Method and apparatus for configuring and controlling interfacing devices

• US 9,425,978 B2
• Filed: 01/08/2013
• Issued: 08/23/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ubiquiti Inc.
• Original Assignee: Ubiquiti Networks, Inc. (Ubiquiti Inc.)
• Inventors: Frei, Randall W., Cheng, Linker, Pera, Robert J.
• Primary Examiner(s): KASENGE, CHARLES R
• Application Number:
  US13/736,767
• Publication Number:
  US 20140005809A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,323 Days
• Field of Search: 700/90, 700/245
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/26 Power supply means, e.g. regulation thereof for memories G11C
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/10 Program control for peripheral devices G06F13/14 - G06F13/42 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 25/01 characterised by the transmission medium
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2803 Home automation networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2809 indicating that an appliance service is present in a home automation network monitoring functionality H04L43/0817; discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services, H04L67/51
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/281 indicating a format for calling an appliance service function in a home automation network for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2818 from a device located outside both the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; arrangements for transmitting signals characterised by the use of a wireless eletrical link G08C17/00; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with remote control systems H04M11/007
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2825 Reporting to a device located outside the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with telemetering systems H04M11/002
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/024 using relational databases for representation of network management data, e.g. managing via structured query language [SQL]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/065 related to network devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/10 Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/046 Interoperability with other network applications or services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/58 Message adaptation for wireless communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/256 NAT traversal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2575 using address mapping retrieval, e.g. simple traversal of user datagram protocol through session traversal utilities for NAT [STUN]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/5061 Pools of addresses
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/104 Peer-to-peer [P2P] networks
• 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: H04L 67/125 : involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/141 : Setup of application sessions admission control or resource allocation in data switching networks H04L47/70
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/289 : Intermediate processing functionally located close to the data consumer application, e.g. in same machine, in same home or in same sub-network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 : Push-based network services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/14 : Short messaging services, e.g. short message services [SMS] or unstructured supplementary service data [USSD]
• CPC Class Codes: Y02B 70/10 : Technologies improving the efficiency by using switched-mode power supplies [SMPS], i.e. efficient power electronics conversion e.g. power factor correction or reduction of losses in power supplies or efficient standby modes
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 : Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A device-controlling system configures, monitors, and controls one or more interfacing devices, such that an interfacing device can obtain and disseminate sensor data from one or more attached physical devices that include sensors for measuring physical attributes. During operation, the system can configure an interfacing device by establishing a network connection with an interfacing device, and determining one or more rules for the interfacing device. A rule can indicate an action description for performing an action, and indicates a condition that indicates criteria for processing the rule'"'"'s action description. The system can configure the interfacing device to process its associated rules.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

establishing, by a device-controlling computer, a communication session with a target sensor-interfacing device, wherein the target sensor-interfacing device obtains sensor data from one or more attached physical devices that each includes a sensor for measuring one or more physical attributes;

selecting, from a plurality of rules to be processed by a set of sensor-interfacing devices of a computer network, a rule which is to be processed by the target sensor-interfacing device, wherein a respective rule includes an action description that indicates instructions for performing an action, and the respective rule also includes a rule-triggering condition that indicates criteria for processing the respective rule'"'"'s action description;

sending, by the device-controlling computer to the target sensor-interfacing device, the rule selected for the target sensor-interfacing device to configure the target sensor-interfacing device to process the selected rule'"'"'s action description in response to the selected rule'"'"'s rule-triggering condition being satisfied by sensor measurement data from the target sensor-interfacing device or another sensor-interfacing device of the computer network;

obtaining, from the target-interfacing device over the computer network, data that includes at least a sensor measurement and a geographic location; and

in response to receiving a request, from a client device, to obtain a device-monitoring user interface (UI);

obtaining a map that covers a geographic area associated with at least the target sensor-interfacing device; and

generating and presenting the device-monitoring UI that displays the obtained map, and displays the target sensor-interfacing device and corresponding sensor measurement data over the map.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

configuring the target sensor-interfacing device to send recent sensor data to the device-controlling computer; and

