JP2003035542A - Device and program for supplementing map data - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a device for supplementing map data which requires an external device a destroyed portion of map data stored in a memory device and can restore the map data by obtaining supplement data, and to provide a program capable of supplementing the destroyed map data. SOLUTION: A map data monitoring program 1101 verifies whether the contents of a map database 1202 stored in a hard disk device 120 is destroyed or not, and specifies the contents of the data in the case destroyed data exists therein. In the case the destroyed data exists therein, the external device is required the data corresponding the destroyed data by a supplement data requiring program 1102. A map data supplementing program 1103 receives supplement data sent as required and stores it in a prescribed memory area.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a map data replenishing device and program capable of replenishing damaged map data, and more particularly to replenishing damaged map data for use in navigation devices. The present invention relates to a program that can supplement damaged map data as a part of a program for a map data supplement device or a navigation device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, there has been put into practical use a device which is equipped with digitized map data and can display a map by designating an arbitrary point, as represented by a vehicle navigation device. Also, a program for displaying map data of such an arbitrary point is a personal computer or PDA.
(Personal Digital Associate
It has also been put to practical use for t).

[0003]

Since the amount of map data is enormous, it cannot be stored in a semiconductor memory and is generally recorded on a recording medium such as a CD or a DVD or a hard disk device. In these recording media and hard disk devices, there is a risk that some of the data will be destroyed due to deterioration of the recording medium or contact between the recording medium and the magnetic head or optical pickup for reading data from the recording medium.

In particular, in a hard disk device, since the magnetic head is levitated on the rotating magnetic disk by a small gap by an air flow, when the device vibrates, the magnetic head comes into contact with the recording medium and the surface of the recording medium. And the resulting data will be damaged. In particular, in a navigation device mounted on a vehicle, there is a high possibility because of vibration generated by traveling. The same applies when a notebook computer or PDA is used in a train or car. Since the destroyed data cannot be used thereafter, there is a problem that the map of the area corresponding to the contents of the destroyed data cannot be displayed.

The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to request the data of a damaged portion of the map data to an external device and acquire supplementary data to obtain the map data. Map data replenishment device that can be recovered,
And to provide a program capable of supplementing destroyed map data.

[0006]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the map data replenishing device according to claim 1 of the present invention comprises:
The map data storage means, the data monitoring means for detecting the damage of the map data stored in the map data storage means, and specifying the damaged data, and the supplementary data corresponding to the specified damage data are external devices. And supplementary data requesting means for receiving and storing supplementary data transmitted from the outside in response to the request.

According to the present invention, the map data stored in the map data storage means is monitored to detect a damaged portion, and data corresponding to the detected data is requested from an external device to be acquired and stored. Since the map data can be stored, even if a part of the map data is damaged, it can be recovered from the state where the data cannot be used. In addition, it is not necessary for the user to perform processing for data supplementation by himself.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the map data supplementing apparatus according to the first aspect, the data monitoring means regularly monitors the map data stored in the map data storage means for damage. It is characterized by This makes it possible to produce the effect that the damaged data has been replenished whenever the user wants to use the map data.

Here, "periodically" means a fixed time interval,
Every time the personal computer is started in the map data supplement program of the personal computer, or every time the map utilization program is started, in the vehicle navigation device, every time the navigation device is started at engine start or the engine It may be any one or a combination thereof, such as immediately before the navigation device stops at the time of stop.

The invention described in claim 3 is the map data supplement device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the supplement data requesting means externally supplies updated supplement data corresponding to the damaged data. It is characterized in that the device is required.
This makes it possible not only to supplement the damaged data with data having the same content, but also to replace it with data having the latest map information of the map area represented by the content of the damaged data.

The invention as defined in claim 4 is from claim 1 to claim 3.
The map data replenishing device according to any one of the above, wherein the map data replenishing device is used for a navigation device that guides a vehicle from a current location to a destination. Therefore, it is possible to provide a navigation device having a device for replenishing damaged map data for a vehicle in which vibration is highly likely to occur, that is, map data is highly likely to be damaged by vibration.

