System and method for using universal location referencing objects to provide geographic item information

• US 7,672,779 B2
• Filed: 10/29/2007
• Issued: 03/02/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/10/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Tele Atlas North America (TomTom NV)
• Original Assignee: Tele Atlas North America (TomTom NV)
• Inventors: Fuchs, Gil
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen; Cuong H
• Application Number:
  US11/927,569
• Publication Number:
  US 20080162467A1
• Time in Patent Office: 855 Days
• Field of Search: 701208-209, 707/103.R, 707/103.Y, 707/101, 707/104.1, 715/855, 709/208
• US Class Current: 701/209
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

A method and system for creating and/or using a universal location referencing object (ULRO) with electronic files including electronic maps. ULROs establish traversable links between a file-of-reference and third-party-files. In accordance with an embodiment, the ULRO comprises a universal location referencing code uniquely corresponding to the location, together with several optional components, including: a set of name information; a super-set of coordinates; a file-of-reference pointer field comprising a file-of-reference pointer; a third-party-file pointer field comprising one or more third-party-file pointers; a file-of-reference back-pointer field comprising a file-of-reference back-pointer; a third-party-file back-pointer field comprising one or more third-party-file back-pointers; and a metadata field. ULROs allow recognition of equivalence of features in different maps, and facilitate dynamic combination or linking of multiple maps into one virtual map, with traversable connectivity for a wide variety of map formats.

Claims

1. A method for providing geographic item information for a location, using universal location referencing objects, comprising the steps of:

accessing a file-of-reference that comprises geographic item information, wherein the file-of-reference comprises geographic item information, including a geographic item associated with a location;

accessing a third-party file, wherein the third-party file comprises additional geographic item information that can be associated with the location; and

in response to a request for information for a particular location,

retrieving a universal location reference object for the particular location, wherein the universal location reference object comprises a universal location reference code that uniquely identifies the particular location, and further comprises identifying information for the particular location,

traversing links to the additional geographic item information in the third-party file,

associating the geographic item information in the file-of-reference with the additional geographic item information in the third-party file, to create a resultant information, and

providing the resultant information as a response to the request.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the request is received from an operator.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the request is received automatically from another system without the input of an operator.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the universal location reference object is created only at the time of receiving the request.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the method further determines which of a plurality of universal location reference objects in the system are associated with the same particular location.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the method further comprises providing an application programming interface that allows software developers to create relationships between the file-of-reference and one or more third-party file.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is incorporated into a cell phone or PDA-based navigation system.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the method is used to provide a driving/traffic conditions update to an end user, operator, or system.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the associating is performed by establishing a traversable link between the file-of-reference and a third-party file for the particular location.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the file-of-reference and the third-party-file are one or more of a map, document, or database that contains geographic information for multiple locations.

11. A method of creating a data structure that uses universal location referencing objects to enable the providing of geographic item information for a location, comprising:

storing in a data structure a pointer to a file-of-reference, wherein the file-of-reference comprises geographic item information, including a geographic item associated with a location;

storing in the data structure a pointer to a third-party file, wherein the third-party file comprises additional geographic item information that can be associated with the location;

storing in the data structure a universal location reference object, wherein the universal location reference object includes

a universal location reference code that uniquely identifies the location,

identifying information for the location, and

links to the additional geographic item information in the third-party file; and

using the combination of pointer to a file-of-reference, pointer to a third-party file, and universal location reference object, to allow a universal location reference object to be retrieved for a particular location, and the links traversed in that universal location reference object to associate the additional geographic item information in the third-party file with the geographic item information in the file-of-reference for that particular location.