EP2110796B1

EP2110796B1 - Universal remote control method for display systems

Info

Publication number: EP2110796B1
Application number: EP20090157355
Authority: EP
Inventors: Çagatay Vestek Elektronik Arastirma Gelistirme A.S. Akçadogan
Original assignee: Vestel Elektronik Sanayi ve Ticaret AS
Current assignee: Vestel Elektronik Sanayi ve Ticaret AS
Priority date: 2008-04-18
Filing date: 2009-04-06
Publication date: 2013-11-13
Anticipated expiration: 2029-04-06
Also published as: EP2110796A3; TR200802728A2; ES2444422T3; EP2110796A2

Description

Field of Invention

The present invention relates to using such devices as mobile phones, laptop computers, PCs, PDAs, cameras etc., comprising particularly a Bluetooth transceiver, as a remote control for display systems which are controllable by means of remote controls.

Prior Art

Thanks to remote controls, the users are enabled to switch ON and OFF compatible electronic devices during use by a certain distance, and if such an electronic system is for instance a display system, they are further enabled to change the system settings, e.g. time, audio, video, and similar parameters or to switch to other video signals (e.g. to change the channels or sources) received by the display system.
Infrared diodes provided in many of the remote controls used in display systems emit carrier signals, which the human eye does not perceive, but are detected by the target receivers. If the target receiver is single-channeled and customized to fulfill a single function, such a function at the receiver side to be controlled remotely can easily be triggered by means of a carrier signal to be transmitted by a single-key control. As for the electronic systems in which are used multifunctional target receivers nowadays, the remote communication between the receiver side and the remote control is usually performed based on digital procedures.
According to the prior art, once the user depresses any key on the remote control, the sub-circuit of that key of the circuit provided in the remote control is closed, so that an integrated circuit responsible of generating the digital codes that correspond to the depressed key generates binary commands in line with the command selected by the user, and transmits these commands to an infrared diode typically disposed at the front of the remote control. The binary commands generated by the integrated circuit in the remote control are transmitted to the receiver side by means of the infrared diode in the form of light rays. In addition to the binary codes corresponding to the command of a depressed key, the signals, generated and transmitted to the receiver side by the remote control, further contains codes such as the "start command", "device address" (used to identify the device at the receiver side), and the "stop command", which allow the receiver side and remote control to communicate in a proper manner.
A flow diagram illustrating the steps of generating commands by a remote control operating via digital procedures, and how these commands are received by the receiver side is given in Figure 1. In this figure, when the user wishes to increase the volume of a display system in use, he/she depresses the key, corresponding to the volume-up function of the remote control of the display system (1), thereafter, since the contact or switch provided under that key is to be closed as a result of depressing it, a processor in the control identifies the depressed key (2) and generates, for instance the "00000101" binary code, corresponding to that key (3). After the processor in the remote control includes into the binary command, matching with the depressed key, the "start" (e.g. corresponding to '1' in terms of binary code) and "stop" commands (e.g. corresponding to '1' in terms of binary code) and the codes corresponding to the "device address" (e.g. corresponding to "0000" in terms of binary codes), these binary commands are transmitted to the infrared diode to be transmitted to the receiver device. The infrared diode receives the "10000010100001" code, which corresponds for instance to the volume-up function (additionally including "start", "stop" and "device address" codes) and generated by the processor in the remote control (4) (this code including '1' (start command), "00000101" (command code), "0000" (device address), '1' (stop command)); and transmits these signals to receiver device (5) by converting this binary code to infrared rays.
The infrared receiver at the receiver device catches the human-invisible infrared rays, transmitted by the remote control, and converts them back to electrical signals (6). The receiver device first checks the address code of the signals received, and identifies whether it is the target device (7) itself, and if it is the target device, it checks the command codes of the signals transmitted from the remote control and fulfills these commands (8, 9).
Even if the receiver device, according to the prior art, contains an infrared receiver on itself; the protocols, which define the communication between the remote control and the receiver device such as the device address, command codes, start and stop commands transmitted by the remote control to the receiver device, differ among different remote controls and receiver devices. Due to this difference in the communication protocols between the remote control and the receiver device, remote controls can control the devices only, which are determined by the manufacturer. According to the prior art, the user is left with nothing, but to use different remote controls for any individual electronic device. Some systems making use of remote controls (e.g. TVs, satellite receivers, DVD/CD players, etc.) may even not be provided with any control key on themselves, besides those systems, which are provided with several keys only to conduct some restricted functions. Other circumstances when the remote control is located far, is defected, or lost shall not allow the receiver devices to be controlled remotely by a certain distance.
Another technique according to the prior art makes use of universal remote controls, being programmable to control many different electronic devices of various manufacturers (programmability meaning here the capability of making key-function assignments on the remote control prior to use, by means of a software provided by the manufacturer of the remote control). The manner how programming is made in universal remote controls is illustrated in details in Figure 2. The user connects the universal remote control via an interface provided by the respective manufacturer (e.g. serial or parallel port, USB) to a computer (10) and runs the setup program provided by the manufacturer on the computer (11). The setup program lists various devices of various manufacturers (12) so that the user selects his/her electronic device among those listed devices (13). The setup program transfers the settings containing the proper key-function assignments according to the selected device to the remote control via the interface providing the connection between the computer and the remote control (15), and following the completion of the key-function assignment operation, the universal remote control is made ready to use (16). According to this technique given in Figure 2 in details, the programming of the universal remote control prior to use brings about a series of complex operations referred to above. Programming such universal remote controls requires a setup program provided by the manufacturer, a computer, and an additional cable to provide the connection between the computer and the remote control (e.g. USB cable, serial or parallel cable). Other difficulties probably to be faced by the user includes the circumstances in which the computer used for this purpose does not support the setup program, the computer does not have the interface specified by the manufacturer of the universal remote control, the electronic devices listed by the setup program does not include the device of the respective user, etc.. Furthermore, the second technique according to the prior art referred to above, i.e. using universal remote controls, does not provide a solution to control the respective device remotely against the cases encountered in the first technique according to the prior art, when the remote control is lost or defected or when it is situated far from the user.
Patent document WO 2004/004229 A2 discloses a remote access device for Bluetooth devices. In this document, a remote device with Bluetooth support is used to establish a communication with several other Bluetooth devices. First, each Bluetooth devices are paired with the remote device. Then, remote device serves as a server and establishes communication between Bluetooth devices that may not communicate with each other due to physical distant of each other. According to this document, remote device can be used as a remote controller for said Bluetooth devices by providing control information to the remote device.
Patent document US 2003/080874 A1 discloses a remote control system which uses Bluetooth devices as remote controller. According to this document, ability information of the Bluetooth device is sent to the device to be controlled. Said ability information indicates the ability of an input operation function of the control device. Device to be controlled creates control information according to received ability information. This control information is sent to the Bluetooth device to be used as remote controller. Then, said Bluetooth device creates a graphical user interface (GUI) according to control information and said GUI is showed on the display of the Bluetooth device. Finally, device to be controlled is controlled through the GUI created on said display.
Patent document WO 01/20572 A1 discloses controlling an electronic device using a wireless communication. In this document, a mobile station is used for controlling controllable electronic devices via short range wireless communication such as Bluetooth. Mobile station comprises a display screen, a user input interface and an access protocol browser. When a user wants to control a device using said mobile station, a connection between mobile station and device to be controlled is established. Then, mobile station downloads control interface data from the device to be controlled through said browser. A control interface is displayed on the display of the mobile station. Finally, device to be controlled is controlled through displayed interface.
In many of the electronic devices used in our everyday life, the remote controls employed to remotely control the functions fulfilled by electronic devices differ among themselves for different device models of different manufacturers. For this reason, providing the possibility of making use of such electronic devices as the mobile phones, laptops and personal computers, which are widely-used in everyday life, to control remotely-controlled devices in a universal manner, shall bring about a significant convenience particularly in using the display systems.

