a rule to process based on the obtained sensor data, and processes the rule to determine whether to perform an action. If the rule'"'"'s condition is satisfied, the interfacing device proceeds to processing the rule'"'"'s action description to perform the action, such as to enable or disable a power outlet, or to perform any other pre-defined action.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

obtaining, by an interfacing device, sensor data from a local power outlet coupled to an electrical load, wherein the interfacing device includes at least one power outlet to provide power to a corresponding electrical load, and wherein the sensor data indicates an electrical measurement associated with the electrical load;

selecting a rule to process based on the obtained sensor data, wherein the rule includes an action description for performing an action, and includes a condition that takes the sensor data as input and indicates criteria for performing the action;

determining that the rule'"'"'s condition is satisfied; and

processing the rule'"'"'s action description to perform the action.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the sensor data from the power outlet includes one or more of:

a power state for the corresponding electrical load;

a current measurement; and

a voltage measurement.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the action includes one or more of:

activating a power outlet;

deactivating a power outlet;

modulating a voltage provided by an outlet;

modulating an amount of current provided by a power outlet;

sending an email message to a predetermined recipient;

creating a system alert;

generating an event for an event log; and

computing a data value based in part on the received sensor data.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining that the sensor data satisfies a data-subscription request from a remote interfacing device; and

communicating the sensor data to the remote interfacing device.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the data-subscription request indicates one or more of:

a minimum threshold value for the sensor data;

a maximum threshold value for the sensor data;

a time duration since a previous piece of sensor data was provided to the remote interfacing device; and

a difference threshold between the obtained sensor data and a previous piece of sensor data that was provided to the remote interfacing device.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein communicating the data to the remote interfacing device involves communicating the data via an established peer-to-peer network connection associated with the remote interfacing device.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the established network connection is established using one or more of:

a WebSockets protocol;

a communication channel via the Session-Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN) protocol; and

a Comet protocol.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the request for establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol includes at least one of:

a WebSocket handshake request to upgrade a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) session to a WebSocket session; and

a Sec-WebSocket-Key token from the network device.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol further involves:

storing the Sec-WebSocket-Key in association with the network device;

generating a Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device based on the Sec-WebSocket-Key; and

sending to the interfacing device a response which acknowledges a persistent WebSocket communication channel, wherein the response includes at least the Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein establishing the network connection using the STUN protocol involves:

receiving a binding request that indicates network-addressing information for the network device, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

storing the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

11. The method of claim 7, wherein establishing the network connection using the Comet protocol involves:

receiving a long-polling request from the network device;

determining network-addressing information for the network device based on the long-polling request, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

storing the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein selecting the rule to process involves:

selecting a set of rules whose condition takes the obtained data as input;

determining a user-specified ordering for the set of rules, wherein the user-specified ordering indicates an order in which the rules are to be processed; and

selecting a rule based on the user-specified ordering.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising adjusting a color of a light-emitting diode (LED) indicator based on one or more of:

determining that the interfacing device is in a factory-default mode;

determining that the interfacing device is provisioned by a network controller which monitors or controls one or more interfacing devices; and

determining that the interfacing device is being monitored by the network controller.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform a method, the method comprising:

obtaining sensor data from a local power outlet coupled to an electrical load, wherein the interfacing device includes at least one power outlet to provide power to a corresponding electrical load, and wherein the sensor data indicates an electrical measurement associated with the electrical load;

selecting a rule to process based on the obtained sensor data, wherein the rule includes an action description for performing an action, and includes a condition that takes the sensor data as input and indicates criteria for performing the action;

determining that the rule'"'"'s condition is satisfied; and

processing the rule'"'"'s action description to perform the action.

15. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein the sensor data from the power outlet includes one or more of:

a power state for the corresponding electrical load;

a current measurement; and

a voltage measurement.

16. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein the action includes one or more of:

activating a power outlet;

deactivating a power outlet;

modulating a voltage provided by an outlet;

modulating an amount of current provided by a power outlet;

sending an email message to a predetermined recipient;

creating a system alert;

generating an event for an event log; and

computing a data value based in part on the received sensor data.

17. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises:

determining that the sensor data satisfies a data-subscription request from a remote interfacing device; and

communicating the sensor data to the remote interfacing device.

18. The storage medium of claim 17, wherein the data-subscription request indicates one or more of:

a minimum threshold value for the sensor data;

a maximum threshold value for the sensor data;

a time duration since a previous piece of sensor data was provided to the remote interfacing device; and

a difference threshold between the obtained sensor data and a previous piece of sensor data that was provided to the remote interfacing device.

19. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein communicating the data to the remote interfacing device involves communicating the data via an established peer-to-peer network connection associated with the remote interfacing device.

20. The storage medium of claim 19, wherein the established network connection is established using one or more of:

a WebSockets protocol;

a communication channel via the Session-Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN) protocol; and

a Comet protocol.

