System and method for simplified representation of geographic addresses

• US 8,612,147 B2
• Filed: 07/06/2012
• Issued: 12/17/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 07/07/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Anup Som
• Original Assignee: Anup Som
• Inventors: Som, Anup
• Primary Examiner(s): FREJD, RUSSELL WARREN
• Application Number:
  US13/543,362
• Publication Number:
  US 20130013202A1
• Time in Patent Office: 529 Days
• Field of Search: 701/408, 701/409, 701/468, 701/520, 701/532, 703/2, 340988-996
• US Class Current: 701/520
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 29/106 using electronic means

Abstract

Computerized methods and system of shortening representations of geographical coordinates (Latitude, Longitude) by replacing the leading significant latitude and longitude digits in a given locality with an optional and often user friendly context hint. The locality context can be indicated either explicitly by a human factors appropriate name, or implicitly by the center of a map or current location of the client computerized device. The invention also discloses a reverse method to recover these eliminated digits by using the approximate center of locality and proximity to provide the missing context information.

Claims

1. A computerized method of determining the complete latitude and longitude values of a geographic address, based on input data pertaining to said addresses'"'"' lower significant digit latitude and longitude values, and at least one context hint pertaining to the addresses'"'"' higher significant digit latitude and longitude values, said method comprising:

obtaining an encoded version of said addresses'"'"' lower significant digit latitude and longitude values;

obtaining or determining a latitude and longitude granularity value;

obtaining at least one context hint;

wherein said at least one context hint is related to said higher significant digit latitude and longitude values of said address within the error limits defined by said granularity value;

using at least one computerized device comprising at least one processor, memory, and software, and said at least one context hint, to determine the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude associated with said at least one context hint;

using said at least one computerized device to parse or decode said encoded lower significant digit latitude and longitude values, thereby producing decoded lower significant digit latitude and longitude values;

combining said decoded lower significant digit latitude and longitude values with said higher significant digit latitude and longitude values associated with said context hint, thereby determining a complete address with both higher significant and lower significant latitude and longitude values.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said encoded version of said addresses'"'"' lower significant digit latitude and longitude values maps said values onto a base encoding scheme between or equal to a base 10 to base 128 base encoding scheme, said encoding scheme further using symbols selected from the printable set of ASCII characters.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein said encoding further uses different character maps or separators to indicate granularity, or interleaves said latitude and longitude symbols thus producing an encoding scheme where the encoded prefix comprises larger geographic areas, and the encoded suffix of comprises a smaller geographic area at a defined location within said larger geographic areas.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein said granularity value is equal to or between 0.1 degree and 4 degrees of latitude and equal to or between 0.1 degrees and 4 degrees of longitude;

and wherein said granularity is either equal or different between said latitude and longitude, and wherein said granularity is either scaled by a linear scaling function or a non-linear scaling function.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said granularity value is obtained from the memory of said at least one computerized device;

or

wherein said input data has a format, and determining said granularity value from said input data format.

6. The method of claim 1, further obtaining a scaled offset value, and using said scaled offset value to alter the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude associated with said at least one context hint;

and using said altered higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude associated with said at least one context hint for determining said complete address.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein said scaled offset value is used in cases where said address is within the granularity value of the equator or prime meridian.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein said context hint is derived from either GPS location, GeoLocation result, center or focus of interactive map, IP address location, telephone number, last known address, location in user profile, or other geographic location parameter communicated from or stored in the memory of said at least one computerized device.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein said context hint is derived from a standard human recognizable place location with a known latitude and longitude value within error limits defined by said granularity value;

further searching a geo-search database on an external server, or a context repository stored on said computerized device for said standard human recognizable place location and determining said known latitude and longitude value.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein said encoded version of said addresses'"'"' lower significant digit latitude and longitude values are further generated by the steps of:

obtaining a geographic address;

determining the latitude and longitude of said geographic address;

obtaining a granularity value;

obtaining a precision value;

using said granularity value to truncate the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address, producing a remainder latitude and longitude of said geographic address;

using said precision value to truncate or round-off the least significant digits of said remainder latitude and longitude of said geographic address, producing lower significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address; and

encoding said lower significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein said encoding maps said values onto a base encoding scheme between or equal to a base 10 to base 128 base encoding scheme, said encoding scheme further using symbols selected from the printable set of ASCII characters.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein said encoding further uses different character maps or separators to indicate granularity, or interleaves said latitude and longitude symbols thus producing an encoding scheme where the encoded prefix comprises larger geographic areas, and the encoded suffix of comprises a smaller geographic area at a defined location within said larger geographic areas.

13. The method of claim 10, further providing said context hints by:

searching a geo-search database or a context repository for a list of human recognizable place locations at distances from said geographic address that occur within the distance error limits defined by said granularity value; and

outputting said human recognizable place location as a context hint.

14. The method of claim 10, further providing a scaled offset value by determining if the distance between the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said context hint and said geographic address is greater than the distance represented by half of said granularity value;

and if so further generating a scaled offset value that, when applied to the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said context hint, produces an adjusted context hint with a distance between the adjusted context hint and the geographic address that is less than the distance represented by half of said granularity value.

15. A computerized method of generating an encoded version of the lower significant digits of a geographic addresses'"'"' latitude and longitude values, said method comprising:

obtaining a geographic address;

determining the latitude and longitude of said geographic address;

determining or obtaining a granularity value;

using a computerized device comprising at least one processor, memory, and software to use said granularity value to truncate the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address, producing lower significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address; and

encoding said lower significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein said encoding maps said values onto a base encoding scheme between or equal to a base 10 to base 128 base encoding scheme, said encoding scheme further using symbols selected from the printable set of ASCII characters.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein said encoding further uses different character maps or separators to indicate granularity, or and interleaves said latitude and longitude symbols thus producing an encoding scheme where the encoded prefix comprises larger geographic areas, and the encoded suffix of comprises a smaller geographic area at a defined location within said larger geographic areas.

18. The method of claim 15, further providing said context hint by:

searching a geo-search database on an external server or a context repository for a human recognizable place location with a latitude and longitude with higher significant digits that correspond to the higher significant digits of the truncated higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said geographic address; and

outputting said human recognizable place location as a context hint.

19. The method of claim 15, further providing a scaled offset value by determining if the distance between the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said context hint and said geographic address is greater than the distance represented by half of said granularity value;

and if so further generating a scaled offset value that, when applied to the higher significant digits of the latitude and longitude of said context hint, produces an adjusted context hint with a distance between the adjusted context hint and the geographic address that is less than the distance represented by half of said granularity value.