JP2006295383A - Mobile communication terminal and communication state notice method - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a mobile communication terminal and a communication state notice method capable of allowing a user to get relief from stress considered to be felt by the user when the user consumes much time due to the downloading of large capacity data by visually and simply informing the user about information associated with a communication environment without the need for using a PC tool. <P>SOLUTION: When discriminating that a channel and a transmission rate are revised in a step S1, a CPU in the mobile communication terminal controls a blink pattern and a color of an LED notice section depending on whether acquired channel information indicates a notice channel, a call channel, a shared channel or an individual channel. The LED notice section is an existing call arrival notice section comprising LEDs for lighting/blinking for the call arrival notice and informs the user about present channel information or a present transfer rate depending on a combination of the emitted color of light and lighting or a blinking pattern through the use of the existing call arrival notice section. Thus, the user can recognize the communication environment of a place to which the large capacity data are downloaded so that the user can download the data at a place with an excellent communication environment. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a mobile communication terminal and a communication state notification method, and in particular, notifies a mobile communication terminal having a function of communicating with another communication terminal via a communication network, and a current communication environment / communication state in the mobile communication terminal. The present invention relates to a communication status notification method.

  A CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) mobile communication system is known as a mobile communication system including a wireless base station, a mobile communication terminal that is a mobile station, and a control station that controls communication of the wireless base station ( For example, see Patent Document 1). In this CDMA mobile communication system, as a radio channel used for communication, one of a common channel shared between a radio base station and a plurality of mobile communication terminals and an individual channel individually assigned to each mobile communication terminal Select and use channels according to traffic characteristics.

  On the other hand, when downloading large amounts of data and measuring throughput in the evaluation of mobile communication devices, even when downloading the same amount of data, multiple mobile communication devices are connected to the base station network, increasing the traffic volume. When downloading is performed in a poor communication state with fading or noise added, the throughput decreases and a large time difference occurs until the download is completed.

  That is, when downloading a large amount of data using a mobile communication terminal, if the download is performed in a state where the communication environment is bad and the transmission rate is low, the maximum rate is ascending to the terminal itself: 64 kbps / down Even if there is a capacity of 384 kbps, there is a case where the maximum rate is not reached and the state is ranked down from the dedicated channel to the common channel even if it is up to 64 kbps / 64 kbps. Normally, information regarding these communication states is not notified to the user.

  When this situation is detected by using a PC tool or the like having a monitoring function for various control signals in the mobile communication terminal and detecting that the error rate of received data increases and the reception rate of normal data deteriorates It is possible to monitor the phenomenon in which the transmission rate decreases or the channel transition from the dedicated channel to the common channel occurs, and the user can be notified of the reason why the download takes time. Note that, when downloading a large volume, communication is generally performed at a high rate by using an individual channel instead of a common channel and requesting an increase in the transmission rate.

  A mobile communication terminal having a communication status notification function is also known in the art (see, for example, Patent Document 2). This conventional mobile communication terminal includes means for detecting a transition from a call to a call and a display means for displaying the detection result when the detection means detects a transition during a call. It is a configuration. Specifically, based on the detection of the call notification signal from the base station or the voice recognition output of the voice recognition unit that recognizes the voice from the other party side, a call is detected and a liquid crystal display element (LCD) or light emitting diode is detected. (LED) notifies the result of detection during a call by displaying or blinking.

JP 2004-282169 A JP-A-11-205863

  However, in a mobile communication terminal that does not have the PC tool having a monitor function for various control signals, it is not possible to know what phenomenon is currently occurring in the mobile communication terminal. When data is downloaded, if it is downloaded at a place where the transmission rate is low due to the communication state, there is a problem that it takes time to complete the download and stresses the user.

  On the other hand, in the mobile communication terminal having the PC tool, the state in the mobile communication terminal in communication can be known, but the state of the read channel in the waiting state for incoming call waiting is not known, and the PC tool is separately provided. It must be prepared, which is disadvantageous in terms of cost.

