Communication navigation system

• US 6,542,816 B1
• Filed: 11/17/2000
• Issued: 04/01/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Kabushikikaisha Equos Research
• Original Assignee: Kabushikikaisha Equos Research
• Inventors: Yamakawa, Hiroyuki, Ito, Yasuo, Sugawara, Takashi, Kitano, Satoshi, Gorai, Naoki
• Primary Examiner(s): Cuchlinski, Jr., William A.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Donnelly, Arthur D.
• Application Number:
  US09/714,868
• Time in Patent Office: 865 Days
• Field of Search: 701/209, 701/210, 701/200, 701/24, 701/25, 701/26, 701/117, 701/118, 701/119, 340/905, 340/988, 340/990, 340/995, 731/78.R
• US Class Current: 701/209
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3492 employing speed data or traffic data, e.g. real-time or historical traffic control systems for road vehicles involving transmission of navigation instructions to the vehicle G08G1/0968
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3629 Guidance using speech or audio output, e.g. text-to-speech text to speech systems per se G10L13/00
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3815 Road data
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3889 Transmission of selected map data, e.g. depending on route
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3896 Transmission of map data from central databases

Abstract

A communication navigation system, wherein a navigation apparatus requests a recommended route guidance data to a information center and guides a user of the navigation apparatus to a destination by using the recommended route guidance data received from the information center.

In this present invention, the navigation apparatus transmits version data of road data held in the navigation apparatus at the request to the information center. The information center prepares a guidance data of recommended route using latest road data held in the information center, and transmits the data to the navigation apparatus. When the information center transmits the guidance data, the information center selects the type of data of the road links along the recommended route, in the guidance data, by comparing the version data received from the navigation apparatus and the version data of each road link along the recommended route. If each data of road links along the recommended route is considered to be contained in the road data held in the navigation apparatus, the information center transmits the only data which enable to specify the road link from the road data held in the navigation apparatus. On the hand, if each data of road links is considered not to be contained in the road data held in the navigation apparatus, the information center transmits whole data of the road link. Therefore, the navigation apparatus can generate the route guidance data by extracting road link data, from its own road data, corresponding to the road link specified by transmitted data and by reconstructing road link data using transmitted data.

Claims

1. A communication navigation system which includes an information center and a vehicle mounted navigation apparatus, in which data concerning a recommended route from a current location of the navigation apparatus to a destination is transmitted from the information center to the navigation apparatus, and then route guidance is carried out by the navigation apparatus using the data transmitted from the information center, wherein the navigation apparatus comprises:

road information storage means containing stored first road information including first road network data including a plurality of road links and first identification data of the first road information;

data transmitting means for transmitting data of a current location and a destination of the navigation apparatus and the first identification data to the information center;

data receiving means for receiving data of recommended route guidance information from the information center;

route guidance data generating means for generating route guidance data based on the first road information stored in the road information storage means and based on the recommended route guidance information transmitted from the information center; and

route guiding means for guiding a user of the navigation apparatus from the current location to the destination of the navigation apparatus using the route guidance data; and

wherein the information center comprises;

a database containing stored second road information including second road network data including a plurality of road links and second identification data of said second road information;

data receiving means for receiving the transmitted data of the current location and the destination of the navigation apparatus and the transmitted first identification data;

recommended route determining means for determining a recommended route, by extracting recommended road links from the second road network data stored in the database, from the current location to the destination received from the navigation apparatus, based on the second road information stored in the database;

judging means for judging respectively whether or not each recommended road link along the recommended route is contained in the first road information, by comparing the first identification data transmitted from the navigation apparatus with the second identification data of the road information stored in the database;

recommended route guidance information generating means for generating recommended route guidance information, based on the database, containing first enabling data enabling retrieval of first recommended road links from the road information storage means, the first recommended road links being those recommended road links judged to be contained in the first road information, and second enabling data enabling construction of second recommended road links, the second recommended road links being those recommended road links judged not to be contained in the first road information; and

data transmitting means for transmitting said recommended route guidance information to the navigation apparatus.

2. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the route guidance data generating means comprises:

(a) means for extracting recommended road links, specified by the transmitted first enabling data, from the first road information stored in the road information storage means in the navigation apparatus, and

(b) means for reconstructing recommended road links by using the transmitted second enabling data enabling reconstruction of each recommended road links along the recommended route; and

wherein said route guidance data generating means uses the means of (a) and/or (b) for generating the route guidance data.

3. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 2, wherein the first road information stored in the road information storage means further includes first guidance data corresponding to the plurality of the road links, and the second road information stored in the database further includes second guidance data corresponding to the plurality of the road links, and the recommended route guidance information generating means generates the recommended route guidance information further containing the second guidance data corresponding to each recommended road link which is judged not to be contained in the first road information, and the route guidance data generating means generates the route guidance data as a combination of the second guidance data contained in the transmitted recommended route guidance information and the first guidance data extracted from the road information storage means.

4. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 3, wherein both of the first guidance data stored in the road information storage means and the second guidance data stored in the database contain, for each road link, at least one of:

data of a road length;

data of coordinates for drawing;

data of coordinates for matching a location of the navigation apparatus; and

data of number of lanes.

5. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 1, wherein both of the first identification data stored in the road information storage means and the second identification data stored in the database are version numbers of the corresponding first and second road information, the database has road information of all versions, the recommended route determining means determines the recommended route using road information of a latest version stored in the database, and the judging means judges whether or not each recommended road link along the recommended route is contained in the first road information, by comparing the latest version number with the version number transmitted from the navigation apparatus.

6. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the first identification data stored in the road information storage means is a version number of the first road information, and each road link in the database contains a version number expressing a road information version, and the judging means judges whether or not each recommended road link along the recommended route is contained in the first road information, by respectively comparing the version number of each recommended road link with the version number transmitted from the navigation apparatus.

7. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the information center further comprises external information acquisition means for acquiring latest traffic conditions and/or latest road conditions, and the recommended route determining means determines the recommended route from the current location to the destination of the navigation apparatus in consideration of the latest traffic conditions and/or the latest road conditions.

8. The communication navigation system as claimed in claim 1, wherein both of the data transmitting means and the data receiving means of the information center, and both of the data transmitting means and the data receiving means of the navigation apparatus are designed so as to communicate using a packet switching technique and/or a circuit switching technique.

9. A navigation apparatus which guides a user from a current location to a destination comprising:

road information storage means for storing first road information which includes a plurality of road links and first identification data identifying the first road information;

data transmitting means for transmitting data concerning the current location and the destination of the navigation apparatus and the first identification data to an information center;

data receiving means for receiving data concerning recommended route guidance information from the information center;

route guidance data generating means for generating route guidance based on the first road information and the recommended route guidance information; and

route guiding means for guiding the user from the current location to the destination using the generated route guidance data;

wherein the first road information contains, for each road link, at least one of;

data of road length;

data of coordinates for drawing;

data of coordinates for matching a location of the navigation apparatus; and

data of number of lanes.

10. An information center, which receives/transmits data from/to a navigation apparatus having road information storage means containing stored first road information including a plurality of road links and first identification data identifying the first road information, said information center comprising:

a database storing second road information including a plurality of road links and second identification data identifying the second road information;

data receiving means for receiving data concerning a current location and a destination of the navigation apparatus and the first identification data transmitted from the navigation apparatus;

recommended route determining means for determining a recommended route from the current location to the destination, and for identifying road links along the determined recommended route utilizing the second road information;

judging means for judging respectively whether or not each identified road link is contained in the first road information, by comparing the first identification data with the second identification data;

recommended route guidance information generating means for generating recommended route guidance information, based on the database, containing firs enabling data enabling retrieval from the first road information of those identified road links judged to be contained in the first road information and second enabling data enabling reconstruction of those identified road links judged not to be contained in the first road information; and

data transmitting means for transmitting the generated recommended route guidance information to the navigation apparatus.

11. The information center as claimed in claim 10, wherein the second road information contains, for each road link, at least one of:

data of a road length;

data of coordinates for drawing;

data of coordinates for matching a location of the navigation apparatus; and

data of number of lanes.