IN-VEHICLE COMPONENT USER INTERFACE

• US 20160257198A1
• Filed: 03/02/2015
• Published: 09/08/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 03/02/2015
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Inventors: BUTTOLO, Pietro, GHOSH, Dipanjan, SALTER, Stuart C., RANKIN, James Stewart II, STRUMOLO, Gary Steven
• Application Number:
  US14/635,321
• Publication Number:
  US 20160257198A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 2360/563 Vehicle displaying mobile device information
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 2360/566 Mobile devices displaying vehicle information
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 2360/569 Vehicle controlling mobile device functions
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 2360/573 Mobile devices controlling vehicle functions
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 2360/589 Wireless data transfers
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 35/00 Instruments specially adapted for vehicles; Arrangement of instruments in or on vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 35/10 Input arrangements, i.e. from user to vehicle, associated with vehicle functions or specially adapted therefor
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 35/60 Instruments characterised by their location or relative disposition in or on vehicles arrangements of lighting devices on dashboards B60Q3/10
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 35/80 Arrangements for controlling instruments
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 35/85 Arrangements for transferring vehicle- or driver-related data

Abstract

A system may include an in-vehicle component, including a first control set to configure the component, configured to identify a device associated with a user approach to the component; and send an interaction request to the device to cause the device to display a user interface for the component including a second control set to configure the component, the second control set including at least one function unavailable in the first control set. A personal device may receive, from an in-vehicle component including a first control set to configure the component, a user interface definition descriptive of a second control set to configure the component; and receive, from the component, a request to display a user interface for the component including the second control set to configure the component, the second control set including at least one function unavailable in the first control set.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

an in-vehicle component, including a first control set to configure the component, configured to

identify a device associated with a user approach to the component; and

send an interaction request to the device to cause the device to display a user interface for the component including a second control set to configure the component, the second control set including at least one function unavailable in the first control set.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the second control set is a superset of the first control set.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the in-vehicle component includes a proximity sensor, and the device associated with the user approach to the component is detected according to an increasing wireless signal intensity of the device detected according to the proximity sensor.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the in-vehicle component includes a proximity sensor, and the device associated with the user approach to the component is detected according to an increasing wireless signal intensity of a wearable device paired to the device detected according to the proximity sensor.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the in-vehicle component includes a sensor configured to identify the user approach despite no increasing wireless signal intensity from the device.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the sensor is one of a touch sensor and a proximity sensor.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the in-vehicle component is further configured to, responsive to the user approach with no increasing wireless signal intensity:

receive wireless signal intensity information for in-vehicle devices from other proximity sensors of the vehicle; and

identify the device from the one of the in-vehicle devices as the one of the in-vehicle devices having a highest wireless signal strength at the in-vehicle component compared to the wireless signal strength for the identified device at the other proximity sensors of the vehicle.

8. A system comprising:

a personal device, configured to

receive, from an in-vehicle component including a first control set to configure the component, a user interface definition descriptive of a second control set to configure the component; and

receive, from the component, a request to display a user interface for the component including the second control set to configure the component, the second control set including at least one function unavailable in the first control set.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the personal device is further configured to:

display the user interface;

receive a user interaction to the user interface requesting a function from the second control set; and

send a request to the component to perform the function from the second control set.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the personal device is further configured to:

receive, from a second in-vehicle component including a first control set to configure the second component, a second user interface definition descriptive of a second control set to configure the second component; and

aggregate the user interface definition and the second user interface definition to combine, in the user interface, functions in common between the user interface definition and the second user interface definition.

11. The system of claim 8, wherein the personal device is further configured to request the user interface definition descriptive of the second control set from the in-vehicle component, responsive to connection of the personal device to the in-vehicle component.

12. The system of claim 8, wherein the personal device is further configured to receive the request to display the user interface for the component responsive to at least one of:

(i) a user approach to the component detected, by the component, according to an increasing wireless signal intensity of the device, and (ii) a user approach to the component detected, by the component, according to an increasing wireless signal intensity of a wearable device paired to the device; and

(iii) a user approach to one of a touch sensor and a proximity sensor of the component, despite no increasing wireless signal intensity from the device or the wearable device detected by the component.

13. The system of claim 8, wherein the user interface definition is encoded using at least one of:

(i) hypertext markup language (HTML), (ii) extensible markup language (XML), (iii) JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), and (iV) view and viewgroup user interface definitions.

14. The system of claim 8, wherein the user interface definition includes at least two of:

(i) attributes descriptive of available control functions, (ii) names for presentation of attributes of the functions in the user interface, (iii) allowed ranges of values for the attributes, (iv) layout information descriptive of grouping and ordering of the control functions, and (v) suggested controls to use to display the control functions in the user interface.

15. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving, by a personal device from an in-vehicle component including a first control set to configure the component, a user interface definition descriptive of a second control set to configure the component; and

receiving, from the component, a request to display a user interface for the component including the second control set to configure the component, the second control set including at least one function unavailable in the first control set.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

displaying the user interface;

receiving a user interaction to the user interface requesting a function from the second control set; and

sending a request to the component to perform the function from the second control set.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

receiving, from a second in-vehicle component including a first control set to configure the second component, a second user interface definition descriptive of a second control set to configure the second component; and

aggregating the user interface definition and the second user interface definition to combine, in the user interface, functions in common between the user interface definition and the second user interface definition.

18. The method of claim 15, further comprising requesting the user interface definition descriptive of the second control set from the in-vehicle component, responsive to connection of the personal device to the in-vehicle component.