According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, a data monitoring function for detecting damage to map data stored in a map data storage means connected to the computer and specifying the damaged data in the computer; A supplementary data request function for requesting an external device for supplementary data corresponding to the specified damaged data; a data supplementary function for receiving supplemental data transmitted from the outside in response to the request and storing it in the map data storage means; It is a program for realizing. As a result, it becomes possible to supply a function for updating damaged map data as a program to a personal computer or a navigation device.

The above invention is intended to update the map data, but unlike other data, the map data is managed by dividing the map data of a wide area into a plurality of areas. By the means, the identification of the destroyed data can be identified as the area on the map including the data. Furthermore, since the contents of map data are not changed by the user, even if the data for each specified area is replenished from an external device, the contents of the data will not differ before and after replenishment, and It can be used while maintaining consistency with the data. In other words, even if a part of the map data is updated, the map data as a whole can be kept consistent and can be used again.

[0014]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to FIGS.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of the first embodiment of the present invention. The first embodiment is an embodiment as a computer program that realizes a function of detecting and supplementing damaged map data.

The computer 10 has a CPU 100 for executing various programs, a program memory 110 for storing the programs to be executed, and a hard disk device 120 for storing a map database 1202 (HDD in FIG. 1).
It is provided). Program memory 1
The substance of the program stored in 10 is stored in the hard disk device 120 in advance, and is called from the hard disk device 120 and executed by the CPU 100 at the time of execution, but in this embodiment, it is stored in the program memory 110 for convenience of description. It is assumed that

As the program according to the present invention, the map database 12 stored in the hard disk device 120 is used.
Map data monitoring program 1101 (corresponding to data monitoring means or data monitoring function) that confirms whether the contents of 02 are not destroyed and specifies the contents of the destroyed data if there is destroyed data, destroyed data If there is a replenishment data, a supplementary data request program 11 for requesting an external device for data corresponding to the destroyed data
02 (corresponding to replenishment data requesting means or replenishment data requesting function), a map data replenishing program 1103 (data replenishing means or data replenishing function) for receiving replenishment data transmitted in response to a request and storing it in a predetermined storage area. Equivalent to). Another program is a map drawing program 1104 that reads map data from the map database 1202 in the hard disk device 120 and displays it on the display 130.

Next, the operation of the program according to the present invention will be described. The map data monitoring program 1101 periodically accesses the map database 1202 stored in the hard disk device 120, for example, at regular intervals, when the computer 10 is started, or when the map drawing program 1104 is started. And check if the map data can be accessed normally. The structure of map data will be described later.

Next, when there is a data portion that cannot be normally accessed, that is, when destroyed data is found, it is determined which map area the data of this portion corresponds to. For example, as shown in FIG. 2, in the map database, an address indicating the location of the data on the hard disk device and an area on the map indicated by the content of the data stored at the address are associated with east longitude and north latitude. Data for map data management are provided, and judgment is made by referring to this management data. In FIG. 2, for example, addresses 201 to 300 have east longitude X3 and north latitude Y3.
To the east longitude X4 north latitude Y4, and so on. The point designated by the coordinates X3 and Y3 represents the upper left coordinate in the rectangular map area, and the coordinates X4 and Y4 represent the lower right coordinate in the map area. That is, the map area divided into rectangles is specified by indicating the coordinates of two points on the diagonal line.

The map data management method is not limited to the above-mentioned example, and for example, each map area may be provided with an identification number or the like assigned to the map database supplier for unified management. Good.

A map data monitoring program 1101
If the data around address 350 could not be accessed by executing
Map area indicated by 00, that is, east longitude X5, north latitude Y5
From this, it is found that there is damaged data in the map area of east longitude X6 and north latitude Y6.

