Map-information providing system using computer network

• US 6,957,250 B1
• Filed: 11/09/2000
• Issued: 10/18/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 11/30/1999
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Increment P Corporation, Pioneer Corporation
• Original Assignee: Increment P Corporation, Pioneer Corporation
• Inventors: Nakano, Toshiaki
• Primary Examiner(s): Vu, Viet D.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Nguyen, Dustin
• Application Number:
  US09/708,561
• Time in Patent Office: 1,804 Days
• Field of Search: 701/104, 701/201, 701/200, 707/4, 707/104, 379/93, 370/360, 709/217, 709/218
• US Class Current: 709/219
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

A map-information providing site S1 has a WWW server S1a for displaying a WWW page for making a designation entry for a request to provide a map image to an information terminal T. A map database site S2 has a map-information database S2b storing map image data, a retrieval database S2c storing retrieval data for retrieving map image data corresponding to the designation entry from the map-information database S2b, and a map server S2a comparing the designation entry and the retrieval database S2c to read out the map image data corresponding to the designation entry from the map-information database S2b, and sending it to the information terminal T.

Claims

1. A map-information providing system through a computer network for transmitting map image data corresponding to a designation entry from a map database site to an information terminal for display when the designation entry for a request to provide a map image to the information terminal has been made on an information providing screen presented from a map-information providing site,

wherein said map-information providing site has a map-information providing server for displaying the information providing screen for making the designation entry for the request to provide the map image to the information terminal,

wherein said map database site has a map-information database storing map image data, a retrieval database storing retrieval data for retrieving the map image data corresponding to said designation entry from said map-information database, and a map server for comparing said designation entry made on said information providing screen with said retrieval database to read out the map image data corresponding to the designation entry from said map-information database, and sending the read-out map image to the information terminal.

2. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein the retrieval data stored in said retrieval database comprises position data representing the correspondence between the designation entry translated into said required information form and coordinates on a map, and data representing the correspondence between the position data and the map image data stored in said map-information database.

3. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein the retrieval data stored in said retrieval database comprises data representing the correspondence between the designation entry translated into said required information form and the map image data stored in said map-information database.

4. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein said information terminal is a mobile terminal having an Internet access function.

5. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein said information providing screen is a World Wide Web page.

6. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein said information providing screen is an information display screen displayed on a display of a mobile terminal having an Internet access function.

7. The map-information providing system through the computer network according to claim 1, wherein said map-information providing server is a corporation server.