  Further, in the conventional mobile communication terminal described in Patent Document 2, the communication state to be notified is a state in which a transition is made from during a call to during a call, and when downloading a large amount of data, the communication state of the download location is good. There is a problem that it is impossible to report whether there is any bad or bad, and this causes a wasteful connection in a place where the communication environment is bad, and it takes time to complete the download, which causes a problem for the user. .

  The present invention has been made in view of the above points. By notifying a user of information regarding a communication environment visually and simply without using a PC tool, the user can obtain a large amount of data. It is an object of the present invention to provide a portable communication terminal and a communication state notification method capable of reducing stress, which is likely to be felt when spending time by downloading the Internet.

  Another object of the present invention is to provide a mobile communication terminal and a communication for notifying a user by changing a display pattern even when the state of a call channel that is in a waiting state for waiting for an incoming call is changed other than during communication, for example. It is to provide a status notification method.

  In order to achieve the above object, the mobile communication terminal of the present invention is a channel in a state other than during communication or in a state other than during communication in a mobile communication terminal having a function of communicating with other communication terminals via a communication network. Is acquired and updated by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and a display color according to information of the channel acquired and updated at the time of channel transition, and the channel information acquired and updated by the acquiring unit. And a notification means for notifying channel information.

  In this invention, the channel information in a state during communication or in a state other than during communication is acquired at the time of channel transition, and it is notified by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and display color. The information of the current channel can be grasped by the combination of the lighting or blinking pattern and the display color.

  In order to achieve the above object, in the portable communication terminal of the present invention, the acquisition unit acquires and updates the transmission rate of the channel at the time of transition of the channel during communication, and the notification unit acquires and updates the transmission rate. According to the transmission rate, the acquired and updated transmission rate is notified by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and a display color.

  In this invention, since the transmission rate during communication is notified to the user by a combination of the lighting or blinking pattern and the display color, the user can grasp the transmission rate currently being communicated. It is possible to visually determine that the transmission rate is low.

  In order to achieve the above object, the mobile communication terminal of the present invention is characterized in that an incoming call notification means for notifying whether there is an incoming call by lighting or blinking is used as the notification means. In this invention, since the existing incoming call notification means originally existing in the mobile communication terminal is used, the cost increase can be minimized.

  In order to achieve the above object, the mobile communication terminal of the present invention uses the above acquisition means as information on a channel other than being communicated, a broadcast channel in the state of acquiring base station information, an incoming call waiting The present invention is characterized in that it is a means for acquiring information on a paging channel in a waiting state. In the present invention, since the state other than the communication is notified as the visual decoration, it is possible to visually determine the current state other than the communication.

  In order to achieve the above object, the mobile communication terminal of the present invention uses a common channel shared with a base station and a separate channel allocated individually for each mobile communication terminal. The acquisition means is characterized in that the acquisition means acquires a common channel and an individual channel as information on a channel during communication, and acquires a transmission rate of the individual channel at the time of transition of the individual channel. In the present invention, it is possible to visually determine whether a communication state of a mobile communication terminal used in a CDMA mobile communication system is a common channel use or an individual channel use, and in the case of an individual channel, the transmission rate is also visually determined. can do.

  In order to achieve the above object, the communication state notification method of the present invention is a communication state notification method for a mobile communication terminal having a function of communicating with other communication terminals via a communication network. A first step of acquiring and updating channel information in a state other than during communication at the time of channel transition, and a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern according to the channel information acquired and updated in the first step And a second step of notifying the acquired and updated channel information by a combination of the display color and the display color.

  In this invention, the channel information in a state during communication or in a state other than during communication is acquired at the time of channel transition, and it is notified by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and display color. The information of the current channel can be grasped by the combination of the lighting or blinking pattern and the display color.

  In order to achieve the above object, in the communication state notification method of the present invention, the first step is to acquire and update the transmission rate of the channel at the time of transition of the channel during communication, and Step 2 is characterized in that the acquired and updated transmission rate is notified by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and a display color according to the acquired and updated transmission rate.