The relationship on the map between the map data divided into a plurality of areas and the damaged data will be described with reference to FIG. As shown by M, the map data is divided into a plurality of areas in a mesh shape and stored in the map database. (A) to (i) in the figure are symbols for identifying each mesh (region) for convenience. Road A naturally extends over a plurality of meshes, but is separated by mesh boundaries in the data. For example, the upper left east longitude coordinates of the mesh (a) are X1, Y1, and the lower right coordinates are X2, Y.
2 and the east longitude north latitude coordinate of the mesh (b) is X
3, Y3, the lower right coordinates are X4, Y4, the upper left east longitude north latitude coordinates of the mesh (c) are X5, Y5, and the lower right coordinates are X6, Y6. That is, the data in the mesh (a) represented by the coordinates X1, Y1 and X2, Y2 is shown in FIG.
Management data from the hard disk drive address 10
It is found that the data is stored in the data area from 1 to 200.

Assuming that the data in the vicinity of address 350 on the hard disk device is damaged as in the above example, the vicinity of address 350 in FIG. 2 is coordinates X5, Y5-X6, Y6. The map area corresponds to the map area, and if this is shown in FIG. 3, the map area that the damaged data should represent is the area indicated by B, for example. The area including the destroyed data is the area indicated by (c) in FIG. That is, by supplementing the data in the area shown in (c), the damaged data can be restored.

Returning to FIG. 1, when the area containing the damaged data can be specified, the supplementary data request program 1102 then requests the external device for the data in the area containing the damaged data. The destination of the supplementary data request program 1102 requesting supplementary data is the map data server 30 that provides the map data distribution service. The request for supplementary data is sent to the communication device 1 such as a modem connected to a telephone line.
40a, sent to the map data server 30 via the public line network 20.

The map data server sends the data of the requested area to the computer 10. At this time, the map data server may be configured to transmit the latest data in the requested map area, but the content. That is, the map database 120 in the computer 10
Data of roads newly installed after 2 was created,
Data including newly added road regulation information may be transmitted. This allows the computer 1
The map database 1202 in 0 can be updated at the same time when supplementing damaged data.

The map data supplement program 1103 receives the supplement data transmitted from the map data server 30 and stores it in the hard disk device 120. At this time, in the above example, for example, the supplementary data is the data in the area shown in FIG. 3C, that is, the data originally stored in the hard disk device 120 at addresses 301 to 400, and the supplementary data is It is stored in the free space of the hard disk device 120. Now, the addresses in the hard disk device 120 storing the supplementary data are numbered 1001 to 1100. At this time, the map data supplement program 1103 uses the map data management data shown in FIG. 2 in the map areas X5, Y5-X6, Y6.
The addresses corresponding to are from "301-400" to "100
1-1100 ".

Since the map drawing program 1104 reads the data of the area to be displayed from the hard disk device 120 by referring to the map data management data of FIG. 3, the information of this map data management data is stored at the address where the supplementary data is stored. By changing to, it becomes possible to maintain consistency with the map data of other areas. That is, the map drawing program 1104 can draw a map using the new supplementary data without changing from the map data of other areas.

Next, a second embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 4 shows an application of the present invention to a vehicle navigation device.

The difference from the first embodiment shown in FIG. 1 is that a GPS (Global Positioning System; Global Positioning) which receives radio waves from satellites and measures the position is used as a sensor for specifying the position of the vehicle. System) 15
0, a vehicle speed sensor 160 for detecting the speed of the vehicle, a gyro 170 for detecting the rotation of the vehicle, and a map database 1202 showing the route from the vehicle current position obtained by these sensors to the destination input by the user. That is, it is provided with a route search program 1105 for searching based on the map data stored in. Further, since the navigation device 40 is mounted on a vehicle and used, the navigation device 40 is provided with a communication device 140b that uses radio such as a mobile phone as a means for requesting damaged map data to the outside. Since the wireless communication is performed with the outside, the communication partner is the circuit switching station 50 equipped with wireless receiving equipment.

The navigation device 40 is configured to present the route to the user by displaying the route obtained by the route search program 1105 on the display 130 by the map drawing program 1104. Also,
In the map database 1202, in addition to road map data, data necessary for route guidance, such as an image showing the shape of an intersection, information about facilities on the map, and voice data for guiding the user along the route. And the like are displayed on the display 130. In the case of audio data, the audio data is output via an audio output unit such as a speaker (not shown) connected to the navigation device 40.

