JP2009259071A - Household electric equipment adapter and household electric equipment control system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a household electric equipment adapter and a household electric equipment control system allowing to obtain the most suitable control program even if there are a plurality of downloadable control programs. <P>SOLUTION: The household electric equipment adapter comprises interface units 101, 102, 103 for obtaining an equipment control program; a program information obtaining means 104 for obtaining control program attribute information from the interface units; a program-to-be-obtained determining means 105 for determining the most suitable control program according to the attribute information; a download control means 106 for downloading via the interface units 101, 102, 103 the most suitable control program determined by the determining means; a download program storage unit 107 for retaining the control program downloaded; and a download program interpretation means 108 for interpreting and executing the control program downloaded. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a household electrical appliance adapter for connecting a household electrical appliance adopting a method capable of downloading and executing a control program to a network, and a household electrical appliance control system including the household electrical appliance adapter.

  When connecting home appliances to a network such as the Internet or home network, in order to avoid increasing the cost of home appliances, the communication function is not provided in the home appliances and an external adapter is used as necessary. In many cases, a configuration for realizing the above is taken. Since the communication interface specifications of home appliances differ depending on the manufacturer and model, conventional home appliance adapters have been developed as dedicated adapters for each device, leading to a problem of increasing the inventory and distribution costs of home appliance adapters. On the other hand, a method has been proposed in which a home appliance adapter is used in common, and a program for mutual conversion between a communication protocol and a network protocol different for each manufacturer or model is downloaded to the home appliance adapter later (for example, non-patent literature). 1, Patent Document 1).

JP 2006-127432 A ECHONET Standard Version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET Communication Equipment Specifications Chapter 8 ECHONET Middleware Adapter Section 8.9 Peer to Peer Type Communication Protocol (ECHONET is a trademark of ECHONET Consortium)

  In the said nonpatent literature 1, the household appliance adapter standardizes the procedure which acquires a control program from household appliances. Moreover, in the said patent document 1, by having two or more interfaces which acquire a household appliance adapter control program, even when there is no internet connection environment or when a household appliance is not operate | moving, download of control software is enabled. However, conventionally, since the download procedure of the control program is fixed, there is a problem that when there are a plurality of control programs that can be downloaded, the home appliance adapter cannot always obtain the optimum program.

  In addition, because it does not take into account deterioration due to aging of the area that stores the control program or deterioration due to the number of rewrites, rewriting exceeding the limit is performed when it is used in an environment where time has passed since manufacturing or frequent rewriting occurs. Then, there was a problem that there is a possibility of destroying the home appliance adapter.

  The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and includes a home appliance adapter that makes it possible to obtain an optimal control program even when there are a plurality of downloadable control programs. A home appliance control system is provided.

  Moreover, the degradation condition of the area | region which stores the downloaded control program is determined, and the household appliance adapter which reduces the destruction of the household appliance adapter resulting from it is provided.

The home appliance adapter of the present invention includes an interface unit that acquires a control program for the device,
Program information acquisition means for acquiring attribute information of the control program from the interface unit;
Acquisition target program determination means for determining an optimal control program from the attribute information;
Download control means for downloading the optimal control program determined by the acquisition target program determination means via the interface unit;
A download program storage for holding the downloaded control program;
Download program interpretation means for interpreting and executing the downloaded control program is provided.
In addition, the home appliance adapter of the present invention includes an interface unit that acquires a control program for the device,
Download control means for downloading a control program via the interface unit;
A download program storage for holding the acquired control program;
Download program interpretation means for interpreting and executing the acquired control program;
Degradation status determination means for determining the degradation status of the download program storage unit is provided.
Furthermore, the household appliance control system of this invention is provided with said household appliance adapter and the download server which provides the newest control program with respect to the household appliance adapter.

The home appliance adapter according to the present invention acquires the attribute information of a plurality of control programs by the program information acquisition means, and determines the acquisition target program by comparing the respective attribute information by the acquisition target program determination means. Can be obtained.
In addition, because it has a degradation status judging means to judge the degradation status of the download program storage unit, it prevents the destruction of the home appliance adapter by preventing the control program from being saved in the degraded storage unit and rewriting the control program beyond the limit. can do.
In addition, since the download server that always provides the latest control program is provided for the home appliance adapter, the modified control program can be immediately reflected in the home appliance adapter when the control program is defective.

