Map-updating-data creating method, and map updating method and apparatus

• US 20060190166A1
• Filed: 02/07/2006
• Published: 08/24/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 02/10/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (Honda Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Alpine Electronics Incorporated (Alps Alpine Co., Ltd.), Mobilemedia Brain Association,Inc.
• Inventors: Sekine, Minoru, Ohira, Masaaki
• Granted Patent: US 7,395,150 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/208
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3859 Differential updating map data

Abstract

A map-updating-data creating apparatus performs, for each old map file, creating a map-updating file for rewriting the map file to a new map file, determining the serial number of each of the updated map files, creating a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to the serial numbers, and generating, as map-updating data, the map-updating file and the serial number management file. A navigation apparatus performs map-updating processing and determines, by referring to the serial number management file, whether a map file has already been updated. The navigation apparatus uses the map-updating file to execute navigation control if the map file has already been updated, and updates the map file and subsequently executes the navigation control if the map file has not been updated.

Claims

1. A map updating method for a navigation apparatus for using map-updating data to update an old map file stored in a map storage unit to create a new map file, the map updating method comprising:

performing sequential map-updating processing on a plurality of map files utilizing the map-updating data;

determining whether or not a necessary map file required for navigation control contains up-to-date map data; and

either executing navigation control by using the necessary map file if the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data, or, if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data then using the map-updating data to update the necessary map file and subsequently execute navigation control using the updated necessary map file.

2. The map updating method according to claim 1, further comprising performing the sequential map-updating processing while the navigation apparatus is not performing navigation processing.

3. The map updating method according to claim 2, further comprising:

if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data, interrupting the sequential map-updating processing; and

after using the map-updating data to update the necessary map file, restarting the sequential map-updating processing in order.

4. The map updating method according to claim 1, further comprising:

together with a map-updating file, acquiring a serial number management file having marks written at positions corresponding to the serial numbers of all map files obtained after the sequential map-updating processing finishes; and

assigning to an updated map file a new serial number, without changing a previously assigned serial number of a non-updated map file,

wherein the determination of whether or not a necessary map file required for navigation control contains up-to-date map data comprises;

checking whether or not a mark is written at a position in the serial number management file that corresponds to the serial number of the necessary map file, the mark indicating whether or not the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data.

5. The map updating method according to claim 4, wherein:

the serial number management file is a file having N bytes, and the bit positions of bytes from the first byte to the N-th byte correspond to the serial numbers; and

by writing a logical one at one bit position, one mark is written.

6. The map updating method according to claim 4, wherein performing the sequential map-updating processing comprises:

determining whether or not the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data by referring to the serial number of the necessary map file and the serial number management file; and

if the map file contains up-to-date map data, performing the sequential map-updating processing on the next map file.

7. The map updating method according to claim 1, wherein performing the sequential map-updating processing comprises:

specifying one of a geographical region and a predetermined location; and

prioritizing updating a map file relating to one of the geographical region and a region within a set distance range from the predetermined location.

8. A map-updating-data creating method for updating old map data to new map data, the old map data including a plurality of old map files, the map-updating-data creating method comprising:

for each old map file to be updated, creating a map-updating file for rewriting the old map file to a new map file;

determining new serial numbers of updated map files in such a manner that previously assigned old serial numbers of non-updated map files are not changed and the new serial numbers sequentially follow the old serial numbers;

creating a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to the new and old serial numbers of all the map files; and

generating map-updating data, the map-dating data including the map-updating file and the serial number management file.

9. The map updating method according to claim 8, wherein, upon finishing creating a map-updating file for a predetermined map file, creating the serial number management file comprises, within the serial number management file, deleting a first mark at a position corresponding to an old serial number of the predetermined map file and writing a second mark at a position corresponding to a new serial number of the predetermined map file.

10. The map updating method according to claim 9, wherein:

the serial number management file is a file having N bytes, and the bit positions of bytes from the first byte to the N-th byte correspond to serial numbers; and

the second mark is written by writing a logical one at each bit position and the first mark is deleted by writing a logical zero at the bit position.

11. A navigation apparatus for updating an old map file stored in a storage unit to a new map file by using map-updating data, the navigation apparatus comprising:

a storage unit operable to store old map data;

a reading/writing control unit operable to control reading of the old map data from the storage unit and writing of new map data into the storage unit; and

a control unit operable to perform sequential map-data processing associated with updating a plurality of map files using map-updating data and to determine whether or not a necessary map file required for navigation control contains up-to-date map data,

wherein if the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data then the necessary map file is used to execute navigation control, and, if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data then the map-updating data is used to update the necessary map file and subsequently the updated necessary map file is used to execute navigation control.

12. The navigation apparatus according to claim 11, comprising:

a map-updating-data generating unit operable to generate the map-updating data;

the control unit is operable to create a new map file using the map-updating data if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data; and

a navigation control unit operable to perform navigation control using the new map file.

