JPS62163987A - positioning device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Field of Application of the Invention] The present invention relates to a so-called GPS positioning device that detects the current position of a moving object using an artificial satellite, and is particularly suitable for a navigation system for a moving object such as a car. related to a positioning device.

[Background of the invention]

As is well known, in the GPS system, positioning calculations are performed by convergence calculations by repeating the Kepler equation, and therefore it is necessary to provide an initial position value, although it may be a rough one.

By the way, this initial value is the coordinate value (latitude.

Longitude or coordinate values based on the earth's central coordinate system) must be given as a numerical value.

However, it is usually difficult for the user to numerically know the coordinates of his or her own position, and therefore, the operation of setting the initial values is generally quite troublesome and complicated.

Regarding this kind of GPS system, for example,
Institute of Electronics and Communication Engineers Technical Report 8ANE84-11 rGPs
Disclosures include ``Receiver Development and Positioning Experiment Results.''

[Purpose of the invention]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to address the problems of the prior art described above and to provide a GPS positioning device in which initial data necessary for positioning calculations can be easily set using extremely simple operations.

[Summary of the invention]

In order to achieve this object, the present invention provides means for easily setting the initial value by manual operation and means for automatically setting the initial value, and enables the user to switch between these means. It is characterized by the following points.

[Embodiments of the invention]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The positioning device according to the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to an embodiment shown in the drawings.

First, FIG. 2 shows an example of a GPS reception system to which an embodiment of the present invention is applied. A GPS satellite signal received from an artificial satellite by an antenna 2 is demodulated by a demodulation circuit 3,・Incorporated into processor unit) 1.

On the other hand, this MPUI uses RAM (Random Access
A microcomputer is constructed together with a memory (memory) 6 and a ROM (read-only φ memory) 7.

The demodulated signal taken in from the demodulation circuit 3 is stored in the ROM 7 and processed by a positioning calculation program, and the result is sent to the RO.
It is stored in M6 and displayed on display 4.

At this point, the travel distance of the mobile object when the positioning result was obtained is taken into the RAM 6 from the trip counter 8. Additionally, various commands and data may be input from the keyboard 5 as necessary.

Next, as described above, it is necessary to input an initial value representing the current position. FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of this initial position setting process.

This process is executed, for example, when the engine of a car is started and the positioning calculation by the GPS system starts. It is checked in step 10 whether it is set to manual. Then, if the mode is automatic setting, the process goes to step 11, and if the mode is manual setting, the process goes to step 40.

If the mode is currently set to automatic setting, first, in step 11, a process is performed in which the mileage stored in the ROM 6 from the trip counter 8 when the vehicle last stopped is read from the ROM. . Next, in step 12, the current travel distance is read from the trip counter 8.

Next, in step 13, find the difference between the mileage read in step 11 and the mileage read in step 12,
A determination is made as to whether it is within a predetermined range. When the result is Y (Yes), the process of step 14 is performed, and when the result is N (No), the process of step 15 is performed.

First, when you proceed to step 14, here, last time,
Finally, the process of loading the position data obtained by the positioning calculation and stored in the RAM 6 is performed.Then, the process proceeds to step 15, where the position data loaded in step 14 is set as an initial value, and based on that. Then, in step 16, it is checked whether the convergence point obtained by the positioning calculation in step 15 matches the position given by the initial value with an error of a predetermined nodal circle. When the result is Y, import in step 14,
The last position coordinates of the previous time are used as the current initial values, and the routine proceeds to the regular positioning calculation routine in steps 30-32. In other words, the fact that the result in step 13 is YK means that the position of the car was mostly determined between the time when the car was driven last time, the positioning calculation was performed, and the car stopped, and when the positioning calculation started again this time. This indicates that there has been no change, and therefore, at this time, the previous position data is used as is as the initial value.

