KR20110134212A - Home network remote sensing and control system using mobile terminal as gateway and its method - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a home network remote sensing and control system and method using a mobile terminal as a gateway. The system according to the present invention includes a conversion relay apparatus for receiving remote sensing data from a remote device in a first short range wireless communication scheme, a mobile terminal for receiving the remote sensing data in a second short range wireless communication scheme from the conversion relay apparatus, and the And a remote server for receiving the remote sensing data remotely from a mobile terminal through a communication network. According to the present invention, it has a relatively low cost, portability, and relative aspects of a network in comparison with a home gateway, which is generally used in various items such as transmission speed, transmission distance, and data processing capacity. In addition, the ZigBee / Bluetooth conversion communication method enables smartphone-based gateway systems to be applied to various remote sensing and control system applications. In addition, it is possible to implement a more economical and efficient remote sensing and control system compared to the prior art, which has the advantage of preoccupying the domestic and overseas remote sensing and control system market and creating new business through various additional services.

Description

Home network remote sensing and control system using mobile terminal as gateway and its method {HOMENETWORK REMOTE MONITORING AND CONTROL SYSTEM USING MOBILE STATION AS GATEWAY, AND METHOD THEREOF}

The present invention relates to a home network remote sensing and control system and method, and more particularly, to a home network remote sensing and control system and method using a mobile terminal such as a smartphone as a gateway.

The functionality of analog and digital meters in one corner of a home or office is expected to change significantly over the next few years. In recent years, telecommunications operators in Europe have been using analog and digital meters for wireless communication and remote sensing and control of home electrical appliances to monitor energy use, environmental monitoring through sensors, and remote control. Attempts are being made. If this movement spreads globally, it will not only create new mega-markets such as wireless transceiver ICs, but also strengthen the wireless networking of consumer electronics. Development manufacturers such as air conditioners, lighting equipment, security devices and white goods appliances will find it difficult to avoid this infrastructure. In the future, it can be included in the added value of the device in the form of 'standard specification', and if it is accelerated in North America, it may become an essential function for white goods.

Until now, the wireless network between devices in the home has been focused on the transmission and reception of music and video contents, and the target devices have been limited. However, if smart meters with various sensors are wirelessly networked, white appliances, which have been ignored in the network trend in the home, such as air conditioners and refrigerators, will become the center. In the field of wireless networking of white goods, the realization will increase with the introduction of smart meters with sensors. For example, the wind can be realized in the form of 'I want to know the situation in the refrigerator even when I'm out' or 'I want to turn off the power of a luminaire that is not turned off by operating a smartphone'.

However, the wired method has the advantage of being able to perform additional services due to its high speed and large data processing capacity, but has the limitation of convenience of installation and operation of the wired communication method, and in the case of a wireless communication method such as RF communication method. There is a problem that there are limitations on transmission speed, transmission distance and data processing capacity.

Accordingly, there is a need to develop a new remote sensing and control system technology for economically and efficiently performing the construction and operation of a system while solving the problems of the conventional communication scheme.

The problem to be solved by the present invention is to provide a home network remote sensing and control system and method using a mobile terminal such as a smartphone as a gateway.

The remote sensing and control system according to an embodiment of the present invention for solving the technical problem is a conversion relay device for receiving the remote sensing data in a first short-range wireless communication method from a remote device, a second short-range wireless from the conversion relay device A mobile terminal for receiving the remote sensing data in a communication scheme, and a remote server for receiving the remote sensing data remotely from the mobile terminal through a communication network.

The first short range wireless communication method may include any one of ZigBee and Ultra Wide Band (UWB) method, and the second short range wireless communication method may include a Bluetooth method, and the communication network may include a wireless LAN, WiBro may include at least one of a mobile communication network and a wireless Internet.

The first short range wireless communication method is a ZigBee method, and the second short range wireless communication method is a Bluetooth method.

The conversion relay apparatus may compress and convert the remote sensing data received from the remote device for a predetermined time to the mobile terminal in the second short range wireless communication scheme.

The mobile terminal may compress and convert the remote sensed data received from the conversion relay device for a predetermined time and transmit the compressed data to the remote server through the communication network.

The remote device may include a sensing unit that acquires state information of a device on which the remote device is mounted or measurement information about a surrounding environment, a memory unit that temporarily stores state information or measurement information obtained by the sensing unit, and the sensing unit. The apparatus may include a wireless modem unit configured to transmit remote data about the state information or measurement information acquired from the unit to the conversion relay apparatus through a variable access address function and the first short range wireless method.

