JP2005148158A - Information display device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve the following problems that; letters are displayed wherein part of letters is missing due to a failure of a display unit; a driver during driving a car cannot recognize letters as displaying is controlled to be off in a non-display state; and driving is judged to be no problem because nothing is displayed. <P>SOLUTION: A display item displayed in an information display device is memorized as a display item related information including words and display space information for displaying the words and when a failure occurs in the display unit 11, displaying is performed avoiding the display unit with failure for each word at a time in the information display unit. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention is an information display device comprising a display unit in which display elements such as LEDs are arranged in a dot matrix, and lighting up the display element to display characters and designs by dot-splitting. In addition, the present invention relates to an information display device that performs display while avoiding the failed display unit when the characters and symbols cannot be displayed.

For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 7-199851 discloses a proposal that displays characters and symbols by avoiding a display unit that has failed when the display unit fails. In this proposal, when a failure occurs in the display unit, the display item read from the display symbol memory circuit is reduced by reducing the character spacing or character size, or replacing the display item with a smaller number of characters. Display is performed while avoiding the display unit.
JP-A-7-199851

  By the way, the above-mentioned proposal is a method of dealing with a display unit that is reduced by reducing the character spacing or character size in units of idioms such as “prohibition of entry” when the display unit fails. The same method could not be used when the unit failed. Therefore, conventionally, the display unit is displayed in a state where some characters are missing while the display unit is out of order, or the display is controlled to disappear so that the display unit is not displayed. For this reason, there are problems that a driver who is traveling cannot recognize characters or that there is no problem in traveling because no display is made.

  The present invention is intended to solve the above-described problems, and its object is to display display items for display on an information display device in units of words such as “entry” and “prohibition”. Stored and when a failure occurs in multiple display units, the display space where the above word can be displayed is searched and the display avoiding the failed display unit is performed. It is an object of the present invention to provide an information display device in which information cannot be displayed or characters are not easily read because the characters are reduced in width.

  The information display device according to the present invention achieves the above-mentioned object, and the means of claim 1 is an information display in which display units in which display elements such as LEDs are arranged in a dot matrix are arranged vertically and horizontally on the front surface of the display plate. In the apparatus, the display data transmitted to the display unit for displaying display items is compared with the monitoring data temporarily stored in the shift register of the display unit and returned from the shift register for data monitoring. A failure display unit detection unit that detects the position of the failed display unit, a display unit position storage unit that stores the position coordinates of the display unit on the front surface of the display panel, and a display unit position that is detected by the failure display unit detection unit The fault display unit position storage unit to be displayed, the display item storage unit to store the display item to be displayed, and the same display Display item related information storage unit for storing display item related information including display space information necessary for displaying words contained in eyes and display words, and display items for display units other than the failed display unit The display position search unit searches for a display position that can secure a display space for the words included in the word, and the display is performed by arranging the word at the searched display position.

  The information display device according to claim 2 displays the display item to be displayed by the display position search unit according to claim 1, wherein the words stored in the display item related information storage unit are weighted. If it is determined that the search is impossible, the display position search is executed by deleting a word having a low weight from the weighted word.

  The information display device according to claim 3 is the information display device according to claim 1, wherein the display item related information storage unit stores characters at a pitch smaller by one display unit than the number of horizontal display units used for two-character words. It is arranged.

  As described above, the present invention provides a display item related information storage unit for storing a display item to be displayed on the display board as a display item related information including a word and display space information for displaying the word, display data, and monitoring A fault display unit detection unit that detects the position of a display unit that has failed due to a mismatch with the data, and a display item display space is secured for the position coordinates of the fault display unit detected by the fault display unit detection unit Since possible display positions can be searched in units of words, it is easy to find a display position that does not interfere with a failed display unit. For this reason, it is possible to display characters of a normal size, and to ensure provision of information that is easy to read.

  In addition, the words stored in the display item related information storage unit are weighted, and when it is determined that it is impossible to display all the words of the display item to be displayed by the search means, the above weighting is performed. Since the display position is searched by deleting the low weighted words of the generated words, it is possible to maintain the high weighted information necessary for the driver.

  In addition, while maintaining the size of the characters to be displayed, a word narrow by one display unit is stored horizontally to search for the presence or absence of a display space for the same word. Even can be applied.

  The display item to be displayed on the information display device is stored as display item related information including a word and display space information for displaying the word. When a failure occurs in the display unit, the unit is broken in the unit of the word. Displayed by avoiding the display unit.

