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US 7,734,415 B2Granted
Navigation system
AssigneesDenso Corporation, Denso It Laboratory, Inc.
InventorsMasanori Oumi, Takamitsu Suzuki, Hirotoshi Iwasaki, Kousuke Hara, Nobuhiro Mizuno
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
When a vehicle deviates from a guide route at a first branch point, the state of the first branch point is memorized. Afterward, when a second branch point becomes a target for a route guide and the state of the second branch point is similar to the memorized state, a user of the vehicle is provided with a guide for preventing deviation from the guide route at the second branch point with a manner of the guide changed. This procedure allows learning of tendency of the user with respect to a state apt to cause the user to mistake a guide route. A guide to help prevent a user from deviating from a guide route at a branch point can be thus performed appropriately.
Claims22
A navigation system for a vehicle, the system comprising:
- a position detector configured to detect a current position of the vehicle;
- a map data storage unit configured with a computer readable storage medium to store road map data;
- a route designating unit configured to designate a guide route to a destination based on the road map data and the current position;
- a route guide unit configured to output a guide to indicate a route for the vehicle to take at a guide-target branch point, which is a target for the guide on a guide route, when the vehicle approaches the guide-target branch point;
- a state storage unit configured to store states of route-deviated branch points, each route-deviated branch point being a branch point at which the vehicle deviated from a guide route in a past, the state of each route-deviated branch point including at least one state item of:
- (i) a configuration of the each route-deviated branch point;
- (ii) a relationship with a neighboring branch point;
- and
- (iii) a road environment arising when entering the each route-deviated branch point;
- a similarity determining unit configured to determine whether a state of the guide-target branch point, which is obtained from the road map data stored in the map data storage unit, is similar to one of the states of the route-deviated branch points, which are stored in the state storage unit, by comparing with respect to the at least one state item, the guide-target branch point being a different point than the route-deviated branch points;
- a guide change unit configured to change a manner of a guide at the guide-target branch point by adding a guide for preventing deviation from the guide route when the state of the guide-target branch point is determined to be similar to the one of the stored at least one state items of the route-deviated branch points, in comparison with a case when the at least one state item of the guide-target branch point is determined to be not similar to any one of the stored at least one state items of the route-deviated branch points;
- and
- a deviation determining unit configured to determine whether the vehicle deviates from a guide route at a branch point intentionally or mistakenly, wherein the state storage unit stores a state of the branch point when the deviation determining unit determines that the vehicle deviates from the guide route at the branch point mistakenly instead of intentionally,
- the deviation determining unit being further configured to determine that the vehicle has deviated from a guide route mistakenly instead of intentionally in one of conditions associated
- (i) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route to depart from the guide route,
- (ii) when the vehicle deviates from the certain guide route and then a guide route, which has a longer distance b a predetermined distance than the certain guide route, is designated,
- (iii) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and enters a road corresponding to an alley in case each road in the road map data has a road type at least including a type of an alley,
- (iv) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and then changes a heading direction to a reversed direction, and
- (v) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and then returns to the guide route, and
- the deviation determining unit being further configured to determine that the vehicle has deviated from a guide route intentionally in a condition associated when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and stops at a position excluding the destination and passing points included in the guide route.
17 more elements
A route guide method in a navigation system for a vehicle, the navigation system including:
- a position detector configured to detect a current position of the vehicle;
- a map data storage unit configured with a computer readable storage medium to store road map data;
- a route designating unit configured to designate a guide route to a destination based on the road map data and the current position;
- and
- a route guide unit configured to output guide to indicate a route for the vehicle to take at a guide-target branch point, which is a target for the guide on a guide route, when the vehicle approaches the guide-target branch point,
- the method comprising:
- storing states of route-deviated branch points, each route-deviated branch point being a branch point at which the vehicle deviated from a guide route in a past, the state of each route-deviated branch point including at least one state item of
- (i) a configuration of the each route-deviated branch point;
- (ii) a relationship with a neighboring branch point;
- and
- (iii) a road environment arising when entering the each route-deviated branch point;
- determining whether at least one state item of a guide-target branch point, which is a target for a guide on a guide route, is similar to one of the stored at least one state items of the route-deviated branch points by comparing with respect to the at least one slate item, when the vehicle approaches the guide-target branch point, the guide-target branch point being a different point than the route-deviated branch points;
- and
- changing a manner of a guide being outputted by the route guide unit at the guide-target branch point by adding a guide for preventing deviation from the guide route when the at least one state item of the guide-target branch point is determined to be similar to the one of the at least one state items of the route-deviated branch points, in comparison with a case when the at least one state item of the guide-target branch point is determined to be not similar to any one of the at least one state items of the route-deviated branch points;
- and
- determining whether the vehicle deviates from a guide route at a branch point intentionally or mistakenly, wherein a state of the branch point is stored newly when it is determined that the vehicle deviates from the guide route at the branch point mistakenly instead of intentionally,
- wherein it is determined that the vehicle has deviated from a guide route mistakenly instead of intentionally in one of conditions associated
- (i) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route to depart from the guide route,
- (ii) when the vehicle deviates from the certain guide route and then guide route, which has a longer distance by a predetermined distance than the certain guide route, is designated,
- (iii) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and enters a road corresponding to an alley in case each road in the road map data has a road type at least including a type of an alley,
- (iv) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and then changes a heading direction to a reversed direction, and
- (v) when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and then returns to the guide route, and
- wherein it is determined that the vehicle has deviated from a guide route intentionally on a condition associated when the vehicle deviates from the guide route and stops at a position excluding the destination and passing points included in the guide route.
20 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.