Objective of Invention

The objective of the present invention is to overcome the problems encountered in the prior art and to make use of electronic devices containing Bluetooth transceivers as remote controls for remotely-controllable electronic devices.

Description of Figures

The present invention is to be disclosed hereunder with references made to annexed figures briefly described as following:

Figure 1 is a flow diagram describing the communication between a remote control and a device controlled remotely by this remote control according to the prior art.
Figure 2 is a flow diagram describing the communication between an universal programmable remote control and a device controlled remotely by this remote control according to the prior art.
Figure 3 is a flow diagram illustrating a device to be used as a remote control and the way this device communicates with a device to be controlled and the manner a setup file is transferred from one device to the other according to the invention.
Figure 4 is a block diagram illustrating how a setup file is saved on the device to be controlled and how different setup files are transmitted via a Bluetooth transceiver according to the device to be used as a remote control.

Description of Invention

Bluetooth is a widely used communication standard in recent electronic devices, providing short-distance (10 to 100 meters) communication and data-file transfer (up to 721 kps) between electronic devices equipped with Bluetooth transceivers. The Bluetooth technology operates at the 2.4 GHz ISM (Industrial Scientific Medical Band) frequency band and makes use of a method referred to as the "spread-spectrum frequency hopping", based on the principle of mutually changing the carrier frequency used by the receiving and transmitting Bluetooth devices to conduct sound and data transmission, without such devices, up to eight in maximum number, making use of this bandwidth interfering each other.
Bluetooth technology is widely used in the electronic devices such as mobile phones, laptop computers, desktop computers, etc. frequently used in the everyday life nowadays, and further these devices have keys or keypads to act as remote control keys or keysets, so that if a receiving device is equipped with a Bluetooth transceiver, they can be easily controlled by means of the electronic devices referred to at the beginning of this sentence in line with the present invention. The basic operation principle of the present invention may be summarized as transmitting the setup file present on an internal or external memory of the receiver device to the device to act as the remote control via Bluetooth connection to be established between these two devices for establishing the communication protocol disclosed according to the first technique of the prior art between these devices, i.e. the receiver and control devices; setting up this program on the control device; and then, once the key-function assignments are made by the user on the control device, making the control device ready to use.
Within the scope of the operation principle according to the present invention, it shall be described in details how the communication standard between the receiver device, i.e. the device to be controlled, and the device to act as a remote control is universalized, for overcoming the problems encountered in the prior art and for controlling any remotely-controllable devices in an easy and universal manner. With respect to defining the communication protocol between the receiver device and the control device according to the present invention, a mutual data exchange must be rendered applicable between the receiver device and the device to be used as the control device, in place of establishing a one-way data exchange between an infrared remote control and a receiver device according to the first technique of the prior art described supra (in one-way communicating, the control device transmits commands, whereas the receiver device fulfills the functions matching to these commands, the receiver device here being not capable to communicate with the control device); as for providing this communication, Bluetooth technology may be employed in place of using an additional interface cable and computer, as was the case with the second technique according to the prior art, disclosed supra, based on the fact that Bluetooth technology provides efficient data exchange over short distances.
Before the receiver and control devices start data exchange via Bluetooth technology, the Bluetooth transceivers provided on the receiver and control devices may either be activated continually, or may be activated/deactivated over different times in line with user preferences according to the present invention. As illustrated in details in Figure 3, if the electronic device to be controlled is a television, the Bluetooth transceiver may be activated automatically with switching the television ON, or the transceiver on the TV may be activated, once the user takes the steps indicated on an on-screen menu (a remark may be provided on the on-screen menu to guide the user while activating the Bluetooth receiver on the display of the television) (17). Following this step, the on-screen menu to be displayed at the television's display shall indicate that the television's Bluetooth transceiver is now activated, and shall further indicate the feasibility of programming any electronic device, already equipped with a Bluetooth transceiver and with a keypad, for use as a remote control for the television itself, according to user preferences (18). Thanks to using such an electronic device as a remote control for the television according to the present invention, the operations conducted via the television's display can be seen by users, and the access of other Bluetooth users being not the owner of the television to that television is prevented.
The remark to appear on the on-screen menu may also guide the user in activating the Bluetooth transceiver of the device to be used as a remote control. The Bluetooth transceiver of the remote control may be activated afterwards, as illustrated in steps 18 or 21 of Figure 3.
