JP2019125395A - Reading device and information providing system - Google Patents

Abstract

To provide a reading device and an information providing system that ensure convenience during reading while reducing an influence of electric waves.SOLUTION: A reading device 20 reads information from an RF tag 12 attached to a product P. An opening 30 is formed in this reading device 20, and a shield part 44 that stores the product P through the opening 30 and an antenna 60 that emits electric waves for communicating with the RF tag 12 attached to the stored product P are provided. The reading device 20 reads information from the RF tag 12 in the state where the shield part 44 is opened.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 3

Description

  The present invention relates to a reader for reading information of an RF tag, and an information providing system for providing information of an item to which the RF tag is attached.

  In recent years, an accounting system 100 shown in FIG. 6 has been proposed in order to smoothly perform accounting in a store. The accounting system 100 includes an RF tag 102 attached to each product P, a reader / writer 104 for reading the information of the RF tag 102, and a register 106 communicably connected to the reader / writer 104. The reader / writer 104 is installed on the back of the accounting counter T, reads the information collectively from the RF tags 102 of the products P in the shopping cart on the accounting counter T, and transmits the read information to the register 106. . The register 106 performs accounting based on the product information (product name and price) corresponding to the received information.

  According to the accounting system 100, accounting can be performed by a simple operation of placing a shopping basket on the accounting counter T. Further, since accounting can be performed while being placed on the accounting counter T, the contents of the shopping basket can be visually recognized, and the customer can reconfirm the product P to be purchased during the accounting. On the other hand, since the communication area of the reader / writer 104 and the space where the customer exists are continuous, radio waves emitted from the antenna of the reader / writer 104 affect other devices or radio waves emitted from other devices. Could interfere with the communication radio wave of the reader / writer 104.

  Here, the reading device of Patent Document 1 includes a case that accommodates a product through an opening, and a lid that opens and closes the opening, and the case and the lid are formed of members that reflect or absorb radio waves. This reading device reads the RF tag in a state in which the opening of the case is closed by a lid, that is, an article housed in the case is sealed by a shield, thus preventing the above-mentioned problems with radio waves. Can.

JP, 2015-207110, A

  However, in the reading device of Patent Document 1, after the product is put in the case and the lid is closed for accounting processing, a troublesome operation of opening the lid and taking out the product is required. In addition, since the shopping basket contained in the case can not be visually recognized, it is not possible to confirm the product again during the accounting process. That is, the convenience of the customer is lost.

  As described above, it has been difficult to achieve both the convenience of the customer and the reduction of the influence of radio waves. Such a problem may occur not only in a reader used for accounting but also in a stationary apparatus for reading an RF tag attached to an article.

  In view of the above-described problems, the present invention has an object to provide a reading device and an information providing system in which the influence of radio waves is reduced while securing convenience at the time of reading.

  In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is a reader for reading information from an RF tag attached to an article, comprising: an antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag; and the antenna. And a shield portion in which an opening wider than an article is formed, and reading information from the RF tag in a state in which the shield portion is opened.

  Moreover, it is characterized by providing the mounting part by which it arrange | positions on the said opening side rather than the said antenna, and the said articles | goods are mounted.

  Further, the shield portion is characterized by including a radio wave absorption layer absorbing the radio wave, and a radio wave reflection layer formed outside the radio wave absorption layer and reflecting the radio wave.

  A storage unit comprising: the above-described reading device; and an information providing device capable of communicating with the reading device, wherein the information providing device stores item information related to the item in association with information of the RF tag; An acquisition unit for acquiring the information of the RF tag from the reader, an information generation unit for extracting the article information corresponding to the acquired information of the RF tag from the storage unit and generating information to be provided; And an output unit for outputting the information to be provided.

