KR20060024807A - Mobile device for mapping sms characters to e.g. sound, vibration, or graphical effects - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to a device for perceivably accentuating message elements of a message, wherein said message is composed of message elements chosen from a limited set of message elements, the device comprising: means for defining and/or altering a set of Selected Message Elements (SMEs) containing at least one SME, wherein each SME is a message element from said limited set of message elements; means for assigning a Perceivable Accentuation Signal (PAS) from a set of PASs to each of said SMEs in said set of SMEs; means for searching said message for SMEs of said set of SMEs; and means for generating the assigned PAS for each SME found in said message. The invention further relates to a method and a computer program product for the perceivable accentuation of message elements of a message.

Description

Mobile device for mapping SMS characters to sound, vibration, graphic effects, and the like. sound, vibration, or graphical effects}

The present invention relates to an apparatus for perceptually highlighting message elements of a message, wherein the message is comprised of selected message elements from a limited set of message elements, the apparatus comprising: at least one selected message element; An SME set comprising: means for defining and / or modifying an SME set, wherein each SME is a selected message element in said limited set of message elements; Means for assigning a PAS selected from a set of Perceivable Accentuation Signals (PAS) to each of the SMEs in the SME set; Means for retrieving the SMEs in the message; And means for generating an assigned PAS for each SME found in the message. The invention also relates to a method and a computer program product for the perceptual emphasis of message elements of a message.

Short Message Service (SMS) allows text messages consisting of a limited number of characters to operate in accordance with mobile telephones, such as the Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) standard or the emerging Universal Mobile Telecommunications (UMTS) standard. Service for sending to mobile phones. SMS is similar to radio calling. However, SMS messages do not require the mobile phone to be in operation and in range, and are retained for several days until the mobile phone is in operation and in range. SMS messages may be sent within the same cell or to persons with roaming service entitlements. In addition, SMS messages can be sent from a website with a PC link to digital phones or from one digital phone to another. Typical uses of SMS include informing voice owners of voicemail messages, informing telephone contacts of salespeople, informing emergency personnel of doctors, and so on. SMS messages may be stored on a mobile phone and are typically displayed on the display of the mobile phone for reading.

In order to improve the information depiction of SMS messages via mobile phones, techniques such as haptic messaging have been developed. Haptic messaging refers to SMS-based messaging, in which a portion of the SMS message includes elements such as smiley, such as 8) or;) or :(, which involve vibration in the receiving mobile phone.

Haptic actuators are known from PC and console game controls, for example as a force feed-back function. Still other applications include vehicle controls, surgical telemanipulators, aircraft controls (stall alarms on steering sticks / wheels) and cars, such as the iDrive of the BMW 700-Series. Haptic actuation is thus an established technique in human-machine interaction and can also be applied to portable consumer products by further reducing actuator sizes.

Special characters, symbols, icons, or smileys can be defined to indicate specific vibration patterns that are delivered as text to a receiving mobile phone via the SMS protocol, where vibration motors or specific haptic actuators are associated with the text. It is generally known that it can be used to generate vibrations together. This enhances and highlights SMS messages without requiring a new type of message format, for example as in the MIDI standard for audio messaging.

However, problems arise when direct haptic content transfer is to be implemented over a network or alternatively between individual devices. The direct haptic transmission means may comprise a Bluetooth connection, an infrared data link, a cable connection or any other method capable of performing a similar transmission function. Due to the different haptic capabilities of mobile phones manufactured by different manufacturers, haptic messaging is difficult to standardize. The standardization of haptic messaging via SMS not only defines the elements (words) of the SMS message that enforce the haptic effects in the mobile phone receiving the SMS message, but also the haptic effects that each mobile phone must be able to generate. It is required to be prescribed. Factors preventing standardization of haptic messaging define the problem of how the sender inputs and processes haptic data, especially with respect to the mobile phone's user interface, in particular certain haptic effects that cannot be applied in older mobile phones at the receiver. If special characters are used in a text message and thus annoying the user, the problem of how to achieve backward compatibility with the older mobile phone at the receiving end, and all the features of future mobile phones to be developed by different manufacturers How they are included in such standards. The lack of standardization has so far prevented the introduction of haptic messaging.

Starting from the above problems encountered in the field of haptic messaging, the general object of the present invention is consequently an apparatus for recognizing the message elements of a message without requiring any standardization of messaging, which is perceptibly emphasized. To provide a way.