The remote sensing and control method according to another embodiment of the present invention for solving the technical problem, the conversion relay device receiving the remote sensing data in the first short-range wireless communication method from the remote device, the mobile terminal the conversion relay Receiving the remote sensing data from a device in a second short range wireless communication scheme, and a remote server receiving the remote sensing data remotely through a communication network from the mobile terminal.

A computer-readable medium according to another embodiment of the present invention records a program for causing a computer to execute the above-described remote sensing and control method.

According to the present invention, the home gateway has various advantages such as low cost, portability, and network in terms of various items such as transmission speed, transmission distance, and data processing capacity. In addition, the ZigBee / Bluetooth conversion communication method enables smartphone-based gateway systems to be applied to various remote sensing and control system applications.

In addition, it is possible to implement a more economical and efficient remote sensing and control system compared to the prior art, which has the advantage of preoccupying the domestic and overseas remote sensing and control system market and creating new business through various additional services.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a home network remote sensing and control system using a mobile terminal as a gateway according to an embodiment of the present invention.
2 is a block diagram illustrating the remote device of FIG. 1 in more detail.
3 is a flowchart provided to explain an operation of a home network remote sensing and control system using a mobile terminal as a gateway according to an embodiment of the present invention.
4 is a flowchart provided to explain an operation of the conversion relay apparatus of FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION Hereinafter, exemplary embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings so that those skilled in the art may easily implement the present invention.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a home network remote sensing and control system using a mobile terminal as a gateway according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 1, a home network remote sensing and control system according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention includes a remote device 100, a conversion relay device 200, a mobile terminal 300, a communication network 400, and a remote server 500. It may include. The remote device 100, the conversion relay device 200, and the mobile terminal 300 may be located in a home, a building, an office, or the like. The remote server 500 may be disposed at a service provider that provides a home network remote sensing and control service according to the present invention. The remote server 500 may be connected to the mobile terminal 300 remotely through the communication network 400 to provide various information and data. I can exchange it. For convenience of description, one mobile terminal 300 and one conversion relay 200 are shown in FIG. 1, but the present invention is not limited thereto, and the number may be added or subtracted according to the number or arrangement position of the remote device 100. have.

The remote device 100 is mounted on a home appliance device such as a TV, a washing machine, a refrigerator, an air conditioner, a boiler, or a sensor device such as an infrared sensor or a temperature sensor to transmit its status information or measurement information to the outside through a short range wireless communication method. In addition, it is possible to perform a given operation according to the command transmitted from the outside. The status information may refer to, for example, the temperature inside the refrigerator in the refrigerator, the remaining time of washing in the washing machine, the boiler hot water temperature in the boiler, the strategic usage of the home appliance, the lighting of the home appliance, and the like. The measurement information may be information related to an operation state, and the measurement information may be information about an ambient environment measured by the corresponding sensor device, and may be various types of information on ambient temperature, humidity, object detection, and the like. Hereinafter, such state information or measurement information transmitted from the remote device to the outside will be referred to as 'remote sensing data'.

2 is a block diagram illustrating the remote device 100 of FIG. 1 in more detail.

Referring to FIG. 2, the remote device 100 may include a sensing unit 110, a memory unit 120, and a wireless modem 130.

The sensing unit 110 may be implemented as various sensors for acquiring state information of a device on which the remote device 100 is mounted or measurement information about the surrounding environment.

The memory unit 120 temporarily stores state information or measurement information acquired by the sensing unit 110.

The wireless modem unit 130 transmits the remote data about the state information or the measurement information acquired by the sensing unit 110 to the conversion relay apparatus 200 through a short range wireless method. In more detail, the wireless modem unit 130 may transmit remote sensing data to the outside through a variable access address function and a ZigBee communication scheme. In particular, ZigBee is one of the representative technologies of short-range wireless sensor network with low power, low cost, and ease of use. Based on the PHY layer and MAC layer of IEEE 802.15.4 standard, ZigBee is a high-level protocol (PROTOCOL) and application. As a standardized technology, it is suitable for the construction of a system which is not very fast at a short distance and rarely uses a network. Of course, according to an embodiment, the wireless modem unit 130 may remotely sense data in the conversion relay apparatus 200 using a short range wireless communication method according to an ultra wide band (UWB) method as a communication method other than ZigBee. May be implemented to transmit wirelessly.

Referring back to FIG. 1, the conversion relay apparatus 200 performs a function of relaying data between the remote device 100 and the mobile terminal 300. To this end, the conversion relay apparatus 200 may exchange data with the remote device 100 in a first short range wireless communication scheme, and exchange data with a mobile terminal 300 in a second short range wireless communication scheme.

In more detail, the conversion relay apparatus 200 receives the remote sensing data transmitted from the remote device 100 through the first short-range wireless communication method of ZigBee or Ultra Wide Band (UWB). The mobile terminal 300 converts and transmits to a second short-range wireless communication method of a communication method, for example, a Bluetooth method.

