INFORMATION ACQUISITION METHOD, INFORMATION ACQUISITION SYSTEM, AND INFORMATION ACQUISITION APPARATUS

• US 20150127421A1
• Filed: 03/07/2014
• Published: 05/07/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 03/11/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Panasonic Intellectual Property Corporation of America (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Panasonic Intellectual Property Corporation of America (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Nakano, Toshihisa, Kozuka, Masayuki, Ohmori, Motoji, Sakata, Tsuyoshi, Miyabe, Yoshiyuki, Okamura, Kazuo, Tojima, Masayoshi, Hirose, Takako
• Granted Patent: US 10,445,751 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/7.29
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/01 Customer relationship services
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2812 describing content present in a home automation network, e.g. audio video content retrieval from the Internet G06F16/95
• 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

Abstract

Provided is a server device (101) including: a transmitting/receiving section (201) for receiving, from a household electric appliance (102), an identifier for identifying the household electric appliance (102) and an operation status of the household electric appliance (102); an updating section (207) for estimating a consumption status of a consumer good using the received operation status so as to update the consumption status of the consumer good stored in a utilization information accumulating section (205) based on the estimated consumption status of the consumer good; and a determination section (206) for deciding whether or not to transmit a confirmation message for confirming the consumer good being used with the household electric appliance, based on the updated consumption status of the consumer good.

Claims

1. An information obtaining method comprising:

receiving information regarding a consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by a user with a household electric appliance;

storing, in a first memory section, a consumption status of the consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by the user, based on the received information regarding the consumer good;

receiving, from the household electric appliance, an identifier for identifying the household electric appliance and an operation status of the household electric appliance;

estimating the consumption status of the consumer good using the received operation status;

updating the consumption status of the consumer good stored in the first memory section based on the estimated consumption status of the consumer good;

deciding whether or not to transmit a confirmation message for confirming the consumer good being used with the household electric appliance, based on the updated consumption status of the consumer good; and

transmitting the confirmation message when it is decided that the confirmation message is to be transmitted.

2. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, wherein a quantity of the consumer good at a start of consumption is determined in advance.

3. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, wherein the first memory section stores a remaining amount of the consumer good, and the method further comprises:

estimating, as the consumption status, the remaining amount of the consumer good using the received operation status;

updating the remaining amount of the consumer good stored in the first memory section, based on the estimated remaining amount of the consumer good;

deciding whether or not the updated remaining amount of the consumer good is less than or equal to a predetermined value; and

transmitting a confirmation message for confirming the consumer good being used when it is decided that the updated remaining amount of the consumer good is less than or equal to the predetermined value.

4. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, the method further comprising:

storing the information regarding a consumer good in the second memory section in advance while the information is associated with a type of the household electric appliance;

receiving, from the household electric appliance, a request for the information regarding a consumer good and an identifier for identifying the household electric appliance;

extracting, from the second memory section, information regarding a consumer good which can be used with the household electric appliance associated with the identifier; and

transmitting the extracted information regarding the consumer good.

5. The information obtaining method according to claim 4, wherein the second memory section stores information regarding a plurality of consumer goods, and the method further comprises:

extracting, from the second memory section, information regarding a plurality of consumer goods which can be used with the household electric appliance associated with the identifier;

transmitting the extracted information regarding the plurality of consumer goods as a consumer goods list; and

receiving the information regarding the consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by the user, from among the consumer goods list.

6. The information obtaining method according to claim 4, the method further comprising:

selecting a consumer good which has been sold to the user based on sales information in which information for identifying the consumer good which has been sold to the user is associated with a type of a household electric appliance with which the consumer good is used; and

extracting the information regarding the selected consumer good from the second memory section.

7. The information obtaining method according to claim 4, the method further comprising:

obtaining information for identifying the consumer good by reading a barcode provided on the consumer good;

receiving the obtained information for identifying the consumer good; and

extracting, from the second memory section, the information regarding the consumer good on which the barcode is provided, based on the received information regarding the consumer good.