  In this invention, since the transmission rate during communication is notified to the user by a combination of the lighting or blinking pattern and the display color, the user can grasp the transmission rate currently being communicated. It is possible to visually determine that the transmission rate is low.

  In order to achieve the above object, in the communication status notification method of the present invention, in the second step, channel information or transmission is performed using an incoming notification means for notifying whether there is an incoming call by lighting or blinking. The rate is notified.

  According to the present invention, channel information in communication or in a state other than communication is acquired at the time of channel transition, and the user is notified by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and display color. Since the current channel information can be grasped by the combination of the lighting or blinking pattern and the display color, it is possible not only to communicate but also to other than communicating without providing a PC tool. The current communication environment and communication status can be visually notified even in the status.

  Therefore, according to the present invention, based on the communication environment / communication state at the time of downloading a large amount of data, the user can try to download the data after spending time or changing the environment, It is possible to avoid unnecessary connection in a bad communication environment, and it is possible to reduce the occurrence of unnecessary stress when downloading a large amount of data.

  Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows a block diagram of an embodiment of a portable communication terminal according to the present invention. A mobile communication terminal 10 according to the present embodiment is a mobile communication terminal (for example, a mobile phone) having a function of communicating with another communication terminal via a communication network, and as shown in FIG. It includes a control unit 30, an antenna 40, a radio unit 50, an operation unit 60, an LED notification unit (incoming illumination) 70, a microphone (microphone) 80, and a speaker 90.

  The control unit 30 includes a central processing unit (CPU) 31 that performs overall control of the mobile communication terminal 10, an operation program of the CPU 31, communication state display function on / off information input from the operation unit 60, and the like. And a memory 32 for identifying and storing. The LCD display unit 20 is a screen display unit configured by a liquid crystal display element (LCD) to display a display screen, and is driven by a display control unit by the CPU 31 of the control unit 30.

  The radio unit 50 performs radio communication with the nearest radio base station (not shown) via the antenna 40. Here, the mobile communication terminal 10 is used in the above-described CDMA mobile communication system, and the radio unit 50 uses a common channel shared with the radio base station or an individual channel individually assigned to the mobile communication terminal 10. Use to communicate. The operation unit 60 inputs various types of information to the control unit 30 according to user operations.

  The LED notification unit 70 is an existing notification unit composed of a light emitting diode (LED) used to notify the user of the presence / absence of an incoming call by lighting or blinking. In this embodiment, the LED notification unit 70 is used. The control unit 30 is also used for notifying the communication state information acquired from the wireless unit 50 in response to the communication state display function being set to ON by the operation of the operation unit 60. In addition, the control unit 30 notifies the information update by changing the lighting / flashing pattern of the LED notification unit 70 in accordance with the update of the communication state information acquired from the wireless unit 50. In the case where the LED notification unit 20 is composed of a plurality of LEDs having different display colors, the display color pattern of the LEDs that are lit or blinking may be changed according to the acquired information on the current communication state. Good.

  The microphone 80 performs acoustic-electrical conversion of the transmission voice to generate a transmission voice signal, and transmits the transmission voice signal from the antenna 40 to the partner terminal through the control unit 30 and the radio unit 50 by a known method. The speaker 90 receives the received voice signal received by the wireless unit 50 via the antenna 40 via the control unit 30, and performs electro-acoustic conversion on the received voice signal to generate a received voice. The operations of the microphone 80 and the speaker 90 are well known.

  Next, the operation of the present embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. When the communication state display function ON is set from the operation unit 60, the CPU 31 of the control unit 30 performs an operation according to the flowchart of FIG. However, FIG. 2 does not cover all channels and transmission rate information, but is a flowchart at a typical state transition. 3 is displayed on the LCD display unit 20 and the illumination lighting pattern in the LED notification unit 70 can be set from the operation unit 60. .

