Irrigation controller wireless network adapter and networked remote service

• US 10,292,343 B2
• Filed: 09/20/2016
• Issued: 05/21/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 08/01/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rain Bird Corporation
• Original Assignee: Rain Bird Corporation
• Inventors: Weiler, Steven W., Redmond, David M., Nickerson, Harvey J., Crist, Timothy J., Decker, Gregory W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Masinick, Michael D
• Application Number:
  US15/270,986
• Publication Number:
  US 20170006787A1
• Time in Patent Office: 973 Days
• CPC Class Codes: A01G 25/16 Control of watering
• CPC Class Codes: A01G 25/165 Cyclic operations, timing systems, timing valves, impulse operations
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/0426 Programming the control sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/02 Agriculture; Fishing; Forestry; Mining
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/102 Entity profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 92/10 between terminal device and access point, i.e. wireless air interface

Abstract

Some embodiments provide systems for use in controlling irrigation, comprising: an irrigation controller configured to couple with one or more valves at a site and to control activation and deactivation of the one or more valves in accordance with an irrigation schedule stored in the irrigation controller; a wireless adapter directly communicationally coupled through a direct wired connection with the irrigation controller; and a network adapter wirelessly coupled over a point-to-point wireless communication path with the wireless adapter, wherein the network adapter is configured to further couple through a direct wired connection with a local router configured to provide communication over a distributed network to a remote server; wherein the wireless adapter is configured to poll the irrigation controller to acquire and locally store status information; and the wireless adapter is configured to communicate, over the point-to-point wireless channel, the status information to the server.

Claims

1. A method of implementing irrigation, the method comprising:

confirming, at a server, authorized access to a first user account of multiple user accounts by a user utilizing a remote user device remote from the server and communicating with the server over a distributed communication network;

receiving, at the server, a request to associate a wireless adapter with the first user account, wherein the wireless adapter is located at a site where irrigation is to be controlled by a local irrigation controller that is separate from and coupled with the wireless adapter over a direct wireline connection, and wherein the site is remote from the server;

communicating instructions to the user device to initiate the association by pressing a communication button on the wireless adapter;

determining, at the server, whether a communication is received, from over the distributed communication network, from the wireless adapter, wherein the communication is generated from the wireless adapter in response to a user physically activating the communication button on the wireless adapter and wirelessly communicated from the wireless adapter; and

associating the wireless adapter with the first user account when the communication is received.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining whether the communication was received within a predefined threshold period of time of the time the instruction to initiate the association is transmitted from the server; and

associating the wireless adapter with the first user account comprises associating the wireless adapter with the first user account when the communication is received within the predefined threshold period of time.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving the request to associate the wireless adapter with the first user account comprises receiving, from the user device, an identifier of the wireless adapter;

determining whether an identifier extracted from the communication received from the wireless adapter correspond to the identifier received from the user device; and

wherein the associating the wireless adapter with the first user account comprises associating the wireless adapter with the first user account when the communication is received within the predefined threshold period of time and the identifier extracted from the communication received from the wireless adapter correspond to the identifier received from the user device.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

receiving, at the server, a protocol translated communication comprising the communication communicated from a network adapter over the distributed communication network, wherein the network adapter wirelessly receives the communication directly from the wireless adapter from over a point-to-point wireless communication channel between the wireless adapter and the network adapter.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, at the server, a request to associate an additional wireless adapter with the first user account;

determining whether a threshold number of wireless adapters are already associated with the first user; and

preventing the additional wireless adapter from being associated with the first user account when the threshold number of wireless adapters are already associated with the first user.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, at the server, a request to disassociate the wireless adapter with the first user account;

determining whether the user accessing the first user account has an authority to disassociate the wireless adapter; and

disassociating the wireless adapter from the first user account when user accessing the first user account has an authority to disassociate the wireless adapter.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

identifying a change to an irrigation schedule to be implemented by the irrigation controller;

calculating a predicted change in a cost of irrigation according to the change to the irrigation schedule; and

forwarding the predicted change in cost to the user device to be displayed to the user.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

communicating, over the distributed network to the user device, a user interface to be displayed on the user device and configured to allow the user to program an irrigation schedule;

identifying at least a portion of a programmed irrigation schedule; and

displaying a natural language description of at least the portion of the programmed irrigation schedule.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein displaying the natural language description comprises displaying a natural language description of one or more options selected through one or more user interfaces.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining an identification of the wireless adapter;

determining a time of transmission of a clock synchronization signal as a function of the identification of the wireless adapter; and

transmitting, from the server, the clock synchronization signal at the determined time of transmission over the distributed network to the wireless adapter, wherein the clock synchronization signal is utilized to synchronize a clock of the irrigation controller.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the time of transmission of the clock synchronization comprises an hour of transmission and a minute of transmission, wherein the determining the time of transmission of the clock synchronization comprises identifying two predefined digits of the identifier of the wireless adapter, and defining the hour of transmission by a first of the two predefined digits and the minute of transmission by a second of the two predefined digits.