Embodiment 1 FIG.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a home appliance adapter 100 and a home appliance control system according to Embodiment 1 of the present invention. In FIG. 1, a home appliance adapter 100 includes a home appliance 110 via a device interface unit 101 realized by a UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter) or the like, and a controller 130 which is a network device via a network interface unit 103 of a home network. Are connected to a personal computer 120, which is a general-purpose device, via a general-purpose interface unit 102 realized by USB (Universal Serial Bus). Further, the controller 130 is connected to the download server 150 via the Internet 140.
In addition to the controller 130, the network device may be another device on the network, and the general-purpose device may be a workstation other than the personal computer 120.

  The home appliance 110 and the controller 130 can communicate via the home appliance adapter 100. It is assumed that the control program for mutual conversion between the communication protocol of the home appliance 110 and the communication protocol of the controller 130 is stored in each of the home appliance 110, the personal computer 120, and the controller 130. In addition, it is assumed that the manufacturer of the home appliance 110 always uploads the latest control program to the download server 150, and the controller 130 periodically downloads and acquires the latest control program from the download server 150.

In the home appliance adapter 100, the device interface unit 101, the general-purpose interface unit 102, and the network interface unit 103 are connected to a program information acquisition unit 104 that acquires attribute information of a control program, and a download control unit 106 that acquires control program data. It is connected.
The program information acquisition unit 104 notifies the acquisition target program determination unit 105 of the attribute information of the control program.
The acquisition target program determination unit 105 determines an optimal control program from the received attribute information of a plurality of control programs, and notifies the download control unit 106 of the result.
The download control unit 106 acquires an optimal control program determined by the acquisition target program determination unit 105 from a corresponding device, and a download program storage unit 107 realized by a rewritable EEPROM (Electrically Erasable and Programmable Read Only Memory) or the like. To store.
The control program stored in the download program storage unit 107 is interpreted by the download program interpretation unit 108 to realize communication between the home appliance 110 via the device interface unit 101 and the controller 130 via the network interface unit 103. To do.

  Next, the operation of the home appliance adapter 100 will be described. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the operation of the home appliance adapter 100 according to the first embodiment. When the home appliance adapter 100 is activated, first, in step ST201, each interface unit 101, 102, 103 acquires device information to be controlled. This processing is performed, for example, between the home appliance adapter 100 and the home appliance 110 according to “ECHONET Standard Version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET Communication Device Specifications Chapter 8 ECHONET Middleware Adapter Section 8.7 Device Interface Information Recognition Service”. It can be carried out by the methods as described. However, other methods may be used as long as the home appliance adapter 100 can acquire information (manufacturer, model, model, etc.) that can specify the home appliance 110.

  Next, in step ST <b> 202, the program information acquisition unit 104 of the home appliance adapter 100 acquires program information from the home appliance 110. FIG. 3 shows an example of the data format of the control program held by the home appliance 110. 3 shows “ECHONET Standard Version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET Communication Equipment Specifications Chapter 8 ECHONET Middleware Adapter Section 8.10 Interpreter Program Execution Environment Specification in Peer to Peer Type Program Download Form 8.10 .3, a well-known data format described in the section “Specifications of the format of the program body”.

  FIG. 4 is a sequence diagram showing a communication procedure between home appliance adapter 100 and home appliance 110 in step ST202. The sequence shown in FIG. 4 is “ECHONET Standard Version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET Communication Device Specifications Chapter 8 ECHONET Middleware Adapter Section 8.9 Peer to Peer Type Communication Protocol Section 8.9.3 From ECHONET Ready Device Part of the "Program Download Protocol". When the home appliance adapter 100 transmits a transmission target information acquisition request frame to the home appliance 110, the home appliance 110 reads program information (manufacturer code, program identifier (model code, model code, software version), download data size). )return it. The home appliance adapter 100 stores the software version and the download data size.

Next, the program information acquisition means 104 of the household appliance adapter 100 acquires program information from the personal computer 120 in step ST203. This process may be the same as step ST202 except that the communication destination is different.
Furthermore, the program information acquisition means 104 of the household appliance adapter 100 acquires program information from the controller 130 at step ST204. This process may also be the same as step ST202 except that the communication destination is different.