in response to determining that a rule associated with the target sensor-interfacing device is satisfied based on recent data from one or more sensor-interfacing devices, modifying the target sensor-interfacing device'"'"'s operating state based on the rule'"'"'s action description.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining one or more other devices that generate sensor data associated with the one or more rules for the target sensor-interfacing device; and

wherein configuring the target sensor-interfacing device involves;

programming the target sensor-interfacing device to process the one or more rules; and

configuring the target sensor-interfacing device to subscribe to sensor data from the one or more other devices.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the data associated with a respective sensor-interfacing device includes device-accessing information for the respective device, which facilitates the client device to obtain real-time sensor data for the device-monitoring UI directly from the respective sensor-interfacing device.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the data associated with a respective device includes a set of image coordinates;

and

wherein providing the device-monitoring UI involves;

obtaining an image of an area associated with at least one sensor-interfacing device; and

generating the device-monitoring UI to display the obtained image, and to overlay the at least one sensor-interfacing device over the obtained image.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the obtained image includes a frame from a real-time video feed;

and

wherein providing the device-monitoring UI further involves updating the device-monitoring UI to display a recent frame from the real-time video feed.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the real-time video feed includes a video feed from a pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) camera;

and wherein providing the device-monitoring UI further involves;

mapping the image coordinates for a respective sensor-interfacing device to a set of coordinates associated with the frame from the PTZ camera; and

updating the device-monitoring UI to overlay the at least one sensor-interfacing device over the recent frame based on the mapped image coordinates.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the user-definable rules is a compound rule that is associated with multiple physical devices.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a command, from a client device, to control the target sensor-interfacing device;

determining an established communication session for communicating with the target sensor-interfacing device; and

configuring the target sensor-interfacing device, via the communication session, as indicated by the received command.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, from a client device, a request to obtain a rule-configuring UI, wherein the rule-configuring UI indicates one or more existing rules for one or more sensor-interfacing devices, and facilitates creating or modifying new or existing rules; and

responsive to receiving a description for a rule;

determining one or more target sensor-interfacing devices that process at least a portion of the rule'"'"'s action description;

generating a device-specific rule for a respective target device, wherein the device-specific rule includes a portion of the rule'"'"'s action description that is to be processed by the respective target device; and

configuring the respective target device to process the device-specific rule.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein configuring the target sensor-interfacing device involves one or more of:

determining a geographic location for the target sensor-interfacing device;

determining a description for one or more physical devices coupled to the target sensor-interfacing device;

generating a digital certificate for the target sensor-interfacing device; and

provisioning the target sensor-interfacing device based at least on the digital certificate.

12. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform a method, the method comprising:

establishing a communication session with a target sensor-interfacing device, wherein the target sensor-interfacing device obtains sensor data from one or more attached physical devices that each includes a sensor for measuring one or more physical attributes;

selecting, from a plurality of rules to be processed by a set of sensor-interfacing devices of a computer network, a rule which is to be processed by the target sensor-interfacing device, wherein a respective rule includes an action description that indicates instructions for performing an action, and the respective rule also includes a rule-triggering condition that indicates criteria for processing the respective rule'"'"'s action description;

sending, to the target sensor-interfacing device, the rule selected for the target sensor-interfacing device to configure the target sensor-interfacing device to process the selected rule'"'"'s action description in response to the selected rule'"'"'s rule-triggering condition being satisfied by sensor measurement data from the target sensor-interfacing device or another sensor-interfacing device of the computer network;

obtaining, from the target-interfacing device over the computer network, data that includes at least a sensor measurement and a geographic location; and

in response to receiving a request, from a client device, to obtain a device-monitoring user interface (UI);

obtaining a map that covers a geographic area associated with at least the target sensor-interfacing device; and

generating and presenting the device-monitoring UI that displays the obtained map, and displays the target sensor-interfacing device and corresponding sensor measurement data over the map.