  According to the present invention, since the antenna is accommodated in the shield portion, it is possible to suppress the spread of radio waves emitted from the antenna and to reduce the influence of radio waves on other devices. In addition, since the shield portion has an opening larger than the article, the RF tag can be read by disposing the article in the shield or by disposing the article on the opening. At this time, the reading is performed with the shield portion being open, so that the troublesome operation of closing the opening as in the prior art is not required. Therefore, the influence of radio waves can be reduced while securing the convenience at the time of reading.

It is an information-provision system which concerns on embodiment of this invention, and is a figure which shows the provision aspect of the information by (a) reader according to (b) mobile terminal. It is a block diagram of the RF tag which comprises the said information provision system, a reader, and a mobile terminal. It is sectional drawing of the said reader, and a partially expanded sectional view. It is a functional block diagram of the above-mentioned mobile terminal. It is sectional drawing of the reader concerning the modification of an embodiment. It is the schematic of the conventional accounting system.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of a reader and an information providing system according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

  As shown to Fig.1 (a), the information-provision system 10 which concerns on this embodiment is used in the shop which sells goods P, such as clothing. At the store, an RF tag 12 is attached to each product P together with a price tag. As shown in FIG. 2, the RF tag 12 includes an antenna 14 and an IC chip 18 incorporating a communication circuit (not shown) communicating with the reader / writer 16 via the antenna 14. The IC chip 18 incorporates a CPU (not shown) and a memory (not shown), and unique information (hereinafter referred to as "tag information") defined so as to uniquely identify the RF tag 12. Is stored in the memory.

Returning to FIG. 1, the product P attached with the RF tag 12 is displayed on a shelf or a table in the store, and the customer selects the favorite product P and places it in the shopping basket B. Here, there is a need to keep track of the total amount of a plurality of products P contained in the shopping basket B while continuing shopping. Therefore, in the information providing system 10 according to the present embodiment, the total amount of the products P put in the shopping cart B is displayed on the mobile terminal 22 of the clerk S using the reading device 20 that reads the tag information of the RF tag 12. It is supposed to be.
Hereinafter, the reader 20 and the mobile terminal 22 will be described in detail.

  The reading device 20 is a stationary device that communicates with the RF tag 12 attached to the item P in the shopping cart B to read tag information, and includes a case 24 as shown in FIG. The housing 24 is provided with a rectangular bottom plate 26 wider than the outline of the edge of the shopping basket B. At each edge of the bottom plate 26, four wall plates 28 (FIG. 1) erected perpendicularly to the bottom plate 26 are joined. Each wall plate 28 extends vertically to about the height of the waist of an adult, and the respective vertical edges are joined together. The four wall plates 28 (FIG. 1) and the bottom plate 26 form a rectangular case 24 open upward.

  Inside the housing 24, two horizontal plates 32, 50 are provided at the top and bottom. The upper horizontal plate 32 is removably supported by the shelf support 34. The horizontal plate 32 is a rectangular plate on which a shopping basket (FIG. 1) containing goods P (FIG. 1) is placed, and in an enclosure in which the placed shopping basket B is formed by the wall plate 28. The height is adjusted to fit within. That is, the horizontal plate 32 functions as a placement unit on which the shopping basket B is placed. The lower horizontal plate 50 is bonded to the inner wall surface of each wall plate 28. An antenna 60 of the reader / writer 16 is disposed on the horizontal plate 50. The horizontal plates 32, 50, the wall plates 28, and the bottom plate 26 are made of wood.

  Here, a radio wave reflection sheet 38 is attached to the inner wall surface 42 extending above the horizontal plate 50 in each wall plate 28. The radio wave reflection sheet 38 is a sheet made of metal such as aluminum and functions as a radio wave reflection layer for reflecting radio waves on the surface thereof. A radio wave absorption sheet 40 is attached to the entire inner surface of the radio wave reflection sheet 38. The radio wave absorption sheet 40 is a sheet formed by mixing magnetic metal powder with a rubber material, and functions as a radio wave absorption layer that absorbs radio waves inside thereof. Similarly, the radio wave reflection sheet 38 is attached to the upper surface of the horizontal plate 50, and the radio wave absorption sheet 40 is attached to the top of the radio wave reflection sheet 38. Thus, the antenna 60 is accommodated by the radio wave reflection sheet 38 and the radio wave absorption sheet 40 provided on each wall plate 28 and the horizontal plate 50, and the shield portion 44 having the opening 30 formed upward is configured.