Next, when proceeding to step 17 after step 13, it means that the position of the car has changed after the last positioning calculation was performed while the positioning calculation was stopped. After assuming the driving range of , select multiple positions within that range to be used as the initial value, select the one closest to the previous position data, and set it as the initial value. do.

And after that, in step 16, what is the convergence status? Research.

When the result is Y, that initial value is officially adopted as the initial value for positioning calculation, and the process moves to the positioning calculation routine of steps 30 to 32.

By the way, when the process of step 17 is passed,
There is a high probability that the position data set as the initial value is data that deviates considerably from the actual position, and therefore the result in step 16 is often N.

Therefore, when the result is N in step 16, K first checks the count value of the loop counter in step 18, and determines whether it is below a specified value. And the result is Y
While , the loop counter t described above is incremented in the next step 19, and then step 20 is entered.
Here, the next position data is selected from among the plurality of previously selected positions described above, and after setting it as a new initial value, the process of step 15 is executed again.

In this way, as a result of repeating the update of the initial value in step 20 and the positioning calculation in step 15, if the result in step 16 becomes Y, it means that an appropriate initial value has been obtained, and the setting is performed in this way. The position data thus obtained is adopted as the initial value, and the process moves to a positioning calculation routine in steps 30 to 32, where new position data are successively provided as the automobile or the like moves.

However, if the positioning calculation value does not converge to the initial value despite the repeated updating of the initial value in step 20, the result in step 18 will eventually become N. For example, if the specified value 'Y20' is set in step 18, when appropriate position data is not obtained even after updating the initial value 20 times, step 18
The result is NVc. At this point, the process proceeds from step 18 to step 20, where an error message is output from the display 4, and thereafter, the process shifts to manual setting mode.

An example of an error message at this time is 1. For example, the message ``Position cannot be set in automatic mode. Please enter the initial position manually.'' will be displayed to notify the user that the mode has been switched to manual mode. Make it.

Then when you go into manual configuration mode like this,
Assuming that the manual setting mode has been selected from the beginning, in this case, first, in the determination process of step 40, it is determined whether the user has selected place name input or map input as the input method. As a selection method at this time, for example, a touch switch may be installed on the display surface of the display 4, and the touch switch may be used to respond to a question via a message, or a method may be adopted in which input is made from the keyboard 5.

Now, if map input is selected by the user,
Based on the determination in step 40, the process proceeds to step 41. In this step 41, processing is performed to cause the display 4 to display an overall map 100 as shown in FIG. In the next step 42, a process 2 is performed to indicate which of the roughly divided regions 101 to 105 has been selected by the user from the entire map shown in FIG. The selection input at this time is also carried out using the touch switch or keyboard 5 described above. When the user selects one of the regions and specifies and inputs that part, the process proceeds to the next step 43 to display an enlarged region map in which only the selected region is enlarged. For example, if the selected area at this time is area 102 in FIG. 3, then in step 43 a partial map 200 divided into locations 201 to 206, as shown in FIG. 4, will be displayed. In the following step 44, this partial map 20
0 is selected by the user. The input method at this time may also be the touch switch described above. In the next step 45, processing is performed to set the position coordinate data corresponding to the location input in step 44 as the initial position coordinates, and then the process moves to a positioning calculation routine consisting of steps 30 to 32.

Next, if it is determined in step 40 that the place name human power has been selected, the process proceeds to step 46, where the entire place name map 300 consisting of each local name 301 to 308 as shown in FIG. 5 is displayed on the display 4. process? This instructs the user to select one of the region names, and in the subsequent step 47, a process is performed to capture which region name has been input. Then, in accordance with this selection result, in the next step 48, the prefecture names 401 to 4 as shown in FIG.
The partial place name map 400 consisting of 08 is displayed, and in the next step 49, it is determined which prefecture name has been selected and inputted. As a result, in step 45, the position coordinate data corresponding to the selected prefecture name is set as the initial position coordinate.

