Method and apparatus for accessing product information using RF tag data

• US 7,921,180 B2
• Filed: 02/14/2001
• Issued: 04/05/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 02/18/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intermec IP Corporation (Honeywell International Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Intermec IP Corporation (Honeywell International Inc.)
• Inventors: Greer, Patrick Thomas, Wiklof, Christopher A.
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, THANH T
• Application Number:
  US09/788,628
• Publication Number:
  US 20020165931A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,702 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 709/229, 235/472.03, 235/380, 370/313, 713/168
• US Class Current: 709/217
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising

Abstract

A method and apparatus for convenient and easy access to product- and shipment-related information and/or transactions is disclosed. A radio frequency tag reader is used to read a radio frequency tag having a structured data format. The end device parses one or more particular data entities from the data read. The radio frequency tag reader accesses a URL having at least a portion in common with one or more of the parsed data entities and displays associated web page content or processes an associated transaction. The radio frequency tag reader may sequentially substitute a series of most probable non-common URL portions to locate associated content if the first tried URL does not result in a valid response. Alternatively, a server may provide such search functionality.

Claims

1. A method of accessing data, comprising:

reading a radio frequency (RF) tag containing data corresponding to a bar code, wherein the bar code comprises a first portion corresponding to a Uniform Code Council (UCC) company identifier and a second portion corresponding to a UCC item identifier;

constructing a uniform resource locator (URL) from the data read from the RF tag corresponding to the bar code, wherein a portion of said URL comprises the UCC company identifier and the UCC item identifier;

calling the URL; and

displaying information associated with said URL, and

wherein said “

company identifier”

comprises a number assigned by the UCC and said “

item identifier”

comprises a number assigned by a manufacturer.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein displaying information associated with said URL comprises:

displaying information of interest about an item associated with the item identifier, wherein the information of interest about the item resides in a user site accessed through the URL.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the barcode corresponds to a universal product code (UPC) symbol.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the barcode corresponds to a European Article Numbering (EAN) symbol.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the barcode corresponds to a Japanese Article Numbering (JAN) symbol.

6. A method of accessing data, comprising:

receiving bar code information encoding a Uniform Code Council (UCC) company identifier and a UCC item identifier; and

constructing a uniform resource locator (URL) from the received bar code information, wherein at least a portion of the URL comprises the UCC company identifier and the UCC item identifier constructed as at least a “

www”

followed by at least the UCC company identifier and the UCC item identifier.

7. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

scanning a bar code comprising at least a first portion encoding the UCC company identifier and a second portion encoding the UCC item identifier.

8. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

linking to the URL so that a manufacturer'"'"'s site is accessed; and

accessing a portion of the manufacturer'"'"'s site pertaining to the identified product.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein linking the URL so that a manufacturer'"'"'s site is accessed comprises:

attempting to link to a plurality of sites, each site with a different domain name, until at least one of the linked sites responds so that information pertaining to the identified product is received.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

constructing the “

.com”

portion of the URL with a domain name, wherein the domain name comprises at least one selected from a group consisting of a “

.net”

domain name, a “

.gov”

domain name and a “

.org”

domain name.

11. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

receiving at least information pertaining to the identified product from the accessed portion of the site pertaining to the identified product; and

displaying the information pertaining to the identified product.

12. The method of claim 6 wherein receiving the bar code information comprises:

receiving the bar code information at a point of sale.

13. The method of claim 6 wherein receiving the bar code information comprises:

receiving universal product code (UPC) bar code information.

14. The method of claim 6 wherein receiving the bar code information comprises:

receiving European Article Numbering (EAN) bar code information.

15. The method of claim 6 wherein receiving the bar code information comprises:

receiving Japanese Article Numbering (JAN) bar code information.

16. The method of claim 7 wherein constructing the URL from the bar code comprises:

appending the UCC company identifier to “

www.”

to construct the “

www.UCC company identifier”

portion of the URL; and

appending the UCC item identifier to “

/”

to construct the /“

UCC item identifier”

portion of the URL.

17. The method of claim 6 wherein constructing the URL from the bar code comprises:

prepending “

www.”

to the UCC company identifier to construct the www.“

UCC company identifier”

portion of the URL; and

prepending “

/”

to the UCC item identifier to construct the /“

UCC item identifier”

portion of the URL.

18. The method of claim 8 wherein linking to the URL comprises:

calling the URL.

19. A method of accessing data, comprising:

receiving a uniform resource locator (URL) call to access a manufacturer site that includes information pertaining to an item of interest, wherein the URL of the manufacturer site uses a Uniform Code Council (UCC) company identifier as the domain and uses an item identifier to identify the item of interest; and

returning the information of interest to a site that initiated the URL call.

20. The method of claim 19 wherein the URL corresponds to a bar code with a UCC company identifier and an item identifier.

21. A method of accessing data, comprising:

receiving bar code information with at least a Uniform Code Council (UCC) company identifier and an item identifier;

determining the UCC company identifier from the bar code information; and

constructing a uniform resource locator (URL) with the UCC company identifier therein.

22. The method of claim 21 wherein the UCC company identifier in the constructed URL is a domain name of a web site.

23. The method of claim 21 wherein the UCC company identifier in the constructed URL identifies a web site of a company associated with the UCC company identifier.

24. The method of claim 21 wherein constructing the URL having the UCC company identifier therein comprises:

constructing the URL to identify a web site; and

constructing the URL such that the UCC company identifier in the constructed URL identifies a location of the web site associated with the company.

25. The method of claim 21, further comprising:

determining the item identifier from the bar code information; and

constructing the URL with the item identifier therein, wherein the item identifier in the constructed URL identifies a location of the web site describing the product associated with the item identifier.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein the item identifier is assigned by the company.

27. The method of claim 26 wherein the item identifier assigned by the company is a UCC item identifier.