  A space for housing the shopping basket B is formed by the shield portion 44 and the horizontal plate 32 described above. That is, the shield part 44 and the horizontal plate 32 function as the accommodating part 36 which accommodates the shopping basket B.

  An internal space formed below the horizontal plate 50 is a space in which the main body 48 of the reader / writer 16 is installed, and lower portions of the four wall plates 28 forming the space and the bottom plate 26 function as a base 46 ing. In the radio wave reflection sheet 38 and the radio wave absorption sheet 40 attached to the horizontal plate 50 and the horizontal plate 50, through holes 52 penetrating the front and back are opened, and the wiring 54 passed through the through holes 52 is provided. Thus, the antenna 60 and the main body 48 installed on the bottom plate 26 are electrically connected to each other.

  The main body 48 of the reader / writer 16 is, as shown in FIG. 2, a communication circuit 62 (transmission / reception circuit, oscillation circuit, modulation / demodulation circuit) for communicating with the RF tag 12 through the CPU 56, the memory 58, and the antenna 60. And a wifi module 64. The CPU 56 executes the program in the memory 58 to acquire tag information collectively or individually from the RF tag 12 via the communication circuit 62 and the antenna 60, and to transmit tag information to the mobile terminal 22 using the wifi module 64. And send.

  The mobile terminal 22 is a smart device such as a tablet terminal or a smart phone owned by a store clerk S (FIG. 1 (b)) of the store, and as shown in FIG. This is realized by a computer provided with the display 70, the liquid crystal display 72, and the touch sensor 74.

  The memory 68 stores an information providing program 76. A product table 78 is previously defined in the information providing program 76. The item table 78 is a table in which item information such as the name, size, and amount of each item P (FIG. 1) is associated with each item of tag information for all items P in the store. Therefore, the computer having the memory 68 functions as a storage unit 80 (FIG. 4) that stores the item information in association with the tag information.

The information providing program 76 further defines a process for providing the customer with information on the product P, and the process is executed by the CPU 66. Specifically, an acquisition step, an information generation step, and an output step are executed by the CPU 66 in this order.
(1) The acquisition step is a step of acquiring tag information, connected to the network via the wifi module 70, specifying the reader / writer 16 existing on the connected network by the IP address, and specifying It requests the writer 16 to transmit tag information, and receives the tag information read from the reader / writer 16. Thus, the wifi module 70 and the CPU 66 function as an acquisition unit 82 (FIG. 4) for acquiring tag information.
(2) The information generation step is a step of generating provided information to be provided to the customer based on the received tag information, and the product information corresponding to the received tag information is extracted from the product table 78, for example, extracted The product information is listed, and the prices included in the product information are added up. Thus, the CPU 66 functions as an information generation unit 84 (FIG. 4) that generates the provided information.
(3) The output step is a step of outputting the generated provision information, and as shown in FIG. 1 (b), the liquid crystal display 72 displays a list of the products P placed in the shopping cart B and the total amount Do. Thus, the CPU 66 and the liquid crystal display 72 function as an output unit 86 (FIG. 4) that outputs the provided information.

  As described above, in the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, when the shopping basket B is set in the storage portion 36 of the reading device 20, the tag information of each product P is read by the reading device 20 in a state where the storage portion 36 is opened. Is read out, and the provided information (list or total amount) is displayed by the mobile terminal 22.

  According to the reading device 20 of the present embodiment, the reading preparation of the RF tag 12 is completed by a simple operation such as inserting the shopping basket B into the housing portion 36 through the opening 30. Further, at the time of reading (at the time of communication), the product P can be reconfirmed while looking at the product P of the shopping basket B from the opening 30.