Following the appearance of the remark on the on-screen menu in relation to activating the Bluetooth transceiver of the electronic device to be controlled, and to programming the remote control device, a step can be commenced by which the software program including the communication protocol between two devices is transferred from the receiver device to the device to be used as a remote control. If the receiver device is a television, either the television may ask the user to select the model information of the device to act as the remote control via an on-screen menu to appear on the television's screen, or if the user's Bluetooth transceiver is active, the television may detect these information automatically (20). As illustrated in Figure 3, if the electronic device to be used as a remote control is a mobile phone, the on-screen menu on the television may list the manufacturers of various mobile phones, models of various mobile phones, and if it is a PC or laptop computer, it may list the operating systems run on computers, the version of such operating systems, and if other Bluetooth devices are to be used as a remote control, it may list their brands and models as well (19). If the electronic device to be controlled is a display device (preferably a television) and if the television system to be controlled has Internet connection, the user may search the setup files from the Internet or from another file service for the remote control device, by which he/she wants to control the television system, by making use of the keypads available on the current remote control, or on the television itself, and once the setup files are located or found, he/she may have them identified by the television system. For instance, while the electronic devices and the operating systems thereof supported by the television system are listed (19), a user, who cannot see the brand of a mobile phone which he/she intends to use as a remote control in the list of devices to be used as remote controls, may use the option "Other Bluetooth Devices", may transmit the information of the brand of the mobile phone he/she uses to the Internet-supported television system via a remote control or keypad controlling the television, so that the television system may download the software of or supported by the user's mobile phone from predetermined software download services according to predetermined rules via the Internet.
After the user selects the model, brand, or operating system of the electronic device from the on-screen menu (if the device to be controlled fails in detecting these data automatically), an alert message is indicated on the on-screen menu of the television for the user to activate the Bluetooth transceiver of the respective device to start the transfer of the setup file from the television to the device to act as the remote control (21). Once the user activates the Bluetooth transceiver of the device in hand, two Bluetooth transceivers come to detect each other, so that the device to be used as a remote control prompts a message to the television for receiving approval to establish communication with itself, i.e. the television (21). If the television responds positively to the confirmation prompt of the remote control, communication is established between two transceivers, such that the television acquires the setup file according to the brand, model, and the operating system, if any, of the device, from an internal or external memory and transmits it to the device (22). After the setup file is installed at the remote control device, the user launches this setup file so that the function-key assignments required to control the television remotely is either made via the on-screen menu of the television with stepwise instructions (23), or these instructions may be provided on the device whereon the setup file is run (24). Once the key-function assignment is completed, the device to act as the remote control is made ready to use (25).
What's described so far in the present document were the steps of establishing communication between the receiver device and the remote control device, and of making ready to use the device to be used as a remote control. What's to be described in details henceforward are the steps of storing the setup file on the television, if the device to be controlled is a television, and of transmitting the setup files, which differ according to the device to be used as a remote control, via the Bluetooth transceiver. As illustrated in Figure 4, the commands transmitted by the user are received by the main processor of the television by means of the infrared receiver (26) and of the Bluetooth transceiver (27). According to the flow diagram in Figure 3, which elaborates the mutual communication of a device to be used as a remote control and the device to be controlled, as well as the transmission of setup files from one device to the other, there remains no need for the device to be controlled to receive the commands via the infrared receiver as from the step 21. In step 17 of the flow diagram illustrated in Figure 3, once the actions to be conducted by the user to activate the television's Bluetooth transceiver are displayed on the on-screen menu on the television's screen, the user activates the television's Bluetooth feature by either depressing any key on the remote control, or any functional key on the television. If the television fails in automatically detecting the brand, model, or operating system of the device to the used as a remote control, the user can enter the data on the brand, model, operating system, etc. which the television requests, via the on-screen menu, by means of the remote control or by making use of the functional keys on the television, as indicated in step 19 of the flow diagram illustrated in Figure 3. Once the device to be used as a remote control is made ready to use, following the completion of steps summarized in the flow diagram of Figure 3 according to the present invention, it shall be feasible to transmit the commands sent by the control device via the Bluetooth transceiver (27) to the system, as illustrated in Figure 4. The internal or external memory area (29) illustrated in connection with the main processor according to the present invention shall be provided with setup files supported by a diversity of devices and their operations systems of different brands and models of various manufacturers. It is the task of the main processor (28) to acquire the setup file supported by the respective control device from this memory area and to transmit it to the device to be used as a remote control via the Bluetooth transceiver. If the device to be controlled is a television with Internet support, as said above, the issue of providing support for altered or varying device brands and models, as well as their updated operating systems can be accomplished by searching and downloading the setup information of the models of electronic devices searched for, by means of the current remote control of that television, and by storing the downloaded information onto a memory area (29) in the system; the setup software prepared for new devices to be used as remote controls can also be downloaded onto an internal or external memory area, by means of the main processor via the software update interface connected to the main processor of the device to be used as a remote control, as illustrated in Figure 4.