It is an object of the present invention to achieve a perceptible emphasis on message elements of a message, which is achieved by proposing a device consisting of selected message elements in a limited set of message elements, said device comprising: one or more selected message elements ( A SME set comprising a Selected Message Element (SME), each SME comprising: means for defining and / or modifying an SME set that is a selected message element in said limited set of message elements; Means for assigning a PAS selected from a set of Perceivable Accentuation Signals (PAS) to each of the SMEs in the SME set; Means for retrieving SMEs of the SME set in the message; And means for generating the assigned PAS for each SME found in the message. Mobile phone devices and / or SMS commands which are devices according to the invention, for example devices capable of rendering SMS messages consisting of message elements (eg characters) of a limited set of message elements (eg ASCII alphabets). With the aid of the device according to the invention, which can be part of any device that is controllable to a device, the user can consequently define a set of SMEs, such as a keyword set, and a PAS, e. You have the possibility to assign a sound. The same PAS may be assigned to multiple SMEs. If the message is rendered, the means in the device retrieves the SMEs, and another means in the device generates, for each SME found, the PAS that was assigned to the SME. The fact that no perceptually stressed standardization of messaging is required is the possibility that the user of the device can define a set of SMEs (and assigned PASs) by themselves, or as a suggestion, the manufacturer of the device already. If the SME set and the assigned PAS were provided, the possibility that the user of the device can change the SME set (and assigned PASs) is reflected. The apparatus should then of course provide a means for displaying and manipulating the SME set and the assigned PASs. Due to the lack of standardization, message authors cannot force the generation of PASs by the device during their message rendering. This is because the message creator does not know the SME set used by the user of the device. In general, this fact only allows the message elements that have no meaning in the context format of the message to be used in the messages being created, in addition to acting as an SME for generating the PAS in the device according to the invention. However, if the message writer knows the type of device generating the PAS, and also knows that the user of the device has not changed or just changed insignificantly the SME set provided to the device by the manufacturer, It is possible to force the generation of PASs by the device during rendering. Thus, if most users do not change the SME set and assigned PASs or change them insignificantly, for example just by adding another SMEs and assigned PASs to the SME set provided by the manufacturer of the device, Has the potential to establish device-specific or manufacturer-specific pseudo-standards for perceptually stressed messaging. It should be noted that, as long as the message elements can be identified in the message and can also be used to define the SME set, the type of message is not very important to the present invention. Thus, using the present invention not only for text messages such as SMS-based messages via mobile phones or electronic messages via a computer, but also verbal messages (such as news rendered via car radios), modulated signals and the like. It is possible. However, then the complexity of the means for defining the SME set and the means for retrieving the SMEs in the message will be greatly increased. The overall function of defining SMEs, retrieving SMEs in a message, and generating PASs is only required at the receiver, not at the transmitter / transmitter. This is recognized as one of the important advantages of the present invention.

The present invention has another advantage that the original messaging format is not modified. In other words, all the modifications are related to the apparatus according to the invention without affecting the message creation and rendering process. Thus, within a message, no special characters are required to define a particular vibration profile, and even if the message is rendered through a device that does not support perceptually accentuated messaging, the message written in the original messaging format will not be understood. It remains in a state where it can be. As a further natural consequence, no changes are required at the device from which the message is written.

In order to enable the retrieval of messages and the definition and processing of SME sets and assigned PASs, integrating the device according to the invention with the device for rendering the message only requires minor extensions of software and / or operating system. The present invention thus makes it possible to launch a messaging that is perceptually stressed with low market risk. This is because only new devices have the feature of highlighting messages perceptually without affecting or acting on other devices. However, providing a feature that makes the manufacturers' devices perceptible to perceiving messages will distinguish manufacturers from their competitors.

According to the device of the invention, the set of PAS preferably comprises visual and / or audio and / or tactile and / or olfactory and / or thermal and / or electrical PASs. Thus, the full range of perceptible effects that can be provided by the electronics, such as flicker of light sources, change of display color, display of icons on the display, flicker of keywords on the display, generation of all kinds of sounds The generation of sounds, the generation of vibrations, the generation of scents, the change of temperature and the generation of low power electric shocks, etc., which are already programmed into the device, can be used to indicate a particular state of the device, in particular error sounds.

According to the apparatus of the present invention, preferably, the PASs in the PAS set have different signal characteristics such as amplitudes and / or frequencies and / or durations and / or signal types. For example, a wide variety of acoustic PASs can be achieved by changing the frequency or duration of standard sinusoidal tones.

According to the device of the invention, the message is a text message, the message elements are characters or combinations of characters, and the means for retrieving the SMEs of the SME set in the message preferably comprises a parser. Do. Thus, in a text message, the SMEs can mean single characters, such as exclamation marks or question marks, or words, or a combination of words or even whole sentences. The definition of PASs for SMEs in text messages is mostly intuitive and easy to achieve.