  Next, the acquisition target program determination unit 105 of the home appliance adapter 100 determines an optimal download program in step ST205. In the present embodiment, the software version is compared with the download data size, and the control program that can be stored in the download program storage unit 107 included in the home appliance adapter 100 is selected with the newest software version.

  Next, the acquisition target program determination unit 105 determines whether or not the program needs to be updated in step ST206. If download data that has been downloaded before is already stored in the download program storage unit 107, it is compared with the version information of the program determined in step ST205, and if it is a new version, the determination is “Y”, which is the same or older If it is a version, the determination is “N”.

  If the determination in step ST206 is “Y”, in step ST207, the download control means 106 downloads a control program from an apparatus (any of the home appliance 110, the personal computer 120, or the controller 130) that holds the acquisition target program. get. This operation can be performed, for example, by referring to “ECHONET Standard Version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET Communication Device Specifications Chapter 8 ECHONET Middleware Adapter Section 8.9 Peer to Peer Type Communication Protocol Section 8.9.3 from ECHONET Ready Equipment It can be performed by a known method shown in “Program Download Protocol” or the like.

  Next, in step ST208, the download program interpretation unit 108 interprets and executes the acquired control program. For example, the control program and download program interpreting means 108 can execute an interpreter program execution in the form of an ECHONET standard version 3.60 Part 7 ECHONET communication equipment specification Chapter 8 ECHONET middleware adapter Section 8.10 Peer to Peer type program download form It may be a known one implemented according to the “environmental specification”.

  If the occurrence of an error is detected in step ST209 during execution of the control program, the home appliance adapter 100 has a bug in the control program or the RAM (Random Access) of the home appliance adapter 100 required for the operation of the control program. Memory) area is determined to be insufficient, and the process returns to the first step ST201.

  The processing of step ST201 to step ST204 when returning to the first step ST201 is the same as the processing described above, and next, the optimum download program is determined in step ST205. However, in this case, since the restart is due to an error, the control program of the newest software version that can be stored in the download program storage unit 107 after excluding the software version program stored in the download program storage unit 107. Select.

  Next, in step ST206, it is determined whether the program needs to be updated. If the restart is due to an error, it is always determined as “Y”, the control program is acquired by downloading in step ST207, and the program is executed in step ST208. In step ST209, the occurrence of an error is detected.

  On the other hand, when it is determined that there is no error “N” in step ST209 (including the case of restart), when a predetermined time elapses during execution of the control program, the process returns to step ST204 and the program from the controller 130 is executed. Get information. Here, it is assumed that the controller 130 always obtains the latest control program provided by the manufacturer of the home appliance 110 from the download server 150 via the Internet 140.

  Next, in step ST205, an optimal control program is determined, and in step ST206, it is determined whether or not the control program needs to be updated. As a result of the determination, if the version is newer than the control program stored in the download program storage unit 107 and the size does not fit in the download program storage unit 107 and has caused an error in the past, the determination in step ST206 is “ In step ST207, the control program is acquired by downloading.

In the first embodiment, the processing for communicating with three external devices such as the home appliance 110, the personal computer 120, and the controller 130 has been described. However, one or two devices may communicate with each other, and among these devices, A plurality of control programs having different versions and sizes may be held, and an optimum program may be determined from them.
Further, the control target using the home appliance adapter 100 may be a device other than the home appliance, for example, a measurement device or a power supply device.

The home appliance adapter 100 according to the first embodiment and the home appliance control system including the same have the following effects.
Since the attribute information of a plurality of control programs is acquired and the attribute information is compared by the acquisition target program determination means to determine the control program to be acquired, the optimal control program can be acquired.
In addition, the interface unit includes at least one of a device interface unit connected to a home appliance, a network interface unit connected to a controller or other device on a network, and a general-purpose interface unit connected to a personal computer or a workstation. Therefore, the control program can be acquired in many environments.
In addition, since the optimum program is determined according to the version information of the control program, the latest version of the control program can be preferentially acquired.
Further, since the optimum program is determined according to the program size information of the control program, a program that can be stored in the download program storage unit can be an acquisition target.
Further, when an error occurs during execution of the control program, the acquisition priority of the control program in which the error has occurred is lowered, so that the possibility of the same error occurring can be reduced.
Further, since the attribute information of the control program is periodically acquired for an interface unit that may be updated in the control program, such as the network interface 103, the latest control program can always be acquired.
In addition, since the home appliance control system of this embodiment has a download server that always provides the latest control program, the modified control program is immediately reflected in the home appliance adapter, such as when the control program is defective. be able to.