  In FIG. 3, the illumination lighting pattern indicates the light emitting color of the light emitting diodes that are lit and flashing in correspondence with the explanation items such as “standby”, “busy”, “good communication environment”, “bad communication environment”, etc. It is a pattern that combines lighting or blinking. The explanation items may be “channel” and “transfer rate”, but these are difficult for the user to understand, so it is desirable to make the explanation items easy to understand for the user as shown in FIG. . When the communication state display function is set to OFF, the lighting / flashing control for the LED notification unit 70 corresponding to the communication state is not performed, so that waste of power consumption can be avoided.

  When the communication state display function is turned on from the operation unit 60, the CPU 31 of the control unit 30 determines whether the channel and the transmission rate have been changed (step S1). Here, as described above, the mobile communication terminal 10 of this embodiment is used in a CDMA mobile communication system, and when downloading data by packet communication, the amount of data, The transmission rate is changed during communication according to the traffic volume.

  Since this transmission rate is a fixed rate such as uplink: 64 kbps / downlink: 64 kbps, uplink: 64 kbps / downlink 384 kbps, etc., depending on the spreading factor (spreading factor), the value of this spreading factor changes. By assigning a display color and a blinking pattern to the LED notification unit 70 each time, the user can visually determine the traffic amount and the state of the communication environment.

  When it is determined in step S1 in FIG. 2 that the channel and transmission rate have not been changed, the CPU 31 acquires information on the channel and transmission rate from the radio unit 50 (step S2), and again in step S1 the channel and transmission rate. It is determined whether or not there is any change. On the other hand, when the CPU 31 determines that the channel and the transmission rate have been changed in step S1, the LED notification unit 70 depends on whether the acquired channel information is a broadcast channel, a paging channel, a common channel, or an individual channel. Controls the blinking pattern and display color.

  That is, when the acquired channel information is a broadcast channel, the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a broadcast channel value (for example, 10) (step S4), and based on the set LED blinking variable. Then, the blinking pattern and display color of the LED notification unit 70 are controlled (step S12). Similarly, when the acquired channel information is the paging channel, the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a value for the paging channel (for example, 20) (step S5), and the acquired channel information is the common channel. In this case, the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a common channel value (for example, 30) (step S6), and the LED notification unit 70 blinks based on the set LED blinking variable. The pattern and display color are controlled (step S12).

  However, if the channel information acquired in step S3 is an individual channel, the transmission rate information acquired after setting the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) to a value for the individual channel (for example, 40), for example (step S7). Is downlink 64 kbps, downlink 128 kbps, or downlink 384 kbps (step S8). When the acquired transmission rate information is 64 kbps downstream, the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a value for 64 kbps downstream (for example, 41) (step S9), and based on the set LED blinking variable. The blinking pattern and display color of the LED notification unit 70 are controlled (step S12).

  Similarly, when the acquired transmission rate information is down 128 kbps, the value of the LED blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a down 128 kbps value (for example, 42) (step S10), and when down 384 kbps, the LED The value of the blinking variable (Illumination_pattern) is set to a value for downlink 384 kbps (for example, 43) (step S11), and the blinking pattern and display color of the LED notification unit 70 are set based on the set LED blinking variables. Is controlled (step S12).

  As described above, according to the present embodiment, the channel and transmission rate information are set to the prepared variables at the time of the state transition during communication by the interrupt process from the radio unit 50, and the state during the communication transitions. Each time it is updated, according to the pattern set in the variable, a plurality of LEDs having different light emission colors constituting the LED notification unit 70 are selected and turned on or blinked, whereby the display color and the lighting or blinking pattern are displayed. A communication state notification function can be realized by combining with the above.

  Further, in this embodiment, not only in the common channel / individual channel in communication but also in the state where the base station information is being acquired other than during communication, the broadcast channel, the call waiting state in standby, the call waiting state Even when the state transitions to the channel, etc., the incoming LED color scheme and lighting / flashing pattern are allocated, so that the user can enjoy the display of the color scheme and lighting / flashing pattern visually. Is possible.