The mobile terminal 300 may be implemented as an information communication terminal such as a smartphone, a PDA, a notebook, and the like. The mobile terminal 300 may exchange various information and data with the conversion relay apparatus 200 in a second short range wireless communication scheme, and exchange various information and data with the remote server 500 through the communication network 400. have. To this end, the mobile terminal 300 includes a first communication module (not shown) supporting a second short range wireless communication scheme and a second communication module (not shown) capable of being connected to the communication network 400 to perform communication. Equipped.

The communication network 400 connects the mobile terminal 300 and the remote server 500 to exchange various information, data, requests, and the like. The WLAN, WiBro, and mobile communication network (CDMA, GSM) , WCDMA), and wireless Internet (Wi-Fi).

The remote server 500 may be operated by a service provider providing a home network remote sensing and control service according to the present invention. The remote server 500 may be connected to the mobile terminal 300 through the communication network 400 to request remote sensing data and store the remote sensing data collected and transmitted from the mobile terminal 300 in a database. In addition, the remote server 500 may provide stored remote sensing data at the request of the service provider.

3 will be described in more detail the operation of the home network remote sensing and control system using a mobile terminal as a gateway according to an embodiment of the present invention.

3 is a flowchart provided to explain the operation of a home network remote sensing and control system using a mobile terminal as a gateway according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 3, the remote server 500 transmits a sensing request for remote sensing data to the mobile terminal 300 through the communication network 400 (S301). The sensing request for remote data (hereinafter referred to as a remote sensing request) may include a group ID and an individual ID. The group ID may be given by grouping the remote devices under a certain condition, and the individual ID may be given for each remote device.

Next, the mobile terminal 400 transmits an ACK response to the remote sensing request of the remote server 500 through the communication network 400 (S303), and converts the remote data sensing request transmitted from the remote server 500 into a conversion relay device. In step S305, the processor 200 transmits the second short-range communication scheme to the 200. Here, the Bluetooth may be used as the second short range communication method.

Then, the conversion relay apparatus 200 transmits an ACK response to the mobile terminal 400 through the second short-range communication method (S307), and transmits the remote sensing request received from the mobile terminal 400 to the remote device 100 in a first manner. It transmits through a short range communication method (S309).

After receiving the remote data detection request, the remote device 100 transmits its corresponding ID and ACK response to the conversion relay device 200 through the first short-range communication method (S311). The remote device 100 generates remote sensing data for acquiring the state information or the measurement information and transmitting the state information or the measurement information to the conversion relay apparatus 200.

Next, when receiving the request for the remote sensing data from the conversion relay device 200 through the first short-range communication method (S313), the remote device 100 receives the remote sensing data through the first short-range communication method (the conversion relay device ( 200) (S315).

According to an embodiment, the conversion relay apparatus 200 may transmit a sleep mode command to the remote device 100 that has received the remote sensing data (S317). As a result, the remote device 100 may reduce power consumption by operating in the sleep mode until the next remote data sensing request.

Then, when the remote server 500 requests the remote sensing data to the mobile terminal 300 through the communication network 400 (S319), the mobile terminal 300 is remote to the conversion relay device 200 in a second short-range wireless communication method. Request the sensed data (S321).

Next, the conversion relay apparatus 200 transmits the remote sensing data stored therein in the second short range wireless communication method according to the remote sensing data request from the mobile terminal 300 (S323). The conversion relay apparatus 200 may compress and transmit the entire remote sensing data received from the remote device 100 for a predetermined time to the mobile terminal 300 according to an exemplary embodiment.

Thereafter, the mobile terminal 200 may transmit the remote sensing data transmitted from the conversion relay apparatus 200 to the remote server 500 through the communication network 400 (S325). Like the conversion relay apparatus 200, the mobile terminal 300 may be implemented to compress the entire remote sensing data received for a predetermined time and transmit the compressed remote sensing data to the remote server 500.

Finally, when receiving the remote sensing data, the remote server 500 stores the data in a database (not shown) and transmits an ACK response to the mobile terminal 300 (S327). In addition, the mobile terminal 300 transmits an ACK response to the conversion relay apparatus 200 in a second short range wireless communication method (S329).

4, the operation of the conversion relay apparatus according to the present invention will be described in more detail.

4 is a flowchart provided to explain an operation of the conversion relay apparatus of FIG. 1.