According to the device of the present invention, the information on the SAS set and the PAS assigned to each SME in the SME set is effectively stored in the device. Effective storage of an SME set and assigned PASs can be achieved by a tabular, in which the first column contains the SMEs and the second column contains the PAS assigned to each SME. The catalogs are categorized according to criteria related to SMEs (topics such as "love", "enjoyment", "work", etc.) or PASs ("vibration", "sound", "light"). Can be. Preferably the tebuler is stored in the RAM of the device or, if necessary to be transferred to other devices, can be detached from the device, such as a flash card or a subscriber identity module (SIM) card of a mobile phone. It may be stored in a storage medium. Of course, any available means such as Bluetooth connection, infrared link, cable connection, etc. can be used to transfer the tubular to another device.

According to the apparatus of the present invention, the means for generating an assigned PAS for each SME found in the message is configured to sequentially and the message rendering rate and / or the allocated PAS for each SME found in the message. Or means for generating in accordance with the message recognition rate of the user of the device. The PASs must be perceived by the user of the device at the moment the SMEs assigned the PAS are displayed or recognized by the user of the device, and the message is sent by the device or by another device (where both devices Very easy to integrate into the device). This basically requires that the PASs occur in the order in which the SMEs to which the PASs are assigned appear in the message. Furthermore, when means for retrieving SMEs in the message has processed the message, each PAS that should be generated by the discovery of the PME to which the PAS is assigned is specified in the message depending on the location of the SME in the message. It is conceivable that a delay is assigned, so that the generation of the PAS occurs simultaneously with the user's knowledge of the corresponding SME in the message. In order to determine the required delay, the means in the device require information about the user's perceived speed, which information can be entered manually by the user or manufacturer of the device.

According to the device of the invention, the device more effectively comprises means for determining the message recognition rate of the user of the device. For example, by measuring the time required for a user to recognize a message and comparing it to the number of message elements in the message, the device can determine the average message recognition rate of the user. Average message recognition rates may be determined from information made available by a message rendering device, which may be a device according to the invention or another device, and may also include the recognition time per message and the number of characters or number of words per message. have.

According to the device of the invention, the device is preferably included in a mobile telephone operable in a portable communication system, preferably the message is a message in a Short Message Service (SMS) format. In this regard, each device capable of receiving SMS messages or to be controlled by SMS messages is understood as a mobile phone.

According to the device of the invention, more preferably the device is included in a computer and preferably the message is an e-mail message.

It is also an object of the present invention to achieve a perceptible emphasis on message elements of a message, which is achieved by proposing a method in which the message consists of selected message elements in a limited set of message elements, said method comprising: one or more selected messages A SME set comprising a Selected Message Element (SME), each SME being a message element selected from the limited set of message elements and a PAS selected from a set of Perceivable Accentuation Signals (PAS) perceptible to each SME. Defining and / or changing an SME set to which is assigned; Retrieving SMEs of the SME set in the message; And generating an assigned PAS for each SME found in the message. Defining the SME set may be performed by the manufacturer of the device in which the method is used or by the user of the method, whereas changing the SME set is preferably performed by the user of the method.

According to the method of the invention, the set of PAS preferably comprises visual and / or audio and / or tactile and / or olfactory and / or thermal and / or electrical PASs.

According to the method of the present invention, the PASs in the PAS set preferably have different signal characteristics such as amplitudes and / or frequencies and / or durations and / or signal types.

According to the method of the present invention, said message is a text message, said message elements are characters or combinations of characters, and said step of retrieving SMEs in said SME set in said message comprises parsing said message. It is preferable to include.

According to the method of the present invention, it is preferable that information on the SAS set and the PASs assigned to each SME in the SME set is stored.

According to the method of the present invention, it is preferable to generate the assigned PASs sequentially for the SME found in the message and in accordance with the message rendering rate and / or the user's message recognition rate of the method.

According to the method of the present invention, the method further comprises the step of determining the message recognition rate of the user of the method.

The object of the invention is also achieved by a computer program product comprising software code parts which can be loaded directly into the internal memory of a digital computer and which carry out the steps of the method when executed on the computer. The digital computer can be, for example, a processor running a mobile phone or computer's operating system.

These and other aspects of the invention will become apparent and apparent with reference to the embodiments described below.

1 is a block diagram schematically illustrating an apparatus for perceptually highlighting message elements of a message according to the present invention.

