Method and apparatus for pre-fetching place page data for subsequent display on a mobile computing device

• US 9,305,107 B2
• Filed: 12/08/2011
• Issued: 04/05/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 12/08/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Siliski, Michael, Sasaki, Takeshi
• Primary Examiner(s): Bengzon, Greg C
• Application Number:
  US13/314,925
• Publication Number:
  US 20130151645A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,580 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/27 Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2216/13 Prefetching
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/60 Editing figures and text; Combining figures or text
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2210/32 Image data format
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/5681 Pre-fetching or pre-delivering data based on network characteristics
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/18 Information format or content conversion, e.g. adaptation by the network of the transmitted or received information for the purpose of wireless delivery to users or terminals

Abstract

A computer-implemented method and system for pre-fetching place page data from a remote mapping system for display on a client computing device is disclosed. User preference data collected from various data sources including applications executing on the client device, online or local user profiles, and other sources may be analyzed to generate a request for place page data from the remote mapping system. The user preference data may indicate a map feature such as a place of business, park, or historic landmark having the characteristics of both a user'"'"'s preferred geographic location and the user'"'"'s personal interests. For example, where the user indicates a geographic preference for “Boston” and a personal interest for “home brewing” the system and method may request place page data for all home brewing or craft beer-related map features near Boston.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for pre-fetching place page data to a mapping application executing on a client computing device from a remote mapping system for subsequent display on the client computing device, the method comprising:

analyzing, by one or more processors, user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data to determine user preference data, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes data indicating one or more particular map locations that are preferred by a user of the client computing device and the user personal interest data includes data indicating personal interests of the user;

analyzing, by one or more processors, the user preference data to determine;

(i) map data in a vector format for rendering an interactive digital map of the one or more particular map locations at a certain zoom level, and (ii) one or more matched place page data of the remote mapping system corresponding to the personal interests of the user at the one or more particular map locations, wherein the place page data includes one or more of text, graphics, and data feed data describing a map feature, wherein at least some of the place page data corresponds to a zoom level other than the certain zoom level of the map data; and

wherein the map data and the place page data correspond to a same geographic region, including analyzing timestamp information associated with the user preference data to determine whether the place page data for the one or more particular map locations should be cached;

sending the map data and the matched place page data from the remote mapping system to the client computing device, including sending the map data separately from the place page data, so that the place page data is available independent of all or some of the memory burden of the corresponding map data;

storing the map data and the matched place page data in a cache memory of the client computing device; and

subsequently retrieving the map data and the matched place page data from the cache memory of the client computing device without further communication between the remote mapping system and the client computing device.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising retrieving the user preferred geographic location data from a mapping application of the client computing device.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes one or more of a city name, an address, an airport code, or global positioning system coordinates.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the user preferred geographic location data is indicated by one or more of a GPS position that was flagged using the mapping application, a geographic location returned to the client computing device by the remote mapping system, and a geographic location having an indicated preference.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising retrieving the user personal interests data from one or more of a social networking application, an e-mail application, and a web browser of the client computing device.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the user personal interests data includes one or more of user profile data, social networking data, web browser history data, e-mail text, and calendar appointment data.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein sending the map data and the matched place page data from the remote mapping system to the client computing device includes sending the place page data at a zoom level at which the map data is not visible.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

periodically sending user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data from the client computing device to a backend user preferences system, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes data indicating one or more particular map locations that are preferred by a user of the client computing device and user personal interest data indicative of personal interests of the user.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the user preferred geographic location data is indicated by one or more of a GPS position that was flagged using a mapping application of the client computing device, a geographic location returned to the client computing device by the remote mapping system, and a geographic location having an indicated preference.