Embodiments of an information display apparatus according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.
In the present embodiment, a case where the present invention is applied to an information display device installed in front of a highway junction will be described as an example.
FIG. 1 shows the front surface of a display board 1 constituting an information display device. A display unit 11 in which LEDs 111 as display elements shown in FIG. 2 are arranged in a dot matrix (16 elements × 16 elements) is arranged vertically and horizontally (vertically 8). The display surface is formed in a unit x 21 units.

The information display device of the present invention includes the display board 1 shown in FIG. 1 and a control unit 2 built in the display board 1. However, the control unit 2 may be housed in a case separate from the display panel 1.
In addition, the display panel 1 can display a display of 7 characters and 2 rows using a display unit of 3 × 3 in length for one character. In addition, since the display using the display unit 1 with the vertical 8 × horizontal 6 display unit and the display using the character information of 5 characters and 2 stages is performed simultaneously, the number of the vertical display units is 8 units. Yes.

  FIG. 3 is a system block diagram of the control unit 2 of the information display device, and 201 is a display item storage unit for storing display items to be displayed on the display board 1, for example, “This road shoulder construction right side passage”, “5 Display items such as “Kilo-pointed falling objects traveling warning” and “Tohoku Expressway snow winter tires required” are stored in the form of character codes, which are stored in the display item related information storage unit described later. By reading out the character font data displayed on the display board 1, it can be converted into display data.

Reference numeral 202 denotes a display item related information storage unit which stores the above display items in a word of up to three characters, for example, in the form of “beyond”, “shoulder”, “construction”, “right” and “pass”. Also, a display space for the number of characters, for example, in the case of two characters, the display space is stored by 18 coordinates (xm, yn) to (xm + 5, yn + 2).
Further, as display item related information, weight information as word information is given to each word. For example, a word “1” is used for a word that represents a district, such as “this destination” or “5 km away”, and has little trouble for the driver to understand the information even if it is deleted from the display item. Weights “2” are assigned to words that indicate the cause of an event, such as “construction”, and weights “3” are assigned to words that indicate an action taken by the driver for an event that has occurred, such as “running” or “attention” Has been ranked.

Reference numeral 203 denotes a display unit position storage unit, which stores the position coordinates of the display unit as shown in FIG. 1, for example, with 168 coordinates in the form of (x1, y1) to (x21, y8).
Reference numeral 204 denotes a display position search unit that searches whether the display space for the number of characters of the word read from the display item related information storage unit 202 can be secured in the display unit except for the failed display unit in the display unit position storage unit.

A display data processing unit 205 converts the display item stored in the display item storage unit 201 with the code number into display data for the display element of the display unit and outputs it as serial data to the display unit.
Each display unit 11 is provided with a shift register (not shown) for inputting the display data and temporarily storing the display data, and drivers for the number of elements that latch the temporarily stored display data and light up in units of display elements. A drive circuit is provided.

  Reference numerals 206 and 207 denote a failure display unit storage unit that stores a known failure display unit detection unit and the position of the detected failure display unit, respectively. Then, the failure display unit detection unit 206 sends back the display data stored in the shift register from the input end, compares it with the transmitted display data, and sets “1” or “0” depending on the failure of the shift register. The position of the failed display unit is detected from the head position of the display unit to which the continuous signal is returned.

Here, a case where a plurality of display units 11 are out of order will be described.
When a plurality of display units have failed, the failed display unit is detected by the above method, and connected to the subsequent display unit using a bypass line that avoids the failed display unit. Then, the display data obtained by compressing the data for the failed display unit is transmitted to the display unit. Hereinafter, the position detection of the failed display unit is repeated, and each time a failed display unit is detected, the position is stored in the failure display unit storage unit 207 and the display data excluding the display data of the failed display unit is displayed. It is possible to perform display that avoids all display units that have been created and eventually failed.

  Although the above description is for the case where all of the display units are controlled using one communication line, various methods for controlling the display units by dividing them into a plurality of systems have been proposed. You may employ | adopt the method of detecting the display unit which divided | segmented into the system | strain and failed in a short time.

A hand operation unit 208 includes a switch (not shown) for selecting a display item by hand operation and controlling the display board 1.
A transmission unit 209 receives a remote control signal of the display board 1 from a central apparatus (not shown) and transmits monitoring data of the display board to the central apparatus.
Reference numeral 210 denotes a program memory that stores a control program for executing display that avoids a display unit that has failed according to the present invention.
Reference numeral 211 denotes a CPU having a temporary storage function for controlling each of the above units according to the control program of the program memory 210.

Next, based on the above-described configuration, the operation will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. 4 and FIGS.
When the failure display unit detector 5 detects a failure of a plurality of display units, for example, two or more display units, the program of the present invention stored in the program memory 210 is started, and the process shown in FIG. 4 is executed.