Embodiment 2. FIG.
FIG. 5 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a home appliance adapter 500 and a home appliance control system according to Embodiment 2 of the present invention. In FIG. 5, elements (means) denoted by the same reference numerals as those in FIG. 1 have been described in the first embodiment, and therefore, only new elements (means) will be described here.
The current time information acquisition unit 501 is a unit that acquires current time information (may be simply date) from the home appliance 110, the personal computer 120, or the controller 130. The current time information acquired by the current time information acquisition unit 501 is notified to the deterioration status determination unit 502.
The manufacturing time storage unit 503 is means for storing the date and time (or simply the date) that the home appliance adapter 500 was manufactured.
The rewrite count storage unit 504 is means for storing the number of times data in the download program storage unit 107 has been rewritten.
The deterioration state determination unit 502 determines the deterioration state of the download program storage unit 107 from the data rewrite information in the rewrite count storage unit 504 and / or the comparison information between the current time information and the time information in the manufacturing time storage unit 503. Then, it is determined whether or not the control program can be rewritten.

  Next, the operation of the home appliance adapter 500 will be described. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the operation of the home appliance adapter 500 according to the second embodiment. When the home appliance adapter 500 is activated, first, in step ST601, the deterioration state determination unit 502 refers to the number of rewrites in the download program storage unit 107 recorded in the rewrite number storage unit 504. When it is determined that the number of rewrites is within a predetermined allowable value (for example, 1000 times) and further rewriting is possible, the determination in step ST602 is “Y”, and the process proceeds to step ST603.

  In step ST603, the current time information acquisition unit 501 acquires current time information from the home appliance 110, the personal computer 120, or the controller 110. Similar to FIG. 4, the time acquisition sequence may be a procedure in which the home appliance adapter 500 transmits a request to each device and acquires a response. Or household appliance adapter 500 itself may be provided with a timer, and information on the present time may be acquired from its own timer. The acquired information on the current time is notified to the deterioration status determination unit 502. In step ST604, the deterioration state determination unit 502 refers to the information stored in the manufacturing time storage unit 503, and determines whether or not the download program storage unit 107 can be rewritten. For example, if the current time is within 15 years from the manufacturing time (the number of days may be specified), the rewriting is possible, the determination is “Y”, and the process proceeds to step ST605.

In step ST605, device information of the device to be controlled is acquired. This process is the same as step ST201 in FIG. Next, control program information is acquired in step ST606. This process is the same as step ST202, step ST203, or step ST204 in FIG. Next, it is determined whether or not the program needs to be updated in step ST607. This process is the same as step ST206 in FIG. When the determination in step ST206 is “Y”, in step ST608, the control program is obtained by downloading from the corresponding device. This process is the same as step ST207 in FIG. After acquisition of the control program, the control program is executed in step ST610. This process is the same as step 208 in FIG.
If the determination in step ST602 or step ST604 is “N”, the process proceeds to step ST609. In this case, if the control program is already stored in the download program storage unit 107, the program is executed in step ST610, and if the control program is not stored in the download program storage unit 107, the process ends.

The home appliance adapter 500 according to the second embodiment and the home appliance control system including the same have the following effects.
Since the deterioration status determination means 502 is provided and the download program storage unit has been rewritten more than a predetermined allowable number of times, the download process of the acquired program is not executed. Can be prevented.
In addition, even when a predetermined allowable time has elapsed from the time of manufacture, the control program write error due to aging can be prevented by operating so as not to execute the acquisition program download process.

  1 includes all the configurations of the first embodiment, and further includes the current time information acquisition unit 501, the deterioration state determination unit 502, the manufacturing time storage unit 503, and the rewrite count storage unit 504 illustrated in FIG. 5. It is more preferable to provide a home appliance adapter that can provide both functions of the first embodiment and the second embodiment.

  The present invention can be applied to various home appliances, and can be used, for example, to control home appliances from a home network.