  Then, the shield unit 44 constituting the housing unit 36 prevents the radio wave emitted from the antenna 60 of the reader / writer 16 from spreading around the reading device 20 and reduces the influence of the radio wave on other devices. Can. In addition, it is also suppressed that radio waves from other devices around the reading device 20 enter the accommodation portion 36, and it is possible to reduce the decrease in the reading accuracy due to the interference of the radio waves.

  Furthermore, as shown in FIG. 3, the shield part 44 is formed on the outside of the radio wave absorption sheet 40 so that the radio wave reflection sheet 38 surrounds the radio wave absorption sheet 40. For this reason, the weak radio wave leaked from the radio wave absorption sheet 40 is reflected by the radio wave reflection sheet 38 and absorbed inside the radio wave absorption sheet 40, so that the radio wave shielding performance is excellent. As a result, the communication area with the RF tag 12 is limited to the housing portion 36 and the upper side, and there is no problem that the tag information of the RF tag 12 of the commodity P around the reader 20 is misread.

  The reading device and the information providing system according to the present invention have been described above based on the embodiments. However, the present invention is of course not limited to the above-described embodiment. For example, the present invention is embodied in the following embodiments. I don't care.

<Modification>
(1) In the above embodiment, the antenna 60 of the reader / writer 16 is attached to the horizontal plate 50, but the antenna 60 may be attached to the lower surface side of the horizontal plate 32. In this case, the horizontal plate 50 may be omitted to simplify the structure. The antenna 60 may be attached to the upper surface side of the horizontal plate 32. In this case, the radio wave reflection sheet 38 can be provided on the upper or lower surface of the horizontal plate 32 to further reduce the influence of radio waves. Alternatively, the antenna 60 may be attached to the inner wall of the wall plate 28. The point is that the antenna 60 may be attached to the inside of the shield part 44 at any position apart from the opening 30.

  (2) In the above embodiment, the radio wave reflection sheet 38 and the radio wave absorption sheet 40 provided on the inner wall surface of each wall plate 28 are downward to the extent that wireless communication between the main body 48 of the reader / writer 16 and the mobile terminal 22 is not impeded. It may extend to

  (3) Further, the radio wave absorbing sheet 40 provided on the horizontal plate 50 may be omitted.

  (4) Further, the radio wave reflection layer and the radio wave absorption layer are not limited to the sheet material, and may be made of a plate material. In this case, the upper portion of each wall plate 28 constituting the peripheral wall around the shield portion 44 may be omitted.

  (5) In the said embodiment, although the horizontal plate 32 is arrange | positioned in the position (depth) where shopping basket B is accommodated, it is a position (depth) where some shopping baskets B are exposed. It may be arranged.

  (6) Also, the horizontal plate 32 is not limited to the aspect disposed inside the shield portion 44. For example, as shown in FIG. 5, the horizontal plate 90 may be provided to block the opening 30 of the shield portion 44. In this case, it is preferable to display a mark of the place (area) on which the shopping basket B is placed on the upper surface of the horizontal plate 90. Also in this modification, the reader 20 performs communication within the communication area shown in FIG. 3, so that the influence of radio waves on other devices can be reduced. In addition, the customer only needs to place the shopping basket B on the horizontal plate 90, which is convenient.

  (7) In the above embodiment, a rectangular enclosure is formed by the four wall plates 28 and the shield portion 44 is formed along the inner wall surface, but the shape of the enclosure is another polygon or a circle, Similarly, the shield portion 44 may be polygonal or circular.

  (8) Moreover, the shield part may be in an aspect in which an opening is formed in the lateral direction. That is, the housing includes a bottom plate 26, four wall plates 28, a top plate provided at the upper end of each wall plate 28, and horizontal plates 32 and 50, and the upper portion of one wall plate 28 The opening for taking in and out the article may be formed. In this aspect, it is preferable that the radio wave reflection sheet 38 be adhered to the entire lower surface of the top plate, and the radio wave absorption sheet 40 be adhered to the entire lower surface of the radio wave reflection sheet 38.