Therefore, according to this embodiment, even in the manual setting mode, the user does not need to input initial values using coordinate values such as latitude and longitude, and the current location is recognized from the map or place name displayed on the display 4. You can complete the initial value setting operation by simply selecting the name of one prefecture where you are located.

Next, the positioning calculation routine in steps 30 to 32 will be explained in more detail. In step 30, positioning calculation is performed using the initial values given as described above. Note that this positioning calculation is based on the well-known GPS method, and the details thereof are disclosed in the above-mentioned documents and the like, so a description thereof will be omitted here. Once the current position has been calculated by the positioning calculation in step 30, the process proceeds to the next step 31, where the current position just calculated and the trip value of the trip counter 8 (FIG. 2) at this time are stored in the RAM 6. . Next, the process advances to step 32, where the initial value is updated 7 times. In other words, now.

The current position coordinates just calculated in step 30 are set as new initial values. After this, the process returns to step 30 and a new calculation of the current position is started again.

As a result, newly calculated current positions are written into the RAM 6 one after another, and these become new initial values and are used to calculate the next current position. However, the current position is updated sequentially and repeatedly at a predetermined frequency, for example, every second, so that the current position can always be provided accurately from moment to moment.

The current position and trip value stored in this RAM 6 are necessary for initial value setting in the automatic setting mode when starting positioning calculation again after positioning calculation has been interrupted (for example, as shown in Figure 1). (Steps 11, 14, 17, etc.), it goes without saying that this RAM 6 must be a memory whose contents do not disappear even when the power is turned off, such as a power backup RAM.

Furthermore, in the above embodiment, the movement range of a moving object such as a car is limited to Japan, and therefore the maps and place names displayed in the manual setting mode are also for Japan. , it goes without saying that these need to be assumed arbitrarily depending on the movement range of the moving object.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, according to the present invention, the initial position setting operation necessary for GPS positioning calculation is not required, and even if it becomes necessary, it is only a very simple operation.
It is possible to provide a positioning device ff1l'& that can fully address the problems of the prior art, is easy to handle, and has sufficient reliability.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a complete flowchart explaining the operation of an embodiment of a positioning device according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an example of a GPS receiving system to which an embodiment of the present invention is applied, and FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of the entire map, FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of the partial map, FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram of the entire place name map, and FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram of the partial place name map. 1...MPU, 2...Antenna, 3.
... Demodulation circuit, 4 ... Display, 5
...011. Keyboard, 6...RAM, 7.
...) (, OM, 8...Trip counter. Agent Patent attorney Kenjibu Take (and one other person) ゛・, Figure 1 O5 Figure 4 Figure 511

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. In a positioning device that calculates the current position using signals from a positioning artificial satellite, means for importing initial position coordinate data in a manual mode at the start of the operation of calculating the current position. 1. A positioning device comprising: a means for operating in an automatic mode; and a means for operating in an automatic mode, and is configured to operate by selecting either the manual mode or the automatic mode. 2. In claim 1, the means performed in the manual mode has an image display function that divides a predetermined moving range of the moving body into a plurality of predetermined areas and sequentially displays each of the areas. By performing a selection operation when any of these multiple predetermined areas is displayed,
A positioning device characterized in that the position coordinate data corresponding to the predetermined area being displayed at that time is configured to be taken in as the initial position coordinate data. 3. The positioning device according to claim 2, wherein the display of a predetermined area by the image display function is configured to be given as a place name. 4. The positioning device according to claim 2, wherein the predetermined area by the image display function is configured to be displayed on a map. 5. Claim 1, characterized in that the means for performing in the automatic mode is configured to take in the last current position data when the positioning operation was previously stopped as the initial position coordinate data. positioning device. 6. In claim 5, whether or not the last position data when the previous positioning operation was stopped is taken in as the initial position coordinate data is determined based on the difference in the distance traveled by the moving body between the previous time and this time. A positioning device characterized in that it is configured to make a determination based on the information.