21. The storage medium of claim 20, wherein the request for establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol includes at least one of:

a WebSocket handshake request to upgrade a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) session to a WebSocket session; and

a Sec-WebSocket-Key token from the network device.

22. The storage medium of claim 21, wherein establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol further involves:

storing the Sec-WebSocket-Key in association with the network device;

generating a Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device based on the Sec-WebSocket-Key; and

sending to the interfacing device a response which acknowledges the persistent WebSocket communication channel, wherein the response includes at least the Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device.

23. The storage medium of claim 20, wherein establishing the network connection using the STUN protocol involves:

receiving a binding request that indicates network-addressing information for the network device, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

storing the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

24. The storage medium of claim 20, wherein establishing the network connection using the Comet protocol involves:

receiving a long-polling request from the network device;

determining network-addressing information for the network device based on the long-polling request, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

storing the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

25. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein selecting the rule to process involves:

selecting a set of rules whose condition takes the obtained data as input;

determining a user-specified ordering for the set of rules, wherein the user-specified ordering indicates an order in which the rules are to be processed; and

selecting a rule based on the user-specified ordering.

26. The storage medium of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises adjusting a color of a light-emitting diode (LED) indicator based on one or more of:

determining that the interfacing device is in a factory-default mode;

determining that the interfacing device is provisioned by a network controller which monitors or controls one or more interfacing devices; and

determining that the interfacing device is being monitored by the network controller.

27. An apparatus, comprising:

one or more power outlets;

a sensor-monitoring module to obtain sensor data from a power outlet, wherein the sensor data indicates an electrical measurement associated with an electrical load coupled to the power outlet; and

a rule-processing module to;

select a rule to process based on the obtained sensor data, wherein the rule includes an action description for performing an action, and includes a condition that takes the sensor data as input and indicates criteria for performing the action; and

responsive to determining that the rule'"'"'s condition is satisfied, processing the rule'"'"'s action description to perform the action.

28. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the sensor data from the power outlet includes one or more of:

a power state for the corresponding electrical load;

a current measurement; and

a voltage measurement.

29. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the action includes one or more of:

activating a power outlet;

deactivating a power outlet;

modulating a voltage provided by an outlet;

modulating an amount of current provided by a power outlet;

sending an email message to a predetermined recipient;

creating a system alert;

generating an event for an event log; and

computing a data value based in part on the received sensor data.

30. The apparatus of claim 27, further comprising:

a communication module configured to communicate with one or more remote interfacing devices; and

a subscription-processing module to;

determine that the sensor data satisfies a data-subscription request from a remote interfacing device; and

configure the communication module to communicate the sensor data to the remote interfacing device.

31. The apparatus of claim 30, wherein the data-subscription request indicates one or more of:

a minimum threshold value for the sensor data;

a maximum threshold value for the sensor data;

a time duration since a previous piece of sensor data was provided to the remote interfacing device; and

a difference threshold between the obtained sensor data and a previous piece of sensor data that was provided to the remote interfacing device.

32. The apparatus of claim 30, wherein while communicating the data to the remote interfacing device, the communication module is further configured to communicate the data via an established peer-to-peer network connection associated with the remote interfacing device.

33. The apparatus of claim 32, wherein the established network connection is established using one or more of:

a WebSockets protocol;

a communication channel via the Session-Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN) protocol; and

a Comet protocol.

34. The apparatus of claim 33, wherein the request for establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol includes at least one of:

a WebSocket handshake request to upgrade a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) session to a WebSocket session; and

a Sec-WebSocket-Key token from the network device.

35. The apparatus of claim 34, wherein while establishing the network connection using the WebSocket protocol, the communication module is further configured to:

store the Sec-WebSocket-Key in association with the network device;

generate a Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device based on the Sec-WebSocket-Key; and

send to the interfacing device a response which acknowledges the persistent WebSocket communication channel, wherein the response includes at least the Sec-WebSocket-Accept token for the interfacing device.

36. The apparatus of claim 33, wherein while establishing the network connection using the STUN protocol, the communication module is further configured to:

receive a binding request that indicates network-addressing information for the network device, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

store the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

37. The apparatus of claim 33, wherein while establishing the network connection using the Comet protocol, the communication module is further configured to:

receive a long-polling request from the network device;

determine network-addressing information for the network device based on the long-polling request, wherein the network-addressing information includes at least one or more of a network address and a port number; and

store the network-addressing information in association with the network device.

38. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein while selecting the rule to process, the rule-processing module is further configured to:

select a set of rules whose condition takes the obtained data as input;

determine a user-specified ordering for the set of rules, wherein the user-specified ordering indicates an order in which the rules are to be processed; and

select a rule based on the user-specified ordering.

39. The apparatus of claim 27, further comprising:

a light-emitting diode (LED) indicator; and

an indicator-controlling module to adjust a color of the LED indicator based on one or more of;

determining that the apparatus is in a factory-default mode;

determining that the apparatus is provisioned by a network controller which monitors or controls one or more interfacing devices; and

determining that the apparatus is being monitored by the network controller.