  (9) Moreover, the opening 30 of the shield part 44 should just be formed in at least 1 direction, for example, may be formed in two directions, upward and sideways.

  (10) In the above embodiment, the reader / writer 16 and the mobile terminal 22 communicate via the network using the respective wifi modules 64 and 70, but the communication interface is not limited to this, and Bluetooth (registered trademark A known wireless communication interface such as a module can be used.

  (11) In the above embodiment, the mobile terminal 22 is used as an information providing device for providing information to customers, but the invention is not limited to this. A device used as a host device of the reader / writer 16, for example, a reader via a network It may be a server that can communicate with the writer 16.

  (12) The above embodiment has been described by taking clothing as an example, but it may be used for various products such as food products, home appliances, books, and DVDs.

  (13) In the above embodiment, although the product is described as an example, the present invention is not limited to the product, and may be used for various articles such as a sample product, a card or a document in which the content of the service is described. In this case, the memory 68 (storage unit 80) of the mobile terminal 22 (information providing terminal) stores an item table in which item information on items is associated with tag information.

  The present invention can also be carried out in variously modified, modified or modified forms based on the knowledge of those skilled in the art without departing from the spirit of the invention. Moreover, you may implement in the form which substituted any invention specific matter to the other technique in the range to which the same effect | action or effect arises.

10 ... information provision system 12 ... RF tag 16 ... reader / writer 20 ... reader 22 ... mobile terminal (information provision apparatus)
36 ... accommodation part 38 ... radio wave reflection sheet (radio wave reflection layer)
40 ... Wave absorbing sheet (wave absorbing layer)
44 ... shield unit 48 ... main body of reader / writer 60 ... antenna 80 ... storage unit 82 ... acquisition unit 84 ... information generation unit 86 ... output unit P ... commodity (article)

Claims (6)

A stationary reader for reading information from an RF tag attached to an article, comprising:
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion that accommodates the antenna, encloses the article, and is formed with an opening wider than the article,
Equipped with
Reading information from the RF tag in a state where the shield part is opened upward;
The reader includes the radio wave absorption layer absorbing the radio wave and / or the radio wave reflection layer reflecting the radio wave. A stationary reader for reading information from an RF tag attached to an article, comprising:
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion for housing the antenna;
Have
The shield part is configured to be able to surround and put in the shopping basket containing the article in a state of being opened upward, and the reading is performed while the state is maintained,
The reader includes the radio wave absorption layer absorbing the radio wave and / or the radio wave reflection layer reflecting the radio wave. A stationary reader that reads information from an RF tag attached to the article;
A tablet terminal that displays information on the item based on the information;
Equipped with
The reader is
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion that accommodates the antenna, encloses the article, and is formed with an opening wider than the article,
Have
The information providing system, wherein the reader reads information from the RF tag in a state where the shield part is opened upward. A stationary reader that reads information from an RF tag attached to the article;
A mobile terminal that displays information on the item based on the information;
Equipped with
The reader is
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion that accommodates the antenna, encloses the article, and is formed with an opening wider than the article,
Have
The information providing system, wherein the reader reads information from the RF tag in a state where the shield part is opened upward. A stationary reader that reads information from an RF tag attached to the article;
A tablet terminal that displays information on the item based on the information;
Equipped with
The reader is
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion for housing the antenna;
Have
The information providing system is characterized in that the shield part is configured to be able to enclose and put out the shopping cart containing the article in an upward opening state, and the reading is performed while the state is maintained. . A stationary reader that reads information from an RF tag attached to the article;
A mobile terminal that displays information on the item based on the information;
Equipped with
The reader is
An antenna for emitting radio waves for communicating with the RF tag;
A shield portion for housing the antenna;
Have
The information providing system is characterized in that the shield part is configured to be able to enclose and put out the shopping cart containing the article in an upward opening state, and the reading is performed while the state is maintained. .

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