METHOD FOR AUTOMATICALLY LOCATING RADIO STATIONS

• US 20120315926A1
• Filed: 11/18/2010
• Published: 12/13/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Crambo, S.A., Nilo Garcia Manchado
• Original Assignee: Crambo, S.A., Nilo Garcia Manchado
• Inventors: Garcia Manchado, Nilo
• Granted Patent: US 9,106,350 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/456.3
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 2205/01 specially adapted for specific applications
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/02 using radio waves using satellite radio beacon systems for determining position G01S19/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/435 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/93 which locates resources of other pieces of information, e.g. URL [Uniform Resource Locator]
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/42 for identifying broadcast areas
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/46 for recognising users' preferences
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/51 of receiving stations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25883 being end-user demographical data, e.g. age, family status or address arrangements for identifying locations of users in broadcast systems H04H60/52
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42202 environmental sensors, e.g. for detecting temperature, luminosity, pressure, earthquakes
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management

Abstract

Method and device for automatically locating radio stations, of the type which comprises at least a first database of radio and/or television stations (1, 21, 31), which includes the geographical location points or position of the station (13, 221), dial (14, 222) and/or on-demand broadcasting URL address (321), as well as a second database of user profiles (2, 22, 32) which also comprises at least one user profile configured according to the listening preferences of said user by means of a series of fields (11, 211, 311).

Claims

1. Method and device for automatically locating radio stations, of the type which comprises at least a first database of radio and/or television stations (1, 21, 31), which includes the geographical location points or position of the station (13, 221), dial (14, 222) and/or on-demand broadcasting URL address (321), as well as a second database of user profiles (2, 22, 32) which also comprises at least one user profile configured according to the listening preferences of said user by means of a series of fields (11, 211, 311);

and wherein said method is characterized in that comprises;

(a) defining at least one user profile in the second user database (2, 22, 32), and wherein said user profile comprises, at least, a listening preference by said user;

(b) establishing at least one user location point of said user position (4, 24); and

(c) indicating to the user, depending on the current location of the user established in (b) and on the set preferences in (a), a station in accordance with said features at said point, indicating the exact dial of the station or stations that have coverage at said point and match with the user preferences.

2. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that it implements a search algorithm (3, 23) which comprises the steps of:

(i) search for matches (101, 201) of the current position (4, 24) with the position of the station (13, 221), which has a variable coverage radius depending on the orography;

(ii) once located a match (102, 202) in the second database of stations (2, 32) it is sought that the defined preferences (103, 203) by the user in the first database of profiles (1, 21) match between them (104, 204), showing the dial in positive case (5, 105, 25, 205).

3. Method according to claim 2, characterized in that it calculates the distance remaining to the next coverage area.

4. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that it comprises a recording stage of a second favorite broadcast, in such a way that it can subsequently be broadcasted at the user'"'"'s will.

5. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that it comprises a routine reproduction stage of radio and/or television broadcast depending on the route selected by the user.

7. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that in the case of not locating a suitable profile (104A) it is shown a message of the type “

out profile stations”

, listing stations with coverage regardless of the defined profile;

while if the cause is the lack of coverage of any station, it will display a message about lack of coverage (203A).

8. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that it comprises a stage of sending data via GPRS to the radio and/or television station, or otherwise to other GPRS devices.

9. Device for automatically locating radio stations (10, 210), of the type which comprises, at least, a first database of radio stations (1, 21), which includes the geographical location points (13, 221) and dial (14, 222), as well as a second database of user profiles (2, 22) which also comprises at least one user profile configured according to the listening preferences of said user by means of a series of fields (11, 211);

and wherein said device (10, 210) is characterized in that it comprises means for executing the method of claim 1.

10. Device according to claim 9, characterized in that it comprises GPRS means for sending and receiving data.

11. Mobile phone, characterized in that it comprises the device of claim 9.

12. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that it comprises a further step of establishing when the coverage of the listening station is lost and connecting with the on-demand broadcasting URL address corresponding to the database of stations by means of a search algorithm (33) configured for this purpose;

and wherein in the event that the on-demand broadcast was not available, there was no link or it was truncated, a list of proposals of connections appropriate to the user profile indicated in the second database will be provided to the user.

13. Method according to claim 12, characterized in that the search algorithm (33) comprises the steps of

(i) analyzing whether there is or no coverage for the current broadcast (301);

if so, the algorithm ends at the beginning (300), establishing a loop by checking that there is or no coverage for the broadcast;

(ii) in the event that the coverage is negative, the algorithm seeks the URL address (302) in the second database of stations (32), connecting with it, and consequently revealing if the link is available (303) or truncated (304); and

where if it is available (303), a loop of analysis of coverage and connection with the URL address is established so that when the coverage of the broadcast is recovered, the on-demand broadcasting URL address is disconnected;

(iii) and where in the event that the URL link of the current broadcast is truncated (304), all those stations (305) that correspond to the selected user profile (306) are sought, until a match (307) is found, showing (309) the selected stations, and showing to the user (3110) and/or selecting one of them by default, closing the loop.

14. Method according to claim 13, characterized in that in the event that there is no match (308) between profile and stations, a “

no appropriate profile”

message will be displayed closing the loop at the beginning (300).

15. Method according to claim 12, characterized in that it comprises a stage of downloading of remote podcast, which is stored in memory, being reproduced in the case that:

there are no matches (308) between profiles and stations or;

if the favorite URL is not available (304).

16. Method according to claim 12 which is implemented in a device comprising means of global localization of the type GPS, and characterized in that it comprises a stage of reproduction of radio and/or television broadcasting routines depending on the route selected by the user.

17. Method according to claim 12, characterized in that the mobile device and the radio, and/or television are integrated (35), launching the broadcast automatically to radio and/or television, playing it.

18. Device for automatically capturing on-demand radio stations (310), of the type comprising data connectivity means GPRS/UMTS (34) or equivalent, and at least a first database of radio and/or television stations (31) with its corresponding on-demand broadcasting URL address (321), as well as a second database of user profiles (32) which also comprises at least one user profile configured according to the listening preferences of said user by means of a plurality of fields (311);

and wherein said device (310) is characterized in that comprises means for executing the method of claim 1.

19. Mobile phone, characterized in that it comprises the device of claim 18.

6. Method according to previous claims, characterized in that the dial definition and radio receiver are integrated, automatically running the positive dial (5, 105, 25, 205).