SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR AUTOMATICALLY GENERATING AN ELECTRONIC JOURNAL

• US 20150168162A1
• Filed: 09/22/2011
• Published: 06/18/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 09/22/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: SUBRAMANIAN, Sowmya, WILDEN, Leif Hendrik, GOLDEN, Keith Patrick
• Granted Patent: US 9,074,901 B1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/28 with correlation of data from several navigational instruments
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/30 Map- or contour-matching
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/20 Monitoring the location of vehicles belonging to a group, e.g. fleet of vehicles, countable or determined number of vehicles

Abstract

A system and method of the subject technology automatically generates an electronic journal of a series of events based on input from data sources already used to record the series of events, and then displays those events in an electronic publication representative of the series of events. A GPS track may be used in connection with the series of events to generate the electronic journal in connection with an interactive map.

Claims

1. A non-transitory machine-readable medium including machine-executable instructions for a method of generating an electronic journal, the method comprising:

receiving location data from one or more data devices;

determining a travel route from the location data;

receiving a plurality of digital pictures generated along the travel route;

determining a cluster of digital pictures in the plurality of digital pictures are of a same image subject based on timestamps of the digital pictures and an image comparison of the digital pictures;

extracting meta-data from the cluster of digital pictures; and

correlating the meta-data from the cluster of digital pictures with the location data associated with the travel route to generate one or more travel events corresponding to the cluster of digital pictures, each travel event including one or more data recordings associated with a location on the travel route.

2. The machine-readable medium of claim 1, further comprising:

providing an interactive map including the travel route and one or more event representations positioned along the travel route, each of the event representations operable to, when selected, display one or more respective travel events.

4. The machine-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the meta-data includes one or more first timestamps, and correlating the meta-data from the cluster of digital pictures with the location data associated with the travel route includes associating a first timestamp with a second timestamp associated with the location data.

5. The machine-readable medium of claim 4, wherein a travel event is generated when two or more of the first timestamps are substantially within a same predetermined frame of time, the predetermined time frame being substantially at a respective second timestamp.

6. The machine-readable medium of claim 2, further comprising:

receiving one or more text messages associated with the travel route.

7. The machine-readable medium of claim 6, further comprising:

generating a narrative associated with the one or more travel events, the narrative including sequentially displaying at least a portion of the one or more text messages apart from the interactive map.

8. The machine-readable medium of claim 7, further comprising:

determining a mode of transportation from the location data; and

automatically including text related to the mode of transportation with the narrative.

14. The machine-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the one or more data devices includes a smart phone and a remote server, wherein the location data is received from the smart phone, and the one or more data recordings is received from the remote server.

15. The machine-readable medium of claim 2, wherein the interactive map is a three-dimensional geographic representation of the travel route.

16. The machine-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the location data is GPS location data.

3. (canceled)

9. -13. (canceled)

17. A computer implemented method of generating an electronic journal, comprising:

receiving, by one or more computing devices, location data from one or more data devices;

determining, by the one or more computing devices, a travel route and a travel period from the location data;

receiving, by the one or more computing devices, one or more digital pictures associated with one or more activities related to the travel route;

extracting, by the one or more computing devices, meta-data from the one or more digital pictures, the meta-data including one or more timestamps;

correlating, by the one or more computing devices, the meta-data with the location data associated with the travel route and the travel period to generate one or more travel events; and

generating, by the one or more computing devices, a chronological storyline representative of the one or more travel events along the travel route and operable to be displayed in combination with an interactive map representative of the travel route, wherein the chronological storyline displays at least one of the one or more digital pictures in connection with displaying the one or more travel events.

18. The computer implemented method of claim 17, wherein the one or more timestamps associated with the meta-data comprises one or more first timestamps, and correlating the meta-data with the location data associated with the travel route and the travel period includes associating a first timestamp with a second timestamp associated with the location data.

19. The computer implemented method of claim 18, wherein a travel event is generated when two or more of the first timestamps are substantially within a same predetermined frame of time, the predetermined time frame being substantially at a respective second timestamp.

20. The computer implemented method of claim 17, further comprising:

receiving one or more text messages associated with the travel route.

21. The computer implemented method of claim 20, further comprising:

generating a narrative associated with the chronological storyline, the narrative including sequentially displaying at least a portion of each of the one or more text messages according to a respective timestamp.

22. The computer implemented method of claim 17, further comprising:

determining a mode of transportation from the location data; and

automatically including text related to the mode of transportation with the chronological storyline.

24. The computer implemented method of claim 17, wherein extracting the meta-data from the one or more digital pictures includes, for each of the one or more digital pictures, determining a subject of the image by an image recognition process.

25. The computer implemented method of claim 24, wherein correlating the meta-data with the location data associated with the travel route includes associating a respective subject with a known location associated with the travel route.

26. The computer implemented method of claim 24, wherein a travel event is generated when two or more respective subjects or digital pictures are substantially the same.

27. The computer implemented method of claim 17, wherein displaying the one or more travel events comprises:

receiving a selected location of the travel route; and

displaying a dialog at the selected location in response to receiving the selected location, wherein the dialog displays the at least one of the one or more digital pictures.

28. The computer implemented method of claim 17, wherein receiving the location data from the one or more data devices comprises receiving a plurality of first GPS location points representative of a first travel route from a first data device, and receiving a plurality of second GPS location points representative of a second travel route from a second data device, the plurality of second GPS location points being fewer in number than the plurality of first GPS location points, and wherein one or more first travel events associated with the first device is not associated with the second device, the method further comprising:

on making a determination that the second travel route is substantially similar to the first travel route, associating the one or more first travel events with the second data device.

29. The computer implemented method of claim 17, wherein the location data is GPS location data.

23. (canceled)

30. A system for generating an electronic journal, comprising:

one or more processors;

a memory including software that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to;

receive GPS data from one or more location-aware data devices;

determine a travel route and a travel period from the GPS data;

receive one or more digital pictures associated with one or more activities related to the travel route;

extract image data from the one or more digital pictures, the image data including one or more timestamps;

correlate the image data with the travel route and the travel period to generate one or more travel events occurring during the travel period; and

generate a chronological storyline representative of the one or more travel events along the travel route and operable to be displayed in combination with an interactive map representative of the travel route, wherein the chronological storyline displays at least one of the one or more digital pictures in connection with displaying the one or more travel events.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein the software, when executed, further causes the one or more processors to:

receive one or more text entries, each of the text entries including a text entry time; and

correlate the one or more text entries with one of the travel route, travel period, and one or more travel events to generate a narrative associated with the chronological storyline, the narrative including at least a portion of each of the one or more text entries according to a respective text entry time.

32. The system of claim 30, wherein the software, when executed, further causes the one or more processors to:

determine a mode of transportation from the location data; and

automatically include text related to the mode of transportation with the chronological storyline.