JPH07105491A - External information notice device for vehicle - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide the external information notice device for vehicle displaying congestion information received externally in a way that its passenger can easily confirm the information. CONSTITUTION:Information sent from an outside of a vehicle in a beacon or an FM wave is received by receivers 10, 12 and stored once in an external storage section. The stored information is rearranged based on a position corresponding to the information by a command of an arrangement section 22. A passenger selects an area desired to be confirmed by touching a display section 26 on a touch panel display device and only the information relating to the area is displayed. Thus, since external information sent at random is stored while being arranged for each area, the information is retrieved quickly.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a vehicle external information informing device for informing a passenger of information sent from the outside of the vehicle by means of an informing device provided inside the vehicle.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, radio waves from artificial satellites are received to measure the position of a vehicle, and this position is compared with map information mounted on the vehicle to determine a map around the vehicle and a map on this map. A so-called GPS navigation system, which displays the vehicle position and informs the driver, is in general demand.

In this system, the map information stored in advance in the device mounted on the vehicle is the information at the time of storage, not the information at the time of actual display. In this system, the information at the actual time is only the position of the own vehicle. Therefore, for information that changes every moment such as road regulations and traffic congestion information due to an accident, the passengers had to rely on external displays such as a graphic information board (congestion information display) on the Metropolitan Expressway.
In addition, the map information mounted on the vehicle may not match the actual situation due to road repair work or the like.

On the other hand, information is transmitted by a beacon transmission source installed on the side of the road or a radio wave from a base station,
Vehicle information systems have been developed in which a vehicle receiving device receives and displays the information. For example, on the Metropolitan Expressway in central Tokyo, etc., a system has been developed that transmits congestion information, regulation information, accident information, etc. of the entire Metropolitan Expressway from a base station and displays this on a display device mounted on the vehicle, A display such as a traffic jam information display board currently installed at more than ten places on the Shuto Expressway can be displayed on a display device in the vehicle. According to this, the case where the contents cannot be sufficiently confirmed by passing through the conventional display plates installed on the upper side or the side of the road is eliminated, and the information can be confirmed when the passenger desires.

Further, when transmitting information by a beacon on the side of the road, the passenger can obtain more detailed information by transmitting particularly important information within the range that the beacon reaches. For example, if the information of the approaching intersection is displayed, the contents can be confirmed even if the information has passed through the conventional road display board, like the above-mentioned traffic congestion information. Furthermore, it is possible to provide more useful information to the passenger by creating and displaying information about the time required to reach a predetermined point based on the current road conditions.

At present, a unified standard for an information providing system from the outside of the vehicle using the above-mentioned FM wave or beacon is under consideration, and it is considered that the number of vehicles adopting such a system will increase in the future.

[0007]

However, the external information in the above-mentioned information providing system is not always sent in an order convenient for the passenger to confirm. Therefore, for example, when it is sent as text information, information corresponding to a predetermined area classification is sent at random, and the receiving side (passenger) must confirm the information one by one.
There was a problem that we could not find the necessary information.

The device disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 63-231477 stores the received information in advance based on the position / type / time information contained in the information in order to solve the above-mentioned problem. It is to be written on the map and displayed.

[0009] However, writing the received information on the map imposes a heavy burden on the processing device. Also, considering that it is for a vehicle, it is difficult to display all the received information because the display unit is also limited to a small size.

The information sent as a two-dimensional image has a large amount of data, which imposes a heavy burden on the processing device.
There is a problem that the processing time becomes long.

Further, in order to enlarge and display a desired portion of the displayed image data, it is necessary to first display an enlarged view of the central portion of the screen and then scroll to adjust to a desired position. However, there is a problem that the operation is complicated because it is necessary to perform the operation in two stages.

The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a device which can efficiently notify a passenger of received external information and is easy to operate.

[0013]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, a vehicle external information notifying apparatus according to the invention of claim 1 is included in sequentially received external information, and the information is applicable. The information processing device includes an arrangement means for rearranging the information based on position coordinate information, a selection means for selecting necessary information from the rearranged information, and a notification means for notifying the selected information. .