1 shows a schematic block diagram of an apparatus for perceptively emphasizing the message elements of a message according to the invention. The apparatus comprises a central processing unit 1 capable of controlling all functions related to the processing and generation of Perceivable Accentuation Signals (PASs). The apparatus further includes the function of rendering the messages. Thus, it can be assumed that the device of FIG. 1 is included in a mobile phone with a color screen and MMS capability, such as a Nokia 6800 mobile phone, in which SMS messages can be rendered and perceptually highlighted. Once the mobile phone is opened, a full keyboard is available for quickly and easily composing text messages and emails. If the present invention aims at haptic messaging, the device of the present invention can be recognized as a "haptic effect receiver", which can be easily integrated into mobile phones such as the Nokia 6800.

The device receives input from keypad 2 via keypad controller 3, from ROM 4 via ROM controller 5, or from demodulator 6 and also displays display 7. Control via the controller 8, control the speaker 9 via the audio controller 10, control the vibration motor 11 through the vibration controller 12 and control the light 13 with the light controller 14. Control via In addition, the central processing unit 1 is connected to a RAM controller 15 which reads data into the RAM 16 and allows data to be written out from the RAM 16. Finally, the central processing unit may input data to the parser 17 and receive output signals of the parser 17. Flash-type memory technology, which can be electronically reprogrammed but otherwise operates as a typical ROM memory, has the same meaning in this description and can be recognized as satisfying its purpose unless otherwise stated.

In order to have a perceptible emphasis on the SMS message elements received and rendered on the mobile phone, the user of the mobile phone must first define a set of Selected Message Elements (SMEs). The SME should be assigned a PAS that can be generated by the mobile phone. In this embodiment, the message is an SMS text message in which message elements (characters) are selected from a limited ASCII alphabet of 128 characters, and SMEs are simply characters or combinations of characters. PASs that can be generated on the mobile phone are stored in ROM 4, for example in the following way:

Content of ROM (4)

PAS1: sound, low

PAS2: sound, high

PAS3: vibration, short

PAS4: vibration, long

PAS5: light, flashing 3 times

PAS6: light, static, short duration

PAS7: light, static, long duration

PAS8: display background, flashing 3 times

PAS9: display background, static

Defining a set of SMEs and assigning a PAS to each SME is controlled by the central processing unit 1. By pressing the buttons on the keypad 2 and following the instructions appearing on the display 7, the user is guided through the menu to enter the SMEs and assign a PAS to each SME. For each SME entered, the available PAS included in the ROM 4 is displayed on the display 7 so that the user can select one PAS using the numeric buttons or the arrow buttons on the keypad 2. do. After the user confirms his inputs, the central processing unit 1 stores each SME of the SME set and the PASs assigned thereto in the SME-PAS section of the RAM 16 via the RAM controller 15. The SME set and assigned PASs may be for example as follows:

Of RAM (16) SME In the -PAS section contents

SME1: :( causes PAS1

SME2: :) causes PAS2

SME3:! causes PAS4

SME4:? causes PAS5

SME5: Heli causes PAS8

The mobile phone is then ready to render SMS messages and highlight SMEs by the PAS as defined in the SME-PAS section of RAM 16. Several other ways to represent similar assignments may be implemented, such as graphical association of SME-PAS with icons or flowchart type graphical presentations.

Standard SMS messages can now be created on any mobile phone or computer and sent to a mobile phone including the device as shown in FIG. 1. The author of the SMS does not recognize that the text of his SMS is parsed on the incoming mobile phone. When the SMS is received by the mobile phone comprising the device of Fig. 1, the demodulator 6 is received as an RF signal via an antenna and thus filtered to extract the original message format (a function fully coupled to the demodulator 6). The down-converting, demodulated and decoded message is transmitted to the central processing unit 1, which may store the SMS in the SMS section of the RAM 16, for example. The text body of the saved SMS message may be as follows:

Of SMS section of RAM 16 contents

Congratulations!

Feeling old now? :)

Missing you, heli

When the user wants to read the SMS message, the central processing unit 1 reads the SMS data from the SMS section of the RAM 16 and also sets the SME through the RAM controller 15 from the SME-PAS section of the RAM 16. And read the assigned PAS and input the data to the parser 17. The parser 17 retrieves the SMEs from the SMS message and internally generates the following list, for example.

