Base station data embedded for transmission within information provided to a user device

• US 9,173,092 B1
• Filed: 05/16/2012
• Issued: 10/27/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 12/02/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Hohpe, Gregor
• Primary Examiner(s): Milord, Marceau
• Application Number:
  US13/473,255
• Time in Patent Office: 1,259 Days
• Field of Search: 455/41.1, 455/41.2, 455/411, 455/414.4, 455/556.2, 455/557
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0253 using browsers or web-pages for accessing management information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/08 Monitoring or testing based on specific metrics, e.g. QoS, energy consumption or environmental parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/02 Protecting privacy or anonymity, e.g. protecting personally identifiable information [PII]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 12/037 of the control plane, e.g. signalling traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/12 Messaging; Mailboxes; Announcements
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/02 Terminal devices

Abstract

Systems and methods are described herein for collecting data from a base station. Data may be collected at a base station. The data may be embedding into a URL. The URL may then be wirelessly transferring to a mobile device. The mobile device may transmit the URL to a front-end sever. Upon receiving the URL at a front-end server from the mobile device, the URL may be stripped of the embedded data. The stripped URL can be passed from the front-end server to a web server for content delivery to the user device. The front-end server may decode the data stripped from the URL to be stored as collected base station data.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for collecting data from a base station, the method comprising:

acquiring data at the base station;

embedding the acquired data into a resource locator; and

wirelessly transmitting the resource locator carrying the embedded data to a mobile device, wherein the mobile device relays the resource locator to a server for content retrieval to the mobile device, and a front-end server strips, decodes, and processes the embedded data from the resource locator.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the base station is a Near Field Communication (NFC) station and the step of wirelessly transmitting the resource locator leverages NFC.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the resource locator is a uniform resource locator (URL).

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the acquired data comprises environmental data from a sensor associated with the base station.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the acquired data comprises operational data associated with the base station.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein content retrieval to the mobile device is followed by rendering the content on a display associated with the mobile device.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the embedded data is transferred to the front-end server by the mobile device along with the primary use case of rendering content associated with the resource locator at the mobile device.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein content retrieval to the mobile device is followed by rendering the content on a display associated with the mobile device.

9. A computer program product, comprising:

a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having computer-readable program code embodied therein for collecting data from a base station, the computer-readable medium comprising computer-readable program code for;

acquiring data at the base station;

embedding, at the base station, the acquired data into a resource locator; and

transmitting, from the base station, the resource locator carrying the embedded data to a mobile device

receiving, in one or more computing devices associated with the transmitted resource locator and not otherwise in communication with the base station, the transmitted resource locator from the mobile device, and

extracting, in the one or more computing devices, the acquired data from the received resource locator.

10. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the base station is a Near Field Communication (NFC) station and the step of transmitting the resource locator leverages NFC.

11. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the resource locator is a uniform resource locator (URL).

12. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the acquired data comprises environmental data from a sensor associated with the base station.

13. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the acquired data comprises operational data associated with the base station.

14. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the embedded data is transferred to the front-end server by the mobile device along with the primary use case of rendering content associated with the resource locator at the mobile device.

15. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the resource locator comprises a bar code.

16. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the base station is a Near Field Communication (NFC) station and the step of transmitting the resource locator leverages NFC.

17. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the resource locator is a uniform resource locator (URL).

18. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the acquired data comprises environmental data from a sensor associated with the base station.

19. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein the acquired data comprises operational data associated with the base station.

20. A system for collecting data from a base station, the system comprising:

the base station;

a front-end server; and

one or more software modules configured to;

acquire data at the base station;

embed the acquired data into a resource locator;

transmit the resource locator to a mobile device using a near field communications protocol where the mobile device relays the resource locator to the front-end server;

receive the resource locator at the front-end server from the mobile device; and

extract, at the front-end server, the acquired data from the received resource locator.