METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR GENERATING AN ELECTRONIC PRODUCT IDENTIFICATION REPORT IN AN EMBEDDED DEVICE
Technologies currently exist for identifying products (i.e., physical items) electronically, using electronic identification transmissions generated by transmitters associated with the products. Identifying products electronically may be useful in a variety of situations. For example, electronic product identification may be useful for tracking the location of a product, managing product inventory, etc. Further, in some situations, it may be useful to generate an electronic product identification (EPID) report, i.e., a report providing information about products that have been electronically identified.
In general, in one aspect, the invention relates to an embedded device. The embedded device comprises a web interface configured to receive a request for an electronic product information (EPID) report, and send the request to a request handling service. The embedded device further comprises the request handling service, configured to deploy at least one event handling component based on the request. The embedded device further comprises the at least one event handling component configured to generate an EPID event cycle based on an EPID read cycle, according to an event cycle boundary condition, generate the EPID report based on the EPID event cycle, and transmit the EPID report to a client. The embedded device further comprises a reader adapter configured to obtain the EPID read cycle, and transmit the EPID read cycle to the at least one event handling component.
In general, in one aspect, the invention relates to a system. The system comprises a client configured to generate a request for an electronic product identification (EPID) report. The system further comprises an embedded device. The embedded device comprises a web interface configured to receive the request, and send the request to a request handling service. The embedded device further comprises the request handling service, configured to deploy at least one event handling component based on the request. The embedded device further comprises the at least one event handling component configured to generate an EPID event cycle based on an EPID read cycle, according to an event cycle boundary condition, generate the EPID report based on the EPID event cycle, and transmit the EPID report to the client. The embedded device further comprises a reader adapter configured to obtain the EPID read cycle, and transmit the EPID read cycle to the at least one event handling component.
In general, in one aspect, the invention relates to a computer readable medium. The computer readable medium comprises executable instructions for generating an electronic product identification (EPID) report by broadcasting availability of an embedded device to obtain an extemal management message, wherein the extemal management message is transmitted by a management console based on the broadcasted availability, obtaining the external management message, by the embedded device, receiving a request for the EPID report, by a web interface in the embedded device, wherein the request confonns to Application Level Events (ALE) specification, sending the request to a request handling service in the embedded device, deploying at least one event handling component in the embedded device, by the request handling service, obtaining an EPID read cycle comprising
(RFID) data, by a reader adapter in the embedded device, generating an EPID event cycle based on the EPID read cycle, according to an event cycle boundary condition, wherein the event cycle boundary condition comprises a condition selected from a group consisting of a time interval grouping, an elapsed time period, an extemal event trigger, and only detecting repeated EPIDs in a specified time period, generating the EPID report based on the EPID event cycle, by the at least one event handling component, and transmitting the EPID report to a client, wherein at least one selected from a group consisting of generating the EPID event cycle, generating the EPID report, and transmitting the EPID report is perfonned based on the external management message.
Other aspects of the invention will be apparent from the following description and the appended claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 shows a diagram of a system in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
FIG. 2 shows a diagram of an embedded device in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
FIG. 3 shows a diagram of a connector interface in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
FIGS. 4-6 show a flowchart in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
FIG. 7 shows a diagram of an embedded device in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
Specific embodiments of the invention will now be described in detail with reference to the accompanying figures. Like elements in the various figures are denoted by like reference numerals for consistency.
In the following detailed description of embodiments of the invention, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a more thorough understanding of the invention. However, it will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art that the invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known features have not been described in detail to avoid unnecessarily complicating the description.
In general, embodiments of the invention provide a method and system to generate an electronic product identification (EPID) report in an embedded device. Specifically, a web interface in the embedded device receives a request for the EPID report and forwards the request to a request handling service. Based on the request, the request handling service deploys one or more event handling components. A reader adapter in the embedded device obtains an EPID read cycle, and transmits the EPID read cycle to the event handling component(s). The event handling component(s) subsequently generate an EPID event cycle based on the EPID read cycle, generate a report based on the EPID event cycle, and transmit the EPID report to a client.
One or more elements of the invention described herein may be based on an EPGglobal Inc’s Application Level Events (ALE) specification. For example, one such specification is described in The Application Level Events (ALE) Specification, Version 1.0, EPC Global Ratified Specification Version of Sep. 15, 2005, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
FIG. 1 shows a diagram of a system in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention. Specifically, FIG. 1 shows a diagram of one or more products (e.g., product A (105), product N (106)), an embedded device (110), a client
(120), and a management console (130) in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention.