In the vehicle external information notifying apparatus according to the present invention, the external information is made to correspond to the subdivisions obtained by further dividing the area division into a plurality of rows and a plurality of columns, in the order of the subdivision matrix. It has an arrangement means for rearranging the external information.

Further, the vehicle external information notifying apparatus according to the invention of claim 3 has an alignment means for classifying and rearranging the external information for each road in the area division.

According to another aspect of the vehicle external information notifying apparatus of the present invention, the notifying means capable of displaying map information, the means for storing a dividing screen for further displaying the area division, and the division screen are included. And a designation means for designating a necessary area, superimposing the map information of the area division and the division screen on the notification means, and further enlarging the area designated by the designation means, Is displayed on the notification means together with the external information included in.

According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a vehicle external information informing device, wherein map information storage means for storing map information and external information of received two-dimensional image data are superimposed on the stored map information. And display means for displaying.

Further, the vehicle external information notifying apparatus according to claim 6 has an item selecting means that can be selected for each item divided based on the content of the external information, and displays a two-dimensional image of the selected item. The external information and the map information are superimposed and displayed on the display means.

[0019]

The present invention has the above-mentioned structure, and according to the first aspect of the present invention, the information sent in disjointed states is rearranged in an order in which the passengers can easily retrieve the information. , You can search for information accurately.

According to the second aspect of the invention, the area of the transmission unit of the external information is further subdivided, and the received external information is stored in association with the subdivided subsections. Thus, if the passenger designates a subsection, the information corresponding to the subsection can be retrieved.

According to the invention of claim 3, the received external information is sorted and stored for each road to which the information corresponds. Accordingly, if the passenger specifies a road for which information is desired, the information along the road can be searched.

According to the fourth aspect of the invention, the division screen is displayed by superimposing it on the map screen of the transmission unit area of the external information. Then, when the passenger selects a desired section, the section is enlarged and displayed.

According to the fifth aspect of the present invention, the map screen based on the stored map information and the external information, which is the two-dimensional image data, are displayed on the display device so as to be superimposed on each other. The burden is reduced and information can be displayed in a short time.

According to the invention described in claim 6, more accurate information can be displayed by selecting the item of the external information of the received two-dimensional image data.

[0025]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT A preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a configuration block diagram of a first embodiment according to the present invention. This apparatus includes an FM multiplex receiver 10 and a beacon receiver 12 as a means for receiving external information. The FM multiplex receiver 10 has an FM antenna 14
The beacon receiver 12 receives the FM wave received by the beacon antenna 16 from the transmission source provided on the side of the road. The external information received by any of the receiving means is temporarily stored in the external information storage unit 18. This external information is transmitted for each regional division into which the whole country is divided into 10 km square divisions. Then, the information in the section is sequentially transmitted, but the order is not particularly determined. Therefore, even if the information stored in the external information storage unit 18 is displayed in the received order at this point, the actually required information is not always displayed immediately. Therefore, the information once received and stored is rearranged based on the instruction of the alignment unit 22 included in the control unit 20, and stored in this state. The rearrangement rule will be described later. Then, in order to obtain the necessary information, the input unit 24 gives an instruction as to which information to select, and this information is displayed on the display unit 26.
Is displayed in. Further, the map information storage unit 28 stores a map for each of the 10 km square areas as shown in FIG. 2, for example, and together with external information, the display unit 2
This map is displayed at 6.

Next, rearrangement will be described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4. FIG. 3A shows a state in which information is transmitted from the outside, and information 1 is transmitted in order. FIG. 3B shows a map of the same area division as that of FIG. 2, and further shows subdivisions divided into 25 equal parts. For the sake of convenience, in the following description, these sections are numbered with columns in the horizontal direction and rows in the vertical direction, and the subsections are identified by the row and column numbers. That is, the upper right subsection is described as (1, 5).

The transmission order of the information shown in FIG. 3 (a) has nothing to do with the position on the map as shown in correspondence with (b). This order is associated with the map and rearranged. That is, from the subsections (1,1) to (1,2) (1,3) ... (1,5) shown in FIG.
(2, 1) ... (2, 5) ... (5, 5), the order of the information is switched from upper left to lower right. Therefore, the information about the subsection (1,1) is first, the information about the subsection (1,2) is next, and the subsection (1,3) is next. According to the example shown in FIG. 3A, the information 1 is stored as information regarding the subsection (1,3), and the information 2 is stored as information regarding the subsection (1,5). The state of rearrangement in this way is shown in FIG.