First, the display item selected from the display item storage unit 201 is read out to the CPU 211 via the hand operation unit 208 or the transmission unit 209 (step S1). For example, the display item “This road shoulder construction right side passage” in FIG. 5 is read.
Next, the read display item is collated with a word stored in the display item related information storage unit 202, and each word collated and matched by collation of the character code is displayed together with display space information and weight information added to the information. The data is read and temporarily stored in the CPU 211 (step S2).

The display space information does not need to be stored in units of words. The display space information for two characters and three characters is stored, and the character space of two or three characters is read by using the number of collations of the character code as the number of characters. May be.

Next, the display unit position coordinate data is read from the display unit position storage unit 203 (step S3), and the failure display unit position coordinate data is read from the failure display unit storage unit 207 (step S4). .
Here, in the case of FIG. 5, the position coordinate data of the failure display unit is (x6, y2),
Stored as (x15, y1), (x8, y6), (x19, y7).

  Next, the display space information assigned to the first word “beyond” temporarily stored in the CPU 211 is read, and the initial values “1” of m and n are substituted for the respective coordinates xm and yn and displayed. Space coordinate conversion is performed (step S5). As a result, the CPU 211 stores 27 coordinates (x1, y1) to (x9, y3).

  Next, in the position coordinate data of the display unit, it is determined whether or not the coordinate-converted display space overlaps with the position coordinate data of the failure display unit (step S6). If it is determined that the display space does not overlap with the position coordinates of the failure display unit, the coordinate data obtained by coordinate conversion is stored as the display position for the word (step S7). Further, the position coordinate data for which the above search has been executed is sequentially deleted from the position coordinate data of the display unit.

On the other hand, if it is determined that the position coordinate data for the display space coordinate-converted in step S6 overlaps the position coordinate data of the failure display unit, first,
The n value of the position coordinate of the display space is incremented by “+1”, and it is determined whether or not it is within the range of the position coordinate of the display unit (step S8). Shift downward (step S9).
Note that FIG. 5 shows that the position coordinate data (x6, y2) for the “next” display space overlaps the position coordinate data of the failure display unit.

  Next, the position coordinate of the display space has an n value of +1 and the position coordinate value is replaced. However, since the position coordinate data (x6, y2) still overlaps with the position coordinate data of the failure display unit, the n value is further increased. +1 coordinate transformation is performed. As a result, the position coordinate of the display space for the word “beyond” moves to a position that does not overlap with the position coordinate of the fault display unit in FIG. The position coordinates of x1, y3) to (x9, y5) are stored.

Similarly, the shift to the right and top of the display space when the shift cannot be performed downward is performed by the following processing.
The m value of the position coordinate of the display space is incremented by “+1”, and it is determined whether or not it is within the range of the position coordinate of the display unit (step S10). Shift to the right (step S11).
When shifting upward, the n value of the position coordinate of the display space is incremented by “−1” to determine whether or not the position coordinate is within the range of the display unit (step S12). The space is shifted upward with respect to the front surface of the display board (step S13).

Then, every time the display space for displaying the word is shifted on the display unit, the process of step S6 is executed, and the position coordinate data of the display position where the display space does not overlap the failure display unit is stored (step S7).
Here, as shown in FIG. 6, when the word “pass” is arranged on the “right side”, the position coordinate (x8, y6) of the display space overlaps with the position coordinate data of the failure display unit, Since there is no coordinate to shift to, shift to the right by 2 units.

  Next, it is determined whether or not the search of the display position for all the words temporarily stored in the CPU 211 has been completed (step S14). If it is determined that the display position search for all words has been completed, the CPU 211 reads the character font for the character of each word, assigns each character font to the new position coordinates stored for each word, and corresponds to the display pixel. New display data is created and passed to the display data processing unit 205. Finally, the display data processing unit 205 rearranges the data in the order of display data transmission, transmits the data to the display unit 11 for display (step S15), and ends the processing.

On the other hand, if it is determined in step S14 that the search for display positions for all words has not been completed, the process returns to step S5, and the same processing as described above is repeatedly executed by substituting xm and yn of the display space for the next word. Is done.
The initial values m and n of the display space for the next word are the x coordinate maximum value of the coordinates of the display position searched last time + 1 (however, the x coordinate maximum value ≦ 15 every time returning to step S5). ), The y coordinate minimum value (y coordinate minimum value ≦ 3) searched last time is applied to the y coordinate, and m = 1 as the initial value of the word displayed in the lower row when the above condition is not met. , N = 4, x-coordinate maximum value ≦ 15, and y-coordinate minimum value ≧ 5. In this regard, by applying the above condition, “this shoulder work” is arranged in a line in FIG. 6 and the position coordinates (x1, y4) of the initial position of the “right” word displayed in the lower row Is already used for the search for the word “beyond” and has been deleted from the position coordinate data, it is shown that it is displayed at the position shown in the figure by the processing of step S8 and step S9.

