Coalescing geo-fence events

• US 9,820,231 B2
• Filed: 06/14/2013
• Issued: 11/14/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 06/14/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Gorgenyi, Frank, Estrada Alva, Daniel, Gonzalez, Fernando, Saha, Sanjib
• Primary Examiner(s): Vu, Thai
• Application Number:
  US13/918,818
• Publication Number:
  US 20140370911A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,614 Days
• Field of Search: 4554042, 4554561, 4554562, 4554563, 455574, 701426, 701434, 701438
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/021 Services related to particular areas, e.g. point of interest [POI] services, venue services or geofences
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/022 with dynamic range variability
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0251 using monitoring of local events, e.g. events related to user activity
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

A device location is determined, and the location of an area of interest that is a geographic area referred to as a geo-fence is identified. Multiple geo-fences can be identified by the device, and different geo-fences can be associated with different programs on the device. An operating system of the device implements multiple different periods of operation for the device, including a conservation period during which certain programs are not typically scheduled to run, and an execution period during which such programs are typically scheduled to run. A system identifies geo-fence events, which occur when the device enters or exits the geo-fence. The system maintains a record of the geo-fence events for each of multiple geo-fences, and provides to a program selected ones of those geo-fence events at a time when the program is scheduled to run on the device during an execution period of the operating system.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

detecting when one or more geo-fence events occur for a computing device during a conservation period of an operating system during which certain programs are not scheduled to run;

maintaining a record of geo-fence events for each of multiple geo-fences;

collecting geo-fence events for each of the multiple geo-fences together for each of the certain programs;

waiting until a program associated with at least one of the multiple geo-fences is scheduled to run during an execution period of the operating system;

providing to the program, after the waiting, the collected geo-fence events for the program; and

deleting from the record of geo-fence events a particular geo-fence event based on a time period expiring.

2. A method as recited in claim 1, the certain programs comprising applications other than operating system programs.

3. A method as recited in claim 1, the providing comprising for each of the multiple geo-fences, providing only a most recent geo-fence exit event and/or a most recent geo-fence enter event.

4. A method as recited in claim 3, the maintaining comprising maintaining a record of multiple geo-fence exit events and multiple geo-fence enter events for each of the multiple geo-fences.

5. A method as recited in claim 1, the maintaining comprising recording the geo-fence events for a geo-fence regardless of whether the program associated with the geo-fence is running.

6. A method as recited in claim 1, further comprising deleting one of the multiple geo-fences associated with the program without notifying the program to delete the one of the multiple geo-fences.

7. A method as recited in claim 1, the record of geo-fence events including, for each geo-fence event, an identification of the geo-fence event and a timestamp of when the geo-fence event was detected.

8. A method as recited in claim 1, the providing comprising providing collected geo-fence events to the program by coalescing one or more geo-fence events for multiple geo-fences associated with the program.

9. A method as recited in claim 1, the providing comprising providing collected geo-fence events to the program only if one or more additional criteria associated with the geo-fence or the program are satisfied.

10. A method as recited in claim 9, the additional criteria comprising network connectivity being available.

11. A computing device comprising:

one or more processors;

a data store to store geo-fence data for multiple geo-fences, the geo-fence data for a geo-fence including an indication of a program associated with the geo-fence; and

one or more computer-readable storage devices comprising computer-readable instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, implement;

a geo-fence event detection module to detect when one or more geo-fence events occur for the multiple geo-fences, including when one or more geo-fence events occur during a conservation period of an operating system during which certain programs are not scheduled to run;

a geo-fence event storage module to maintain a record of the detected one or more geo-fence events; and

a geo-fence event reporting module that waits to provide, to a program subsequently scheduled to run during an execution period of the operating system, an indication of one or more geo-fence events included in the record of the detected one or more geo-fence events until the operating system enters the execution period.

12. A computing device as recited in claim 11, the certain programs comprising applications other than operating system programs.

13. A computing device as recited in claim 11, the program being subsequently scheduled to run in a next execution period of the operating system.

14. A computing device as recited in claim 11, wherein to provide the indication is to provide for each of the multiple geo-fences, only a most recent geo-fence exit event and/or geo-fence enter event.

15. A computing device as recited in claim 11, wherein the record is a record of detected geo-fence events for a geo-fence regardless of whether the program associated with the geo-fence is running.

16. A computing device as recited in claim 11, the record of geo-fence events including, for each geo-fence, an identification of the geo-fence event and a timestamp of when the geo-fence event was detected.

17. A computing device as recited in claim 11, wherein the indication is an indication of one or more geo-fence events provided to the program by coalescing one or more geo-fence events for multiple geo-fences.

18. A computing device as recited in claim 11, wherein the indication is an indication of a geo-fence event provided to the program only if one or more additional criteria associated with the geo-fence are satisfied.

19. A computing device as recited in claim 11, further comprising deleting from the record of geo-fence events a particular geo-fence event based on the program associated with the geo-fence being uninstalled from the computing device.

20. A method comprising:

detecting when one or more geo-fence events occur for a computing device during a conservation period of an operating system during which certain programs are not scheduled to run;

maintaining a record of geo-fence events for each of multiple geo-fences, including maintaining a record of multiple geo-fence exit events and multiple geo-fence enter events for each of the multiple geo-fences, the record of geo-fence events including for each geo-fence event an identification of the geo-fence event and a timestamp of when the geo-fence event was detected; and

providing, to a program associated with two or more of the multiple geo-fences when the program is scheduled to run during an execution period of the operating system, an indication of a most recent geo-fence exit event and geo-fence enter event for each of the two or more of the multiple geo-fences from the record of geo-fence events responsive to the program running during the execution period of the operating system.