List generated internally by parser 17

SME3 found after 16 characters

SME4 found after 34 characters

SME2 found after 36 characters

SME5 found after 52 characters

Statistical information about the time it takes for a mobile phone user to read SMS messages, based on the information determined by the central processing unit 1 for each SMS that the mobile phone user reads, and based on the SME set and the assigned PAS, The parser 17 converts the internally generated list into a list output to the central processing unit 1. The printed list might look like this:

List output by parser 17

Generate PAS4 after 1.6 s

Generate PAS5 after 3.4 s

Generate PAS2 after 3.6 s

Generate PAS8 after 5.4 s

The central processing unit 1 uses a display processor 8 to present the SMS message on the display 7 to the current user, and simultaneously with the visual recognition of the user's SMS via the display 7. Use the commands as output from the parser 17 to generate the required PAS. Specifically, the central processing unit 1 causes the vibration controller 12 to generate long vibrations 1.6 s after the display of the SMS on the display 7 is initiated, and 3.4 s after the light controller. (14) causes the light 13 to flash three times, 3.6 s passes the sound controller 16 to generate a high pitched sound through the speaker 10, and 5.4 s passes the display controller. (8) causes the background of the display 7 to flash three times. As such, the SMEs in the SMS message are perceptibly emphasized. If it is necessary to use multiple display pages to display a message, the delay function can be adjusted in consideration of this, so that the original intention of adjusting the appropriate effect timing is maintained.

The present invention has been described above through the preferred embodiments. It should be noted that alternative methods and modification embodiments exist that are apparent to those skilled in the art and may be implemented without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention as set forth in the appended claims. For example, the storage format and storage locations of SMEs and PASs are fundamentally different from the configuration of the apparatus as shown in FIG. 1, or other types of PASs may be used. In addition, in the field of cellular wireless communications, it should be noted that the present invention can be applied to the messaging formats of Enhanced Messaging Service (EMS) and Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS).

Claims (17)

An apparatus for perceptually highlighting message elements of a message, wherein the message consists of selected message elements from a limited set of message elements, the device comprising: A set of SMEs comprising at least one Selected Message Element (SME), each SME comprising: means for defining and / or modifying an SME set that is a selected message element in said limited set of message elements; Means for assigning a PAS selected from a set of Perceivable Accentuation Signals (PAS) to each of the SMEs in the SME set; Means for retrieving SMEs of the SME set in the message; And And recognizably highlighting message elements of a message comprising means for generating an assigned PAS for each SME found in the message. The method of claim 1, And the PAS set includes visual and / or audio and / or tactile and / or olfactory and / or thermal and / or electrical PASs. The method according to claim 1 or 2, And wherein the PASs in the PAS set have different signal characteristics such as amplitudes and / or frequencies and / or durations and / or signal types. . The method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, The message is a text message, the message elements are characters or combinations of characters, and the means for retrieving the SMEs of the SME set in the message comprises a parser. Perceptual emphasis. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 4, And information about the PASs assigned to each SME in the SME set and the SME set is stored in the device. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 5, The means for generating the assigned PAS for each SME found in the message may sequentially and the rate of rendering of the assigned PAS for each SME found in the message and / or Means for generating perceptible message elements of a message, characterized in that it comprises means for generating in accordance with the message recognition rate of the user of the device. The method of claim 6, And means for determining a message acknowledgment rate of the user of the device. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 7, And said device is included in a mobile telephone operable in a portable communication system, said message being a short message service (SMS) formatted message. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 7, And said device is included in a computer, said message being an e-mail message. A method of perceptually highlighting message elements of a message, the method comprising: a message consisting of selected message elements from a limited set of message elements, An SME set comprising one or more Selected Message Elements (SMEs), each SME being a message element selected from the limited set of message elements and a perceivable Accentuation Signal (PAS) perceptible to each SME. Defining and / or changing the SME set to which the selected PAS in the set is assigned; Retrieving SMEs of the SME set in the message; And Generating perceptible PAS for each SME found in the message. The method of claim 10, And the PAS set includes visual and / or audio and / or tactile and / or olfactory and / or thermal and / or electrical PASs. The method according to claim 10 or 11, wherein And the PASs in the PAS set have different signal characteristics such as amplitudes and / or frequencies and / or durations and / or signal types. . The method according to any one of claims 10 to 12, Wherein said message is a text message, said message elements are characters or combinations of characters, and said step of retrieving SMEs in said SME set in said message comprises parsing said message. A method of highlighting the perceptual elements of a message. The method according to any one of claims 10 to 13, And information about the allocated PASs for the SME set and each SME in the SME set is stored. The method according to any one of claims 10 to 14, For each SME found in the message, the assigned PASs are generated sequentially and consistent with the rendering rate of the message and / or the user's message recognition rate of the method. How to emphasize it. The method of claim 15, And determining the message acknowledgment rate of the user of the method. A computer program product that can be loaded directly into an internal memory of a digital computer, the computer comprising software code portions that perform the steps of the method of any one of claims 10 to 16 when the computer program product is executed on a computer. Program product.

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