The map data monitoring program 1101, the supplement data request program 1102, and the map data supplement program 1103 perform the same operations as in the first embodiment, but as explained below, they are adapted to the operations peculiar to the navigation device. It is preferable to perform processing.

For example, the route search program 1105
When accessing the map database 1202 for route search, the map data monitoring program 1101 operates in parallel and the map database 1202 for route search.
It is monitored whether the data in the map can be accessed without fail, and the map database 120 is activated when the vehicle ignition is turned on and the navigation device 40 is activated.
It is preferable to perform processing such as checking whether the data in 2 is damaged, or checking whether the data in the map database 1202 is damaged even when the ignition is turned off. By doing so, it becomes possible to detect data corruption more precisely.

Further, when it is detected that the data in the map database 1202 is damaged, the supplementary data request program 1102 requests the external device, that is, the map data server 30, for supplementary data.
When the vehicle speed sensor 160 detects that the vehicle is stopped, the navigation device 40 communicates with the outside in order to obtain information from outside the vehicle, such as acquisition of traffic information or information via the Internet. It may be configured to make a request for data. By making a request for supplementary data and receiving the corresponding supplementary data when the vehicle is stopped, more reliable data transmission / reception becomes possible. That is, the communication may be interrupted while driving, for example, in a tunnel or due to a shadow of a building, but if the vehicle is stopped, such a risk can be avoided. In addition, when acquiring traffic information, etc., the navigation device 4
0, as its function, transmits and receives supplementary data in accordance with the communication with the outside of the vehicle, so that the communication cost can be reduced.

As described above, the navigation device 4
Data necessary for route guidance is also stored in the map database 1202 of 0. Therefore, regarding these data as well, the map data monitoring program 1101 monitors the presence or absence of damage, and if there is a damaged portion, requests it to the outside. It is also preferable to configure so that the information is acquired by the above method. As described above, the data necessary for guidance is not changed by the user, and since the guidance data is stored in association with the divided map areas, the damaged data is the same as the map data. Even if it is supplemented, it can be reused while maintaining consistency with existing data.

[0035]

As described above, according to the present invention, the map data stored in the map data storage means is monitored to detect the damaged portion, and the data corresponding to the detected data is requested to the external device. Since the map data can be obtained and stored, even if a part of the map data is damaged, it can be recovered from the state where the map data cannot be used. In addition, it is not necessary for the user to perform processing for data supplementation by himself.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram illustrating a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of map data management.

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating the structure of map data.

FIG. 4 is a configuration diagram illustrating a second embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 computers 20 networks 30 map database server 40 navigation device 100 CPU 110 program memory 1101 Map data monitoring program 1102 Replenishment data request program 1103 Map data supplement program 1104 Map drawing program 1105 Route search program 120 hard disk drive 1202 map database 130 display 140a, 140b communication device 150 GPS 160 vehicle speed sensor 170 Gyro

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Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A map data storage means, a data monitoring means for detecting damage to the map data stored in the map data storage means and specifying the damaged data, and a supplement corresponding to the specified damage data. A map data replenishing device comprising: replenishment data requesting means for requesting data to an external device; and data replenishing means for receiving and storing replenishment data transmitted from the outside in response to the request. 2. The map data replenishing device according to claim 1, wherein the data monitoring unit regularly monitors for damage to the map data stored in the map data storage unit. 3. The map data replenishing device according to claim 1, wherein the replenishment data requesting means requests an external device for updated replenishment data corresponding to the damaged data. 4. The map data replenishing device according to claim 1, wherein the map data replenishing device is used in a navigation device for guiding a vehicle from a present location to a destination. 5. A data monitoring function for detecting damage to map data stored in a map data storage means connected to the computer and identifying the damaged data, the data monitoring function corresponding to the specified damaged data. A program for realizing a replenishment data request function of requesting replenishment data to an external device; a data replenishment function of receiving replenishment data transmitted from the outside in response to the request and storing it in the map data storage means.