Communication of digital information presented on an appliance display

• US 9,128,931 B2
• Filed: 12/17/2012
• Issued: 09/08/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 12/17/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Haier US Appliance Solutions, Inc. DBA GE Appliances (Haier Group Company)
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: DeVos, Richard
• Primary Examiner(s): Wendell, Andrew
• Application Number:
  US13/716,561
• Publication Number:
  US 20140170969A1
• Time in Patent Office: 995 Days
• Field of Search: 455/414.1, 455/41.1, 455/41.2, 455/41.3, 455/66.1, 455/67.11, 455/90.1
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/00 Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/06 Authentication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/77 Graphical identity
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/80 Services using short range communication, e.g. near-field communication [NFC], radio-frequency identification [RFID] or low energy communication

Abstract

A system and method of communicating information associated with an appliance is provided. An appliance can present an optical machine-readable representation, such as a linear or matrix barcode, on a display of the appliance. The optical machine-readable representation can encode information associated with an event occurrence for the appliance. A client, such as a computer, smartphone, tablet, etc., can capture information indicative of the optical machine-readable representation. The client computing device can then access information, such as diagnostic information, responsive to the optical machine-readable representation.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of communicating information associated with a refrigerator, comprising:

capturing, at a computing device, information indicative of an optical machine-readable representation of information, the optical machine-readable representation presented on a digital display of a refrigerator, the optical machine-readable representation comprising a matrix barcode generated responsive to a detection of an event occurrence associated with the refrigerator, wherein the event occurrence is associated with a need to replace a water filter associated with the refrigerator; and

accessing, with the computing device, data associated with the refrigerator responsive to the optical machine-readable representation, the data indicative of commercial information associated with purchasing a replacement water filter.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein accessing, with the computing device, data associated with the refrigerator responsive to the optical machine-readable representation comprises:

transmitting, from the computing device to a server, a signal indicative of the optical machine-readable representation of information displayed on the display of the refrigerator over a network; and

receiving, at the computing device, the data associated with the refrigerator from the server responsive to the signal indicative of the optical machine-readable representation of information.

3. The method as in claim 1, wherein capturing, at a computing device, information indicative of an optical machine-readable representation comprises capturing a digital image of the optical machine-readable representation.

4. The method as in claim 1, wherein the method comprises placing the computing device in proximity to the refrigerator such that the computing device receives information from the refrigerator using near-field communication.

5. The method as in claim 1, wherein the method further comprises presenting the data associated with the refrigerator in a user interface.

6. The method as in claim 1, wherein the optical machine-readable representation encodes information associated with an appliance in communication with the refrigerator.

7. The method as in claim 1, wherein the optical machine-readable representation of information is digitally encoded in a non-human readable display format.

8. The method as in claim 6, wherein the digitally encoded display format comprises a digital image.

9. The method as in claim 1, further comprising transmitting the data associated with the refrigerator from the computing device to the refrigerator.

10. A refrigerator, comprising:

a display;

a controller, the controller configured to execute computer-readable instructions stored in a memory to cause the controller to perform operations, the operations, the operations comprising;

detecting an event occurrence for the refrigerator, the event occurrence being associated with a need to replace a water filter associated with the refrigerator;

identifying information associated with the event occurrence, the information comprising commercial information associated with purchasing a replacement water filter;

encoding the information associated with the event occurrence in a non-human readable optical machine-readable representation, the optical machine-readable representation digitally encoded in a nonhuman readable display format; and

presenting the non-human-readable optical machine readable representation on the display.

11. The refrigerator of claim 10, wherein the refrigerator further comprises an antenna capable of near field communication, the antenna configured to communicate information associated with the event occurrence.

12. The refrigerator of claim 10, wherein the non-human readable optical machine readable representation comprises a linear or matrix barcode.

13. The refrigerator of claim 10, wherein the non-human readable optical machine readable representation comprises a digital image.