APPARATUS, SYSTEM, AND METHOD FOR ORGANIZING INFORMATION BY TIME AND PLACE

• US 20090164439A1
• Filed: 12/19/2008
• Published: 06/25/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/19/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Temporal LLC
• Original Assignee: Temporal LLC
• Inventors: Nevins, David C.
• Granted Patent: US 8,994,731 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2477 Temporal data queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases

Abstract

An apparatus and method for capturing and organizing information spatio-temporally utilizes a standardized time reference and geographical locations to associate a time and a place to each event that is captured. These events are placed in a coordinate system according to the associated times and places. The apparatus and method may use a meridial clock. A series of related events forms an event path that progresses chronologically. Plural event paths are illustrated in a coordinate system based image of a user interface. Events from different event paths are synchronized so that events that occur in a particular moment are placed in the same time plane. As time progresses, the events emit from the plane into a region representing the past, and a relationship of events with their times and places is illustrated. A map in the plane of the image may facilitate visualization of places and times with events.

Claims

1. An apparatus including a computer readable storage medium encoded with instructions capable of being executed by a computer for recording information by time and place, the apparatus comprising:

a capture module configured to capture information including at least a time and a place of an event; and

a plot module configured to place the information in a coordinate system having at least a first variable representing times and at least a second variable representing places;

wherein the information is placed in the coordinate system such that the time and the place are correlated.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein:

the capture module captures information from a plurality of times and places for a plurality of events; and

the plot module places the information from the plurality of times and places for the plurality of events in the coordinate system.

3. The apparatus of claim 2, further comprising a user interface module, the user interface module configured to provide a universal information source of events organized by time and place.

4. The apparatus of claim 3, wherein the user interface module is configured to enable a user to access information on a particular event by zooming in on at least one of a place and a time among the plurality of times and places in the coordinate system.

5. The apparatus of claim 2, further comprising a correlation module configured to:

correlate a particular element of time information with a particular element of location information for a particular event; and

associate a series of events with each other to form an event path in which each of the series of events has at least one of an individual, animal, vegetation, object, and process in common with another of the series of events.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the correlation module forms a plurality of distinct event paths, the apparatus further comprising a user interface module configured to present the plurality of event paths on the coordinate system such that the event paths are correlated by time and location.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a third variable, wherein the second variable is a variable value on an x-axis representing a location in a first dimension of two dimensional space and the third variable is a variable value on a y-axis representing a location in a second dimension of the two dimensional space.

8. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein:

the coordinate system is a three dimensional coordinate system; and

the first variable is a variable value on a z-axis representing at least one of a time and a location in a third dimension of the three dimensional space.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising a fourth variable that is an alternative variable value on the z-axis wherein the first variable represents time and the fourth variable representing a location in the third dimension of a Cartesian coordinate system.

10. The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a correlation module configured to correlate a particular element of time information with a particular element of location information for a particular event.

11. An apparatus to organize information by place and time, the apparatus comprising:

a capture module that captures event information, location information, and time information;

a correlation module that correlates a particular unit of the event information, a particular unit of the location information, and a particular unit of the time information as a particular event in a plurality of events; and

a plot module that plots the particular event of the plurality of events on at least one member of a group consisting of an x-axis and a y-axis of a Cartesian coordinate system from the unit of location information correlated with the particular event and on a z-axis of the Cartesian coordinate system from the unit of time information correlated with the particular event.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the particular unit of event information correlated with the particular event includes information that identifies the particular event with one member of a first group comprising a single user, a group of users, an individual who is not a user, a group with at least one individual who is not a user, an object, a group of objects, an animal, a group of animals, a unit of vegetation, a group of units of vegetation, a phenomenon, a group of phenomena, a record stored in at least one electronic storage device, a group of records stored in at least one electronic storage device, a process executing on at least one computer, a group of processes executing on at least one computer, a related series of events, and a location.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein each event of the plurality of events belongs to the same member of the first group and wherein the plot module plots the plurality of events as one member of a second group comprising an event path and a location pipeline.

14. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein at least one of the particular unit of event information, the particular unit of location information, and the particular unit of time information includes a capture of information from a group comprising a record stored in at least one electronic storage device, an image from a scanner, input from a user interface, a process executing on at least one computer, a position device, and media data, wherein the position device is selected from one member of a group comprising a Global Positioning System, an Inertial Measurement Unit, a device reading a Radio Frequency Identification, and a sensor, and wherein the media data is selected from one format of a group of formats comprising audio, at least one picture, video, and graphics.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, further comprising a search module that allows a user to search a database storing event information, location information, and time information correlated as events by at least one category of a group of categories comprising individual user, group of users, place, time, and event.

16. The apparatus of claim 15, further comprising an event-player module that sequentially plays individual captures of information from a group of at least one selected series of events as those events are plotted along the z-axis.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the event-player module also plays compatible individual captures of information concurrently in real time, wherein compatible individual captures of information comprise at least one image and audio, and wherein the at least one image and the audio are from related regions of the z-axis.

18. The apparatus of claim 17, further comprising a temporal zoom module that allows a user to select a region of the z-axis for display and for play by the event-player module.

19. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising a peer-to-peer module that allows a particular individual user to register over a network to store a series of events associated with the particular user in the database and to access the series of events pertaining to the particular individual user and a plurality of events not submitted to the database by the particular user.

20. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising a location zoom module that allows a user to select the size of the region of at least one of the x-axis and the y-axis for display.

21. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising an event-horizon module, wherein the event-horizon module plots the location of at least one event on the x-axis, the y-axis, and the z-axis of a Cartesian coordinate system.

22. A method of correlating information based on time and location, the method comprising placing event information in a coordinate system having variables representing time and location.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein placing the event information in a coordinate system having variables representing time and location comprises facilitating access to the information universally.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein placing the event information in a coordinate system having variables representing time and location comprises representing time in a standardized time reference.