In one or more embodiments of the invention, a product (e.g., 105, 106) may be any type of physical item configured to transmit electronic identification infonnation. Specifically, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the electronic identification infonnation may be transmitted by a transmitter (not shown) integrated with the product, coupled with the product, contained within the product, or any combination thereof. Such transmissions may be referred to as electronic identification transmissions. Specifically, the electronic identification transmissions may be used to uniquely identify an individual product, group of products, and/or class of products. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the transmitter may be a radio frequency identification (REID) transmitter, a Bluetooth® transmitter, an IEEE 802.1 ITM transmitter, an infrared transmitter, or any other similar type of transmitter. Bluetooth® is a registered trademark of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG). IEEE 802.llTM is a trademark of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
In general tenns, an embedded device (e.g., 110) is a device in which a computer system is physically embedded to control functionality of the device. Specifically, an embedded device (e.g., 110) physically contains most or all of the computing components (i.e., hardware and/or software) needed to achieve its designated purpose. Said another way, computer systems in embedded devices (e.g., 110) are not used for general-purpose computing, and are therefore distinguished from standard computer systems by degrees of specialization and integration. Accordingly, the embedded device (110) includes one or more specialized hardware and/or software components. Examples of embedded devices include automated teller machines (ATMs), mobile phones, routers, printers, computerized thermostats, calculators, microwave ovens, digital video disc (DVD) players, personal digital assistants (PDAs), video game consoles, etc.
More specifically, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may include hardware and/or software components specialized for perfonning EPID-related tasks. In particular, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may be configured to obtain one or more transmissions from one or more products (e.g., 105, 106) and generate an EPID report based on the transmission(s). Generation of an EPID report based on product transmissions is discussed below. In one or more embodiments of the invention, using an embedded device to perform EPID-related tasks may reduce the complexity of an EPID system and/or may improve performance of the system by reducing the need for communication with other components in the system (not shown).
In one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may be further configured to receive a request for an EPID report from a client (120). Specifically, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may be configured to generate the EPID report and transmit the EPID report to the client (120) in response to the request. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the client (120) may be any hardware and/or software device configured to transmit a request for an EPID report to the embedded device (110). For example, the client (120) may be a server, another type of embedded device, or any other similar type of hardware and/or software device. Further, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) and the client (120) may communicate via a wired connection (e.g., a telephone line, a digital signal 1 (DSI) line, a registered jack 45 (RJ45) cable, a universal serial bus
(USB) cable, etc.), a wireless connection (e.g., Bluetooth®, IEEE 802.1 ITM, infrared, etc.), or any combination thereof.
In one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may be further configured to obtain an extemal management message from a management console (130). Specifically, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may be configured to perform EPID-related tasks based on the external management message. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the management console (130) may be any hardware and/or software device configured to transmit an extemal management message to the embedded device (110). For example, the management console (130) may be a server, another type of embedded device, or any other similar type of hardware and/ or software device. Further, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) and the management console (130) may communicate via a wired connection (e.g., a telephone line, a digital signal 1 (DSI) line, a registered jack 45 (RJ45) cable, a universal serial bus (U SB) cable, etc.), a wireless connection (e.g., Bluetooth® transmitter, an IEEE 802.llTM, infrared, etc.), or any combination thereof. As discussed above, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may include one or more specialized hardware and/or software components.
FIG. 2 shows a diagram of the embedded device (110) in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the embedded device (110) may include a web interface (210) configured to receive a request for an EPID report. In one or more embodiments of the invention, the web interface (210) may be any type of interface configured to receive the request for the EPID report via a network connection (i.e., a wired and/or wireless network connection), in a predefined format. For example, the web interface (210) may be a Microsoft® .NET interface, a PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP) interface, a ColdFusionTM interface, a ]avaTM servlet interface, or any other similar type of web interface. Microsoft® is a registered trademark of Microsoft, Inc, ColdFusionTM is a registered trademark of MacroMedia, Inc, and ]avaTM is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc. In one or more embodiments of the invention, using a web interface (210) to receive requests for EPID reports may increase the number of client devices that are able to make such requests.
More specifically, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the web interface (210) may be a ]avaTM servlet operating on a ]avaTM web server (e.g., Jetty or any other similar type of ]avaTM web server). In one or more embodiments of the invention, the predefined format in which the request is received may be an extensible markup language Q(ML) fonnat, a hypertext markup language (HTML) format, a remote procedure call (RPC) format, or any other similar type of fonnat. Further, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the request may confonn to the ALE specification. In one or more embodiments of the invention, conforming to a specification may facilitate interoperability of the embedded device with a variety of clients, as long as the clients also confonn to the same specification.
Further, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the web interface (210) may be configured to send the request to a request handling service (220) in the embedded device (110). As discussed above, in one or more embodiments of the invention, the request for the EPID report may be received in a predefined format. In one or more embodiments of the invention, if the request is received in an XML format, the request handling service (220) may be configured to parse the request using an XML parser (not shown). For example, the XML parser may be the open source XML parser kXML,
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