Indoor/outdoor decision apparatus and indoor/outdoor decision method

• US 8,190,172 B2
• Filed: 05/20/2010
• Issued: 05/29/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2009
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Original Assignee: NTT Docomo Incorporated (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation)
• Inventors: Oda, Yasuhiro, Shen, Jiyun
• Primary Examiner(s): Afshar, Kamran
• Assistant Examiner(s): ROD, YOUSEF R
• Application Number:
  US12/783,912
• Publication Number:
  US 20100317366A1
• Time in Patent Office: 740 Days
• Field of Search: 455/456.1
• US Class Current: 455/456.1
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/015 between indoor and outdoor environments
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/02521 using a radio-map

Abstract

An appropriate indoor/outdoor decision is made for a mobile communication terminal in accordance with a purpose of selection of a positioning method or the like. A positioning server 10 is an indoor/outdoor decision apparatus for making an indoor/outdoor decision on whether a mobile communication terminal 20 is located indoors or outdoors, which has: a communication information acquiring unit 11 which acquires communication information about wireless communication at the mobile communication terminal 20; an environment information acquiring unit 12 which acquires environment information indicative of an environment associated with the mobile communication terminal 20; a criterion setting unit 13 which sets a criterion for the indoor/outdoor decision according to the environment information; and a deciding unit 14 which makes the indoor/outdoor decision with reference to the communication information on the basis of the set criterion.

Claims

1. An indoor/outdoor decision apparatus for making an indoor/outdoor decision on whether a mobile communication terminal is located indoors or outdoors, comprising:

a communication information acquiring unit which acquires communication information about wireless communication at the mobile communication terminal, the communication information including at least a value associated with a reception intensity of a radio wave received by the mobile communication terminal from at least one radio wave transmitter;

an environment information acquiring unit which acquires environment information indicative of an environment associated with the mobile communication terminal from the mobile communication terminal, the environment information including at least time information, weather information, and region information associated with the mobile communication terminal;

a criterion setting unit which sets a threshold as a criterion for the indoor/outdoor decision, according to the environment information acquired by the environment information acquiring unit; and

a deciding unit which makes the indoor/outdoor decision by comparing the value associated with the reception intensity acquired by the communication information acquiring unit, with the threshold set by the criterion setting unit.

2. The indoor/outdoor decision apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein the deciding unit uses a technique of pattern recognition to classify preliminarily-stored communication information of mobile communication terminals located indoors and communication information of mobile communication terminals located outdoors into a class of communication information of mobile communication terminals located indoors and a class of communication information of mobile communication terminals located outdoors, and decides to which class the communication information acquired by the communication information acquiring unit belongs, thereby making the indoor/outdoor decision, and

wherein the criterion setting unit sets a weight to be used in the classification, as a criterion for making the indoor/outdoor decision.

3. The indoor/outdoor decision apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising positioning unit which determines a method of positioning for the mobile communication terminal in accordance with a result of the indoor/outdoor decision made by the deciding unit, and which performs positioning of the mobile communication terminal by the determined method.

4. The indoor/outdoor decision apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the criterion setting unit preliminarily stores results of positioning for other mobile communication terminals by the positioning unit and environment information associated with the other mobile communication terminals acquired by the environment information acquiring unit, in association with each other, and sets a criterion for making the indoor/outdoor decision on the basis of said pieces of information.

6. The indoor/outdoor decision apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the threshold is set to a first value when the environment information indicates that the mobile communication terminal is indoors and the threshold is set to a second value that is higher than the first value when the environment information indicates that the mobile communication terminal is outdoors.

5. An indoor/outdoor decision method for making an indoor/outdoor decision on whether a mobile communication terminal is located indoors or outdoors, comprising:

a communication information acquiring step of acquiring communication information about wireless communication at the mobile communication terminal, the communication information including at least a value associated with a reception intensity of a radio wave received by the mobile communication terminal from at least one radio wave transmitter;

an environment information acquiring step of acquiring environment information indicative of an environment associated with the mobile communication terminal from the mobile communication terminal, the environment information including at least time information, weather information, and region information associated with the mobile communication terminal;

a criterion setting step of setting a threshold as a criterion for the indoor/outdoor decision, according to the environment information acquired in the environment information acquiring step; and

a deciding step of making the indoor/outdoor decision by comparing the value associated with the reception intensity acquired by the communication information acquiring unit, with the threshold set by the criterion setting unit.