Next, the actual operation of this apparatus will be described. FIG. 5 is a display example of the display unit 26 provided near the driver's seat, in which the position of the vehicle is measured by a satellite navigation system (GPS), an inertial navigation device, or the like, and a map around the vehicle is displayed in an overlapping manner. A display example as a navigation device is shown. Of course, the display device is not limited to this, and may be a display device for displaying a television broadcast or the like. This figure shows that the vehicle 100 is traveling northward on the XX highway 102. When the information from the outside is received by the FM multiplex receiver 10 or the beacon receiver 12, the information reception display 104 is displayed on the upper right of the screen to inform the information. When the passenger wants to obtain some information, he touches this information reception display 104 with his / her finger. The display unit 26 of the present device is a so-called touch panel display, and is configured so that a predetermined operation can be performed by touching a predetermined portion according to the display. That is, the display unit 26 also serves as the input unit 24. Then, when the information reception display 104 is touched, a mode for notifying external information is set. A display example of this mode is shown in FIG.

The passenger is a cross in front of the XX highway 102.
Δ If you want to know the congestion status of the service area (S.A.) 106, you can use this × ΔS. A. Subsections (2,
Touch 4) and the information about this will be displayed in the information display section 108.
Is displayed in. An example of this is shown in FIG. The displayed information is the content of the information 14 shown in FIG.
If the rearrangement is not performed and the information is retrieved in the received order, the information will be displayed in the 14th position.

When there are a plurality of pieces of information included in the subsection (2, 4) and desired information is not obtained in the first display, the next candidate selection switch displayed in the lower right of the display unit 26 is displayed. Touch 110. As a result, the information display unit 10
The contents of 8 are changed.

In the above, the displayed portion is selected by touching the target portion on the map screen, that is, the information is selected. However, the cursor key 112 may be used for the selection. In FIG. 6A, when the selection key 114 at the center of the cursor key 112 is touched, the cursor 116 is displayed in the subsection (3, 3). The cursor 116 can be moved up, down, left, and right by the cursor key 112, and the portion where the cursor 116 is present becomes a target for information display. When the cursor 116 is moved to a desired place, the selection key 114 is touched. As a result, the external information is displayed on the information display unit 108, and the state shown in FIG. 6B is obtained. Also in this case, when the next candidate selection switch 110 is touched, the following information is displayed.

When it is desired to retrieve information contained in another subsection from the state shown in FIG. 6B, the desired subsection is touched or the cursor 116 is moved by the cursor key 112. For example, if the cursor is moved to the right and up one by one and moved to the subsection (1, 5), information regarding the xΔ interchange (IC) 118 can be searched. According to the example shown in FIG. 3A, the information 2 × ΔI. C. A display indicating that the upstream line is congested is displayed.

By narrowing and limiting the area as described above, it becomes possible to select information and perform accurate information retrieval in a short time.

Next, the second embodiment will be described. The device configuration of this embodiment is the same as that of the first embodiment shown in FIG. 1, but the operation of the alignment section 22 is different. The external information received by the FM multiplex receiver 10 or the beacon receiver 12 and stored in the external information storage unit 18 is stored in the alignment unit 22.
According to the command, the information is classified and sorted by road. For example, in the map shown in FIG.
△ × Bypass, national road × ○, etc. are classified.

As for the operation, as in the first embodiment, when the external information is received, the information reception display 104 is displayed as shown in FIG. Touching this brings up the display shown in FIG. In the display, in addition to the same information display unit 108 as described above, a target road display unit 120 showing a road to be the target of information is displayed. As shown in this example, the present apparatus first displays information about the road currently running, and among them, the information closest to the front is displayed. Then, when it is desired to display other information about this road, the information display unit 10
Touch 8. In addition, when it is desired to make information about other roads illustrious, the target road display unit 120 is touched. In this way, it is possible to display the information of the road to be known.

