Address input method and apparatus for navigation system

• US 7,664,597 B2
• Filed: 03/31/2005
• Issued: 02/16/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/31/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Alpine Electronics Incorporated (Alps Alpine Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Alpine Electronics Incorporated (Alps Alpine Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Imanishi, Shunichi
• Primary Examiner(s): To; Tuan C
• Application Number:
  US11/095,169
• Publication Number:
  US 20060224312A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,783 Days
• Field of Search: 701/200, 701/209, 701/202, 701/208, 340/995.1, 340/539, 340/531, 340/988, 707/3, 382/187, 382/198
• US Class Current: 701/209
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3611 using character input or menus, e.g. menus of POIs character input methods in general G06F3/0233

Abstract

A method and apparatus for use with a navigation system allows a user to easily and quickly input an address of a destination with use of a specially made database even when spelling of the address is not certain to the user. The navigation system is designed to help the user in entering a desired street name accurately and efficiently by checking candidate cities when a first character of street name is specified. Since the user accurately knows at least the first character of the intended street name, the candidate street names will be narrowed down by selecting the city. The user may further input second character and further characters upon which the navigation system incrementally retrieves candidate street names with use of the comprehensive alphabetical usage file.

Claims

1. An apparatus for inputting an address of a destination in a navigation system, comprising:

means for receiving a only first character of a street name of a destination specified by a user before receiving any other information on the destination;

means for reading a precompiled data file based solely on the first character specified by the user to search administrative regions that have street names that start with the first character specified by the user;

means for immediately displaying a list of names of the administrative regions that have the street names that start with the first character specified by the user where the administrative regions in the list have been searched from all over a country;

means for receiving a name of the administrative region selected by the user from the list of the names of the administrative regions;

means for displaying candidate street names that start with the first character specified by the user within the selected administrative region; and

means for accepting a street name of the destination selected by the user from the candidate street names;

whereby sequentially searching for the destination in the order of (1) the first character of street names, (2) the name of the administrative region, and (3) the street name within the selected administrative region.

2. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 1, further comprising:

means for receiving a second character of the street name of the destination specified by the user;

means for retrieving candidate street names that start with the first and second characters within the selected administrative region;

means for displaying candidate street names that start with the first and second characters specified by the user within the selected administrative region; and

means for repeating the above steps for further characters that follow the first and second characters.

3. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 1, wherein said street name that indicates the address of the destination is specified by alphabetical characters or a combination of alphabetical characters and numeral characters.

4. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 3, wherein said administrative region includes city, county, and state.

5. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 1, wherein said precompiled data file includes a data file which classifies administrative region names according to the first character of said street name.

6. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 1, wherein said precompiled data file includes a comprehensive alphabet usage file which has a plurality of character tables that indicate possible characters of the street names that follow the first character within the selected administrative region.

7. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 4, wherein city names and state names are associated with one another in the precompiled data file and are sorted by the first character of the street names throughout the country.

8. An apparatus for inputting an address as defined in claim 1, wherein said address of the destination is expressed by Japanese language and the first character and other characters are Japanese kana letters.

9. An apparatus for inputting an address of a destination as defined in claim 8, wherein said data in said precompiled data file is expressed by Japanese language and said administrative regions are classified by a Japanese administrative system.