7. A computer-implemented method for pre-fetching place page data from a remote mapping system to a mapping application for subsequent display on a client computing device executing the mapping application during conditions of no connectivity between the remote mapping system and the client computing device, the method comprising:

periodically sending user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data from the client computing device to a backend user preferences system, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes data indicating one or more particular map locations that are preferred by a user of the client computing device and user personal interest data indicative of personal interests of the user, wherein the backend user preferences system analyzing timestamp information associated with preference data for the user to determine whether the place page data for the one or more particular map locations should be cached;

receiving (i) map data in a vector format for rendering an interactive digital map of the one or more particular map locations at a certain zoom level, and (ii) place page data corresponding to the personal interests of the user at the one or more particular map locations from the remote mapping system in response to the sent user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data, the place page data including one or more of text, graphics, and data feed data describing a map feature, including receiving the map data separately from the place page data, so that the place page data is available independent of all or some of the memory burden of the corresponding map data, wherein at least some of the place page data corresponds to a zoom level other than the certain zoom level of the map data; and

wherein the map data and the place page data correspond to a same geographic region;

storing the map data and the place page data in a cache memory of the client computing device; and

subsequently retrieving the map data and the place page data from the cache memory of the client computing device without further communication between the remote mapping system and the client computing device.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes one or more of a city name, an address, an airport code, or global positioning system coordinates.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the user preferred geographic location data is indicated by one or more of a GPS position that was flagged using the mapping application, a geographic location returned to the client computing device by the remote mapping system, and a geographic location having an indicated preference.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein periodically sending user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data from the client computing device to a backend user preferences system includes periodically sending the user personal interests data from one or more of a social networking application, an e-mail application, and a web browser of the client computing device.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the user personal interests data includes one or more of user profile data, social networking data, web browser history data, e-mail text, and calendar appointment data.

12. A client computing device comprising:

a processor;

a transceiver to communicate with a backend user preferences system via a network connection;

a cache memory; and

a memory storing an application and instructions for execution by the processor, the instructions causing the processor to;

periodically cause user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data to be sent from the client computing device to the backend user preferences system via the network connection, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes data indicating one or more particular map locations that are preferred by a user of the client computing device and user personal interest data indicative of personal interests of the user, wherein the backend user preferences system analyzing timestamp information associated with preference data for the user to determine whether the place page data for the one or more particular map locations should be cached,

receive (i) map data in a vector format for rendering an interactive digital map of the one or more particular map locations at a certain zoom level, and (ii) place page data corresponding to the personal interests of the user at the one or more particular map locations from a remote mapping system via the network connection, the place page data received in response to the sent user preferred geographic location data and user personal interests data, the place page data including one or more of text, graphics, and data feed data describing a map feature, wherein at least some of the place page data corresponds to a zoom level other than the certain zoom level of the map data;

wherein the map data and the place page data correspond to a same geographic region, wherein the map data is received separately from the place page data, so that the place page data is available independent of all or some of the memory burden of the corresponding map data,

store the received map data and the place page data in the cache memory; and

display the map data and the place page data from the cache memory without further communication between the remote mapping system and the client computing device.

13. The client computing device of claim 12, wherein the user preferred geographic location data includes one or more of a city name, an address, an airport code, or global positioning system coordinates.

14. The client computing device of claim 12, wherein the user preferred geographic location data is indicated by one or more of a GPS position that was flagged using the mapping application, a geographic location returned to the client computing device by the remote mapping system, and a geographic location having an indicated preference.

15. The client computing device of claim 14, wherein the user personal interests data includes one or more of user profile data, social networking data, web browser history data, e-mail text, and calendar appointment data.

17. A method in client computing devices for pre-fetching place page data for subsequent display, the method comprising:

requesting, at a client computing device from a remote mapping system, (i) map data in a vector format for rendering an interactive digital map for a certain geographic region at a certain zoom level, and (ii) place page data corresponding to the personal interests of the user at the same geographic region, the place page data including one or more of text, graphics, and data feed data describing a map feature, wherein the remote mapping system analyzes timestamp information associated with preference data for the user to determine whether the place page data for the one or more particular map locations should be cached;

receiving, from the remote mapping system, the map data and the place page data for the geographic region, including receiving place page data without accompanying map data for a portion of the geographic region, so that the place page data is available independent of all or some of the memory burden of the corresponding map data;

storing the received map data and the received place page data in a cache memory of the client computing device;

subsequently retrieving the map data and the place page data from the cache memory of the client computing device without further communication between the remote mapping system and the client computing device; and

displaying the retrieved map data and place page at the client device, including displaying place page data without also displaying map data that includes features described by the place page data for the at least the portion of the geographic region.