It is a block diagram showing the structure of the household appliance adapter and household appliance control system which concern on Embodiment 1 of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows operation | movement of the household appliance adapter of Embodiment 1 of this invention. It is an example of the download data of this invention. It is a sequence diagram which shows the operation example of the program information acquisition means of this invention. It is a block diagram showing the structure of the household appliance adapter and household appliance control system which concern on Embodiment 2 of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows operation | movement of the household appliance adapter of Embodiment 2 of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 100 Home appliance adapter, 101 Device interface part, 102 General-purpose interface part, 103 Network interface part, 104 Program information acquisition means, 105 Acquisition object program determination means, 106 Download control means, 107 Download program storage part, 108 Download program interpretation means, 110 Home Appliances, 120 Personal Computer, 130 Controller, 140 Internet, 150 Download Server, 500 Home Appliance Adapter, 501 Current Time Information Acquisition Unit, 502 Degradation State Determination Unit, 503 Manufacturing Time Storage Unit, 504 Rewrite Count Storage Unit.

Claims (12)

An interface unit for acquiring a device control program;
Program information acquisition means for acquiring attribute information of the control program from the interface unit;
Acquisition target program determination means for determining an optimal control program from the attribute information;
Download control means for downloading the optimal control program determined by the acquisition target program determination means via the interface unit;
A download program storage for holding the downloaded control program;
A home appliance adapter comprising download program interpretation means for interpreting and executing a downloaded control program.   The interface unit includes at least one interface unit selected from a device interface unit connected to a home appliance, a network interface unit connected to a network device on a network, and a general-purpose interface unit connected to a general-purpose device. Home appliance adapter.   3. The home appliance adapter according to claim 1, wherein the attribute information includes version information of the control program, and the acquisition program determination unit preferentially determines the latest control program as an optimal control program.   The attribute information includes program size information of the control program, and the acquisition target program determination unit compares the program size of the control program that is the acquisition target with the maximum program size that can be stored in the download program storage unit. The home appliance adapter according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein a control program that can be stored in the download program storage unit is a download target.   When an error occurs when the control program downloaded by the download control means is executed by the download program interpretation means, and the home appliance adapter is restarted, the acquisition target program determination means performs the control executed when the error occurs. The household appliance adapter in any one of Claims 1-4 which lowers | hangs the acquisition priority of a program.   The program information acquisition means periodically acquires attribute information of the control program for an interface unit that may be updated in the control program, and automatically updates the control program when the control program is updated. The home appliance adapter according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the home appliance adapter operates so as to download and acquire an optimal control program by the download control means. An interface unit for acquiring a device control program;
Download control means for downloading the control program via the interface unit;
A download program storage for holding the acquired control program;
Download program interpretation means for interpreting and executing the acquired control program;
A home appliance adapter comprising a deterioration state determination unit that determines a deterioration state of the download program storage unit.   The home appliance adapter according to any one of claims 1 to 6, further comprising a deterioration state determination unit that determines a deterioration state of the download program storage unit. Manufacturing time storage means for holding the manufacturing time of the home appliance adapter, and current time information acquisition means for acquiring current time information from the interface unit,
9. The deterioration state determination unit operates so as not to execute a control program download process when the time information acquired by the current time information acquisition unit is a predetermined time elapsed from the time of manufacture. Home appliance adapter. A rewrite count storage unit for storing the number of times the control program stored in the download program storage unit has been rewritten,
The home appliance adapter according to claim 7 or 8, wherein the deterioration state determination unit operates so as not to execute a control program download process when the number of times in the rewrite count storage unit is equal to or greater than a predetermined number. An interface unit for acquiring a control program for the device, a program information acquisition unit for acquiring attribute information of the control program from the interface unit, an acquisition target program determination unit for determining an optimal control program from the attribute information, and an acquisition target Download control means for downloading the optimal control program determined by the program determination means via the interface section, a download program storage section for holding the downloaded control program, and a download program for interpreting and executing the downloaded control program A home appliance adapter with interpretation means;
A home appliance control system comprising: a download server that provides a latest control program for the home appliance adapter.   12. The home appliance control system according to claim 11, wherein the home appliance adapter includes a deterioration state determination unit that determines a deterioration state of the download program storage unit.

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