Claims

A method for controlling at least one display system having Bluetooth support and being remotely controllable by at least one other remote control method, by an electronic device with Bluetooth support, characterized by comprising the steps, whereby
- the Bluetooth transceiver of the display system is activated by another remote control method by the user,

- the display system displays the supported remote control devices with Bluetooth support on the display system,

- the user sends information by another remote control method to the display system about an electronic device with Bluetooth support, which he/she intends to use as a remote control device with Bluetooth support,

- the display system transmits, via Bluetooth, to the electronic device to be used as a remote control device with Bluetooth support, the setup information required for controlling the display system, and

- the control keys of the electronic device with Bluetooth support are assigned by means of the display system and the electronic device with Bluetooth support is turned into a remote control with Bluetooth support for the display system
wherein,
- said display system has access to an information provider,

- if the electronic device with Bluetooth support to be used by the user as a remote control device is not present among the Bluetooth remote control devices supported by said display device, the user transmits information about the electronic device with Bluetooth support which he/she wants to use as a remote control to the display system by means of said another remote control method,

- said display system acquires the setup information of the electronic device with Bluetooth support, from said information provider, which the user wants to use as a remote control.
A method according to Claim 1, characterized in that said setup information is stored on an internal memory in the display system.
A method according to Claim 1, characterized in that said information provider is the Internet.
A method according to Claim 1, characterized in that said information provider is an external memory unit.
A method according to Claim 2, characterized in that the setup information acquired from said information provider is stored on an internal memory of the display system.