  In a terminal that can download a large amount of data by changing the location, such as a mobile communication terminal, even when downloading the same amount of data, the transmission rate is high and low depending on the communication state. Since there is a difference in the time until the download is completed, the user feels stress for the user who performs the download at a low transmission rate.

  However, according to the present embodiment, the incoming call illumination function by the existing LED notification unit 70 is used to visually indicate the state during communication. It is possible to determine that the user is underneath, in which case the user can try to download a large amount of data after spending time or changing the environment, so the communication environment is poor Therefore, it is possible to avoid unnecessary connection, and it is not necessary to feel the above stress.

  The present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment. For example, the communication mobile terminal can be applied to a simple mobile phone (PHS) other than a mobile phone, a mobile information device, and the like. The present invention also includes a computer program that causes the CPU 31 to execute the operation of FIG.

  Further, in the above-described embodiment, the description has been made such that the existing LED notification unit 70 for notification of incoming calls is used to notify the communication state and the like by a combination of a color scheme and a lighting / flashing pattern. For example, the battery mark on the screen of the LCD display unit 20 and the field (area) at the top of the screen where the antenna picture is displayed are used, and the color of the field at the top is changed every time the channel is changed. Notification can also be made by a method such as a change.

It is a block diagram of one embodiment of a portable communication terminal of the present invention. It is a flowchart for operation | movement description of FIG. It is a figure which shows the example of a screen at the time of ON setting of a communication status display by this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Mobile communication terminal 20 LCD display part 30 Control part 31 CPU (central processing unit)
32 Memory 40 Antenna 50 Radio unit 60 Operation unit 70 LED notification unit 80 Microphone 90 Speaker

Claims (8)

In a mobile communication terminal having a function of communicating with other communication terminals via a communication network,
Acquisition means for acquiring and updating information on a channel in communication or in a state other than in communication at the time of transition of the channel;
In accordance with the information on the channel acquired and updated by the acquisition means, a notification means for notifying the information on the acquired and updated channel by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and a display color is provided. A mobile communication terminal.   The acquisition unit acquires and updates the transmission rate of the channel at the time of transition of the channel during communication, and the notification unit determines a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and display color according to the acquired and updated transmission rate. The mobile communication terminal according to claim 1, wherein the acquired and updated transmission rates are notified by a combination of the above.   3. The mobile communication terminal according to claim 1, wherein the notification means uses an incoming call notification means for notifying whether there is an incoming call by lighting or blinking.   The acquisition means is means for acquiring information on a broadcast channel in a state of acquiring base station information and information on a call channel in a standby state of waiting for an incoming call as information on a channel other than the communication in progress. The mobile communication terminal according to any one of claims 1 to 3.   A mobile communication terminal in a CDMA mobile communication system that uses a common channel shared with a base station and an individual channel individually assigned to each mobile communication terminal, wherein the acquisition means includes the channel in communication 5. The mobile communication terminal according to claim 2, wherein the common channel and the dedicated channel are acquired as information of the channel, and a transmission rate of the dedicated channel is acquired at the time of transition of the dedicated channel. . In a communication state notification method of a mobile communication terminal having a function of communicating with other communication terminals via a communication network,
A first step of acquiring and updating information on a channel in communication or in a state other than in communication at the time of transition of the channel;
A second step of notifying the acquired and updated channel information by a combination of a predetermined lighting or blinking pattern and display color according to the channel information acquired and updated in the first step; A communication status notification method comprising:   The first step acquires and updates the transmission rate of the channel at the time of transition of the channel being communicated, and the second step determines whether to turn on or off in advance according to the acquired and updated transmission rate. 7. The communication state notification method according to claim 6, wherein the acquired and updated transmission rate is notified by a combination of a blinking pattern and a display color. 8. The communication state according to claim 6, wherein the second step notifies the channel information or the transmission rate using an incoming notification unit that notifies the presence or absence of an incoming call by lighting or blinking. 9. Notification method.

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