8. The information obtaining method according to claim 7, the method further comprising:

obtaining information for identifying the consumer good by reading the barcode by means of an information appliance different from the household electric appliance; and

receiving the information for identifying the consumer good, which has been obtained by the information appliance, directly from the information appliance, or receiving the information for identifying the consumer good, which has been obtained by the information appliance, via the household electric appliance.

9. The information obtaining method according to claim 4, the method further comprising:

reading out information for identifying the consumer good from a wireless tag provided on the consumer good;

receiving the information for identifying the consumer good read out from the wireless tag; and

extracting, from the second memory section, the information regarding the consumer good on which the wireless tag is provided, based on the received information for identifying the consumer good.

10. The information obtaining method according to claim 9, the method further comprising:

reading out information for identifying the consumer good from the wireless tag by means of an information appliance different from the household electric appliance; and

receiving the information for identifying the consumer good, which has been read out by the information appliance, directly from the information appliance, or receiving the information for identifying the consumer good, which has been read out by the information appliance, via the household electric appliance.

11. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, wherein the first memory section stores an amount of consumption of the consumer good, and the method further comprises:

receiving the amount of consumption of the consumer good which is measured by the household electric appliance; and

updating the consumption status of the consumer good stored in the first memory section, based on the received amount of consumption of the consumer good.

12. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, wherein the operation status includes setting information regarding an operation of the household electric appliance which is set by the user for the household electric appliance when operating the household electric appliance, and the method further comprises:

calculating the amount of consumption of the consumer good from the setting information by using a parameter determined in advance according to the operation.

13. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, the method further comprising:

storing, in a third memory section, setting information regarding an operation of the household electric appliance which is set for the household electric appliance when operating the household electric appliance using the consumer good;

extracting the setting information stored in the third memory section based on the received information regarding a consumer good; and

transmitting the extracted setting information to the household electric appliance.

14. The information obtaining method according to claim 1, wherein the confirmation message is transmitted to the household electric appliance with which the consumer good is used, another household electric appliance different from the household electric appliance with which the consumer good is used, or an information appliance.

15. An information obtaining system comprising a server device and a household electric appliance communicatively connected to the server device,

the server device including:

a first receiving section for receiving information regarding a consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by a user;

a first memory section for storing a consumption status of a consumer good;

a memory control section for storing, in the first memory section, a consumption status of the consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by the user, based on the received information regarding the consumer good;

a second receiving section for receiving, from the household electric appliance, an identifier for identifying the household electric appliance and an operation status of the household electric appliance;

an estimating section for estimating the consumption status of the consumer good using the received operation status;

an updating section for updating the consumption status of the consumer good stored in the first memory section based on the estimated consumption status of the consumer good;

a decision section for deciding whether or not to transmit a confirmation message for confirming the consumer good being used, based on the updated consumption status of the consumer good; and

a transmitting section for transmitting the confirmation message when it is decided that the confirmation message is to be transmitted, and

the household electric appliance including;

a first transmitting section for transmitting, to the server device, a request for the information regarding a consumer good and an identifier for identifying the household electric appliance;

a first receiving section for receiving the information regarding a consumer good transmitted by the server device;

a second transmitting section for transmitting, to the server device, the information regarding a consumer good which has been determined as a consumer good actually used by the user; and

a third transmitting section for transmitting, to the server device, the identifier for identifying the household electric appliance and the operation status of the household electric appliance.

16. An information appliance communicatively connected to a server device, the information appliance comprising:

a receiving section for receiving a confirmation message for confirming a consumer good being used, the confirmation message having been decided by the server device to be transmitted based on a consumption status of a consumer good to be used with a household electric appliance, the consumption status having been estimated by using an operation status of the household electric appliance;

a display section for displaying the received confirmation message;

an accepting section for accepting, from a user, an input of response information for the confirmation message; and

a transmitting section for transmitting, to the server device, the response information accepted by the accepting section.