Next, a third embodiment will be described. The configuration of the apparatus of this embodiment is the same as that shown in FIG. 1, but the map information storage unit 28 stores the classification screen 122 shown in FIG. 8 in addition to the map information. Further, in the above-described two embodiments, the transmitted information is information in characters, but this embodiment corresponds to the case where simple image information is also transmitted at the same time. The character information is organized as information for each small section as in the first embodiment. However, in the case of this embodiment, the subdivisions are nine divisions corresponding to the division screen 122.

FIG. 9 is an example of image information transmitted, and shows a simple map within the same area division as in FIG. 2 and traffic information in accordance with the simple map. For example, an accident display 124 of Δ × bypass or × ΔI. C. Congestion display 126 near the area and × ΔS. A. Congestion display 128
In addition, a parking lot full display 130 and the like are shown along with the map. The image information and the division screen 122 described above are displayed on the display unit 24 in a superimposed manner. This display example is shown in FIG.
It is shown in (a). When an occupant touches a portion of the display screen to be enlarged, the portion divided by the division screen including the touched portion is enlarged and displayed. That is, the division () in the lower middle of FIG.
Part) is enlarged, and this part is enlarged, as shown in FIG.
It becomes the display like. According to this display, detailed roads around the station are also displayed. In addition, FIG. 10B shows a case where the parking lot information is selectively displayed, and the information display unit 108 indicates that the □□ parking lot is full, that is, an “x” -marked full mark 132. It is displayed by. Information display section 1
In 08, the information of the full parking lot is preferentially displayed, and in order to display the information of the other parking lots, the next candidate selection switch 110 is touched. Further, when it is desired to see other items such as traffic jam information, accident regulation information, gas station information, etc., they are selected by the up and down keys of the cursor key 112.

In the case of the present embodiment, it has been described that the enlarged portion is selected by the touch panel switch. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and the ten keys or the cursor keys may be used for selection. According to the ten-key pad, if the numbers assigned to the respective divisions in FIG. 8 are associated with the numbers on the ten-key pad, the selection means becomes easy to understand.

Next, a fourth embodiment will be described. This embodiment can receive external information of two-dimensional image information as in the third embodiment. FIG. 11 shows the traffic jam information sent as a simple image, and the traffic jam is displayed by the arrow 134 (the traffic jam display). Although it is not clear which road is congested only with this information, the map corresponding to this information is called from the map information storage unit 28 and displayed in a superimposed manner. FIG. 12 is an example of this, and the position of the traffic jam becomes clear by overlaying it on the map. Moreover, since the information sent is simple graphic information, the burden of transmission, reception, image processing, etc. is light and processing can be performed in a short time.

In addition to traffic congestion information, it is also preferable to display accident / regulation information, parking lot empty / vacant information, and the like.

Finally, the fifth embodiment will be described.
In this embodiment, the information of the weather information system (for example, AMeDAS) is received as external information, and this is processed and displayed. FIG. 13 is an example of a system that subdivides the whole country and displays the weather of the subdivided part. The rainy portion is indicated by the shaded portion 136. By comparing this with the map stored in the map information storage unit 28, necessary weather information on the road is extracted. In the present embodiment, when the travel route is set in advance, the weather information on this route is notified. For example, when heading west on the Tomei Expressway, the rainy weather area on the Tomei Expressway in FIG. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 14, the color of the display of the Tomei Expressway in this portion is changed to notify the passenger that it is raining.

As described above in each embodiment,
The received information is processed and stored or displayed in a state in which the passenger can easily use it. As a result, the passenger can quickly read the necessary information in a personality.

[0044]

As described above, the present invention has the following effects.

According to the first aspect of the present invention, the information sent in a scattered state is rearranged in the order in which the passenger can easily retrieve the information, so that the information can be accurately searched out.

According to the second aspect of the invention, the area of the transmission unit of external information is further subdivided, and the received external information is stored in association with the subdivided subsections. Thus, if the passenger designates a subsection, the information corresponding to the subsection can be retrieved.