13. The navigation apparatus according to claim 11, wherein the control unit is operable to perform the sequential map-updating processing while not simultaneously performing processing associated with navigation control.

14. The navigation apparatus according to claim 11, wherein, if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data, the control unit updates the necessary map file using the map-updating data, and subsequently restarts the sequential map-updating processing in order.

15. The navigation apparatus according to claim 11, wherein:

the control unit includes a file storage unit which acquires and stores the map-updating data, the map-updating data including a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to the serial numbers of all map files obtained after the sequential map-updating processing finishes; and

the control unit is operable to assign a new serial number to an updated map file without changing a previously assigned serial number of a non-updated map file, and, by checking whether or not a mark is written at a position in the serial number management file which corresponds to the serial number of the necessary map file, it is determined whether or not the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data.

16. The navigation apparatus according to claim 15, wherein the serial number management file is a file having N bytes, and the bit positions of bytes from the first byte to the N-th byte correspond to the serial numbers.

17. The navigation apparatus according to claim 11, further comprising a data unit operable to specify one of a geographical region and a predetermined location, and to prioritize updating a map file relating to one of the geographical region and a region within a set distance range from the predetermined location.

18. A map-updating-data creating apparatus for creating map-updating data, the map-updating data being used to update old map data to new map data, the old map data including a plurality of old map files, the map-updating-data creating apparatus comprising:

a map file unit operable to transfer map files;

a processing unit operable to create, for each old map file to be updated, a map-updating file for rewriting the old map file to a new map file, and to determine the serial numbers of updated map files in such a manner that previously assigned old serial numbers of map files not being updated are not changed and new serial numbers following the old serial numbers are assigned in ascending order to map files being updated, and to create a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to the serial numbers; and

a map-updating-data unit operable to generate map-updating data, the map-updating data including the map-updating file and the serial number management file.

19. The map-updating-data creating apparatus according to claim 18, further comprising a storage unit operable to store the serial number management file.

20. The map-updating-data creating apparatus according to claim 18, wherein when creating the serial number management file, the processing unit deletes a first mark in the serial number management file at one position corresponding to an old serial number of a map file being updated, and writes a second mark in the serial number management file at another position corresponding to a new serial number of the map file being updated.

21. The map-updating-data creating apparatus according to claim 20, wherein:

the serial number management file is a file having N bytes, and the bit positions of bytes from the first byte to the N-th byte correspond to the serial numbers; and

the second mark is written by writing a logical one at a bit position and the first mark is deleted by writing a logical zero at the bit position.

22. A map-data updating method for updating old map data to new map data, the old map data including a plurality of old map files, the map-data updating method comprising:

for each old map file to be updated, creating a map-updating file for rewriting the old map file to a new map file;

determining serial numbers of updated map files in such a manner that previously assigned old serial numbers of map files which are not updated are not changed and new serial numbers which follow the previously assigned serial numbers are assigned in ascending order to map files which are updated;

creating a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to the serial numbers of map files received;

generating map-updating data, the map-updating data including the map-updating file and the serial number management file;

using the map-updating data to perform sequential map-updating processing; and

determining whether or not a necessary map file required for navigation control contains up-to-date map data by referring to the serial number management file, wherein if the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data then the necessary map file is used to execute the navigation control, and alternatively, if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data then the necessary map file is updated using the map-updating data and subsequently the updated necessary map file is used to execute the navigation control.

23. A map-data updating system for updating old map data to new map data, comprising;

a map-updating-data creating apparatus operable to create map-updating data for updating old map data to new map data, the old map data including a plurality of old map files; and

a navigation apparatus operable to perform map updating using the map-updating data,

wherein;

the map-updating-data creating apparatus comprises;

a map file unit operable to transfer old map files and new map files;

a processing unit operable to create, for each old map file to be updated, a map-updating file for rewriting the old map file to a new map file, and to determine the serial numbers of updated map files in such a manner that the previously assigned old serial numbers of map files not being updated are not changed and new serial numbers sequentially following the old serial numbers are assigned to map files being updated, and to create a serial number management file in which marks are respectively written at positions corresponding to all the serial numbers; and

a map-updating-data unit operable to generate map-updating data, the map-updating data including the map-updating file and the serial number management file; and

the navigation apparatus comprises;

a storage unit operable to store the old map data;

a reading/writing control unit operable to control reading of the old map data from the storage unit and writing of the new map data into the storage unit;

a map-updating-data input unit operable to transfer the map-updating data; and

a control unit operable to perform map-updating processing by using the map-updating data, and to determine whether or not a necessary map file required for navigation control contains up-to-date map data,

wherein if the necessary map file contains up-to-date map data then the necessary map file is used to execute the navigation control, and, if the necessary map file does not contain up-to-date map data then the map-updating data is used to update the necessary map file and subsequently the updated necessary map file is used to execute the navigation control.