13. An apparatus, comprising:

a processor;

a memory storing instructions that when executed by the processor cause the apparatus to implement;

a communication module to establish a communication session with a target sensor-interfacing device, wherein the target sensor-interfacing device obtains sensor data from one or more attached physical devices that each includes a sensor for measuring one or more physical attributes;

a rule-processing module to select, from a plurality of rules to be processed by a set of sensor-interfacing devices of a computer network, a rule which is to be processed by the target sensor-interfacing device, wherein a respective rule includes an action description that indicates instructions for performing an action, and the respective rule also includes a rule-triggering condition that indicates criteria for processing the respective rule'"'"'s action description; and

a device-configuring module to;

send, to the target sensor-interfacing device, the rule selected for the target sensor-interfacing device to configure the target sensor-interfacing device to process the selected rule'"'"'s action description in response to the selected rule'"'"'s rule-triggering condition being satisfied by sensor measurement data from the target sensor-interfacing device or another sensor-interfacing device of the computer network; and

a user-interfacing module to obtain, from the target-interfacing device over the computer network, data that includes at least a sensor measurement and a geographic location; and

wherein in response to receiving a request, from a client device, to obtain a device-monitoring user interface (UI), the user-interfacing module is further configured to;

obtain a map that covers a geographic area associated with at least the target sensor-interfacing device; and

generate and present the device-monitoring UI that displays the obtained map, and display the target sensor-interfacing device and corresponding sensor measurement data over the map.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the device-configuring module is further configured to:

configure the target sensor-interfacing device to send recent sensor data to the device-controlling computer; and

modify the target sensor-interfacing device'"'"'s operating state based on the rule'"'"'s action description, in response to determining that a rule associated with the target sensor-interfacing device is satisfied based on recent data from one or more sensor-interfacing devices.

15. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the rule-processing module is further configured to determine one or more other devices that generate sensor data associated with the one or more rules for the sensor-interfacing device;

and

wherein while configuring the target sensor-interfacing device, the device-configuring module is further configured to;

program the target sensor-interfacing device to process the one or more rules; and

configure the target sensor-interfacing device to subscribe to sensor data from the one or more other devices.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the data associated with a respective sensor-interfacing device includes device-accessing information for the respective device, which facilitates the client device to obtain real-time sensor data for the device-monitoring UI directly from the respective sensor-interfacing device.

17. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the data associated with a respective device includes a set of image coordinates;

and

wherein while providing the device-monitoring UI, the user-interfacing module is further configured to;

obtain an image of an area associated with at least one sensor-interfacing device; and

generate the device-monitoring UI to display the obtained image, and to overlay the at least one sensor-interfacing device over the obtained image.

18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the obtained image includes a frame from a real-time video feed;

and

wherein while providing the device-monitoring UI, the user-interfacing module is further configured to update the device-monitoring UI to display a recent frame from the real-time video feed.

19. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the real-time video feed includes a video feed from a pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) camera;

and

wherein while providing the device-monitoring UI, the user-interfacing module is further configured to;

map the image coordinates for a respective sensor-interfacing device to a set of coordinates associated with the frame from the PTZ camera; and

update the device-monitoring UI to overlay the at least one sensor-interfacing device over the recent frame based on the mapped image coordinates.

20. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein at least one of the user-definable rules includes a compound rule that is associated with multiple physical devices.

21. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the device-configuring module is further configured to:

receive a command, from a client device, to control the target sensor-interfacing device;

determine an established communication session for communicating with the target sensor-interfacing device; and

configure the target sensor-interfacing device, via the communication session, as indicated by the received command.

22. The apparatus of claim 13, further comprising a user-interfacing module to:

receive, from a client device, a request to obtain a rule-configuring UI, wherein the rule-configuring UI indicates one or more existing rules for one or more sensor-interfacing devices, and facilitates creating or modifying new or existing rules; and

responsive to receiving a description for a rule;

determine one or more target sensor-interfacing devices that process at least a portion of the rule'"'"'s action description;

generate a device-specific rule for a respective target device, wherein the device-specific rule includes a portion of the rule'"'"'s action description that is to be processed by the respective target device; and

configure the respective target device to process the device-specific rule.

23. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein while configuring the sensor-interfacing device, the device-configuring module is further configured to perform one or more of:

determining a geographic location for the target sensor-interfacing device;

determining a description for one or more physical devices coupled to the target sensor-interfacing device;

generating a digital certificate for the target sensor-interfacing device; and

provisioning the target sensor-interfacing device based at least on the digital certificate.