Referring to FIG. 4, first, when the conversion relay apparatus 200 is connected from the mobile terminal 300 (S410), an operation other than a remote data sensing function may be performed (S415). For example, it can perform application download and update function, communication environment setting and initialization. The application program receives and stores the remote sensing data from the remote device 100 at a predetermined time interval in addition to the operation according to the data sensing request of the mobile terminal 300, and compresses it into the mobile terminal 300. To perform a function such as storing.

Meanwhile, when the remote sensing data sensing command is received from the mobile terminal 300 (S420), the conversion relay apparatus 200 performs the steps S305 to S329 of FIG. 3 to transmit the remote sensing data to the mobile terminal (S420). 300 may be delivered (S425).

Meanwhile, when the predetermined time t1 elapses (S430), the conversion relay apparatus 200 automatically requests and transmits remote sensing data from the mobile terminal 300 to the remote device 100 and stores the received data in the memory. (S435).

Thereafter, when the predetermined time t2 elapses (S440), the conversion relay apparatus 200 may compress the entire remote sensing data received from the remote device 100 and transmit the compressed remote sensing data to the mobile terminal 300 (S445).

Embodiments of the present invention include a computer-readable medium having program instructions for performing various computer-implemented operations. This medium records a program for executing the home network remote sensing and control method using the mobile terminal as a gateway described above. The medium may include program instructions, data files, data structures, etc., alone or in combination. Examples of such media include magnetic media such as hard disks, floppy disks and magnetic tape, optical recording media such as CDs and DVDs, floppy disks and program commands such as magnetic-optical media, ROM, RAM, flash memory, and the like. Hardware devices configured to store and perform such operations. Alternatively, the medium may be a transmission medium such as an optical or metal wire, a waveguide, or the like including a carrier wave for transmitting a signal specifying a program command, a data structure, and the like. Examples of program instructions include not only machine code generated by a compiler, but also high-level language code that can be executed by a computer using an interpreter or the like.

Although the preferred embodiments of the present invention have been described in detail above, the scope of the present invention is not limited thereto, and various modifications and improvements of those skilled in the art using the basic concepts of the present invention defined in the following claims are also provided. It belongs to the scope of rights.

Claims (12)

A conversion relay apparatus for receiving remote sensing data from a remote device in a first short range wireless communication scheme;
A mobile terminal for receiving the remote sensing data from the conversion relay apparatus in a second short range wireless communication scheme; and
A remote server that receives the remote sensing data remotely from the mobile terminal through a communication network
Remote sensing and control system comprising a. The method of claim 1,
The first short range wireless communication method is composed of ZigBee or Ultra Wide Band (UWB),
The second short range wireless communication method is a Bluetooth method,
The communication network is a remote sensing and control system including at least one of a wireless LAN, WiBro, a mobile communication network and the wireless Internet. 3. The method of claim 2,
The first short range wireless communication method is a ZigBee method,
The second short range wireless communication method is a Bluetooth sensing remote control and control system. The method of claim 1,
The conversion relay device,
And remotely compress and convert the remote sensing data received from the remote device for a predetermined time to the mobile terminal in the second short range wireless communication scheme. The method of claim 1,
The mobile terminal,
And remotely compressing and converting the remote sensing data received from the conversion relay device for a predetermined time to the remote server through the communication network. The method of claim 1,
The remote device,
A sensing unit for acquiring state information of a device equipped with the remote device or measurement information about a surrounding environment;
A memory unit for temporarily storing state information or measurement information acquired by the sensing unit;
And a wireless modem unit configured to transmit remote data about the state information or the measurement information acquired by the sensing unit to the conversion relay apparatus through a variable access address function and the first short range wireless method. Receiving, by the conversion relay apparatus, the remote sensing data from the remote device in a first short range wireless communication scheme,
Receiving, by the mobile terminal, the remote sensing data from the conversion relay apparatus in a second short range wireless communication scheme, and
A remote server receiving the remote sensing data remotely from the mobile terminal through a communication network
Remote sensing and control method comprising a. 8. The method of claim 7,
The first short range wireless communication method is a ZigBee or Ultra Wide Band (UWB) method.
The second short range wireless communication method is a Bluetooth method,
The communication network remote sensing and control method including at least one of a wireless LAN, WiBro, a mobile communication network and the wireless Internet. In claim 8,
The first short range wireless communication method is a ZigBee method,
And the second short range wireless communication method is a Bluetooth method. 8. The method of claim 7,
The conversion relay device,
And remotely compressing and converting the remote sensing data received from the remote device for a predetermined time to the mobile terminal in the second short range wireless communication scheme. 8. The method of claim 7,
The mobile terminal,
And remotely compressing and converting the remote sensing data received from the conversion relay apparatus for a predetermined time to the remote server through the communication network. A computer-readable medium having recorded thereon a program for causing a computer to execute the method of claim 7.

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