  In the above method, the initial value of the subsequent word is updated based on the coordinates of the tail of the previous word. For example, an association table for determining “shoulder construction” as an idiom is stored, and “shoulder” “construction” When the character code included in "" matches the character code of "shoulder construction" stored in the idiom table, any movable word is moved and displayed as one column of idioms with the same y-coordinate. May be.

If the display position for the word is not found in step S12, the numerical value word with a low weight, in the embodiment, “beyond” is deleted (step S16), and the processing from step S3 onward is executed.
FIG. 7 shows an example in which the display unit of the position coordinate (x20, y3) is newly broken and the display is performed with the “next” deleted.

Next, another embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.
In this embodiment, a case is described in which the present invention is applied to a display board 1 composed mainly of character display and comprising a display unit of 6 vertical units × 21 horizontal units.
In the above-described embodiment, one character is represented by a display unit of 3 vertical units × 3 horizontal units, whereas in this embodiment, a word consisting of 2 characters is displayed in 3 vertical units × 5 horizontal units. And the related display space information are stored in the display item related information storage unit.

The number of display units for displaying 2 characters is reduced from 6 horizontal units to 5 units. However, since standard characters are composed of 45 vertical elements x 39 vertical elements, the number of horizontal 5 unit elements is 80 elements. On the other hand, a space for two elements can be secured, and the interpretation of characters is not affected. Therefore, a display method that avoids a failure display unit using a word with a narrow display space may be employed before deleting the low weight word in the above-described embodiment.
As another example of this method, the word “here” is divided into “this” and “destination”, and “tunnel” is divided into “ton” and “nel” to search for display positions that can be displayed. Also good.

  In the above embodiment, the method for determining the overlap with the position coordinate data of the defective display unit by the coordinate conversion of the display space has been described. However, the present invention is not limited to the above method, and the display item A method of using a numerical value related to the display space of the word and a numerical value related to the position coordinate data of the failed display unit, and a method of analyzing the display space from the difference between the numerical value of the display unit and the coordinate between the failed display unit and the failed display unit It is also possible to search for a display position by using a method for preliminarily storing numerical data related to a display space in units of words for display items of the present invention and searching for a display position that avoids a failure display unit. Shall be included.

  In the above-described embodiment, the case of an information display device for displaying road information has been described, but it goes without saying that the present invention can be applied to various information display devices other than road information.

It is a front view of the display board which comprises the information display apparatus of this invention. It is a front view of the display unit used for the display board of an information display apparatus. It is a system block diagram of an information display device. It is a flowchart for demonstrating operation | movement of a system block diagram same as the above. It is explanatory drawing explaining arrangement | positioning of the display item in case a display unit is normal. It is explanatory drawing which shows the example of a display which avoided the failed display unit. It is explanatory drawing which shows the example of a display when the word "this ahead" with a low weight is deleted. It is explanatory drawing which shows the example of a display by another Example.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Display board 2 Control part 11 Display unit 201 Display item memory | storage part 202 Display item related information memory | storage part 203 Display item unit position memory | storage part 204 Display position search part

Claims (3)

In an information display device in which display units in which display elements such as LEDs are arranged in a dot matrix are arranged vertically and horizontally on the front surface of a display plate, display data transmitted to the display unit and display unit for displaying display items A fault display unit detector for detecting the position of the faulty display unit by collating it with the monitor data temporarily stored in the shift register and returned from the shift register for data monitoring, and the position of the display unit on the front of the display board A display unit position storage unit that stores coordinates, a failure display unit position storage unit that stores the position of the display unit detected by the failure display unit detection unit, a display item storage unit that stores the display item to be displayed, Display including the words included in the same display item and the display space information necessary for displaying the same word A display item related information storage unit for storing eye related information, and a display position search unit for searching for a display position that can secure a display space for a word included in the display item with respect to a display unit other than the failed display unit. The information display device is characterized in that the above word is arranged and displayed at the searched display position. The weight stored in the display item related information storage unit is weighted, and if the display position search unit determines that it is impossible to display the display item to be displayed, 2. The information display apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a search for a display position is executed by deleting a word having a low weight. 2. The information display according to claim 1, wherein the display item related information storage unit is arranged with characters arranged at a pitch smaller by one display unit than the number of horizontal display units used for a two-character word. apparatus.

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