Method and apparatus for distributing sensor data

• US 9,351,246 B2
• Filed: 07/15/2011
• Issued: 05/24/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 07/15/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nokia Technologies Oy (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Nokia Technologies Oy (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Nieminen, Johanna, Savolainen, Teemu Ilmari, Isomki, Markus Sakari, Mutikainen, Jari
• Primary Examiner(s): Elliott, IV, Benjamin H
• Application Number:
  US14/130,633
• Publication Number:
  US 20140140254A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,775 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0484 for the control of specific functions or operations, e.g. selecting or manipulating an object, an image or a displayed text element, setting a parameter value or selecting a range
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/74 Address processing for routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0209 in terminal devices terminal devices per se H04W88/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

Various methods for distributing a single stream of sensor data to one or more services are provided. One example method may include maintaining an association between sensor data and one or more services requesting the sensor data. The method of this example embodiment may further comprise receiving the sensor data. The example method may further comprise generating one or more copies of the sensor data. The example method may also comprise providing for distribution of the copies of the sensor data to the services requesting the sensor data, such that a copy of the sensor data is provided for distribution to each of the services requesting the sensor data. Similar and related example methods, example apparatuses, and example computer program products are also provided.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

maintaining, at a gateway, an association between sensor data and one or more services requesting the sensor data from a wireless sensor;

receiving a frequency parameter for each of the one or more services requesting the sensor data, wherein each of the frequency parameters provides an indication of a frequency for providing the sensor data to the respective service;

determining, from the frequency parameters, which of the frequency parameters has a higher frequency;

providing, by the gateway, for transmission of a request for sensor data from the wireless sensor, wherein the request indicates a rate at which the sensor data is to be sent by the wireless sensor to the gateway, wherein the rate represents the higher frequency;

receiving, at the rate requested, the sensor data generated by the wireless sensor;

generating, from the received sensor data, one or more copies of the sensor data; and

providing, by the gateway, for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving the sensor data further comprises receiving a first sensor data packet, wherein the first sensor data packet comprises an indication of a destination address of the first sensor data packet.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the generating the one or more copies of the sensor data further comprises:

extracting the sensor data from the first sensor data packet;

creating a second sensor data packet; and

inserting the extracted sensor data from the first sensor data packet into the second sensor data packet.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the generating the one or more copies of the sensor data further comprises:

generating one or more copies of the first sensor data packet; and

modifying the indication of the destination address of each of the one or more copies of the first sensor data packet, wherein the destination address of each of the one or more copies of the first sensor data packet is modified to the address of a corresponding one of the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the indication of the destination address of the first sensor data packet comprises a multicast address associated with a multicast group, and wherein the providing for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to the one or more services requesting the sensor data further comprises:

providing for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to one or more services subscribing to the multicast group associated with the multicast address.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving the sensor data further comprises receiving sensor data at the frequency indicated by the frequency parameter having the higher frequency, and wherein to provide for distribution of one of the one or more copies of the sensor data to a corresponding one of the one or more services requesting the sensor data, the method further comprises:

determining the frequency parameter associated with the one of the one or more services requesting sensor data;

sampling the received sensor data at a frequency indicated by the frequency parameter; and

providing for transmission of the sampled sensor data to the one of the one or more services requesting sensor data.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing for display of a user interface, wherein the user interface allows a user to configure the association between the sensor data and the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

accepting a connection from a sensor apparatus providing the sensor data;

connecting to the one or more services; and

attaching the connection to the sensor apparatus with one or more connections to the one or more services.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the higher frequency corresponds to a higher frequency between two services requesting the sensor data from the wireless sensor.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the higher frequency corresponds to a highest rate at which a plurality of services request the sensor data from the wireless sensor.

11. An apparatus comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory comprising computer program code, the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to;

maintain an association between sensor data and one or more services requesting the sensor data from a wireless sensor;

receive a frequency parameter for each of the one or more services requesting the sensor data, wherein each of the frequency parameters provides an indication of a frequency for providing the sensor data to the respective service;

determine, from the frequency parameters, which of the frequency parameters has a higher frequency; and

provide for transmission of a request for sensor data from the wireless sensor, wherein the request indicates a rate at which the sensor data is to be sent by the wireless sensor to the gateway, wherein the rate represents the higher frequency;

receive, at the rate requested, the sensor data generated by the wireless sensor;

generate, from the received sensor data, one or more copies of the sensor data; and

provide for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the receiving the sensor data further comprises receiving a first sensor data packet, wherein the first sensor data packet comprises an indication of a destination address of the first sensor data packet.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein in order to generate one or more copies of the sensor data, the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

extract the sensor data from the first sensor data packet;

create a second sensor data packet; and

insert the extracted sensor data from the first sensor data packet into the second sensor data packet.

14. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein in order to generate one or more copies of the sensor data, the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

generate one or more copies of the first sensor data packet; and

modify the indication of the destination address of each of the one or more copies of the first sensor data packet, wherein the destination address of each of the one or more copies of the first sensor data packet is modified to the address of a corresponding one of the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

15. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein the indication of the destination address of the first sensor data packet comprises a multicast address associated with a multicast group, and wherein in order to provide for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to the one or more services requesting the sensor data, the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

provide for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to one or more services subscribing to the multicast group associated with the multicast address.

16. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein receiving sensor data further comprises receiving sensor data at the frequency indicated by the frequency parameter having the higher frequency, and wherein in order to provide for distribution of one of the one or more copies of the sensor data to a corresponding one of the one or more services requesting the sensor data, the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

determine the frequency parameter associated with the one of the one or more services requesting sensor data;

sample the received sensor data at a frequency indicated by the frequency parameter; and

provide for transmission of the sampled sensor data to the one of the one or more services requesting sensor data.

17. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

provide for display of a user interface, wherein the user interface allows a user to configure the association between the sensor data and the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

18. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the at least one memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to:

accept a connection from a sensor apparatus providing the sensor data;

connect to the one or more services; and

attach the connection to the sensor apparatus with one or more connections to the one or more services.

19. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable medium encoded with instructions that, when executed by at least one processor, perform at least the following:

maintaining, at a gateway, an association between sensor data and one or more services requesting the sensor data from a wireless sensor;

receiving a frequency parameter for each of the one or more services requesting the sensor data, wherein each of the frequency parameters provides an indication of a frequency for providing the sensor data to the respective service;

determining, from the frequency parameters, which of the frequency parameters has a higher frequency;

providing, by the gateway, for transmission of a request for sensor data from the wireless sensor, wherein the request indicates a rate at which the sensor data is to be sent by the wireless sensor to the gateway, wherein the rate represents the higher frequency;

receiving, at the rate requested, the sensor data generated by the wireless sensor;

generating from the received sensor data, one or more copies of the sensor data; and

providing, by the gateway, for distribution of the one or more copies of the sensor data to the one or more services requesting the sensor data.

20. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the receiving the sensor data further comprises receiving a first sensor data packet, wherein the first sensor data packet comprises an indication of a destination address of the first sensor data packet.

21. A method comprising:

maintaining, at a gateway, an association between sensor data generated by a sensor and a plurality of services requesting the sensor data generated by the sensor, the plurality of services comprising a first service and a second service;

receiving, at the gateway, a first frequency parameter and a second frequency parameter, wherein the first frequency parameter indicates a first rate at which the sensor data is to be provided to the first service and the second frequency parameter indicates a second rate at which the sensor data is to be provided to the second service;

providing for transmission of a request for sensor data from the sensor, wherein the request indicates a rate at which the sensor data is to be sent from the sensor to the gateway, wherein rate is determined by the gateway based on at least the received first rate and the received second rate;

receiving, at the rate requested, the sensor data from the sensor;

generating, from the received sensor data, one or more copies of the received sensor data; and

distributing, by the gateway and on behalf of the sensor, the one or more copies of the sensor data to the plurality of services requesting the sensor data.

22. The method of claim 21 further comprising:

determining, at the gateway, whether the first frequency parameter is greater than the second frequency parameter.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein the rate, at which the sensor data is to be sent by the sensor to the gateway, is the first rate, when the first rate is greater than the second rate.

24. The method of claim 21, wherein the rate, at which the sensor data is to be sent by the sensor to the gateway, is the second rate, when the second rate is greater than the first rate.

25. The method of claim 21, wherein the sensor comprises a wireless device including a Bluetooth transceiver, a Bluetooth Low Energy transceiver, and/or a near field communication transceiver.

26. The method of claim 21, wherein the gateway comprises a mobile phone and/or a home gateway.