According to the third aspect of the invention, the received external information is sorted and stored for each road to which the information corresponds. Accordingly, if the passenger specifies a road for which information is desired, the information along the road can be searched.

As described above, according to the invention described in any one of claims 1 to 3, the passenger can quickly confirm the information he / she wants to obtain, and the operation margin including other driving operation is larger. Become.

According to the fourth aspect of the invention, the division screen is displayed by superimposing it on the map screen of the transmission unit area of the external information. Then, when the passenger selects a desired section, the section is enlarged and displayed. Therefore, the enlarged display is promptly performed, and the information desired by the passenger can be immediately confirmed.

Further, according to the invention described in claim 5, the map screen based on the stored map information and the external information which is the two-dimensional image data are superposed and displayed on the display device, whereby the calculation processing is performed. The burden is reduced and information can be displayed in a short time.

According to the sixth aspect of the invention, by selecting the item of the external information of the received two-dimensional image data, it is possible to prevent a large number of items from being displayed at the same time and becoming difficult to see. it can.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a preferred embodiment of a vehicle external information notification device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of map information stored in a map information storage unit of the apparatus of the embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of external information, (a) is an example of information sent in characters, and (b) is a diagram for explaining correspondence between the received information and the position on the map. is there.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a state after rearrangement of external information of the apparatus according to the first exemplary embodiment is performed.

FIG. 5 is a diagram for explaining a display of the first embodiment,
It is a figure which shows the display before displaying the received external information.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing a display example of the device of the first embodiment.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a display example of the device of the second embodiment.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a segmentation screen for selecting an enlarged portion of the device of the third embodiment.

FIG. 9 is a diagram showing an example of external information transmitted as two-dimensional image information.

FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating an operation of selecting an enlarged screen according to the third embodiment.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of external information transmitted as two-dimensional image information.

FIG. 12 is a diagram showing a display example in which the two-dimensional image information shown in FIG. 11 and the map stored in the map information storage unit are superimposed on each other in the apparatus of the fourth embodiment.

FIG. 13 is a diagram showing an example of weather information.

FIG. 14 is an example of displaying the weather on the planned travel route in the device of the fifth embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

 10 FM multiplex receiver 12 Beacon receiver 20 Control unit 24 Input unit 26 Display unit 28 Map information storage unit 104 Information reception display 108 Information display unit 110 Next candidate selection switch 112 Cursor key 116 Cursor 120 Target road display unit 122 Classification screen 124 Accident display 126 traffic jam display 128 congestion display 130 full display

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Toru Ito 1 Toyota-cho, Toyota-shi, Aichi Toyota Automobile Co., Ltd.

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A vehicle external information informing device for informing an occupant of external information for each area segment sequentially sent from outside the vehicle to an occupant by means of an informing device provided in the vehicle. Based on the above, there is provided an arrangement means for rearranging the information, a selection means for selecting necessary information from the rearranged information, and an informing means for informing the selected information. External information notification device. 2. The external information notifying device for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the alignment means associates the external information with a subsection obtained by further dividing the area division into a plurality of rows and a plurality of columns,
An external information notification device for a vehicle, wherein the external information is rearranged in the order of a matrix of small sections. 3. The vehicle external information notifying device according to claim 1, wherein the alignment means sorts and rearranges the external information for each road in the area division. External information notification device. 4. The vehicle external information notification device according to claim 1, wherein the notification means is means capable of displaying map information, and means for storing a classification screen for further displaying the area classification, and And a designation means for designating a required area from the division screen, superimposing the map information of the area division and the division screen on the notification means, and further enlarging the area designated by the designation means. An external information informing device for a vehicle, which is displayed on the informing means together with the external information included in the area. 5. A map information storage for storing map information in a vehicle external information notification device, which notifies an occupant of external information sent from outside the vehicle as two-dimensional image data by a notification device provided in the vehicle. An external information informing device for a vehicle, comprising: a means and a display means for displaying the external information by superimposing the external information on the stored map information. 6. The vehicular external information notification device according to claim 5, further comprising an item selection unit that can be selected for each item divided based on the content of the external information, and external information related to the selected item. An external information notifying device for a vehicle, which displays the map information in a superimposed manner on the display means.